BLACK VISTALITES REVISITED

Now that the "Luke's Ludwigs" project is over and done, I felt it was time to go back and finish my "Black Vistalites" kit that I was working on earlier.  This, of course, is in addition to my work on the "Miracle MIJ-it Kit," which is coming along nicely, by the way.  But with Luke's Ludwigs out of the way, I needed a kit set up for me to actually play on those rare occasions when I do sit down and knock around on some drums for five minutes or so.  With the acquisition of a 15" tom, it was time to drag the Black Vistalites back out and incorporate this new drum into the set-up.

What I really wanted was a 16" floor tom but unfortunately I never could track one down.  (There will probably be three for sale on Ebay today, now that I don't need one.)  So a 15" mounted tom would have to do instead.  There were a couple of different ways I could mount this tom but a right-side "double floor tom arrangement" was what I was going for to offset the concert toms on the left side.  This way I would have two high toms, two mid toms and two low toms.  Very symmetrical, counterbalanced and uniform while following my preferred "spiral staircase"-style tom flow.*

The first method would be to set the large tom on a snare stand, but I've done this before and unless you have a sturdy stand that sets up very low to the ground, it can be rather wobbly.  Another solution I have utilized in the past is adding attachable floor tom legs to the bottom lugs which works out pretty well.  But my 15" tom had a tom mount bracket and I had an extra Ludwig tom holder so I went that route as evidenced by the above non-professional photo.

I used Remo "Black Dots" for the bottom heads to maintain my black and white theme and because I like the look of them.

On top I went with coated heads, using Diplomats for the high toms, Emperors for the mid toms and Ambassadors for the two floors.

Most times I assemble a kit, restore it and bang around on it for a time before growing tired of it and moving on to the next project.  In this case, however, I am extremely pleased with the look and sound of my finished product.  These Ludwig Vistalites really sound great and I truly enjoy playing them.  Today I found myself pounding away on them for almost fifteen minutes.  Boy, was I tired afterwards, but this kit is just too cool.  I think I may keep them set up for a while.

So just to review, here are the specifications for this set-up:

LUDWIG BLACK VISTALITES
6 x 10" Concert Tom
8 x 12" Concert Tom
8 x 12" Tom
9 x 13" Tom
11 x 15" Tom
16 x 18" Floor Tom
14 x 22" Bass Drum

5 x 14" Japanese (no badge) wood Snare Drum (white wrap with silver flecks)
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*The step-down "spiral staircase" method of arranging toms (such as Neil Peart uses) differs from the single-leveled "wall-of-toms" method used by drummers such as Peter Criss of Kiss and Nicko McBrain of Iron Maiden in that lowering the toms on the right-hand side allows the ride cymbal to be mounted at a shorter height along with a battery of crashes and chinas, instead of having these cymbals mounted way up high to clear the larger drums.  My personal preference is to have things close and tight so that I don't have to reach way up or way out to hit them, so I like my ride cymbal positioned low, directly over the floor tom(s), with plenty of room for as many splashes, crashes and chinas as I can squeeze in that right-hand space.  This information is completely superfluous, irrelevant and inconsequential, but I had fun writing it anyway.