At Winter NAMM SHow 2009 the Farmingdale, New York based drum company GMS presented a technology to put a thin coating of real metal on their maple drum shells. Various metal types are available for GMS’s new Revolution Series drums including bronze, brass, copper, steel and nickel. Drummers can choose to have a metal coating on the inside, outside, or both surfaces of shell.
\"Revolution opens up a whole new palette for drummers to personalize their sound. The range of choices, both visual and sonic, is enormous.\"
Adhering to the wood with a chemical cross-link bond, the metal is thin enough — approximately 1/32\" — to make a negligible difference in the shell’s overall mass, therefore having no appreciable effect on its fundamental pitch. However, each metal type has a noticeable impact on the drum’s tone due to its characteristic reflection properties within the shell’s air column and the complementary interaction of wood and metal vibration frequencies.
Bearing edges are left uncoated to promote a warmer tone, while the metal coating amplifies attack, projection, brightness, and bite. Mazzella:
\"Each of the metal coatings, adds its own distinctive vibe to the drum. If you have a brass lined drum, you’ll get that brass sound, but the mass of the maple gives the drum a lot of “thickness”, unobtainable in a metal-only drum. We’ve also found that the drums have an incredible amount of “headroom”; when you really hit the drum, it just knocks you of your throne!\"
