"We feel our 'solid stave' shell design, and the high degree of precision we are able to achieve throughout the building process, raises the bar not only for stave and solid drums but for all drums."

To begin with, Archetype Series drums are made from vertically oriented bars of wood. This lets Hendrix Drums take advantage of the wood’s vertical grain and produce an ultra thin drum shell with thicker areas at the top and bottom that form natural reinforcing rings. According to Rhett, the result is a strong, stable shell with a lower fundamental note, wider tuning range and greater resonance than other drum designs. Using vertical bars further optimizes the drum by allowing us to apply the bearing edge on the end-grain of the wood instead of on the face-grain - increasing the strength of the edge and the sensitivity of the drum at any tension level.

Secondly, the drum company calls their drums 'solid stave' because they combine the characteristics of solid and stave instruments. Continues Rhett:

"Since all of the bars that make up each drum are taken from either a single board or from multiple boards that are closely matched for color, grain, and density, our drums produce the appearance, warmth and depth of a 'solid shell' instrument without the stress and instability that steaming and bending a traditional one-ply shell creates."

Finally, in addition to their advantages over both steam bent shells and standard stave shells, Hendrix Drums' drum shells use a fraction of the glue needed to produce a multiple-ply drum shell - as much as 95% less in the case of a conventional, 10-ply snare drum shell. Using less glue greatly enhances the overall sound and performance of the drums and allows the wood to have a more noticeable influence on their tone. Rhett:

"Unlike drums with exotic exteriors that are purely for looks, our Walnut drums sound radically different than our Cherry drums do. For many players, even those who have been around high-end drums for many years, that's quite a revelation."

Available in a wide range of American Walnut and Cherry bass drums (18-24"), tom-toms (10-18") and 14x6" snare drums (also offered in African Sapele), Hendrix Drums are distributed exclusively by Big Bang Distribution.

Watch Johnny Rabb play on a acoustic Hendrix Drums Archetype Stave Walnut drum set:

The new Hendrix Archetype Series drums come fully-equipped with a host of high-end components, including HD's solid aluminum single point lugs, S-Hoops and Remo drumheads as well as Hendrix Drums' exclusive Sleeved Washers on every tension rod. Archetype snare drums also include Dunnett R7 three-position throw-offs, Fat Cat dual-adjustable snare wires and TightScrew tension rods.

Hendrix Solid-Stave Drums will be first displayed at the Big Bang booth (#3564)during NAMM, the world's largest trade-only event for the music products industry.