 Hello and welcome to the drum history podcast. I'm your host Bart van der Zee and today I'm joined by Mr. Eric soy from black swamp percussion Eric. Welcome to the podcast. Hey, thanks a lot. Appreciate being on it Yeah, so black swamp you are the founder and president you guys are located in Holland, Michigan Which I have been to very cool little town. This is interesting because black swamp is very well known for orchestral and band instruments because very very well known for that of a high quality tambourines Snayers all kinds of things which we'll learn about shortly. So I Guess let's start Eric with why don't you just take us back to 1994? I believe because I'm looking at your very cool It says an incomplete history of black swamp percussion website, which is funny So just take us back to the beginning and how did the company start? So my background is as a drummer, you know started in band like a lot of us do So that was in junior high when I started one of my hobbies has always been Tinkering with this and that putting stuff together taking it apart and my dad had a really Nice workshop with a lot of different stuff. So so you know, I would repair things. I would repair drums my first Real drum set was a beat-up piece of junk. I think they were slingerland shells because they had slingerland lugs But it was completely trashed and we completely redid it in Neilpert Tama Red Because that was my guy So and that just that kind of continued on I ended up going to Bowling Green State University for percussion and while I kind of meandered more into the concert and orchestral world I still played drum set a lot You know bands in high school and that type of thing so that was my Kind of focus in college and when I was in college. I still would tinker and do stuff and make little do little projects So I so I got my bachelors Met my wife who's from Holland. I'm actually from near Cleveland in Ohio We moved back to Holland for a few years and then we went back for our masters still along the time I still tinkered In that two-year period before we went back for our masters. I I built a marimba a Four and a half octave marimba Wow, I took I took four octaves off of an old Deegan marimba and I Searched around for rosewood and I got I got some rosewood for the extra bars and had Have you ever you've heard of Gilberto right century mallet service in Chicago I have not he worked for deegan For a long time deegan solti amaha He was still in the old deegan factory in chicago, but did a lot of mallet restoration So I got I got bars finished by him and I made the whole marimba and it was it was quite a project to do So then I we went back for our masters and my master's degree is actually in ethnomusicology so study of music and other cultures and Spent some time in indonesia spent some time in africa in gana And all the all the while still playing some drum sets still doing gigs Orchestral gigs driving all over like a lot of us all do Um, and so all the while just still building So we get done with grad school. My wife gets a teaching job and I Taught a little bit at the university after that started gigging All the while I've been messing around still building stuff. Um So then I started making bamboo Handled timpani mallets Hardly a lot of professionals use that type of timpani mallet because it just feels really good And not many people did it So I what the heck I'll just try make some Uh drove off to I would get the bamboo from a nursery supply Uh store So I would drive two hours get this gigantic bundle Take it back to our little rented house Uh and sort through all the bamboo and so I just started making stuff Then people are like, hey, can I buy some? Oh, sure. I guess so and over the months and then the years and just sort of Off and running and it so it all came out of a hobby a lifelong hobby I never really set out to make it a business I didn't really know what I was doing Figuring it all out is I would I mean I was just a player I was a player wasn't a business guy Uh or anything like that That seems like that's like a classic business story and I I can't I can't remember the details but going back to like the vic first episode and things like that it was like People who just do something on their own and then it catches on Or even I know like the big fat snare drum story is similar where they just start making them And then people like it and they want one and they want one. Yeah pretty natural and I think the passion Comes through Uh and and people can tell that it's made by a percussionist for percussionists kind of do Yeah, that that's a big that's a big thing. Um I think one of the reasons that we are successful in a very kind of weird niche space in orchestral percussion is because I'm an orchestral percussionist And you know, I played You know forever I played in the Grand Rapids symphony for 14 years After we moved back to holland And a lot of the products come out of I'm very particular with craft and building quality And I would see things and I would say that's not very well done. I can do it better Kind of some hubris there, right? Or I would see I would have a personal playing situation where I would say I I need to solve this problem and there's nothing to solve the problem and then I start working on it and Create a product and that's how over the years we've Just introduced product after product, you know, some things are not rocket science like wood blocks It's trickier to do some of these things than what it seems as far as getting them to sound to sound good Like triangles it was a very difficult project But it seems very simple, but it's not with metals plating and tempering and heat treating Uh and all that yeah all that kind of stuff I mean, this is all stuff that like I think it's really cool to have you on here because this is stuff that um You really don't appreciate how difficult something is until you uh, you know are more in that world And you hear from people like you so it makes perfect sense Now let me ask you this before we go on when you started and it kind of you know, you kind of fell into being a business owner Was there a lot of competition in the I guess I would consider you like a boutique brand or cast a boutique brand. Yeah Um What was there a lot of competition in that field or who were your big major competitors in this in the beginning? As far as more professional quality things there There were some uh players You know players that were professionals that made Tempani bamboo tempi mouth just on the side as a hobby, but they sold sold things Um There was a grover pro percussion and then tambourine professional tambourine world a lot of the good professional small tambourine makers Were kind of gone. They had done it on the side. Um, I don't know if you've ever heard a harlan percussion No Yeah, he made some great tambourines Uh then stopped doing it for a while. Um, he was off into media and he was an executive and now he's back Back in it. But guys like that at that point. It's not like I was going up against uh, the big guys like we are now because Because they've gone. Oh Oh, we should get into this Which would be and you don't even have to say them But like like it seems like most of the big Japanese and American brands It seems like a lot of them have a market Like this, uh, like you said because it's like There's there's opportunity and it's probably a lot easier for them to just pivot a little bit and change a couple things And they have the tooling than it is for, you know, small guys All right, right and they they for the most part stayed out of the small percussion, but we we make A lot of tambourines we make a lot of drums But we we sell a lot of wood blocks. Uh, we sell a lot of cast and that's there's this other stuff Some of them have dipped their toe in kind of Bar of a few ideas wink wink, you know what I'm saying and uh, We just do it better. I think we do it better because we're in that world We've been in that world. That's what we concentrate on. It's not just Hey, we should we should do this because we can maybe sell stuff Our focus is to make a quality product that solves a problem and helps people make better music. That's That's where it starts It's got to make money of course and all that but that's really not where it starts. We're not You know, who's getting rich In the orchestral percussion world. I don't know No, but that's so true where you you're starting at a good place of of this is a problem that should be solved or we can make this better Uh If people buy it great And then that lets you make more things and you have a business and you can like, you know pay salaries and stuff like that Sure Before we continue on the timeline. I want to ask a quick question about maybe I'm really interested in your the tambourines because I think tambourines are one of those things where they are You know, I think I've played a bunch of different tambourines and I think most drummers of any style have played on you know All the different kinds and styles and you can tell there's a difference between brands and plastic and wood and you know Metals can you just maybe give us a little bit of uh your perspective on what makes like because you you I'm sure make some of the Finest tambourines that can be you know bought what what makes a really really good special tambourine Well going back when I Uh, do you remember lone star percussion? Yeah, and I've seen them still at you know drum shows and stuff like that yeah, well Two owners ago the original owner He had this pamphlet and he called it not a catalog he called it his price list And that it was him and steve weiss music In philadelphia and I would just page, you know Like the modern drummers you would just memorize every page of every issue That's what I did with catalogs and I would go What what can I make what can I do? So I don't even know where I came up with the idea of making tambourines But I had no idea what a tambourine was supposed to sound like I don't what's a tambourine supposed to sound like I don't know Um, I know I wanted to make it out out of a steam bent shell not not a ply shell So I had to learn how to steam bend Wood you have to learn how to make it round so there's a lot of Of just the technical aspect. What kind of head do you use? I don't know buy different kinds of heads skin heads Try those and then the big thing of course is the jingle material and how you process it So it was just a matter of experimentation Trying this and trying that I got lucky Um with some things that that I tried and I went wow, okay, that is pretty good I think um And then what I did is I I went and found out, uh, the the contact information for big players In the chicago symphony jim ross. He's been in chicago symphony And I don't remember how I got in contact with him, but I said hey I'm making I'm I'm mr. Nobody. You have no idea who I am But I'm making these tambourines. I'll send you some would you tell me what you think? And so I did that with a number of players name players And they're all just super nice and helpful and gracious And honest which is what I needed um So I would send them away and they would You know tell me what they like what they're looking for A lot of it was what they were looking for was not being offered or had in the past But no no no more Solid steam vent shells sound way better than ply shells Um at the percussive art society one year Chris lamb who was principal of new york philharmonic Was walking somewhere and I recognized him and I literally chased him down and I said mr. Lamb Mr. Lamb, can I talk to you for a minute? I had my tambourine and uh, Chris lamb is very into product development He's worked with a lot of companies works with maypex now on their drums But he said yeah, send me some so I sent him some and he gave me comments I made tweaks. I sent him some more he goes That's good. You got to do this. It's got something like this So that's what I did with various players So that's how the that's how the tambourine Came along and as I went through that I started to learn what They wanted I'm not a name player I'm good. I'm you know, I'm good. Of course. I'm sure you are of course. I'm not you know, I played in a Seed level orchestra and I think I did okay for But yeah, I'm not I mean these guys that play in the big orchestras. They are shockingly good When you really see what they can do it makes people like me stand back and go I you know There there's a reason Yeah, there's a reason they're there. There's a reason just like any any musician Totally. Yeah, uh, maybe I can anticipate a a question as to what is the difference between an orchestral and like a Rhythm tech not put down. Yeah, but a rock tambourine the mind. Oh, exactly That's my background is in those of like You're in a recording studio and you've got one and you're gonna hit some tambourine You do you know, we're almost done. Let's do a track of tambourine Okay, or let's hit it on the the the hi-hat or on the two and four What is the difference? Well the shell a solid wood shell Is not going to be as kind or as receptive to abuse As one of the plastic shell tambourines It's and there's a sound difference as far as the body and the warmth That plastic just does not do Does just doesn't do and especially with the typo we use ash and cherry and Why Well, I started using ash because it was one of it's one of the easiest woods to bend But it happened to sound really good. So that's why we You know had made so many tambourines out of solid ash So this is a shell and there's the head obviously orchestral tambourines have a head because You need to have a surface to do Thumb rolls which is For those out there that aren't familiar. Some people have enough grip on their thumb Some people like me use beeswax And basically your thumb bounces along the head quickly and gives you an extended thumb roll Interesting type of sound So you have to be able to do that and it's partly the aesthetic of having the head be part of the sound uh one one thing that chris lamb Said to me early on in his preferences. There needs to be a balance between the jingle sound and the head sound But you'll find some orchestral players. They dampen the head As much as possible So just and there's so there's different schools From europe to the east coast to the midwest to the west coast All kind of have their own specific sound concepts I feel like there's probably a whole world of like how to really actually play the tambourine like this in this Uh, you know arena of like big dog orchestral stuff as opposed to kind of grabbing it near a you know set up a mic play it for the track You mute a little bit But there has to be a whole world of style and technique that I have no clue about Oh, yeah, uh, you know the orchestral western music orchestral players I'm a fairly good tambourine player But I am nothing like some of these true Super percussion artists that are at the top of the game And then you have the middle east Players like the rick I mean that's just a whole another world of tambourine playing So it's a deceptively simple instrument, but it's it's bread and butter across the world as far as As far as playing and then with and then with the jingles Uh on a rock jingle a rock and roll tambourine the jingle tends to be the same shape the same material and unhammered and what what that means Is that uh, I should say undistorted that might be a better term, but hammering distorts it Uh, so on a rock tambourine all the jingles are the same pitch So they all sound the same and what that makes is a very kind of Carrot sound, you know, it's kind of a very narrow Ching sound which is totally appropriate For what they're used for totally appropriate on a tambourine and this is something I learned from chryslam I learned a lot from chryslam. He said jingle jingle sets are like a little pair of crash cymbals And in orchestral crash cymbals, they're different. They have to be a different pitch Otherwise they sound like That narrow thing so you have different pitches And they meld to create kind of a bigger fuller sound so So you distort the jingle we did by hammering them And so you create jingles if you take The jingles out of one of our tambourines take four jingles that you drop them on table They'll all be kind of a different pitch So when all that mixes up It creates kind of a bigger This instead of that Yeah, because the two sounds might I mean if it's like a I don't think it's a phase thing But two identical sounds kind of cancel each other out a little bit and kind of Close off because they're too similar, but I guess if you have different ones, they Sort of dissipate differently Right And it's all experimentation and me learning And me getting feedback of people saying yeah, this sounds good. I'm like, okay I'll do more of that or this is what I'll aim for But still our tambourines sound very different than a grover Which Like snare drums People own a lot of different Types of tambourines brands brands of Snare drums Brands of triangles, you know, it's a whole arsenal just like any any other percussive World Yeah, we like our gear. Yeah Yeah Different toys does anyone ever take The orchestral tambourine and use it in like Recording studio worlds for like, you know, your modern like pop music would that work that way? Oh, yeah, we do Elton John's Percussionist uses some of our tambourines Trey cool does Nice and Some other bands here and there it's not, you know, it's not a big portion Mostly it's custom stuff we do for people because they they know our tambourines Just because we're well known for tambourines and they want something and they like them. Well, like great Yeah, we've we've never really made a push into um a studio specific Although lots of people use them in the studio Or a drum set specific although they're you know people that keep them next to them or put them upside down in the floor Tom things like that, but uh, we're just busy enough We're busy enough with what we have going already. Yeah and successful because it's it's clearly working. Um, I remember in my studio days, which I don't really do as much anymore But it would be there was a a vintage Wooden Ludwig Tambourine that was the go-to that like you'd try all the other ones and it was like, you know, you try the newer um, whatever brand and it would be plastic and there'd be you know a different one and in Uh, for some odd reason and it didn't have a head on it It was just an open. Mm-hmm. I'm sure there's a term for that. Oh, you know, whatever Headless. Yeah headless headless. That's good. That makes sense headless Uh, and it was just you know in the room. It didn't sound it almost sounded like some some jingles were missing or something It wasn't perfect But then you listen to it with the playback and it was like that's the one Yeah, something about I guess it might have been the wood or just I've also heard I think the band king gizzard and the lizard wizard. I believe they always talked about uh The the wooden Ludwig tambourines classically being being a kind of a go-to for studios. Yeah, they're they're on so many motown hits Yeah, it's an iconic tambourine. It's kind of the sleeper right people don't really realize Well, of course Ludwig made Seems like millions of everything they made And actually I have one of I have two Ludwigs hanging right over there. You can't see it. I have I call it my I call it my tambourine tree I've got all these vintage tambourines kind of hanging down for my for my awesome Ceiling, but I have an interesting story about the Ludwig The good Ludwig tambourines which are not the ones in the 80s Because they're just different But you know Jim Catalano from Ludwig, of course, right and he told me that He went to the dumpster with a giant push cart full of those jingles And pushed them into the dumpster that ought to be loud And one of the saddest things ever, of course Geez because some of those jingles just the jingles. Yeah, wow because metal Composition changes over time Jingles change over time. We have Just like any any symbol You use crash symbols drum set symbols ride hi hats pairs for concert They you play them in and they sound a little bit different as time moves on They will sound different even if you don't touch them They'll just kind of work their way in And uh, you know all the little molecules do whatever they do But it's exact same way With a tambourine because we'll have people Occasionally they'll say hey, I just bought TD one or best-selling one Uh, and it doesn't sound anything like my the one that's two years old and then we have to Try to explain to them how it's not going to be until it gets played in or just has some time Yeah, and that's always a challenge because you don't want to make a customer feel like you don't want to talk down to them You just kind of want it or or sound like you're making an excuse You want to be honest and straightforward. This is just the way it is Symbols are like that too where over time they even you know fingerprints and little things change the sound and God i'm looking at your tambourines on your website. I mean they are you can tell they're they're special This might be a weird question, but And this could lead to a whole another long conversation. I'm sure but do you like when you're in an orchestra situation How does it work with like mic-ing? Something like this like just does the the percussionist in their little area They typically have one mic that they're going near with the tambourine Or how does that typically work to get it out in this huge theater to make it, you know Sound as best as it can. How does that work? Yeah In a typical orchestra hall for a typical classical concert You're not mic'd nothing is mic'd except for maybe if there's a soloist But even in a typical classical concert A piano concerto piano the piano is not mic'd Soloists are not mic'd Be are violinists not make no one's no one's mic'd so it's all mixed It's all mixed by the conductor at the front. That's who does the mix But a good hall will will take that sound out And you know certain halls in america are known for being They have this personality or that personality We played at carney e hall once And everyone's heard of carney e hall and when we played there It was an aha moment that we all went Oh, we now we understand why this is one of the most famous halls in the world Because you could hear Everybody everywhere certain halls you'd go into Man, I can't hear the basses and I and I play with them and I need to hear them or I didn't I don't hear this part, but in carney you hear everything Um, so to go back to your question A pop's concert Which would have a singer that's doing Broadway or You know more music that's not classical maybe more modern music that has orchestra backup, then they'll use mics Sometimes sometimes Uh our outdoor concerts that we did in a big shell at a ski area So he did it at the bottom of the ski area The hill and everybody sat on the slope But that was that was totally Mike everybody was mic'd and yes, uh the sound guy whose name was dancer Who uh did sound for rock bands for years and years and years Uh, I think he might have done sound for ted new jen or something Nice, but yeah, he was he did kind of major guy. Yeah, but uh, yes Playing up to the mic. Yes. Sometimes he would say, you know play that up near the mic Okay, but for the most part it was all Unmiked, um And we didn't really have to play to the mic He did all that everything was usually we just did what we usually do He adjusted the mic or him or whoever else was doing the sound Would just do it back there. So we didn't really have to do anything different Okay, I had no idea and I'm glad, you know, I'll ask the dumb question. So someone out there now knows No No Um, so the next time I'm at a drum show and I see you guys I'm gonna play your tambourines just to get a different feel for it and see what that is actually like because you know Um, it's worth checking out if you're used to just like you said rhythm tech or these other brands Which are in guitar centers and stuff, which are really good for what you're doing And you mount it on your drum set and you're playing it with a stick or something like that Everything has its place. Yeah, but um, this is very different. So All right, let's keep going down on your on your timeline here. So you were you were making Uh bamboo sticks. You were making tambourines castanets. When did you get into snare drums? Uh snare drums started in Maybe 1999 98 99 because I mean I give our beginning date as january 1 1995 that's not that's just a Some kind of hard beginning or it it sort of had been growing before that and even in 95 I was still Thinking is this a business? I don't know. I'm selling stuff. Does that mean I don't know It's just kind of still getting you know, I was still gigging a lot and Then we moved we moved back Uh, we got we were having our first kid and my wife was Rift reduction in force from her teaching job Pregnant and we're like, you know, there's no reason for us to be in in adrian michigan where we had You know only the people we had met in the two years, you know, let's go back to how it's great It's a great place to live Yeah, it's it's a bit Nothing's open on sunday Your neighbors would look out of their windows If you were mowing your lawn on sunday So we moved in 97 My wife's brother's friend had a cabinet shop and they had a little space so I moved in there and you know a couple year and a half for two years I started messing with snare drums and a lot of trial and error and failure and trying this and uh, I made some snare drums and said I don't know. I just don't know if I know what i'm doing So I put them and I'm like, you know, I don't even know if they sound very good put them on the shelf so kind of Put that aside and still concentrate on the other stuff And then got that then got back to it Back then in the orchestral snare world Where there's a lot of similarities between drum set drums And orchestral drums, but the the big differences would be um Cable snares which mimic the old gut snares typically the the heads are much thinner than a drum set type snare and die cast hoops most orchestral players use die cast because it gives more of a distinct Markado sound because every if you're playing Four stroke roughs are very quiet things that need to be very distinct A triple plant shoot just is too fat. It just sounds too too. It's too wide of a sound. I call it So there are those things and and there there were people Players uh fred hinger played in philadelphia uh very famous Tempinist and teacher he made some drums that were very very I mean they're very sought after still And there were a couple other people making orchestral drums here and there And yeah, I just started started messing with stuff and And I mean that in the early years when the big people were not Involved the the big players were not involved Uh, uh, we would take We would take 25 snares to to percussive art society and they would be gone by noon the first day Geez. Wow Because there was really nothing available It's a little different now, but we still Very much hold our own against the biggest drum companies in the world Yeah, we are we are this, you know and as hey as long as we're in the conversation, you know, and we very much are Um, you know, we will never sell as many drums as some of these big companies Not gonna happen. They've got the infrastructure. They They have more people on their janitorial staff for the offices than we have total here But that's what makes it special and and what makes you guys unique, but I mean, uh, I'm sure you do But you should feel very proud For starting this and be like, is this a business? You know, I guess it is to getting to that point where you're being talked about I'm sure in like boardrooms and probably I don't want to say being copied But you're being looked at as an innovator and they're you know Kind of a Tastemaker in your scene. Yeah, you feel very proud of that. Yeah. Appreciate that. Appreciate that. We we work really hard Being that I mean, we're a small company and like any Any world it's it's a lot of relationships So in our world, you know, here's the drum set world And here's the cancer percussion world. So, you know, we all know each other pretty much and So you just develop those relationships and you listen to each other and as a company, that's the big thing What do they want? I am not principal percussionist of the chicago symphony You know, I am that will never be in my future So what do they want because they're the ones that are the world famous orchestras? So That's always been the focus. What what do players want to hear? They're they do that for the most part some of some people like tom freer who's in cleveland tympanist in cleveland orchestra He's got both ends whereas he is a brilliant player and he's a brilliant designer of Instruments and I worked with him on some stuff for some years also but I'm good at The design machinery process sourcing repeatability Yeah Production even though we are production. I call us more custom production Yeah, but you want each one to be the same you if they buy five of them You don't want one to be like, whoa, what happened to that one, right? Yeah, we we do custom We do a fair amount of custom But that's kind of not our focus because there's a lot of Problems with that once you know once you get to a certain point in the business You know, you got to feed the machine You got to feed the overhead. You got to feed the benefits. You got to feed the pay and i'm fine with that We still do enough stuff Custom that's still interesting But totally yeah when I mean we're not huge but you know, I've got a nice size facility and I got people that work for me You got to pay the bills and you need bread and butter to you need bread and butter to make the jelly Yeah, that's that makes perfect sense and you've got Uh, uh, you've got a nice selection. What is it four five six seven or so lines of snare drums? Um, maybe what is the most popular that's like your you know in your world that that you are This is what everyone the go-to for a lot of people when they look when they think black swamp Yeah, our most popular snare is a Well, this is and now it's a five inch uh, the multi sonic system and five by 14 or 14 by five With diecast and we have it in two different colors and that's that's the big bread and butter snare drum And then we have As you can see we have solid shells. We have titanium Um, you know in the past we've done brass. We've done bronze um You know done aluminum. We've done a tried a lot of different things and That's not bread and butter But it makes it interesting for us and I We all want we want stuff to be interesting and not We just don't want to come in here and stamp out a million of the same widgets not interesting not what I want to do So the bread and butter helps pay for some of this other stuff that we still sell I mean the titanium drums are expensive, but Yeah, they sound unique Uh, they they sound they have a particular sound that really works For people for certain situations. We do a lot of solid shells of different exotics a lot of different stuff that No one had ever really made drum drum shells out of before like bokote. No one had ever done that Shell mature that that would until I started doing it very hard to bend shells Well, and that that gets to the question about making the shells But I'm just looking around kind of clicking while we're talking and these are not like astronomically priced snare drums by any means This is a very specific Thing which I think also it's in line with the price of like Other high-end snare drums in the drum set world. So this is I didn't even know what to expect But they're very comparable to like, you know another nice pro drum, but um Shell construction. I mean are you guys doing all the are you building the shells in shop or is everything done there? No, and that's one thing. I'm gonna preface this We have a lot of when we consider them partners People that do stuff that do it well because that's what they do and It bothers me a little bit When a company will give the impression That they do this and they do that when I full well. No, you do not do that my tact has always been Yeah, no, we do not make the ply shells keller does some things that we don't make I will say we source this elsewhere. I won't tell you who it is but yeah, totally you know keller For all the bashing the keller bashing that goes on They make a good great. Oh my god, and that's that comes up a lot on this show where More times than not and people are probably sick of hearing it because it comes up so much of people defending saying Listen keller's awesome. It's custom design. It's not just you're not pulling one off the shelf and screwing some lugs on it It's specific formulas and stuff. So no, I think that's uh, I like the way you put that where You know be proud. Yeah, they're very they're consistent their veneers are very good um Yeah, I I don't like see the the keller bashing, you know, it's funny when dw stopped using keller And then it became oh, this is a keller air at dw Which everyone's like those are great. Yeah, exactly. You know that Yeah, well, all right. That's that's interesting and I totally understand and and that's um A very fair point, but it's the construction and putting it together and getting it all by all then and everything Which is hugely important. Um Now am I mistaken? Do you guys is the dynamics snare? Is that a drum set more of a typical drum set snare drum? Yeah, yeah, so that that was kind of a pet project that I started many years ago and Um, you know it shares a lot of the same components and you know, we're not really known for those But they're great drums and the people that like them really like them Um, but yeah, we use the same the same lugs We do do put different heads on there more drum set appropriate heads and triple flange hoops Uh curly wires Not cable obviously Although surprising the amount of drum set players that want cable So sometimes I got to kind of steer their expectations as to You know, this is going to be drier than what you're expecting and it's going to be a more Markado sound than what you're expecting. It's not going to be this You know death leopard type of sound, you know Yeah, but that's interesting The people want that and you never know unless you talk to someone like you and you experiment and It's pretty cool. I think uh from senior guys booth again. I need to experiment more but um Next year when I'm back more in the drum shows after the madness of having a baby Um, I will absolutely come and just experiment more and um, you know mess around because it's cool How many different little things you can have in our in our world, you know, oh, yeah I'm I have so much stuff that I bought Just because I thought it was cool and I've used it once but I still like it It's still fun to just have this little gizmo. I have a total gizmo. I'm a total gizmo freak I am completely in love with gizmos. So there's so many clever people out there Making really interesting things Or coming up with you mentioned big fast snare drum Who the fuck? I mean part of that's not really a new idea because people were cutting out rings before that but Wow, you know, he took it to the next level and added layers of interest Uh beyond just a basic. Oh, you know ream. Oh or or that type that type of a product adding the gasket and the weight and yeah, um But that's like, uh, I mean similar to what you're doing where like people people have done this stuff before they've made triangles they've made certain things but You do it a certain way and people like that and um, it actually it just makes me think too Kind of unrelated. Where did the name black swamp percussion come from? What made you think of that? Well Okay, first my name is soy s o o y 70 of people don't know how to pronounce it correctly Okay, the second thing is I wasn't a name player vik furth name player Mike balter he was a regional name player Uh, Broadway shows really good player people kind of don't know that about mike balter really really good mallet player Uh, and there's other, um alan abel abel triangles, uh, a very common orchestral triangle, you know, he was in the Uh, philadelphia orchestra so The name black swamp comes from the area around bowling green in Toledo area The nickname for that area was called the great black swamp by the native americans because it was a big swamp land And there's all kinds of there's the black swamp arts festival. There's black swamp brewery. There's black swamp this and that And it was just sort of a joke. It was just sort of before I Because it wasn't a business. It was just sort of something I did And and for anyone that's around bowling green Black swamp was just sort of colloquial A name that was common and not weird like it is to most of humanity Outside of bowling green. I think it's cool. I think it's very cool So it got to the point where it wasn't defined as the color black and a Environmental wetlands It became colloquial with high quality percussion it became connected with that And then it just sort of enters the lexicon Uh, and yeah, so so here we are. I mean, I get that question a lot, which is a great question I didn't have any better idea What it should be and you kind of don't forget it, right? It's kind of it's not It's not like awesome percussion or super superior percussion or It's unique that type of thing. Yeah. All right moving on the timeline here. Keep keep going here. I mean, I'm looking at your History on your website. It said significant sales growth in 2005 allowed you guys the opportunity to move into a 10,000 square foot Manufacturing facility where you are today right now, correct? Yeah, right That's pretty huge that had to be an accomplishment that you've outgrown what you're where you were Yeah, and you got a big big boy, uh, you know manufacturing place if you only knew any uh People that have started their only people that have started their own business will understand the risk and the Gosh, I do the right thing in 1999. I bought my first cnc machine Uh, it's a five-axis machine that anything we make out of wood It does something to that drills holes and snare shells Slots and tambourines it makes wood blocks. We make our castanets candles So I I I didn't know hardly anything about cnc's and it was Uh, and I'll tell you in 99 it was it was 100,000 dollars Oh my god, which yeah I mean, that's a lot of money now, but for my little company and So I got it and went down for training Yeah, I basically knew just about nothing but I'm pretty mechanically inclined and and so That's kind of my one of my love languages And so so we got that and I remember about two months after it was delivered and working with it I said to my wife. I said, this is the biggest mistake I've made in my life. This is this is horrible Six months down the road. I went Julie. This is the best decision I ever made That happens man. Yeah, we can't so I'm on my second one now. We couldn't do What we do as consistently with the same quality without this machine that said Everyone that works here Amazing craftsman so anyway, that was my first big step and then That shop I moved into Just a little north of here little tiny space Outgrew that I took over a little bit more of their space that they weren't using Outgrew that they built a bigger play a bigger. I think it was 3,200 something square feet They built a building on the back of their building. So I moved into there And then yeah It's the old Renting versus buying am I I'm giving all this money to someone else. Yeah, so I started looking into buildings and needed more room because things were just I you know the um The horse was dragging me around you know is taking me for a ride and uh So, you know looking around and and I I Purchased a building. We're in a like a condo complex. So there's a number of businesses all connected to the same complex but um So, yeah, it it's another story of Well, my wife and I bought it You'll risk you put your neck on the line and Six months down the road This is the biggest mistake I ever made in my life But now it's you know, my my wife even said this that you know as far as You know, it's an asset And she's she's yeah, that was a really good decision I didn't know what I was doing. I sort of still don't know what I'm doing But you're like I feel like it's taking your you're being led By like the universe or whatever the drum universe is like taking you into these steps You know and you're just kind of like stepping through it and it's worked out so far. Yeah, it's Making good product consistently serving the customer Treating people right working with vendors all that's hard Uh, it's not as hard as running the business and keeping it being able to flip that switch on Of the lights in the morning Yeah, so all that's hard the rest of it. Well, which is why you know, you see a lot of businesses crash and burn And you see businesses that are growing fast you think oh, they're gonna They're gonna skyrocket through the universe and they burn it they crash and burn because it's very You can you can go broke growing too fast. But what one of my biggest customers Said that to me one time he said eric be careful. Don't grow too fast And he was right because we had just wild growth years And those are really tough on cash flow Unless you get daddy war bucks in here, right to drop a bunch of money But that was you know, obviously gonna happen All people see is the products But for the most part what you don't see is uh You know the accounting side of it the the the legal side of it the you know, just just the paperwork of of State of michigan and the uncle sam It's benefits and yeah, yeah trying to figure out. What do I pay people? What benefits do I offer? It's just yeah, it's a big it's a big thing. But I have Uh, I mean my team here Unbelievable just so good um So i'm gonna give a shout out tim church He has been with me for 25 years growl with the business from packing up boxes and now he heads up to artists Dealers and and you know, it's just really really good People really like tim I like you too tim I've met looking at the website. I think I've met tim at the drum shows and super super nice guy Everyone I've met on your team was very nice. Yeah, and then there's uh, um, I'll go and I'll go and rank up seniority jamal taylor He moved here from the east side of the state Tim knew him from the winner drum line world that they were involved in and uh, he's been here 16 years and is a juggernaut force of nature with Just enthusiasm and skill Uh, yeah, so so that's great. He runs the shop So I don't have to worry about that because he runs all that and it's all it's all go smooth uh, and then The next one down would be uh, uh christin and she's basically our cfo and She kind of does the Big picture financial stuff. She's a cpa Just scary smart and then there's eric peterson and they call him eric jr So they really call him jr and he Grew from a guy that we just hired in the production and now he He knows how to make pretty much everything And he can do it really well That guy can do stuff better than I ever could do Because you know, he was a little more focused But he's just good. He's smart. I'll hire smart over Guild Or experienced any day and that's always paid off. I've hired experienced people And I've fired experienced people but smart people I want to I want to keep around and then Nathan Now he does social media and he does shipping. So he's kind of got a strange job And he does some other stuff in there But like any small business we all wear Crazy different amounts of hats and yep. I've talked to Nathan years ago. Very nice guy Very good at what he does. Yeah, and then there's a Samuel. He's he's a newer person and So he's great Yeah, and uh So it's a really great team. We're we're way smaller than what people think we are because we As I like to say on the internet. No one knows you're a dog And so you put out this you kind of have this bigger presence Then what it's then what we actually are? Um And I would never trade machinery for people but the cnc and the people we can put out a lot more And I do a lot of machine stuff special machines for buffing for sanding for edges kind of What I do is I build the skill into the machine So it's like yeah, it's high quality. It's repeatable. It's consistent People come in here and we get to typically two reactions one is as man, I thought there would just be a bunch of uh palette racks with boxes From china on it and like no we we make stuff we make noise and a lot of dust and And then the other the other the other thing people say is wow, this is smaller than I thought even though we're not small You know, they think we're I don't know how many people they think are here Well, we've had we've had more in the past, but My staff is so good. We can just you know, it's it's pretty it's pretty well oiled at this time I've always had that with Other brands where even even bigger brands like large, you know big big big brands are like Oh, we actually aren't as big as people think we are employee number wise and I frequently get emails That'll say, you know, hey drum history team or hey guys, and I'm just like there's no one else It is just every single thing is just me Which but I think it's better to give that representation of it being a team effort or it's gotta be a bunch of people working at black swamp because they do so much work It's better to do that than yeah, then think like this has to be one person because it's so yeah, you know the opposite Um, but which you just hit uh in 2020 Three years ago now, which is weird to say in january your 25th anniversary So you're not coming up on 30 years. Yeah, that's pretty crazy, man I mean you've created your own job and been working for yourself for almost 30 years I don't know how to do anything else. So no one better fire me Yeah, it's yeah, so 2023 it'd be 28 years and I go wow that I've I've never really worked I mean other little jobs in college and stuff In between that and my masters and I don't count gigs, but I've never had a regular job They'll work for a corporation and you know you sacrifice certain things You know, I have plenty of friends. They like Working in a big company their job is very siloed Which is totally fine But they got you know, I got the good benefits and they got you know better pay I'm what was that What was the movie up where that where that dog was like squirrel? That's me. I'm like, oh, hey something new. I want to do something new. Hey, look at that. That's super interesting Yeah And so starting it's good because you're the boss, you know Yeah, yeah Although a lot of that has been tempered over the years as you as you integrate a team and you got to work With a team versus I Started the thing I did what I wanted I did all the stuff because there was no one else to do it There was no one to tell me no And and you just kind of throw stuff against the wall and hope it sticks And and you go forward but then once you get a team And there's other stuff going on and it gets a little bit more formalized and I kind of have to sure Adapt to that if you want to make it sustainable Right and not chaos and you got people To pay You know in 20 years, I've never missed the payroll ever never ever missed the payroll So that's and that's always very number one Yeah, well you're already you're balancing things correctly and not growing too fast like your your friend said and All right, awesome. Eric. Well, I feel like we've covered a lot of stuff here Is there is there anything in the history of black swamp that you think I've missed or do we we feel like your History has been represented pretty well. No, no, that's that's great. I appreciate it You know, sometimes I'm like dragon. It's been 28 years. I'm like When did that happen? What happened then? No, it's good. And I'm glad you have your website where I can follow along but So everyone listening Eric is kind enough He's going to hang out at the end of this and we're going to do a Patreon bonus episode where I'm going to talk to him about his experience With being at the drum shows and and you know percussive art society at PA at PASIC. You guys are always there Yeah, that's a huge part of your business and I think you you have to be there and I've learned from doing the my show that Good things happen from being at these drum shows like in in every way when you leave You're like that was worth it. I'm really glad so if you guys want to hear that we're going to record that after this go to patreon.com slash drum history podcast And you can check that out and a bunch of other bonus episodes so Eric you want to tell people where they can find you your social media all that stuff as we wrap up Sure. Yeah, the the website is www.blackswamp.com And then you know, we're on Instagram and Facebook and tiktok and it's all sort of variations of Black swamp perk or black swamp if we could if we could get black swamp if it wasn't taken already So yeah, we're out. We're on all those the social media things. Yep. Cool. All right I will put all the links in the description and uh, you know If if you are in this world of the orchestral percussion or in drum set stuff with your your dynamic snare Then uh, you know, check it out. Most people know about you But if for some other reason you haven't then be sure to check out black swamp and Absolute pleasure talking to you. I'm glad we connected and um, you know, hope to see you again at you know At a drum show soon and uh, I appreciate you being here. Yeah. Thanks a lot. It was great. It was great talking to you Always been a fan. I've always been a fan Thank you. I appreciate that. Thanks, Eric