DW, whose full name is "Drum Workshop", is an American drum kit brand founded in 1972. Compared with other established drum kit manufacturers with a history of several decades, DW's less than 40-year history seems a bit thin, and its position in the industry mainly comes from hand-made custom drum kits. At a time when many manufacturers are relocating their production lines to Chinese mainland and Taiwan, most of DW's drum kits are still made in the United States, and their products have a high degree of customization freedom that other brands cannot match, so they are highly respected by professional drummers.
With excellent quality and continuous innovation, DW began to be favored by a large number of professional drummers in the 80s of the last century. Jonathan Moffett played "Beat It" for MJ using DW's drum kit, and then again on his 1987 tour with Madonna. In 1989, legendary drummer Tommy Lee of Motley Crue purchased a drum kit from the then-unknown brand and subsequently became the face of DW. A year later, DW launched its first complete drum kit at NAMM (National Music Merchants Association), and DW became an instant hit. Today, well-known drummers such as Sheila E, Terry Bozzio, Neil Peart and Gary Novak have used DW's drum kits, hammers or hardware.
If you open the list a bit, you'll know that the more experienced drummers tend to replace the standard tamper for a better experience. But this doesn't happen with DW's drum kits, as their rams are also the best in the industry. Among DW's current hammer products, the highest-grade Titanium 9000 uses a variety of DW's patented technologies, among which the floating rotor technology enables the speed, power and accuracy of the hammer to reach the industry's top level through the friction reduction ball bearings in the rotor. Each Titanium 9000 is uniquely numbered and has a Certificate of Authenticity and can be purchased with DW's range of premium and custom drum kits. The price of a single is between 5,000 and 13,000 yuan.
With the exception of a small number of drum cavities made up of solid wood cutting and single layers of wood, the vast majority of mid-to-high-end acoustic drum kits are made up of ply plates. They are called shelves because they are made up of multiple veneers stacked on top of each other. The vast majority of drum kit manufacturers order formed shelves from upstream lumber mills and process them. DW, on the other hand, buys thin sheets and pressurizes and glues them themselves. This increases the cost, but also allows the consumer to combine the grain movements in the drum cavity to get different tones. At present, DW supports four mainstream thin plate combinations: VLT, VLX, HVLT, and X-SHELL.
Each drum chamber produced by DW will have a special sticker with basic information about the drum chamber, including the Timbre Note. It is a recommendation made by the producer based on experience that the best pitch for that drum cavity. "Timbre Note:D" means that the producers suggested that the best sound would be obtained when the drum note was tuned to D major, and that it was worth using as a reference for drummers when tuning.
In DW's drum kit series, apart from custom sets and limited edition series at variable prices, the most high-end is the Collector's series. This kit is every drummer's dream drum kit with a choice of all-birch, all-cherry, all-oak, maple/mahogany, shell, and more. The maple timbre is warm, while the oak drum has an aggressive bass effect that is more suitable for rock 'n' roll. The Collector's series is the most customizable drum kit in DW and the industry, and users can choose a combination of shell wood, wood grain direction, drum size, drum skin type, ring mode, and finish type according to their preferences and needs. Arguably, most of the Collector's in the world are unique. This drum kit for professional drummers is expensive, and the price of the most basic five-piece kit (a kick drum, a snare drum, and a tee drum) is also around 20,000 yuan, and it does not include cymbals and shipping costs.
In response to the retro sound and look of vintage drum kits, many manufacturers have restarted the production of old-fashioned drum pieces. DW's Classic and Jazz are some of the best performing vintage drum kits on the market right now. Borrowed from the old-fashioned drum kit of the 30s in the previous world, the Classic's drum shell features a "mahogany-poplar-mahogany" sandwich design, which has a darker and richer sound, with short sustain and a tone that reflects the tones of the 1930s-1950s. Like the Collector's, the Classic comes in a variety of chrome finishes, but with a more nostalgic color scheme and pattern. At the same time, the Jazz series expresses the timbre of the golden age of jazz from the 50s to 70s of the last century, which is warm and powerful, and more resonant, which is more suitable for more high-pitched jazz.
In addition to the above three high-end series, DW has also launched a more affordable Performance series. This drum kit made from North American maple is part of DW's flagship move towards the $10,000 to $20,000 mid-range market. Unlike custom series such as Collector's, Performance is DW's first mass-produced series, and it follows DW's traditional design in details such as drum lugs and finishes, while adopting a new, unique HVX combination in the wood grain combination. The lower combo side brings plenty of natural resonance, and its kick drum sound is warm and aggressive when performing live. Its three tombos have a sweet, crisp tone and smooth decay to suit different musical styles.
The shorter Deskin series is also DW's low-to-medium price drum kit, which is produced in Chinese mainland and Taiwan, and its overall performance is not as stable as Performance. In the price range of about 10,000 yuan, the competitiveness is not as good as that of Pearl, TAMA, and Sonor. If you don't have a lot of budget and want to experience the craftsmanship of DW, you may want to choose PDP, which is now a sub-brand of DW.
