i used to be this really hard hitter... by 2002 i had developed the "art of the hard"
i was so loud, i hit a rim shot one jam and my guitarist got 2 weeks mc from having eardrum broken (liquid started oozing from his ear)
also, i broke 2 drumsticks per 2 hour jam on average. mostly hickory. and all kinds of brands - vater fusions, zildjian 2bs, pro marks, u name it.
it got to the point, i wasn't sure if i was loud and at a drum exchange a drummer (i think ahpek) commented ,"bro thats not loud... thats f**king loud!!!" :lol:
to make things worse, i bought this 14inch aluminium snare wif the god mofo frigging loud crack, it made some of my band musos have a "2nd heart beat" wif every crack.
i woke up one day and realise, this is way beyond the point of no return.
i've learnt since how to be more 'soft' and tone down on my hardness.
i've reached the penultimate in a sense - with a few good hits i know how and when to slice or break a drumstick in two. it comes from knowing ur elbow fulcrum, transferring some power starting from your back muscles, all the way into the stick and let the stick and rim rock each other

lol

.... but its really quite a useless skill (who would wanna waste money??)
but till that end i've put my skill to good use, knowing where and when to crack the stick, i can get a loud hit and have drumstick pretty lasting, also a good tone and crack for recording while chipping away the stick as economical as possible.
well thats the story of my drum stick breaking journey... haha....

:lol: