If you are a big fan of Dom and his drumming skills, then this is the section for you!
Here we document the various drum kits that he uses, as it often changes from tour to tour.

Dom is currently an endorser of DW drums and he uses kits which are customised by the brand.

He has used various kits over the years of various brands and various sizes.

Without a handy guide like this to his drum kits, if could be tricky to work out what exactly he is using. Working it out alone involves as much luck as games of bingo but we’re not sure it’ll be as fun.

If you want to use a kit like Dom then keep checking back to this section of the website to see what he is currently using and how it can be built up.

This page documents his recent change from Tama to DW drums to coincide with The Resistance tour. However, you can still read all about his Black Holes & Revelations Kit

Dom’s Current Set Up

Configuration

DRUMSDW Collectors Series 8ply maple drum kit with VLT shells in Damask Finish. (Lacquer Solid Black with Silver Metallic Rebase finish and Silver Flake detailing.)

Snare = Matching 14×6.5 or Ludwig 14×6.5 ‘Black Beauty’
Tom Tom = 12×10
Floor Tom = 14×14
Floor Tom = 16×16
Gong bass = 21×16
Bass = 22×20


CYMBALSDom is known to chop and change his cymbals about depending on venue.
However all his cymbals are Zildjian.
14″ K Custom Special Dry Hats
18″ A Custom Crash or 18″ K Custom Fast Crash or 18″ A Custom EFX (prototype)
19″ A Custom Crash or 19″ K Dark Crash
22″ K Custom Medium Ride or 22″ A Custom Ride
18″ FX Oriental China “Trash”
11″ FX Oriental “Trash” Splash or 11″ K Custom Hybrid Trash Splash
8″ EFX-1 Splash

OTHER PERCUSSION11″ RhythmTech Ribbon Crasher
Handheld Shaker
Mounted Tambourine
Timpani

ELECTRONICSRoland RT-10S Snare Drum Trigger
Roland RT-10T Tom Tom Trigger
Roland RT-10K Bass Drum Trigger
Roland SPD-S sampler
Roland TD-20KX Drum Module
Apple Mac running Native Instruments “Battery 3″
Custom-made, light-up electronic Kit.

HARDWAREDW9000 Single Kick Pedal
DW9000 Hi-Hat Pedal
DW stands.

HEADSToms = Remo clear Emperor batter heads with clear Ambassador resonants
Snare = Remo coated CS batter with clear Ambassador resonant
Bass = Remo Powerstroke 4 batter with clear Ambassador resonant
Gong Bass = Clear Ambassador batter

OTHERPro Mark TX101 (Dom Howard Signature) Drum Sticks
Hot Rods
Brushes
Mallets
18″ Industrial Floor Fan
Stick Bag
Hi-Hat Stand Stick Clamp

DRUMS

For eight years, Dom endorsed Tama Drums, which meant that because of his popularity and influence, he was given drum kits for free! In 2009 however, and the start of The Resistance tour, Dom switched to endorse Drum Workshop (DW) Drums.

“I really didn’t think that anything would top the sound of that (Tama) kit, but as soon as I jumped on the DW it just sounded incredible and I remembered exactly why I got into them in the first place. It was so clear which one sounded best.”

“The Perspex was amazing through a big PA on tour, brilliant, but the DW has such a vast tonal range. It’s not mid-rangey like the Perspex shells are, it’s more expressive and more sensitive.”

“Tama were great to me and I used them for eight years, they were amazing, but the new (DW) kits are phenomenal.”

Dom is left handed and sets his kit in a ‘one up, two down’ configuration. He also has his gong bass drum next to his hi-hats on his right.
Dimensions

Snare = Matching 14×6.5 or Ludwig 14×6.5 ‘Black Beauty’ or 402
Tom Tom = 12×10
Floor Tom = 14×14
Floor Tom = 16×16
Gong bass = 21×16
Bass = 22×20

The Gong Bass Drum features a 22″ head on a 20″ shell with no bottom head. This drum produces a sound with excellent sustain that’s close in character to a concert tympani. Dom uses the Gong Bass drum on “Knights of Cydonia”, “Map of the Problematique” and “United States of Eurasia”.

Cymbals

Dom endorses Zildjian cymbals and often swaps them around a bit.
Like his drums, because of his popularity and influence, he gets given cymbals for free!

Current Configuration

14″ K Custom Special Dry Hats

18″ A Custom Crash or 18″ K Custom Fast Crash or 18″ A Custom EFX (prototype)

19″ A Custom Crash or 19″ K Dark Crash

22″ K Custom Medium Ride or 22″ A Custom Medium Ride

18″ FX Oriental China “Trash”

11″ FX Oriental “Trash” Splash

8″ A Splash

For the Absolution era, Dom sported a 20″ Oriental Crash Of Doom to the right of his 18″ Crash and above his hats.

The Crash of doom (furthest right above his hi-hats) only lasted for the duration of the Absolution tour and has now been made redundant.

Other Percussion

***This page is due to be updated***

In amongst his drums and cymbals, Dom also uses an 11″ RhythmTech Ribbon Crasher and a tambourine mounted underneath it.

The ribbon crasher creates a trashy sound similar to the ’slosh’ of an open hi-hat and is used in Time Is Running Out, Hysteria, Apocalypse Please, Eternally Missed and Megalomania.

The tambourine is not a new addition to his percussion, more “relocated”. As in the early days, Dom would rest a tambourine on top of his hi-hat cymbals during live versions of Megalomania.

In the introduction of Falling Away With You, you can hear a ‘hang’ being played. This is what creates the warm ‘ding’ sounds throughought the song.

Dom describes this instrument as:

“A thing that looks like a cross between a barbeque and a flying saucer. It’s like an inverted metal drum with a pentatonic C scale on the top that you tap with your hands. It’s made by this company called PANArt. It’s a really cool sounding instrument that’s pleasurable to play and so relaxing as well.”

During the Origin of Symmetry tour, Dom had a Balafon as part of his kit. This big wooden patterned xylophone is only used in Screenager.

During City Of Delusion and Screenager, Dom uses a hand held shaker.

Matt’s guitar tech Paul Spencer dampening the ribbon crasher with gummy bears!

Electronics

Dom uses Roland Electronic Drum Components.

On Dom’s snare drum, he has the RT-10S Snare drum trigger.

These are what make the ’shaker’ sound in Supermassive Black Hole and a ‘clapping’ sound in Starlight.

The snare trigger is also used to layer the live sound of the snare drum, by adding a ‘midi snare’ signal over the top of the original sound.

The triggers are linked to a Roland TD20X drum brain. (In the BH&R tour, it was an SPD-S sampler.)

Dom starts the various backing tracks by using a foot pedal next to his hi-hat stand. This presumably is an elaborate “play” button for backing tracks.

Hardware
Dom plays with a SINGLE Iron Cobra bass drum pedal. He has been known to use a double in the past, and so that explains why in some videos such as Hullabaloo, you can see this. However none of his songs actually need it and the only time he is known to have used it was for the odd bass drum flam during song ending jams.

Keeping in with his new ’space age’ see-through kit, he has recently started using the limited edition HP900PC Chrome Iron Cobra.
Dom also uses the Tama Iron Cobra Hi-hat stand, and the Tama first drum stool.

He used to have a backrest on it - but recently this has been removed.

Dom also has a big 18″ industrial floor fan next to him to keep him cool during play. The other band members have their own too.

Dom also has a stick bag mounted on his floor tom, and a stick holder mounted on his hi hat stand - just incase!

HEADSToms = Remo clear Emperor batter heads with clear Ambassador resonants
Snare = Remo coated CS batter with clear Ambassador resonant
Bass = Remo Powerstroke 4 batter with clear Ambassador resonant
Gong Bass = Clear Ambassador batter

Other

Dom is not only the percussionist in the band. Oh no! He is also in charge of the Buchla 200e synthesizer at the beginning of Take A Bow.

And he also provides backing vocals in Supermassive Black Hole, in which his voice is distorted in a Vocoder.

“…into the supermassive…”

Dom uses Westone UM2 sound-isolating, in-ear monitors along with the rest of the band, and to aid with monitoring, Dom also has two L-Acoustics dV-Subs close-by to achieve the punch which in-ears can’t recreate.

Dom has used many different brands of sticks in the past. However he is now endorsed by Pro-Mark. His prefered size being 5BN, but recently Pro-Mark have released the Dom Howard Autograph Model - TX101W which he is now known to use live.

And occasionally Dom wears one of the band’s customized sweatbands when playing live.

And finally, here is someone who is just as vital as Dom but never gets a mention…until now…

Dom’s drum technician, Stuart Quinnell!