I leave the drums unfinished mainly out of laziness, and partly from indecisiveness. I rationalize leaving them undecorated by telling myself that whoever ends up with the drum will decorate it however they want to, or that it's a legitimate constructivist aesthetic, or by telling myself "If they sound good, they're done!"
If I lived near a forest, I might go cut down a tree, but I've lived all my life in expanding cities, so I go to construction sites and ask for scrap PVC.
I don't like the drums because they are heavy, and the plastic gives them overtones which reminds me of these big rubber balls we used in elementary school to play four-square with.
I like the drums, because they have unique sounds; they don't sound
like mass-produced hand drums. I think it's neat making music out sewer
pipes. The drum shells are also indestructible: you could play them at
the bottom of the ocean or on the moon, or set them on top of a termite
hill, or leave them in the sun for decades, or let kids play with them,
etc. I make them carefully, because I know plastics are very difficult
to recycle, and these drums will be around long after I will.
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