Remo Rototoms

Stewart Copeland played Remo Rototoms, fitted with CS Black Dot heads, during The Police's early years as a band. Rototoms are drums which have a single drum head on top and a metal frame that. The pitch of the drums can be adjusted by rotating them.

Stewart had a set of Rototoms for experimental tom-tom sounds and additional percussion as early as March 1978; they are first sighted along with TAMA Imperialstar Concert Tom-Toms in photos from a concert at the Rainbow Theatre, London on 12 March 1978. And he also included a Rototom in his Eberhard Schoener touring setup in January 1979. But generally he did not use them as much for live work as he probably preferred to stick to a relatively straightforward drum setup without much need for extra drums and percussion like the Rototom. It was used for occasional studio overdubs on Police/Klark Kent records, but for the most part remained at his home studio.

He did, however, start using Remo Rototoms again (only the 8" Rototom) during the 1979-1980 Reggatta De Blanc and the 1980-1981 Zenyatta Mondatta tours. Specifically it was for triggering sounds from the TAMA DS-200 drum synthesizer via the pickups - in Stewart's view, the Rototom sounded rather dead and small that he could stick it anywhere and trigger the drum synth from that. By then, he already had a set of TAMA Octobans for tuned percussion. The Rototom was initially positioned in series with the Octobans, but was later moved to beneath the hi-hat beneath Stewart's left hand.

Quotes on the Remo Rototoms
From Modern Drummer magazine, November 1981 'Ask A Pro' section: "'I've used the Remo Rototoms quite a lot. They're very specialized drums. If you're buying your first drumset, I wouldn't really bother with them. But if you're into experimentation, I suppose they're experimental. As for the basis for a drumset they're not versatile enough. I like them for particular tom-tom effects, I usually prefer normal tom-toms because they have a good sound. But occasionally, you want to use something that doesn't sound like it's part of a drumset.'"