Well, because I'm SUCH a nice guy, and to show you that I'm not that
old 
... I thought I would write out a bit of the drum groove on the
TOOL - Aenima CD. Track number 2 is
"Eulogy" ... here's the first two bars of the drum groove at the 6:35 mark.
The whole groove is sixteenth note based. As you mentioned, the Kick drum and Snare parts are pretty basic (please note that I did not notate the accented backbeats on the Snare; it's a given). The Hi-Hat, as you said is the tricky part. The
polyrhtyhm is a 3:4 type of thing if you look at just the sixteenth-notes. In the 3:4 ... the 3 is the quarter-notes. I personally like to call this a
poly-grouping or
poly-phrasing rather than a polyrhythm because it involves the subdivisions rather than completing itself each bar. If that doesn't make sense, don't worry; we've had discussions of the "wording" here before ... with no resolution. Call it whatever you want.
Here's an explanation of the Hi-Hat pattern. It's a three-note reoccurring pattern which starts off with a closed hihat stroke, then a accented (not notated to save time) open hihat (see the
o above the notes), followed by a closed hihat stroke WITH THE FOOT ... which basically serves two purposes: to end the open hihat sound and to provide the second sound of the hihat.
To practice this groove, I would recommend getting your metronome, set it SLOW, and work out the Hi-Hat pattern first. Try adding the Snare with the Hi-Hat part; then the Kick drum (or vice versa). If this is too difficult, try adding just one note at a time, keep the little Hi-Hat ostinato going and just play the Kick drum beats on beat one. Then add the next Kick drum beat. Then add the Snare hit on two ... and so on.
Now ... you'll need to finish out this groove because anytime you have a three note ostinato phrase like this, it will take a full three bars before the pattern starts repeating itself. I left out the third bar because I wanted you to figure the rest out for yourself. Once you get that third bar notated (just continue with my HiHat parts; analyze what I've already written for you), you'll have it. It's going to be a little weird because the music is in four bar phrases, but the Hi-Hat pattern is reoccurring every three bars.
Be sure to listen for any nuances that I may have missed. I only spent about 10 minutes from the time I listened and notated this thing ... so there may be some ghost strokes and such in there that I missed. The big thing that I wanted you to see is that it's not actually a polyrhythm in the sense of 3 against 4 or something like that. But it is an odd-phrase pattern or poly-grouping phrase. Everyone calls it something different. The important thing is to hear and see the difference.
Enjoy!
Make your checks payable to Bart Elliott. You spell million ... M I L L I O N.
