The largest drum shop in the UK, Graham Russell Drums based in Fareham, has on display the 'Legacy Of The Royals' drum kit, built by the British Drum Co and played by Nicko McBrain of Iron Maiden in the 2024 Mountbatten Festival of Music along with 100 plus musicians of the Massed Bands of His Majesty's Royal Marines and world renowned Corps of Drums. The drum kit is on display until the end of August 2025.
00:02So tell me a little bit about the kits that you've got on display here at the minute.
00:06So the Nick and McBride British Drum Company kit has been loaned to us by the Royal Marines.
00:12One of their drummers is a customer of ours and he came in and mentioned the fact that they had the kit in HMS Collingwood,
00:19which is literally next door to where we're based here at Fairham.
00:22And he said, wouldn't it be great to get it on display in the store on the glass floor?
00:27So he made some inquiries with the powers that be at the Marines and they agreed that we could borrow it for a month.
00:35So Dave came in a week ago and set it all up for us.
00:39It was built by British Drum Company, especially for a concert at the Royal Albert Hall.
00:45The Royal Marines played their annual concert at the Royal Albert Hall and Nicko agreed to go and play with the Royal Marines band.
00:52This is on YouTube, we'll put a link back, but you can see Nicko playing that actual kit with the Royal Marines band.
00:59And once they'd done that concert, the kit was auctioned for charity, for the Royal Marines charity.
01:04And it's on for an awful lot of money.
01:07And the gentleman that bought it then gifted the kit back to the Royal Marines, which was fantastic.
01:11So the Royal Marines have ownership of that kit and it ended up in Collingwood, as I mentioned.
01:18So they will use it for concerts and stuff.
01:21I think it will end up in a museum in Portsmouth.
01:24So they've lent the kit to us.
01:26So we've got it on display for a month.
01:27So any Nicko McBrain fans or drum fans, Iron Maiden fans, can come and view the kit.
01:32You can walk all round.
01:33You can see it from behind, from the front.
01:34And we've got it till the end of August, which is a great thrill for us.
01:38It's a unique kit.
01:40All the artwork on every drum is customised.
01:43Every drum is unique.
01:44It relates to a battle and a period of the Marines history.
01:48So it's a great story for all the artwork.
01:51There's a lot online on YouTube about the kit, so you can probably find out more.
01:57But yeah, the artwork is unique.
01:58The drum kit's unique.
01:59It was built for Nicko.
02:00He's played it.
02:01And it's obviously his exact size.
02:04It's an exact replica of what he would tour with Iron Maiden, down to the cymbals.
02:08The cymbals were donated by Posty.
02:11The drums were donated by BDC and custom made.
02:14And it's exactly what he would play with Iron Maiden.
02:17Tell me what the reaction's been like so far from this.
02:20Oh, fantastic.
02:21I mean, people have been asking if they can buy it, which I'd love to sell it.
02:24It's not mine to sell.
02:25Yeah, people love it.
02:26It's obviously an enormous drum kit.
02:28We sell a lot of drum kits here.
02:30We're the biggest drum shock in the UK.
02:32So we sell lots of very expensive drum kits, but we don't get kits like that.
02:36So to have a drum kit of that size and that uniqueness is very special.
02:42So yeah, it's getting a lot of love and a lot of Iron Maiden fans are coming in to see it.
02:47People are literally just coming in and saying, I've come to see the kit.
02:50So we know which kit they mean when they walk in.
02:53So tell us a little bit more about what you do here.
02:56Obviously, you do drums.
02:56We do drums, drums, cymbals, percussion and accessories.
03:00We are the largest drum shop in the UK.
03:03We've been running for nearly 20 years.
03:05We've been in this building for 12 and a half years.
03:09It started with my wife and I.
03:10Hayley and I started it 20 years ago.
03:12It was a hobby of mine and it's a hobby that's got out of hand, I guess, because we've now got a huge warehouse and we do a lot of online sales.
03:23We have drummers traveling from all over the country, literally four, five, six hours to come and visit us because we have, I think we've got about 85 kits on display.
03:32We've got 200 snare drums, 600 cymbals.
03:35So we've got a massive selection of stock.
03:38We've got 10 people working here that are all drummers with the exception of Hayley.
03:42So we've got some very experienced players that work here.
03:45So we can solve most problems and answer most questions that anybody has, whether they're a complete beginner or whether they're a working professional drummer.
03:54We get from all ends of the spectrum.
03:58So, yeah, we're very busy and it's growing year on year.
04:01And like I said, we've taken on this unit, which is unit four.
04:04So we've doubled in size in the last 12 months and it's continuing to grow.
04:09So it's going very well.
04:10And I understand you're involved in local festivals.
04:13We are.
04:14We do drum kit hire even for bands, but we also do festivals.
04:19So today we're delivering two drum kits to Wickham Festival.
04:22So one will be for the main stage and one will be for the second stage.
04:25Last week we did Gospel Waterfront Festival.
04:28A couple of weeks ago we did the Arundel Jazz Festival.
04:31We hire our kids to Turner Sims in Southampton for a lot of jazz concerts.
04:35So, yeah, we can hire kids to private individuals for one-off gigs or for festivals.
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