BeatIt Test: Natal Cafe Racer Exotic snare drum

Our friends from DrumStore, one of the best drum shops in Poland have recently sent us a package. We always get something cool from them, and so it was this time. We got three big boxes full of drum gear. We have tested and reviewed it all. Now we want to share some of our thoughts with you. This time we will show you a beautiful snare drum by Natal Drums. It’s the Natal Cafe Racer Exotic 14 x 6,5 model.

Package and overall look

The drum was well secured. It came to us in a solid cardboard box with a big brand logo on it. Snare drum was protected by four styrofoam blocks and one extra cardboard plate to protect the upper parts. When we put it outside the box we saw a beautiful instrument, all dark brown with visible wood structure. Pure beauty! Sun lugs and well put chrome made it look even better. What a drum!

2. Product

Natal Cafe Racer Exotic looks great. It’s equipped with smooth Tri-Throw snare strainer and solid Triple Flanged lugs. Australian tulipwood makes beautiful, warm and focused sound. The drum is quite heavy, so there is no worries about bouncing on the stand. That makes all the drummers sure, that they will enjoy playing it. Doesn’t matter if you are hard rock skinsman, or if you like funk/r’n’b or fusion. It will fit you well! This drum keeps the tuning really good. There is no tuning dropping while playing. We are pretty sure that it will last even through the longest gigs. Ghost notes are really enjoyable with this one. Especially in mid-tuning. The drum is equipped with Evans 360 heads and solid 20-strand snare wire by Natal. We are really impressed!

3. Testing

We have tested this drum in our production room. After tuning it to F (Batter head 240 Hz, reso head 359 Hz) we have played some paradiddles and drum patterns on it. After doing this we attached the snare drum to the kit (Natal Arcadia UFX). It mixed with the rest very well. It wasn’t too loud but we could still hear its characteristics. Very warm tone overwhelmed us and playing some funk-based rhytms was really pleasuring. It’s definately an expressive snare, in balanced way.

4. Summary

Natal Cafe Racer Exotic is an beautiful indtrument, which can attract many drummers with its warm and focused tone. It can be your main snare drum, it can also be a great “fatty” second snare. It’s all up to you. Hardware works flawless, it doesn’t loose the tuning, what else can we say? We definately want to congratulate Natal Drums. It’s a great product, and we encourage you to check it out in your nearest drum store. It’s worth it!