Watch this Catholic priest perfectly play Bleed by Meshuggah on drums

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By ( Metal Hammer ) published

Father Hyacinth Marie Cordell has gone viral by nailing one of the most difficult drum parts in all of heavy metal

A priest plays drums, next to a photo of Meshuggah singer of Jens Kidman onstage
(Image credit: benedictusesdomine via Instagram | Aldara Zarraoa/WireImage)

Footage of a Catholic priest playing drums to Meshuggah’s Bleed has gone viral.

Father Hyacinth Marie Cordell of St Patrick Church in Philadelphia drums for the worship group Saints Alive Music and frequently uploads his drum performances to Instagram.

A clip of his take on Bleed was published on June 24 and has now been ‘liked’ upwards of 200,000 times.

Cordell wrote as a caption to the clip: “Catholic priest plays Meshuggah (Bleed part 2, with variations), dedicated to St. John the Baptist on the Solemnity of his Nativity”

Watch the video via the player embedded below.

Meshuggah released Bleed in 2008 as a single from that year’s album, Obzen.

The song quickly became notable for its intricate drum pattern, performed by longtime drummer Tomas Haake.

Haake spoke about the complexity of Bleed in a 2010 interview with Faceculture: “It was one of those songs where we didn’t know if I was going to be able to do it.

“For a few months, we didn’t know if we were gonna have it on the album or not.

“The problem for me initially was to get the very pattern that the song is based on. That part, for me, it took a lot of time just to be able to play that properly.

“I just basically had to change my approach to how I play the bass drum.

“I always used to just, like, pummel really hard and only in single strokes.

“For this one, I don’t play as hard on the kicks.

“Some songs, I lean on the pedals and hit really hard. But, on this one, I lean back more and you keep your feet up in the air. It’s more like tap dancing, so you play it softer.”

Bleed is now Meshuggah’s most listened-to song, boasting upwards of 60 million streams on Spotify.

Matt Mills
Matt Mills
Online Editor, Metal Hammer

Louder’s resident Gojira obsessive was still at uni when he joined the team in 2017. Since then, Matt’s become a regular in Metal Hammer and Prog, at his happiest when interviewing the most forward-thinking artists heavy music can muster. He’s got bylines in The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, NME and many others, too. When he’s not writing, you’ll probably find him skydiving, scuba diving or coasteering.