Matt Nicholls

“I bought a Tama kit in maybe 2007 from my local drum shop in Rotherham. I just needed a good kit to record on. All I had before that was an old Pearl Export that was good for touring but it didn’t sound the best.

“The band had a bit of money, not much, and we thought we’d buy a sick drum kit to record on. We bought a maple Starclassic kit and have recorded every album on it since apart from the one we have just finished because we didn’t fly it out to the studio. It’s the kit that I have at home. I love it.”

Since the First Love Tour Mat has been using a Tama Starclassic Bubinga in standard rock sizes as he says. It's a 1 up 2 down kit with a 22" bass drum. The tom sizes are 12x8 rack tom on a snare stand and 2 floor toms size 16x16 and 18x16. The kit has a Light Pink/Champagne Sparkle finish with black nickel hardware.

In the MusicRadar interview by Rich Chamberlain, Matt Nicholls of Bring Me The Horizon discusses using Vic Firth 2B drumsticks, noting their durability and suitability for his powerful playing style.

I use DW Hardwear for my stands and everything but I went with the Tama Speed Cobra pedal.

Mat is using the Tama HH915N Hi-Hat Speed Cobra pedals since he signed with Tama in 2018. He also has a custom X-hat made by Tama for him especially that uses the Kevlar strap on it.

Matt is seen using this ride cymbal during a sound check for the song It Never Ends from BMTH's album Sempiternal. He beats it up good!

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Happy Song at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

“It is. It’s the Black Brass, a 14" and I’ve also got the 13" G Maple. That Black Brass snare is insane, it’s so loud. Previously I had a Vinnie Paul Pearl snare, the 8” deep one that was like snakeskin. I loved it.

“I put a heavyweight head on it and it sounded so fat. SJC tried replicating it for me but we couldn’t ever get that sound. I went to Headstock and they gave me the Black Brass, we put a heavy head on it and it sounded great.

“We put a little Moon Gel on it and this thing that’s like an O ring, called a Big Fat Snare Drum, it sounds wicked. It gives it this big, dead sound. I don’t want my drums to ring or sound tinny.”

Mat Nicholls talks about his Cymbal setup and he uses the k hybrid hats

Matt Nicholls is seen using this cymbal in tons of videos including his soundcheck for It Never Ends.

Listed on Nicholls' official Zildjian artist page.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Happy Song at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Happy Song at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Happy Song at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Happy Song at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Happy Song at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Shadow Moses at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, in 2019, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Shadow Moses at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Shadow Moses at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Shadow Moses at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

In this YouTube video of Matt Nicholls performing Shadow Moses at Worchester Palladium, Worchester, MA, it states in the description posted by Zildjian his drum set up for the tour.

“It is. It’s the Black Brass, a 14" and I’ve also got the 13" G Maple. That Black Brass snare is insane, it’s so loud. Previously I had a Vinnie Paul Pearl snare, the 8” deep one that was like snakeskin. I loved it.

“I put a heavyweight head on it and it sounded so fat. SJC tried replicating it for me but we couldn’t ever get that sound. I went to Headstock and they gave me the Black Brass, we put a heavy head on it and it sounded great.

“We put a little Moon Gel on it and this thing that’s like an O ring, called a Big Fat Snare Drum, it sounds wicked. It gives it this big, dead sound. I don’t want my drums to ring or sound tinny.”

Matt Nicholls confirmed his use of the Pearl Export drum kit, stating, "I had a Pearl Export before that and we were like, we need a new drum kit to make this sound good. I went to a drum store in Rotherham and a guy took me round a few kits. It looks cool too, orange sparkle. I’ve used that to record the last four records" (MusicRadar, Chris Barnes, "Bring Me The Horizon drummer Matt Nicholls on confidence, computer composition, clicks and more").

Matt Nicholls confirmed his use of the Pearl 14x8" Vinnie Paul Signature Snare, stating, "I have a bunch of snares that sound really good, but I think the main one I used was my old Vinnie Paul snare." This information was provided in an interview with MusicRadar by Chris Barnes.

Matt Nicholls, drummer for Bring Me the Horizon, uses the Evans Heavyweight Coated Snare Batter - 14 inch - Dry. According to an Instagram post by @evansdrumheads, Nicholls shares, "I use a dry heavyweight snare head. It's pretty durable for like being on tour. It just means that I can get the sound I want without the fear of it breaking."

Matt Nicholls uses the Evans EC2 Clear Drum Head, as confirmed by @evansdrumheads on Instagram: "We use the EC2s. Again, I get that nice big, fat sound out of them for my style of drumming."

Matt Nicholls, drummer for Bring Me The Horizon, has confirmed his use of the Pearl Joey Jordison Signature Export Drum Set. Nicholls stated, "The first bonus we got as a band, we all got £1,000 each. I went straight to a shop and bought a Joey Jordison Signature Export kit. It was ridiculous. I was used to having one kick, rack, and a floor. This kit came with two kicks, three rack toms, two floor toms, and also a 13" aluminum snare which sounded wicked." (Source: MusicRadar, Rich Chamberlain)

Matt Nicholls used an SJC Custom Drum Kit, which features maple shells in flat white stain with custom wood badges, flat white powder-coated hardware, die-cast hoops, and inline tube lugs. The kit includes a 12"x8" rack tom, 16"x16" floor tom, 22"x18" bass drum, and an SJC 14"x8" maple shell snare with a brass wrap and 2.3mm brass hoops. This setup is confirmed by an image available on Equipboard.

Matt Nicholls confirms his use of the Zildjian 21" K Custom Special Dry Trash Crash cymbal in a walkthrough video by soundattak, where he states: "I used to use a china a lot for the old metal-ly stuff we used to do, and I guess since we stopped doing all of them with heavy breakdown kind of things, I just eventually moved away from it and I like this, it's like in-between a crash and a china, and you get that long decay, not like what you get with a china you know, it's super sharp and fast decay so, it's probably my favorite cymbal what I've got at the minute here." (source: YouTube, soundattak, "BRING ME THE HORIZON - Mat Nicholls Walkthrough")

At 6:11 in the "BRING ME THE HORIZON - Mat Nicholls Walkthrough" video by soundattak on YouTube, Matt Nicholls confirms, "My sticks are Vic Firth. They're the Rock stick. I used to use 2Bs for ages and I tried these and I tried the Metal sticks and then we settled on these Rock sticks. The tips are a bit better for less damage on the heads. I found with the 2Bs with the acorn head, I was denting them a bit more, do you know what I mean? But with these, it's good for rimshots too cuz I'm getting more central with my stick. Usually you know, I'm a bit short with the 2Bs so, the extra length helps me get a bit more central and that. But yeah, the Vic Firth Rock sticks." This indicates that Matt Nicholls uses Vic Firth American Classic Rock Wood Tip Drumsticks.

In this instagram post and pic we can see that Matt use these to trig his drums on snare and toms