Leave it to an English cult band that's been around for over 30 years to elicit the most enthusiastic review this week: Wire, with their 47th release, "Object 47." Then Mac Wilson, Melanie Walker and I also shared thoughts on The Kaiser Chiefs' "Off With Their Heads" and Passion Pit's "Chunk Of Change."
Finally, I posed a follow-up question to last week's keyboard query - asking, "what song contains your all-time favorite percussion part?"
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Comments: 40
mine is "Flim" By The Bad Plus
or "Salmon Jump Suit" by Happy Apple.
In fact anything with Dave King playing drums is amazing.
He IS an amazing drummer.
Anyone disagree?
Also Bill, You should have Mary Lucia on Musicheads sometime!
Rush - "Natural Science"
Pat Metheny - "First Circle"..Paul Wertico plays the most precise and accurate cymbal work I've ever heard on any song. It's so crisp and clean.
soundscapem n., glad you mentioned Rush...you can't mention drummers without Rush & Neil Peart!
No mention of the Hamm's commercial? Who doesn't like the straightforward-straight-to-the-sternum tom-tom sound?
While the Joe Morello is a shoe-in in any drumming discussion, my personal preference seems to lean towards the inescapable, can't you see them sweating from the sheer power of it drumming. There are different kinds of power and skill, I just like the heavier end. Glad I didn't have to bring up Rush, or I'd wonder if all was lost. Peart always sounds so deeply determined. On the flip side of that sometimes a drum machine beat just positively sends a song... Outkast's "Bombs Over Baghdad" comes to mind. It completely sets it, sends it, and takes you along.
The one guy from the jazz world who never fails to absolutely stun me is Future Man from the Flecktones. A "percussionist" in a loose sense because he spends most of his time playing the drumitar, of course (and more recently the RoyEl, which is an absolutely fascinating instrument), but he's still an absolute genius. One of my favorite tracks for him is "P'lod in the House," where he somehow manages to unite the crazy rhythm of the song and find a seemingly infinite number of fills within the song.
As far as non-jazz, how about . . .
-Stewart Copeland on "Roxanne"
-Bruce Thomas on "Lipstick Vogue"
-Ringo on "Dear Prudence" or "The End"
"Tomorrow Never Knows" - I mean, this wouldn't be the same song without Ringo's hypnotic, trance-like riff
"Helter Skelter" - He got blisters on his fingers for crying out loud!
have to send a shout out to "roland" from Big Black. Steelworker and the intro to The Big Payback are always genuine for a listen.
Also, anything by The Who with Keith Moon playing drums. He is my favorite Rock n' Roll drummer of all time. "Substitute" is pretty damn amazing.
Also liked the sparseness of The Police or Morphine; this could lead to some great percussion. Neil Pert from 2112 era, Talking Heads - Papa Legba best with headphones one in the dark, and the off tempo beat of Go Your Own Way by Fleetwood Mac.
In rock-n-roll it seems that the frontman and/or the lead guitarist get all the glory. There is something to be said about contributing to the sound as a whole. Rock-n-roll is a team sport! Mitch Mitchell certainly contributed a bunch to the Hendrix sound.
I've read that during many of the Jimi Hendrix Experience recordings around 1970, it was often just Jimi & Mitch Mitchell in the studio playing off one another.
Can't beat Gene Krupa, who is really one of the first drumming legends, for setting the bar with "Stompin' At The Savoy"....and many, many others.
Now on to my favorite drum parts. This is a hard question, but I do have to say that I can't believe how little soul this list has.
No mention of the J.B.s who had so many killer beats-Doing it to Death, The Grunt, J.B. Shout, the list could go on forever.
Or the Meters. One of my fav all time funk groups-Live Wire, People Say, Hey Pocky-Way, etc. etc.
I could probably go on and on with Classic R&B and Funk songs but that might get boring
SRV - Couldn't stand the weather
Soul Coughing - Super BonBon, Circles
Wallflowers - One Headlight
stuck for now...
I'm sure I'll think of others...
also, impresive is paul simon's use of the brazilian drum group, olodum on "rhythm of the saints"
a few years back, I decided that being a percussionist myself, I needed to see a bunch of aging drum superstars befor they died. I saw tito puente and max roach... so inspiring!
I have too many fave drum bits to mention, but one contemporary drummer that I think needs props is Janet Weiss, ex-Sleater-Kinney and now The Jicks. I just played Quasi which she is also in and every track on that is a hooj drum extravaganza.
And the best I have ever seen live is Steven Dozd of Flaming Lips.
Frick...in James Brown's autobiography he mentions legendary afrobeat drummer Tony Allen as the influence in helping him discover funk!
Jim, you can't go wrong with the Clash!
An oldy but goody... How many drummers does it take to change a lightbulb?
Five: One to screw the bulb in, and four to talk about how much better Neil Peart coulda done it.
Last week I mentioned The Rentals, and a few weeks earlier I mentioned Weezer - so I feel like I'm kicking a dead horse here, but...
Pat Wilson is very underated. That distinctive early Weezer sound has everything to do with Wilson's drums...so hard and steady, but so simple - no fancy stuff. It was the perfect match for Cuomo's songs. Same goes for his work with Matt Sharp.
Anything Santana.
"Manic Deprssion" by The Jimi Hendrix Experience. Mitch was the greatest.
"Sing, Sing, Sing"- Benny Goodman Orchestra. Most people say it's the tom solo in the beginning. For me, it's the furious Krupa drumming in the finale as the horns are playing.
"Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard"- Paul Simon.
"Evil Ways"- Santana. Gotta love the cowbell.
"Peggy Sue"- Buddy Holly and the Crickets.
As for drum machine, "Say Goodnight and Go"- by Imogen Heap.
Swordfishtrombones - Tom Waits
The Marimba is so cool in this song, with the drummer on the toms in the back... yeah, that's what I'm talkin' about!
The Boxer - Simon & Garfunkel
I love that crazy sound; "lie-la-lie" BASHH!! 'lie-la-lie 'lie-la-lie"
I didn't know what it was, I thought a snare with a big verb... nah-uh...
"Drummer Hal Blaine created the huge drum sound heard during the chorus by banging a heavy chain against the concrete floor of an empty storage closet." - From wiki
And I always liked Elaine Harris of Trip Shakespeare. So much power packed in such a small package.
I am also quite a fan of Flo Mournier, the drummer from the tech-death metal band Cryptopsy. So much metal is just blast beats but Mr. Mournier keeps things very interesting. The same thing goes for Thomas Haake from the Swedish band Meshuggah, he always comes up with some very interesting patterns.
I still can't believe that was done with a full drumset (with a few electrical gadgets, too). That guy played so well...I thought it was all a computer! Anyone else who had a chance to see them before they broke up saw something special. Anyone know what happened? Did they go off to college or something?
The Marimba is so cool in this song, with the drummer on the toms in the back... yeah, that's what I'm talkin' about!"
Nate, great suggestion! Percussion need not just be about the beat . . . it can carry a melody too! Awesome song lyrically and vocally, too.
I second Lexi on the whole of the YYY's Fever To Tell. Driving and seedy like the band. And i almost mastered the drum part for Maps on Rock Band. haha.