Best/Worse Drummers of All Time?

.Tyson Studios.

.Tyson Studios.

I LOST THE GAME
Best drummers, over-hyped drummers... go. My favorite drummers are Buddy Rich, Keith Moon, and Mike Portnoy.

Over-hyped: travis barker, travis barker, and... travis barker. ur tuuuurn
 
.Tyson Studios. said:
Best drummers, over-hyped drummers... go. My favorite drummers are Buddy Rich, Keith Moon, and Mike Portnoy.

Over-hyped: travis barker, travis barker, and... travis barker. ur tuuuurn
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Wow! I don't know how to respond to that except that I really don't agree at all with your best
drummers. Sure Buddy Rich is technically the most incredible drummer that ever picked up sticks, but musically, he was an attention hog that didn't play well with others. Keith Moon was "animal" from The Muppets. He hit hard, played fast and wowed teenagers with his antics, but musically?...blah. Mike Portnoy is a perfectly good and proficient drummer that gives a good backbeat has great fills and is otherwise unremarkable except that he manages a really large kit better than Terry Bozzio can.
Yeah, Travis Barker is over hyped as is Dave Grohl but neither of those two are anywhere near the worst drummers around. They have certain abilities.
Selecting a worst/best list is very personal. Who I would consider best probably wouldn't be to your tastes at all (as yours aren't to mine). My criteria for listening to what I consider to be a really great drummer is how musical they are as well as how skilled they are with their craft. It has to be both. A good drummer needs to be able to play with others and not just fit overly busy solos into what the other musicians are doing (that's the obnoxious guitarist's job :p). I respect drummers that push the envelope by trying new things and make them work. Trying to voice the drums differently (not with electronic gadgetry, but with real drums). I have a ton of drummers that I listen to (and there are probably more great drummers out there working in the last few decades than there ever were in the past) and they all have something to offer.
I didn't mean to trash Terry Bozzio, because I've seen him play a 7 piece kit on tour with a tribute band and he was awesome and then I went to a two drummer live concert where he had his monster kit and I was underwhelmed by his playing. I think he was confused by all the drums and cymbals.
 
Best-Neil Peart, Stewart Copland, Bonzo, Kieth Moon, Phil Collins
Worst-Dennis Wilson (pretty bad)
 
Yeah, I agree about Stewart Copland being among the best (really, as Rimshot says, it's a largely personal choice.)

Others here seemed to get offended when I called Ringo "The luckiest man in music," but what was either not communicated well, or not understood, is that I don't think he's a bad drummer, just that he had the phenomenal luck of being in the best possible place, at the best possible time. He seems to personify the saying, "I'd rather be lucky than good, any day."

I can't really think of a "worst." Dave Grohl comes to mind, but more for his bizzare opinions about the cause of HIV/AIDS (He's a freakin' DRUMMER, ferchrisake, not an infectious disease researcher!) than his drumming. As this is a best/worse drummer thread, not a best/worse person or thinker, his weird, poorly-informed opinions are not really part of the landscape.
 
I agree with you about Ringo. Most overrated shit ever. Any slightly competent drummer could have been in the Beatles.
 
I don't really have an opinion about Ringo as a drummer, although his groove on "Come Together" is great. I often think his value to the Beatles as a unit was his personality. The best bands are the sum of their parts, and it's rarely solely about musicianship, I think. :)
 
Bubba po said:
I don't really have an opinion about Ringo as a drummer, although his groove on "Come Together" is great. I often think his value to the Beatles as a unit was his personality. The best bands are the sum of their parts, and it's rarely solely about musicianship, I think. :)
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Well obviously. The Beatles were mega-huge way before they became these "genius" songcrafters, as they are thought of today. They were a simple boy band that played a bunch of simple covers and went "oooooooooooooh" while shaking their heads back and forth really quickly. They were cutesy though and the girls loved them. And wherever there are girls, there will be twice as many boys.
 
My opinion;
Best: Anyone who can keep time and make a song feel good. i.e. Everyone, including Ringo! UNLESS.....
Worst: Anyone who worries about who is the best or worst at anything.
 
Bubba po said:
I don't really have an opinion about Ringo as a drummer, although his groove on "Come Together" is great. I often think his value to the Beatles as a unit was his personality. The best bands are the sum of their parts, and it's rarely solely about musicianship, I think. :)
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Wasn't that Paul's work on the drums for that song Come Together?
 
In rock and roll, the appearance and the personality of the musician is almost more important than their ability. It's a fashion show out there. That doesn't mean that there aren't great musicians, but THAT seems to come second to the public. It's sort of like: If you're not a knock-dead gorgeous hot babe, forget a career in country music.

Other genres of music aren't as superficial. Jazz, blues,folk, classical and world music are more interested in musicianship alone.

I am in awe of the technical ability of Buddy Rich and I loved watching him play and showing off his skills, but I found the music very unrewarding because it was always all about Buddy and no one else. In that same genre of "big band swing" I really like Louis Bellson as a drummer. In the Jazz world, there are really awesome creative people like Elvin Jones and Tony Williams (among a ton of others) that advanced the art of drumming.

Ringo Starr is a perfectly good drummer for what he was doing. He was part of that old school of drummers that provided a back beat to the group and did nothing to stand out. Charlie Watts is in that same school. A drummer that is in that same school of thinking but manages to really stand out because of incredible musicianship is Steve Gadd. This drummer has all the awesome chops that we all respect, but never once hogs the limelight. It's always about serving the music. He provides one of the most solid on the mark grooves of any drummer I've ever heard.

Stewart Copeland is a good drummer, but far from great. If he's all that friggin' wonderful, then why did Sting hire Vinnie Colaiuta to cover him on a lot of recordings. (Vinnie Colaiuta is a personal favorite of mine). How about Terry Lynn Carrington or Cindy Blackman? (great stuff coming out of those ladies).
Another personal favorite of mine (and a friend) is Jeff Tain Watts. I don't know if he's one of the best drummers ever, but I like him and he never disappoints.

And now for the 800 lb. gorilla in the room. Why has nobody mentioned John Bonham? That drummer almost singlehandedly revolutionized rock drumming. He is still as revered today as Jimi Hendrix is as a guitarist by even young musicians.
 
Rimshot said:
If he's all that friggin' wonderful, then why did Sting hire Vinnie Colaiuta to cover him on a lot of recordings. (Vinnie Colaiuta is a personal favorite of mine)
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Are you saying that Sting's done anything worthwhile since leaving the Police? :D

Copeland's the first to admit that he had a massive amount of time off from drumming and lost a lot of his chops when doing his film score work etc. He's just a drummer that I really admire - any rock drummer should listen to "Message in a Bottle" as a masterclass in constructing a drum part to a song It's an arrangement which complements the song, drives the energy of the song and builds wonderfully. And it all still sounds so fresh, snappy and off-the-cuff. Awesome.

But just my opinion. :D
 
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