Red Mosquito

Mike wrote:Can someone with more drum knowledge than me talk about Jack's playing a bit or explain it to me? I like him a lot on the songs of his era but on older songs his playing can sound awkward to me. Where Dave sounded huge Jack sounds rather small and... dry? Does he have a unique drum set up? I think it's his snare that sounds very tight/dry to me. His drum sound does not have a lot of space/openness. Songs like Animal or Go have a weird quality to them when Jack is playing them.

Dave A had a lot of attack and wrist in his playing. He also had very tight snares. Jack is a lot looser in style and doesn't crack the snare as much. Additionally, he has a looser snare so it doesn't peak/attack as much. You can hear the same difference with RHCP listening to Jack versus Chad Smith.

Jack also doesn't push the beat like Dave A and Matt do. He sits on or behind the beat. One of the best drummer of this sort is Steve Ferrone. His work with Tom Petty and strangely Duran Duran on Notorious is a good example of this. When you hear Jack play Animal, Hail Hail, Last Exit etc, the drums don't push the song like when Matt or Dave A plays them.

tragabigzanda wrote:Awesome post LMS

To add, there are drummers who have that attach and play on/behind the beat. When Chad smith joined PJ at Jazz fest it was quite pronounced.

Behind the beat
Chad Smith


Dave Grohl


Jack Irons


Oddly Dave A is rather on the beat here, not driving it as he often did.



Pushing the beat
Matt Cameron

God level posts, LMS.

LetMeSleep wrote:

Mike wrote:Can someone with more drum knowledge than me talk about Jack's playing a bit or explain it to me? I like him a lot on the songs of his era but on older songs his playing can sound awkward to me. Where Dave sounded huge Jack sounds rather small and... dry? Does he have a unique drum set up? I think it's his snare that sounds very tight/dry to me. His drum sound does not have a lot of space/openness. Songs like Animal or Go have a weird quality to them when Jack is playing them.

Dave A had a lot of attack and wrist in his playing. He also had very tight snares. Jack is a lot looser in style and doesn't crack the snare as much. Additionally, he has a looser snare so it doesn't peak/attack as much. You can hear the same difference with RHCP listening to Jack versus Chad Smith.

Jack also doesn't push the beat like Dave A and Matt do. He sits on or behind the beat. One of the best drummer of this sort is Steve Ferrone. His work with Tom Petty and strangely Duran Duran on Notorious is a good example of this. When you hear Jack play Animal, Hail Hail, Last Exit etc, the drums don't push the song like when Matt or Dave A plays them.

Steve Ferrone is one of the best drummers ever. Period. He just oozes groove.

Fuck yeah wease.

Excellent posts, LMS.

The examples above get to the core of the discomfort I feel with Matt's drumming in Pearl Jam. They're simply a "behind the beat" kind of band in my head and Matt's playing simply doesn't feel or sound right to me in most cases.

It's interesting to contrast Matt Chamberlain's looser style of playing in Soundgarden when he temporarily filled in for Matt Cameron a few years ago due to conflicting Pearl Jam touring commitments*:




(* They definitely got this worked out all backwards, it would've made a lot more sense for Chamberlain to have stepped into Pearl Jam, but oh well.)

Last page of posts was stellar..Great insight, thanks!

LetMeSleep wrote:Fuck yeah wease.

Ferrone's work with Clapton back in the late 80s-early 90s is simply fantastic.

tragabigzanda wrote:Agree this has been a great recent run of posts. Just want to add that for Cameron, in addition to his ahead-of-the-beat timing, he also has an intentional choice (discussed in interviews) of always hitting his drums square in the center of the head, and with noticeable force. Very different from Jack who tended to finesse the outer edges of the rims.

Yeah I remember that. It was something that I tried hard to do early on. Now I adore hearing different rings of snare during a song.

That MC RITFW is almost comically fast.

tragabigzanda wrote:Agree this has been a great recent run of posts. Just want to add that for Cameron, in addition to his ahead-of-the-beat timing, he also has an intentional choice (discussed in interviews) of always hitting his drums square in the center of the head, and with noticeable force. Very different from Jack who tended to finesse the outer edges of the rims.

Always have to take care to finesse the outer edges

I played shine on you crazy diamond really loud in the house the other day and my kids loved it. Dance party.

Jack again on drums for some of the new Josh Klinghoffer album.

i only heard the first seconds of the songs, but it seems Jack is more into some kind of electronic drum beat kinda sound for some time...I remember feeling the same with his work with Lanegan.

Birds in Hell wrote:Jack again on drums for some of the new Josh Klinghoffer album.

Hey I like this