K&S:  Ok, David, tell me a little bit about your current projects that you’re working on.

DR:  Well, right now, Pocket Full of Rocks, we just released our first major label project called “Song to the King”.  It’s very straightforward, simple drumming.  I get to do a few cool things on it, but for the most part, it’s pretty straightforward, radio-friendly type stuff.  But other than that, I’m getting to play with a few other artists, like Vickie Beaching, a rock guitar girl from England.  I’m getting to do that, and on the other forefront, I’m playing with a guy named B Wright, who’s a hip hop guy.  With him, I’m playing kick and snare drum, high hat, you know, and that’s it. 

K&S:  Kind of a “QuestLove” thing?

DR:  Yes.  Very much just keeping it in pocket kind of thing.  That and just doing some studio projects here and there, all different types of music.  It’s keeping me busy.  It’s fun because I’m getting the opportunity to do not just one thing.  I’m getting to play the rock stuff, the hip hop stuff, the contemporary stuff, you know, kind of everything in between.

K&S:  You mentioned something about some possible jingle business coming up out of Dallas.

DR:  I’ve done jingle stuff before with a company called TM Century out of Dallas who do a ton of jingles.  I’ve gotten to do the theme song on an O’Reilly’s commercial.  They do everything from local to national jingles and commercials, and so I’ve been called to do some projects.  Right now I’m just having to learn to get a little more tech savvy so I can start doing some of this from here in Nashville instead of driving to Dallas because I can’t really do that.  So, my next project would be to be able to get my own home recording gear and do the jingles here at the house and e-mail the files over.  The jingle stuff is a lot of fun because it’s very quirky.  It’s quick and it’s just fun, because you usually just go in, they kind of give you an idea and let you do what you do and just see if it sticks or not. 

K&S:  Have you found that the move from the Texarkana area up here to Nashville, with all of it’s supposed glamour, has been a major benefit?  Things like picking up more actual work in the drum business and that sort of thing, becoming more of a name.  How has it benefited you to actually be here versus where you were? 

DR:  Well, back at home, I stayed fairly busy, but it was just tough.  Back in Texas, it was hard to—I may have some gigs, but it was just hard to make a living.  I may play some stuff here and there, but it was just really tough.  I’ve gotten a couple of calls from Nashville before and they said “hey, we need you here today at noon,” and it’s a great session.  They’d call me at 10:00 in the morning and they’d need me here at 12:00, and I’m like, “I live in Texas”.  “Oh, never mind, we’ll call somebody else from now on.”  I would loose the opportunity because of where I lived.  So it’s just like anything, you’ve got to be close to where it’s at, because they may call you at a moment’s notice.  A lot of times I’ll be the fill-in guy.  Somebody has a drummer for a session or a live gig, the drummer may get hurt, they call, “Hey, can you fill in tonight?  It’s an emergency.”  If I’m here, I’m only twenty minutes away, and I can drive.  So, definitely, there are benefits, but it’s definitely not glamour.  I mean, it’s a lot of hard work, and moving to Nashville, it’s no different than being at home.  I’m just closer to where the music is at. 

K&S:  You have met some pretty big name musicians up here.  Are these guys a bunch of Rock Stars or are they just normal guys like you and me?  Let’s pull the plug on the sensationalism of actually being a Nashville musician.

DR:  Well, it’s definitely sensationalized.  We were talking earlier about VH1 and MTV and MTV cribs.  You know, you see these guys with these multi-million dollar homes and driving Bentleys and everybody’s taking care of everything for them.  There are those rare cases, but in general, that’s not what it is here.  I meet guys all the time, Chester Thompson for example.  He charges $50 a month for drum lessons.  He’s Chester Thompson.  He’s played with Phil Collins and everybody you can imagine, and he’s teaching drum lessons up the road and wears sneakers from Target, and you know, he’s just a regular guy.  He loves music and he’s making a living.  So it’s definitely sensationalized.  I used to have false images in my head of what it would be like to be here, and I moved here, and there for a few weeks, I was really impressed when I ran across somebody really well-known.  But when you start to get to know them, the more you realize they are no different.  You go to the studio and you see this famous female country star who shows up in her pajamas with no makeup and her hair is not brushed, and she’s holding her hand in front of her mouth cause she hasn’t brushed her teeth.  You know, you realize, wow, this person has made it and she’s done a lot, and she’s no different from us.  Her daughter is calling her while she’s recording, and she’s fighting back and forth with her daughter on the phone.  It’s just real life stuff.  It’s no different than anywhere else.

K&S:  Your studio work, let’s talk about that.  We were talking the other day about ghost drummers and ghost drumming, which just means people coming in and actually drumming on tracks where the actual bands musicians, even though they’re great musicians, don’t have quite the precision it takes to produce the quality recording or produce it in a timely manner in just a few takes.  Have you had the opportunity to come in and drum behind some guys like that? 

DR:  I’ve gotten one call to do that.  I’ve had some other opportunities that fell through but basically, a guy that’s a great drummer of this band, like I say, he’s a great drummer but he’s a live player.  When it came down to recording, it was just different, it’s a totally different thing than playing live.  So they called me in and I got a chance to go fill in, and then at that point, what I have to do is make that drummer feel very comfortable, because it’s very awkward for me, being the hired guy, to come in and replace another guy.  I mean, I could put myself in that position.  I can understand how awkward that would be.  But that happens all the time. Obviously, there are some guys here in Nashville that are the standard fill-in guys.  I’m definitely not one.  There are four or five guys here in Nashville that do probably 95% of all the work, and it’s not because there’s not other drummers around.  It’s just because those guys have proven themselves over time, and the producer knows if I call this guy, he’ll get it done in a snap.  So there’s a bunch of guys here in Nashville that do ghost drumming a lot.  But yes, I’ve gotten some calls for that kind of stuff.  I just have to be cautious, because you don’t want to step on anybody’s toes. 

K&S:  How has the building of your timekeeping, precision, and the less is more studio approach affected how you play and how you think on your feet live?  Good?  Bad?  In the middle? 

DR:  Kind of both.  Growing up, I think it was always about creativity.  I always wanted to be the drummer that was known for creativity.  I used to put saw blades and all kinds of neat stuff on my kit just have different sounds and experiment.  It was all about creativity and melodic drumming and that sort of thing.  Then I started getting into the studio scene years back, and I realized that it was all meat and potatoes—kick, snare, high hat, make it feel good.  So I spent a lot of time working on that.  Then I moved to here to Nashville and that’s 98% of what they want, if not 100% of what they want, meat and potatoes.  If you do anything else, it freaks them out.  So for me wanting to do real well here, I focused a lot on the meat and potatoes, and I’ve noticed that as I’ve done that, I’ve kind of let some of the creative elements behind.  So where I’m at now is trying to get back to square one.  I’ve worked hard on both.  So now I just need to be able to combine the two, be creative and do some neat stuff but yet still have the meat and potatoes- the back beat.  It’s just a whole new process for me because I went from one extreme to the other, and now I’m trying to bridge the two together. 

K&S:  Live and in the studio as well - click track.  Friend or foe? 

DR:  Very much a friend.  For me, it all started years ago because of the whole timing issue.  I just love good timing.  You don’t have to sound like a machine.  I don’t believe that either.  The music flows.  I mean, I listen to classical music and there are tempo fluctuations.  And in a live situation, there’s sometimes that emotion of music.  But in general, I love somebody that has great solid feel and time.  So what I started doing to help out was to sleep with my metronome on.  What I would do is set it on 120 beats a minute and sleep with it playing in my ear for about six weeks.  And then lower it to 80 beats a minute and sleep with it a month or six weeks.  Basically what happens is a subconscious thing.  It’s like when you’re asleep and somebody’s in your house cooking early in the morning, maybe cooking breakfast, you’re sound asleep but may have a dream about eating breakfast even though you’re asleep because you smell everything and it’s a subconscious thing.  It works the same with the metronome.  After doing this for a few years, I could hear 120 and play right along.  I mean, it would be live and I hear it in my head because I’ve listened to it so much in my sleep.  So that gives me six to eight hours a night of practicing to a click without having to do a thing.  I just turn it on and go to sleep.  And so that has been something subconsciously that’s allowed me to play with a click, and I’m to the point now that I can kind of play around the click and weave in and out, and I know exactly where we’re at.  But it’s taken years to do that. 

K&S:  I’ve never heard that approach before.  I’ve heard a lot of things, but that’s the first time I’ve heard that. 

K&S:  In the studio you can get second chances but live, if you’re playing to a loop or you’re trying to keep in sync with a particular video or something like that and you’re playing to a click, you don’t really have any chance for redemption. 

DR:  Right. 

K&S:  So, have you done much live work with a click?

DR:  Very much so.  I’ve done tons of tracks and loops, and that’s where the real test is.  Like you said, it’s live.  In Pocket, we don’t normally use tracks, but after we did the album, we had some strings and percussion stuff in the background, and as long as I’ve been playing to a click, it kind of made me nervous at first.  It was like “Ah, I hope we can pull this off,” because there was no chance live to redeem myself.  I had one chance.  I was going to push play and it had to be right.  It’s a lot of fun.  I love playing to the click.  It’s a lot of fun to me now.  I don’t like playing without one. 

K&S:  What kind of practice click mechanism do you use? 

DR:  I’m using a Tama Rhythm Watch.  It is real simple and easy to operate.  I had a little drum machine at one point, but I’m not a very technical kind of guy.  You just have to make a habit out of it.  It takes a little discipline, but it’s just a habit.  I mean, literally everywhere I go, I have my metronome in the van or somewhere close by.  Every time we go to a hotel, you can ask my guys, I have my metronome in my hand everywhere I go.  And there’s nothing special on my part.  It just took some discipline, because I want to do it.  It’s just as simple as keeping it around. 

K&S:  I remember you telling me some time ago that you carry your drumsticks around just to keep the feel of things when you are not able to set up a kit and practice. 

DR:  Right. 

K&S:  You know, just keeping that feel and that idea with you, when you’re watching TV or something.  What other kind of things do you do to stay inspired? 

DR:  To stay inspired?  I just love music.  I’m always looking for something new and looking for people who can show me something new.  I mean, whether it’s somebody who’s just started playing drums or whether it’s a Dennis Chambers level player, I’m always looking for somebody that can have a challange for me. 

K&S:  So you can learn from all levels.

DR:  I can learn from all levels, and I’ve even learned from students that just started playing drums, they were playing for a week.

K&S:  Watch out, you guys, because David Rollins is trying to steal your licks.

DR:  That’s true.  You better watch out because I’ve got lots of licks that I’ve gotten from beginner students and stuff that they do—they didn’t think it was anything technical.  It’s just something that they sat down and was just messing around with, and to them it was just normal.  I think all of us have some things like that, that just kind of naturally come out, and for me it was like “Oh my gosh!”  I’d give away free drum lessons because I’d end up sitting there learning their licks, and teach them for free the next week.  So I’m just always looking to learn something.  And again, that’s really nothing on my part.  I just love music, and I want to be the best I can be and learn the best I can, and at the end of the day, that’s just it.  I just want to be good at what I do.  And I’m not trying to compete with anybody.  I want to be the very best me I can be, and if at the end of the day people like it, great.  If they don’t like it, great.  I’m just going to do what I do and do the very best I can at it. 

K&S:  How do you maintain that excitement about playing, you know, the privilege of being able to do it versus it being what you’ve got to do? 

DR:  Well, I’ve been on all sides of it, and for ten years of it, just in one band, struggling to make it.  I’ve been, I mean, financially just at the very worst you could possibly be, but there was always something in me driving, it’s like “I want to do this regardless of how hard it gets.”  I’ve always had that.  So, the fresh part for me just comes from that fact that I just love what I do.  I mean, it blows my mind when I hear these guys that say, “Oh, I’ve got to go play another gig,” and they’re just bored with it.  I got a call a while back to go play djembe for 20 people.  It was four songs, and I was like, “Oh my gosh, I’m so excited to do this.”  And they were looking at me like I was crazy.  I just love the opportunity, because there are people everywhere that are not getting the opportunity, and now that I’m here getting to do even bigger things, I remember the hard times and I remember when 10 people would show up to a gig and we were excited about it.  That’s just stuck with me.  So coming up here, it’s just a privilege.  I don’t have to do what I do, I get to do what I do.  It’s not like it’s a chore for me to go get my drums.  I don’t have to go play drums.  I get to go play drums.  I get to go do what I love to do.  It’s not a chore.  Gosh, man, I’ll just be sitting here at the house and obviously I have to make a living, but man, I’ll set up my drums in the house and my wife’s at work, and I’ll just play for four hours because I love doing it.  Even if I’m not practicing, I just want to play.  So, I really don’t know how to keep that, it’s just there because I just love it.  I always have. 

K&S:  Well, tell me about life on the road a little bit, because you’re kind of in and out.  You’re in for a couple of days, and so we’re here doing this.  But then tomorrow morning, you’ll be heading out, a few dates to go play.  It’s actually going to bring you down to Shreveport.  I won’t be there for that. 

DR:  Yes, sir.  Back on home turf.  Once again, it’s a blast cause I get to play music.  Honestly, the road part of it, now that is tough.  I’ll just be honest.  The music part of it is not hard at all.  I mean, I’ll load in at 3:00 in the morning and set my drums up and do sound check at 4:00 in the morning, whatever.  But traveling from location to location, it can get you to the point sometimes where you don’t know where you’re at and you’re getting an hour and a half of sleep.  You saw me get up late today cause I didn’t get any sleep the night before. 

K&S:  But there are guys out there who probably think that because you’re in a band that’s made it, which to them the definition means you’ve recorded an album under a label, that now you’re in a tour bus with roadies and all the perks.  That’s really one percent of what’s really going on in the musical world.

DR:  Yes.  Very much.  There’s some established artists here in Nashville, some fairly well established artists, that it’s night after night, a van and a trailer, just like us.  And so it goes back to what I said earlier about the false reality thing.  It’s a lot of hard work.  I get to do what I love to do, and that sounds all glamorous and good, and it is fun.  I mean, I’m so thankful.  But it’s a lot of no sleep, driving all night long…

K&S:  You’re driving your own van, so your band mates are going to come over here in the morning and you’re all going to take off in that van and trailer parked right out front of your house here?

DR:   1100 miles tomorrow.  Load in at 8:30 the next morning. 

K&S:  And everything always goes peachy on these trips, right?  There’s never any kind of problem, no adversity. 

DR:  Well, you stick five guys in a van and you’re always asking for trouble.  You know, just a couple of weeks ago I was heading to Pennsylvania and we stopped to get gas and look at the front tires.  The front tires were solid metal all the way around on both sides.  So we had to pull over.  It took three hours and $600 to put commercial tires and fix the front end.  Put us late for our gig, and we spent money that we really didn’t have.  Thank God for management.  But, you know, talk about glamour, I was definitely brought to reality a few weeks ago.  We got to play with Third Day in St. Louis, Missouri, and management had rented us a bus.  It’s a brand new 2006 Prevost bus.  It’s like “oh wow,” so excited.  We get on this bus and there’s twelve bunks and each had it’s own television and climate control.  You know, I get on the bus and don’t have to drive.  I just get in my bunk and turn on the TV and turn my air conditioner on and fall asleep.  I sleep seven or eight hours on the bus, wake up at the event, get up and do sound check.  The event went well, it was great.  I got back on the bus for eight hours, slept all the way like a baby.  It was more comfortable than my own bed.  I mean, it was just crazy.  Get back in town, come home and take a shower, get ready to drive for the next event, get in our van, it overheats so I am stuck on the side of the road and walking half a mile with a bucket to go get water for my van.  So it’s like back to reality.  So you have some moments where it’s like great, but at the end of the day, I’m still driving the purple van, and hoping it won’t break down.  The bus was just a favor, so that was a once in a lifetime deal.  I say that, I don’t know, maybe one day we’ll get a bus.  Once again, it was just back to reality.  It was three hours later after I get off this nice bus, and I’m stuck on the side of the road, walking half a mile, sweating to death. 

K&S:  How do you balance—you’ve got a family, you’ve got a wife and you’ve got four children.  Being a musician and saying I’m going to take this chance and I’m going to move up to Nashville to do this—I’m already doing it for a living but I’m going to it for a living up there, and having a wife that says “yes, when are we leaving?”  Tell me about the blessing of having that kind of situation, that kind of family, that kind of spouse. 

DR:  Well, I couldn’t do it if I didn’t have my wife’s blessing.  I mean, it would be just too stressful.  You know how it is.  Musically when you’re stressed out, you can’t play right, and that’s a whole other sermon all by itself, but my wife is—I’m just blessed with a wife who’s like, you know, “ok, you’ve got to go on the road for a week, I’ll see you later, go do what you do, I’m supporting you,” and she’s pushing me to go do what I do because once again, if I’m doing what I’m doing, it makes me happy and at the same time I get to provide for my family, and it gives an opportunity for her.  She works for management; she works in the industry, so it reciprocates even to her.  And the good thing about being able to do this full time is that when I’m home, I get to be home.  You know, if I’m off the road for two weeks and I don’t have a session lined up, I get to spend time with my family for two weeks, every day, all day, and so I make up for it in that sense.  Yeah, I have to be gone a lot, but when I’m home, I get to be home.  And so, I’m blessed to have her support.  I make up for it in the end, of being gone.  You can’t put a dollar figure on doing what I love to do.  I talk to people all time who make good money and have worked at jobs for 30 or 40 years, that made a good living, did fine, got by, everything was great, and now they’re older and looking back, “Well, I wish I would have done this or I wish I would have tried this when I was younger.”  I don’t want to be that guy that looks back and I wishes I would have done something different.  I want to give it all I’ve got.  God forbid, if I failed at it, at least I can say I tried.  I would rather move here and fail than wonder the rest of my life what could have happened.   You never know until you give it a shot.  And it’s not for everybody at all.  Just because you have a dream to do something doesn’t mean you’re supposed to do it.  Just because you’re talented with something, doesn’t mean that’s your calling.  But for me, that’s what I’m supposed to be doing, and I’m going to do it until I can’t do it anymore. 

K&S:  Well, you’re definitely a hardworking guy, and I believe that you came by every bit of it honestly.  You’re pretty much a fully endorsed guy, so you’re getting a full ride where a lot of guys that aren’t well known don’t get full ride.  They get deep discounts and still have to shell out a little bit of money; the two major things being drums and cymbals.  Let’s talk about that a little bit. 

DR:  I’m using Taye drums.  I’m using their studio maple series.  Incredible drums.  Seven-ply, Canadian sugar maple, real thin rigid shells, so they resonate, real deep low end.  They record phenomenally.  I’ve had producers here in town, bigger producers, that ended up using my kit on some of their projects ans they can choose any brand they want to record with.   It’s subjective.  Really, with drums, it’s all opinion, what you like.  Because these days you have to make a good product in order to compete, but for me, Taye drums are the way to go.  I’ve had producers that are just blown away by them. 

K&S:  How did you get with Taye? 

DR:  I was doing a deal with the Percussive Arts Society, I guess over five years ago in Dallas, and just happened to walk by this booth, and I saw Ray Ayotte.  Ray Ayotte is very much a hero of mine.  I’ve always wanted to meet him.  I met him and sat down at a drum set and started playing on it and fell in love with this kit.  We got to talking and I’m playing on another kit, and we got done talking and he said “Hey, I want to talk to you about doing a deal.  I want you to meet me in Anaheim, California, for the NAMM show.”  And of course, I’m excited and just blown away.  Anyway, I come home and my wife and I get to talking and I’m like “I can’t afford a plane ticket just to fly to L.A. not knowing what this is even about.”  So I was a little bummed out about it, and that night I was praying, “God, if this is meant to be, make something happen.”  And the very next day we got a call from Bakersfield, California, to book our band to come play and it happened to be the same weekend as the NAMM show. 

K&S:  So you were already going that way.

DR:  Already going that way, so I went by the NAMM show, talked to him, played on a couple of kits, and gave him a demo.  He disappeared for about thirty minutes, and he came back and said “welcome aboard, we’ll call you in two weeks”.  Two weeks later they called and asked me what I wanted so I ordered a kit.  I just have a good relationship with Ray and the team over at Taye, and next thing you know I was hooked up with Sabian and got real close to the people there.  It’s more about relationships than anything.  It’s 95% relationship.  I mean, obviously, they’re not just going to give away their gear. 

K&S:  Did the Taye deal have anything to do with Sabian?  Did you get a recommendation from them? 

DR:  Yeah, Ray Ayotte, once again, based on my loyalty to Taye and being out playing all the time, and getting close and having that relationship aspect, he walked me over to the Sabian booth and said “hey man, take care of this guy, he’s one of our endorsers.”  And Sabian gladly did it, and once again, it was based on the relationship.  That’s the same way here in Nashville about getting work, it’s all based on relationships.  Obviously, you’ve got to be able to play, but there are players all over here that can play circles around any of us, that won’t ever get any work because of their attitude and being hard to work with.  They’re not relational type people.  So it really does boil down to being a people person and being able to just make that connection to people. 

K&S:  What do you think of all the new innovations in the drum industry? 

DR:  I hear a lot of guys that are into vintage drums, and I love vintage drums myself, there’s a sound to them, but drums really are made so much better today than they’ve ever been.  Understand that in another sixty years, the drums of today will be vintage drums.  And so, as much as I love the old stuff, the new stuff is just made so much better.  I think there are a few gimmicks out there and there are a few things, a few products that are made that you really can’t make any better, they’re just making it because they can, but for the most part, most of the engineering is legit.  I see a lot of gimmicks in guitar magazines and other things, and like I said, there are a few drum magazines, but I’ve seen a lot of improvement with the way toms resonate and the way they’re making shells—thin, thin shells without reinforcing hoops that are stronger than old drums with reinforcing hoops.  Just the way they are making things.  At this day and time, like I said earlier, it’s really a subjective thing.  You can pick brand ABCDEFG and you’re going to get a good product, and so it’s just a matter of your taste.  You have to make a good product these days in order to survive, and so they push each other.  If this company wants to survive, they have to make a product that is just as good if not better than their competitor.  Otherwise, they’re not going to make it.  So, they’re pushing each other to raise the quality of the product. 

K&S:  Yeah. 

DR:  That’s why I went with Sabian cymbals.  There are a lot of great cymbal companies out there.  And once again this is just my opinion, but Sabian is just one of those companies, that’s why I love them so much, they’re so innovative.  It seems like every two months they’ve got a new product.  They’re a company that’ll listen to drummers.  A drummer can talk to them and say “hey, can you take a 16 inch crash cymbal and flange the edge and put a ribbon in the bell,” and this, that and the other, and they’ll give it a try.  Where there are a lot of companies that won’t do that.  That’s one of the reasons I went with Sabian, because they’re innovative.  They don’t just make their standard products.  They’re always pushing the envelope trying to make better products and make more innovative, creative products.  So I like to go with companies that are always pushing things, not just making the same things that they’ve made forever. 

K&S:  You’ve got kind of an inventive mindset.  Kind of like me...  Always trying to think of a way to accomplish some kind of an idea or rig something up so you can make something work. 

DR:  Yeah. 

K&S:  I guess you would make as good a drum tech as you would a drummer. 

DR:  I’d love to tech.  I think it’s great. 

K&S:  Let’s talk a little bit about advice, advice that you might have for some other guys, younger guys, just whoever that’s out there, who may find themselves getting a little discouraged about the music industry or in general. 

DR:  First off, not everybody, and this is an encouragement, not everybody is called to do this full-time.  There are a lot of guys who work jobs that love to do this, and they’re getting an opportunity to play, and that’s great.  But for those who are looking to do this full-time, they just need to evaluate and look at the reality.  Are they willing to go through some tough times.  It’s very rare that somebody just does something overnight.  I’ve been doing this a long time, and it’s been a tough journey.  It’s taken a long time to start paying off.  So, you got to kind of evaluate things.  It’s easy to have big dreams, and we should have dreams and we should follow our dreams, but we really have to look at the reality and see if you’re willing to go on the road for a while and not make much money or eat the Raman noodles and Pinto beans because there’s nothing else.  You know, that’s not a discouragement at all, I just want to have people who want to do this see reality.  It’s not that way for everybody.  Sometimes things happen quicker for others, but for me, I’ve had to reassess why I do what I do.  At the end of the day, I just love it.  The advice would be take lessons, become the best you can be, don’t try to be somebody else, be the best you can be.  It’s like having a fingerprint.  Nobody else has your fingerprint.  You do what you do and be the very best at what you do.  That’s what’s going to get you work in the long run.  People don’t hire me because they think I sound like Abe Laboriel Jr. or because I sound like this other person.  They hire me because they want what I do.  And same way with them, they’re going to hire them because of what they do.  I can’t do what they do.  I can’t do what you do.  Because what you do is unique and special.  So, become the best you can be.  Be teachable.  I’ve been doing this a long time, and I’m about to start taking lessons again, and I’m still studying.  Producers tell me “oh, I don’t like this, try this,” and it’s totally out of my normal box, but I’m going to try it because I’m teachable.  So you’ve got to be teachable. 

K&S:  Who are you thinking about taking lessons from?

DR:  I’ve been talking to Chester Thompson.  I was actually supposed to start a while back, and we’ve met, but I didn’t get to go too far on it.  But I’m taking online lessons and talking to a bunch of drummers.  I’ve got some drummers and friends in town who will come over, set up drum kits, and just kind of share ideas.  So that’s really close to lessons.  I think everybody really needs a mentor, somebody that can give them specific things to work on. 

And I want to be that guy in another 10 or 15 years who will take lessons, and put your pride aside, become best you can be. 

K&S:  Well, I think there’s a big difference between having a live person there to coach or mentor you or whatever the case is.  They may not necessarily be better than you at some particular thing, but that coaching mentality—they can give that outside ear and say okay, try this approach or that approach.  It’s invaluable.  There are a lot of lessons in Modern Drummer magazine and online, and they’re written transcriptions and they don’t get you the feel.  It’s just written and you’re like okay, I can read this, but I’m not sure I’m doing it right.  I want to watch somebody play this and see what their body language is even like. 

DR:  Exactly.  Well, that’s what having a coach is all about… they can help prevent bad habits.  It’s much easier to prevent a bad habit than it is to relearn something.  I’ve got little tricks and things I do that are actually hindering some other things, and I’ve been doing them for so long I’m having to relearn a few things and break some bad habits.  Where, if I had learned it right to begin with –

K&S:  Give us an example of that. 

DR:  Take fills and tom patters for example.  I think we all to a degree have a certain starting place when we fill.

K&S:  It’s what you call your go-to fill. 

DR:  My go-to fill and that sort of thing.  Just some habits.  Maybe even ways I set up my drum kit.  Years ago I thought it was fine but realized it was hindering certain things, so I set up my drum kit differently, more ergonomic.  Everything’s very accessible, and it changed my playing.  But I had to relearn some things.  Posture is another good one.  I’m not as young as I used to be, and I see a lot of guys now hunched over playing, not realizing that in another 10 or 15 years they’re going to be feeling that in the back.  So something I’ve really worked on is sitting up against the wall.  I haven’t thought of it today obviously, but when I play, I’m very conscious of my posture, because I spent 10 years of my life not really focused on posture.  I was worried about playing.  I didn’t realize that posture affected my playing.  If you have good posture, you’re going to be freer.  Your limbs will move easier.  Like I said, having a coach there will definitely make keep you accountable if nothing else. 

K&S:  Some of the biggest names in the business have gone back to some degree to get coaching from a teacher.  They’ve taken what you would consider lessons.  A lot of guys won’t take lessons unless they honestly feel like that the person they’re taking lessons from can just blow them away.  If they feel like they can do anything their teacher can do they don’t feel like the teacher has anything to offer, and I believe that’s a mistake. 

DR:  I agree.  You have to be teachable, but you also have to be confident in what you do.  And there’s a difference between confidence and arrogance.  But if you want to be good at what you do, be confident in what you do.  You’re not going to hire a painter to come paint your house and he says “I hope I can paint it.”  You want somebody who knows they can do a good job.  So you have to be a confident drummer because that’s what’s going to get you work.

K&S:  Dave, Steve and Neil did it.

DR:  They all got to study with Freddy Gruber and I actually had the opportunity to study with him one time.

K&S:  Freddy Gruber? 

DR:  Freddy Gruber.  He’s a quirky little guy, but he definitely thinks outside the box.  Even though he may seem a little strange to some people, he’s really a sweet guy.  It’s funny because he’s not—this is what is so crazy.  He’s not really much of a drummer.  He can play, but he’s not really much of a drummer.  You got Steve Smith and all of these guys going to him, which shows the whole coaching thing.  He thinks in a way that drummers can draw from him.  He teaches in a way that’s not scientific as much as it is natural teaching. 

K&S:  Your top 3 favorite drummers. 

DR:  Number one is Jeff Porcaro.  Jeff Porcaro has always been a hero of mine.  As a matter of fact, he’s just the man to me.  It’s really sad that he’s gone.  Even in Nashville, I’ve heard a lot of stories about him.  He was a great player.  What I’ve heard from producers who have worked with him said, “He was a great drummer but man, he sure was a great guy to work with.”  I hear that about him, so he wasn’t only a great drummer, he was one of those guys that people liked to work with him.  He was easy to work with.  He was teachable.  He’d go in and if somebody didn’t like something, they would tell him they didn’t like it.  I guess like all of us, he’s had some run-ins with people, but he was just a great guy and an honorable drummer.  His shuffle stuff alone...  What drummer hasn’t tried to mimic Jeff Porcaro.  Come on. 

K&S:  Number two?

DR:  Steve Gadd.  Talk about feel.  Steve Gadd can groove like nobody.  I saw him with James Taylor, and he’d do these patterns that seemed so simple.  As a matter of fact, you need to pick up the October Road album by James Taylor.  To me, that’s some of his best drumming.  And some of the stuff sounds so simple.  Even my wife was like, “Honey, he’s your hero.  You can play that.”  And it’s funny to me because I sat down and tried to play some of that stuff and couldn’t even figure it out.

K&S:  You’ve got that trained ear though.  You were hearing the embellishments and the stuff he was doing. 

DR:  And I sat down and tried to play it, some of the stuff that seemed the most simple on that album, and I still haven’t figured it out.  And it’s nothing technical.  There’s just this feel that he has that’s like nobody else.  And he’s also a very humble—very successful but humble guy.  So, gosh, Steve Gadd!

K&S:  Number three? 

DR:  Number three, that’s a toughie.  I hate to sound cliché, but I guess I’ll say Steve Smith.  And the reason is he’s a great phenomenal drummer.  He can play everything from rock to the most hard core jazz, but he’s one of those guys whose been playing and has proven himself and yet he’s still always learning and studying and asking questions and, you know, if he finds out that what he’s been playing for the last ten years is harder than this way, he’ll change the way he plays.  And he’s always trying to grow and learn and change.  To me, I’m looking at him and asking what else can you learn.  How better can you be.  But he’s one of those guys that’s willing to do that.  I want to be that kind of guy. 

K&S:  Yeah.  He’s made some marked improvements, though, if you look back at some of the early video tapes or you look at his VHS set when he had the two of them through DCI.  Just his playing back then versus now and the direction that he’s gone in with it. 

DR:  He’s one of those guys that can play all those different styles of music and still make it believable.  There’s a lot of guys that can play the technical aspects of different styles of music, but it would sound like a rock guy playing jazz or a jazz guy playing rock.  Whereas with Steve Smith, he could play these different styles of music and actually make it sound like that’s just what he does.  It’s not like a rock guy trying to play jazz.  He sounds like a jazz guy when he’s playing jazz.  When he was playing with Journey, you’d never have guessed he was a jazz guy.  Just the way he held sticks and a few things.  But he sounds like a rock guy playing with Journey. 

K&S:  I’m going to let you squeeze one in, an alternate. 

DR:  An alternate.  I’ll say Abe Laboriel Jr.  Again, he’s just a great guy.  I got to talk to him some and he’s just a real nice guy.  I mean, he’s a power house. 

K&S:  He’s a big guy. 

DR:  He’s a big guy. 

K&S:  A big drum set.

DR:  A big drum set.  The man, he’s not Steve Smith when it comes to technical stuff.  The guy can hold his own obviously doing the technical stuff.  But man that guy’s just meat and potatoes and hits with authority.  He’s not necessarily a loud player but he’s very confident and a very forceful player. 

K&S:  I’ve always tried to explain the difference between volume/velocity versus playing fat. 

DR:  Yeah. 

K&S:  Playing fat is something Daniel Nelson does.  He’s not necessarily swinging from the bleachers, but his groove is fat and it’s undeniable.  When you hear him playing a Prince song and singing along with it, it’s like his pocket gets that much deeper when he’s singing along with it.  It’s just fat.

DR:  Well, there’s something to be said about that.  I mean, I love the Steve Smiths and the Dream Theater stuff and all the real complex drumming.  I love all that.  But there’s something about being able to just bob your head when you hear a song.  And when you see somebody like Abe who just, man, big drums, big guy and just plays forcefully, and he’s just all meat and potatoes, but he’s one of the number one LA guys right now.  He’s demanding—he gets more calls than just about anybody else right now.  He’s the hot guy.  He’s playing with Paul McCarty and man, he’s just breaking it up. 

K&S:  Well, everybody’s got their place, that’s for sure. 

DR:  That’s the whole thing about being yourself.  Yes, I’m going to grow and get better, but I have things that I do that are just kind of my own deal.  You know, I played at this festival this weekend and I saw this guy that was eight years younger than myself, an unsigned man, whatever.  This guy sat down and just ripped it to shreds.  I mean, I was just like hanging my head, just going “Oh my gosh,” you know, and this guy saw me play.  I was kind of just humbled, very much so.  And I’ve got the guy coming over to me, he’s like “Man, how’d you play that groove on that Beautiful song you did?”  And I need to asking this guy how he did half of what he did, and the guy comes over to me, he’s three times the player, and he comes and asks me “How did you do that groove?  What’s the thing that you did?”  So I had to go show him this thing.  I just want to do what I do.  If you like what I do, then that’s great and I hope you hire me.  If you don’t like what I do, that’s fine, you know, but I’ve just got to do what I do. 

K&S:  We all know that you’re out to steal everybody’s licks. 

DR:  That’s right.  You watch out.  Chad Alexander, you better watch out. 

K&S:  Who in Shreveport do you want to holla at?

DR:  Daniel Nelson, he’s a beloved friend.  I love him closer than a brother.  I’ll do anything for him.  He’s just a phenomenal friend and one of the best drummers I know.  You want somebody that can groove with the best of them, you got Daniel Nelson.  And you’ve got Chad Alexander, a guy who studied technique out the whazoo who can do some rudimental chops that’ll just blow your mind.  So those are two of my real close compadres back in Shreveport. 

K&S:  Any bass players you want to holla at in Shreveport?  Any guys that you played with there? 

DR:  Oh yea.  Gray Schuler, good ol Gray.  A phenomenal bass player and he’s also a great songwriter.  He sings country music.  Kind of a different thing than what he did when I played with him.  I actually played on his country project.  Great songwriter, great bass player.  Love those guys. 

K&S:  Shreveport has some hidden talent tucked away down there. 

DR:  What’s great about it is it’s not a competition thing.  I mean, I’m trying to get Daniel Nelson to move here.  I want him to succeed.  It’s not a competition.  We’re all in this together.  It’s different with drummers.  I don’t know what it is.  It’s more like a brotherhood.  It’s not a competition.

K&S:  I’ve heard that before. 

DR:  There’s plenty of work for us all to do our thing.  If I couldn’t make a gig for something, I’m going to call Daniel Nelson, and I’m not worried about him taking my place.  He’ll do the job.  I’ve gotten jobs before for stuff and I make a phone call. 

K&S:  It’s guys like him up there that manage to keep their calendar pretty full and they’re doing multiple things.  Just kind of first call guys as far as the live stuff goes.  Before we finish, tell us how you started playing?

DR:  Well, I grew up around it.  My dad was a phenomenal player growing up.  I didn’t really get serious about drumming until I was about 13 though.  I was always banging on stuff and playing, but I was playing other instruments.  I guess I was probably 12 or 13 and my dad gave me his Ludwig Vistelite kit.  It was like a smoky gray, black kit, five-piece kit.  And he gave that to me and started me off showing me some simple things.  And the week that I got the drums it just clicked.  It was like this is what I want to do.  I’ve always wanted to make music.  My whole life I’ve wanted to play music and do that.  But when it became the drumming thing, it was like this is what I want to do, the week I got the drums.  So I went out and borrowed money from my parents and bought every drum related magazine and everything I could find, lesson books and VHS tapes and everything I could find, and just started studying it.  There was nobody where I lived that really played other than my dad and he was working all the time.  So he would show me some stuff here and there, but I’d lock myself in my bedroom with a VCR and for hours just learn stuff.  For me, I was disciplined with it because I just had to do it.  It was great because my parents were gracious — my room was right behind the living room and it would be ten o’clock at night and I’d be banging away, and they’d just close the door to my room and just let me do it because they knew how much I loved it.  So I had very supportive parents.  I just had a love for it.  Like I said, from the week I got the drums, this was what I wanted to do.  Since then, I’ve never let go of that. 

K&S:  What was your first paying gig? 

DR:  My first paying gig was—it’s funny cause I actually got paid for this.  I played for my dad’s band on a Jerry Lewis telethon and it was my very first gig and they paid me like twenty bucks to just come fill in.  I got to play a few songs and my dad stepped out and I got to fill in for him. 

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