Early Access - YouTube Video AND Podcast - Keith Carlock and Ofri Nehemaya

Download the free transcription here.

Today we have a tale of two generations: one master at his apogee, one up-and-comer who’s already turning hears.

Keith Carlock is one of the most universally revered “drummer’s drummers”, and also one of the most unique. Like Brian Blade, Eric Harland, Nasheet Waits, Marcus Gilmore, and JD Beck, he has many “descendants”, but no fore-bearers who sound quite like him.

He’s been Steely Dan’s most long-running drummer since their original lineup (and maybe even including that - I didn’t look that second part up), but “true fans” will know Keith as one-third of the most interesting fusion trio of the early 2000s: that of Wayne Krantz, which often included Tim Lefevbre.

And Keith’s style is, in my opinion, one of the primary “tree trunks” in the style that became “New York fusion”, which includes Mark G, Nate Wood, Louis Cole (though he’s a west-coaster), Arthur Hnatek, and possibly Maison Guidry. Though these younger players have plenty of their own ideas, it’s hard to deny Keith’s DNA is in there.

All of which makes it ripe for a video. Because surprisingly, not much has been said about exactly what makes him unique. And this is a YouTube cliche, but some of the details may surprise you.

Ofri Nehemaya, for his part, is barely in his ‘30s, but has already played and toured with Shai Maestro, Aaron Goldberg, Avishai (Bass) Cohen (the same drum chair where Mark Guiliana got his first big break), and Gilad Hekselman. He’s also no stranger to bandleading, releasing a viral, self-produced, straight-to-YouTube single called Just Sayin at age…I think it was 19;)

Ofri has been on my radar since then, and I was excited to ask him about how he practices, how he channels flow, how he approaches moving to a new scene and “fitting in”, and more.

You’ll see in the opening minutes I’m trying to pull some practice details out of him, and he just wants to talk about flow state and making music, so we go in that direction.

(I still suspect he has some juicy shed secrets. Perhaps we’ll explore those in a Part Two.)

Couldn’t be more excited about a couple of bits of content, and hope you enjoy!

Early Access - Who Is The Greatest Jazz Drummer of All Time?

Today I thought we’d tackle something “light” and “easy”, which wouldn’t require a 25-minute video.

Just kidding. Let’s jump right in the deep end and attempt to answer who, among all the greats, is the singular GOAT when it comes to jazz drummers.

It’s not as easy a question as it seems, and it doesn’t even seem easy!

Do simply say it’s the drummer who’s reached the highest level of advancement? That would probably unfairly privilege modern jazz drummers. But they arguably had an easier job, since they could stand on the shoulders of their fore-bearers.

Maybe it’s the drummer who “ran the ball the farthest down the field” - i.e. advanced jazz drums the most relative to where they were before. That would necessarily favor the pioneers, because they had more “low hanging fruit”, and there was more “blue water” - a bigger canvas upon which to innovate, with less paint already there.

Or maybe it’s the outliers - those who were the most ahead-of-their time. That would favor those who took big leaps, and you could handicap it based on how set-in-stone the music of their era was.

It’s on this last metric where I think we get closest.

Anyway, I hope you’ll join me on this trip down memory lane, examining the contributions of some of the greatest jazz drummers in history.

And we’ll see if you agree with my conclusion at the end.

Know you’ll enjoy!

Early Access - Joshua Crawford on Pocket, Influences, and Influencer Life

Two years ago, I did a virtual drum shed with former podcast guest Raghav Mehrotra, the always-entertaining David Cola, and this week’s guest, Josh Crawford.

Josh, who rose to fame doing reaction videos to jaw-dropping drummers, is himself an elite player, and in this conversation I wanted to hear his opinions on both sides: becoming the player he is, and also influencer lyfe.

Josh is one of the most efficient players I’ve seen - he plays the most intricate stuff while expending a level of energy that looks more like he’s reading a newspaper. We get into some detail as I try to pick his brain about sticking and his approach to playing around the drums in general.

We also discuss the ever-present cold war of chops vs pocket, a subject on which Josh has dropped many-a-humorous-instagram voiceover - whether it’s Nick Canon footage from Drumline or Russell Croww and Denzel Washington - of famous movie characters “arguing” about pocket vs chops. When I pressed him on the subject, Josh had an unexpected take.

And of course we discuss the genesis of his internet fame, whether it was planned or serendipitous, and what he reckons he’d be doing if he hadn’t blown up on YouTube.

Joshua is both funny and insightful, which is why I have no double you’ll enjoy this little chat.

Early Access - Are We Learning Drum Hand Technique The Wrong Way?

Here’s your free study guide for download.

Suppose you were a space alien, dispatched from a highly-advanced-but-distant planet, to report back about the activities and goings-on of Planet Earth, and your particular assignment was humans playing the drums.

Just work with me here.

You might write a dispatch like this:

“Humans who 'play the drums' spend an enormous amount of time on elaborate hand rituals using what they call a 'practice pad', all the while telling each other these are necessary to play the drums, then shame each other from using any of them on the actual drums.”

And further…

"Based on the proportion of practice pad videos compared to everything else, learning these very specific pad exercises must be hugely important to playing what I want on the kit."

Of course I’m being cheeky, but spot the lie.

In this video, I begin with a slightly outrageous conceit - that perhaps the humble pad is popular for some other reason than its pure utility for increasing skill on the drum kit…

…then spend more than 2/3 of the video speaking about why, indeed, I think hand exercises are very important, probably to insulate myself from criticism, because that will work.

Then we delve into a few reasons why practice pad stuff being near-ubiquitous online and in books - instead of a very helpful sector of drum instruction - and I say this with the ultimate delicacy…

…might be out of proportion with its utility to play the drums better, if that was truly the goal.

Learn basic technique and/or drill a technique change: absolutely.

Play in low-volume environments, or when you otherwise can’t access the kit: 100%.

Use as its own fun, related passtime, closely-related to playing the drums, but not 100% the same thing, and sometimes a practice-time cannibal if time is ever scarce, as long as we’re being intellectually honest: definitely.

But use for an hour for warmup in the same room as the kit, when you’re already year into playing drums, and there are other, kit-related things that would probably help more in the same amount of time?

[eyebrow raise]

Anyway, I’m sure if I’m lucky enough for this video to make any impact, it will get me in no shortage of hot-water, and earn me comments like “dude doesn’t have singles like Gianluca Pellerito, and he’s talking about the practice pad.” And to some degree I’m signing up for it with the outrageous title and thumbnail.

I hope people will take the time to consider the arguments, however.

Enjoy this one!