kids that are starting out nowadays are so lucky to have access to all these amazing videos. When I started, I would cut out all the exercises in Modern Drummer and put them in a binder. I would then spend the whole week practicising those. The internet now makes all this material so easily accessible, I wonder if people appreciate it as much. I mean, I cherished my latest issue of Modern Drummer like my life depended on it.
Yeah that's the thing, my generation has lost the appreciation for all the information that's been made accessible to us. Mostly, young aspiring musicians nowadays are kindof overwhelmed with the huge mountain of potential exercises and routes to explore. So it's a double edged sword. We might be learning a wider array of stuff, but at the same time we are less invested and don't dive into new material as deeply as musicians used to.
I would learn Stewart Copeland, Neil Peart, from watching early MTV. Drums set in front of the tele and pray to shame I could drop fills like the best. Fast forward 38 years and I have achieved, to varying levels, most of the MTV videos put out by these artists. Dont get me wrong. With age brings other influences to tackle. Namely. Bernie Purdie, Buddy Rich and The grinch that drummed Cream- Mr. Ginger almighty. May he rest peacefully on the ultimate drum throne in the sky!
Thanks for posting this. There was precious little coverage for drummers back then and many British drummers of a certain age will remember this rare example from the BBC.
Thanks so much for this and God bless Billy! I've been looking for it since the late '80s when my VHS got chewed up! Seeing this on BBC2 inspired me to take up drums.
I saw Billy play a clinic in Cols, OH when I was in my early 20s, some 17 years ago. He was at the local drum shop. I was just leaving with my new pails, my first "NICE" kit. He said "Nice pails kid". His clinic was awesome too... lol
Hot damn, listen to how well the kits are tuned. The sound of the skins alone is hypnotic before anyone else even plays a note. You can often tell a good drummer just as they are setting up because of this, before they even play one bar of a backbeat.
