"Ringo's underrated he has great rythm!!"

"He's overrated, he's not technical!!"

"He's okay."

 

But what do progheads think??

 

I personally think he is good for the 60's, but still isn't great or anything.

Just wondering what you thought!

("No, no I don't smoke it no more...". yuck.)

 

I put him, Charlie Watts and Kenny Aronoff in the same category.  No frills, and steady as a rock.

 

 

 

I'd say a good drummer,he did was needed for the songs.Having a complex drummer in the band probaly would of resulted in The Beatles being in a very different lime light to which we know now.Weather he was capable is a different matter.

Whats all this talk about "good for the 60s"?  What does that even mean?

 

But he was the luckiest man in the world, being a good/average drummer, he got the chance to join The Beatkles, where any drummer would had been millionare and famous.

 

Iván

 

He is the best drummer. He played in the best band with the best musicians, singers and song writers!!!

 

Can you really imagine Palmer, Peart, Bruford or ...playing in Beatles???

 

Are you talk to me ???  

 

I am a MAN not a Girl

 

"... the most technically gifted session drummer in the world would never have come up with those tom fills on A Day in the Life" - Phil Collins on The Making of Sgt Pepper.

 

Good point about Mr Moon. What would the very very Beatles-ish The Kids Are Alright have been like with Mr Starkey on drums? Not quite so good, I feel. What if Mr Starkey had done the Kenny Jones solo on Stewart's Losing You (live or studio). Shambolic as the Faces might have appeared, I'd go for KJ every time. Then there's Ian Paice, Bonham, even Micky Waller. As you say, not the right table for that discussion!

 

Uiii!!! I will go there NOW!!!

 

Sometimes I get stick (no pun intended) for agreeing with people in these forums but I'll acknowledge your point is correct. I guess I'm biased 'cos I loved Who/Faces/Kinks/Stones more than I ever did the Beatles. I'm not a drummer anyway - so what do I really know?

 

I'm sure that, unlike Ringo, I'm still happy to hand out my autograph. I never really foregave him for his Thomas the Tank Engine voiceovers anyway

 

 

 

 

 

 I have heard many drummers screw up his parts. That super group Dirty Mac drummer screwed up on "Yer Blues" because of the time changes in that song. No one seems to get Ringo drum part on "Come Together" right.  His drum solo on "Long Tall Sally" foreshadows Keith Moon by a year. Sorry much of Power Pop style of drumming can be traced to his early work like "Any Time at All" or the power drumming of "She Loves You" and "Slow Down".  He is not the best technical drummer but he was very influential.

 

 

That would of course be the late great Mitch Mitchell.

I hope that opinion's not based on Octopus' Garden.

 

You're correct Andy, although it is also said that George Martin didn't consider Pete Best to be good enough. Ringo was already known to the Beatles from Hamburg and had a reputation as the best drummer in Liverpool. If you look at any photos taken just after Ringo joined, you will see George Harrison has a black eye kindly donated by an irate Pete Best fan.

 

And in most other bands, too

 

Actually not wrong forum The Beatles are here. Probably the wealthiest drummer alive too.

 

 

 

I think the Stones are overrated. They were always miles behind the Beatles even Brian Jones was rumored to have wished to be with the Beatles because he liked what the Beatles were doing musically.  The Beatles certainly approached prog music and did with "A Day in the Life".  Musicologists complimented the Beatles use of subdominants, descending chromatics and rhythm.  Dylan, McGuinn, Richards, Garcia were all influence by the Beatles chord progression. So I this is bunk about the Beatles being more than teen idols.  The Stones were basically a derivative of Chuck Berry and Muddy Waters and if it was not the Beatles pushing them I doubt we would have heard "Paint It Black" or "As Tears Go By".

 

Robert Fripp on hearing the Beatles Sgt Pepper

Robert Fripp- When I was 20, I worked at a hotel in a dance orchestra, playing weddings, bar-mitzvahs, dancing, and cabaret. I drove home and I was also at college at the time. Then I put on the radio (Radio Luxemburg) and I heard this music. It was terrifying. I had no idea what it was. Then it kept going. Then there was this enormous whine note of strings. Then there was this colossal piano chord. I discovered later that I'd come in half-way through Sgt. Pepper, played continuously. My life was never the same again.

 

Now if the question is "Was Ringo a technical virtuoso, or a fusion drummer, or a complex drummer", well then, obviously, he wasn't.

As someone who can appreciate the perfection of minimalism, I have no problem proclaiming both Ringo and Billy Cobham to be great drummers. Just as I have no problem considering both Steve Howe and Johnny Ramone to be great guitarists.

 

That last paragraph sums it up for me too. I hope no-one brings up the juxtaposition theory with your particular examples, though. The mind truly boggles at the thought of Howe performing Cretin Hop... or Dear Johnny on Starship Trooper

 

A perusal of The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions (Holy Grail for 'Beatleoligists')  by Mark Lewishon will provide further enlightenment of just how indispensible the 'Be-Ringed One' was to the Fabs.

 

Extraordinary.....

Metronomes wish they could play like Ringo.  Also I'm pretty sure Ringo still drummed on that tune.  

 

Sorry, I meant to say Back in the USSR. Ringo couldn't get the drums to that, so Paul did it.

Read the credits section at the bottom of this.

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back_in_the_ussr - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back_in_the_ussr

 

There might be some truth to that, but in the book Beatlesongs (if you've ever read that), says that stuff was tense, but Ringo wasn't able to play what Paul wanted. I mean, if you listen to Band on The Run album by Paul, the drumming is honestly better than anything Ringo ever played. It's almost safe for me to say that Macca's a better drummer than Ringo.

 

I agree. His drum solo is really cool on The End, and keeps great rythm, but isn't Mike Portnoy or Carl Palmer either.

 

Would be very cool, but would you really want him as your drummer instead of technically capable drummers like Mike Portnoy, Nick D'Virgilio, Carl Palmer, or Alan White???

I believe Paul played the drums on Back in The USSR and Dear Prudence because Ringo had walked out of the band at this point.  I can't believe that Ringo wouldn't have been able to play either of those songs. I also don't believe that Macca is a better drummer, just listen to the clunky drumming in Dear Prudence.

Listen to Portnoy's drumming on the Yellow Matter Custard CD, he certainly doesn't add anything much in the drumming department, skilful drummer though he is.

 

Well, that's the thing he can play great, but with YMC, he wanted to keep it like the original versions without jazzing it up (which is fully capable of).

 

Quick, who was the drummer for Herman's Hermits?   Or for that matter the Kinks or Yardbirds?

 

I ain't sayin' the guy was the original incarnation of John Bonham, but please.

 

And screw what McCartney played or did not play, drum-wise, on the White Album.  

 

Warning sexist comment:  Ringo ended up with the best 'bird'.

 

 

 

 

IMO, the only one who plays in the same league nowadays is Mike Portnoy. I am not a huge DT fan, but I witnessed one of their concert in October 2007, and I was mostly looking at him because he is just fabulous.

I assume we're sticking to the boundaries of rock and roll here, correct?

And there is nothing wrong with 4/4.

 

He might have ended up with the best bird, but George wins in that department for his liaison with Patti Boyd = gorgeous in the extreme.

 

Get your serious point s too. I'm a massive Kinks fan, but without digging out CDs I can't remember if their drummer was Mick Avery or John Gosling - one of the two played bass and the other drums, but I can't immediately recall which was which!

 

Re McCartney and drums - Ronnie Wood plays drums on some of his solo stuff. Oh for Ringo!

 

I have heard that Ringo had a facility to play odd and unusual time signatures with ease. This pushed rock into uncharted territories heretofore unknown. For example, the 7/4 timing of "All You Need Is Love," or the  ” with repeating 11/8, 4/4, and 7/8 passages in the chorus. "Here Comes The Sun" and "Happiness is a Warm Gun".     Ringo’s proficiency in many differen styles such as two beat swing (”When I’m Sixty-Four”), ballads (”Something”), R&B (”Leave My Kitten Alone” and “Taxman”) and country (the Rubber Soul album) helped the Beatles to explore many musical directions with ease

 

No time signature is really that hard its just that we're beaten in the head with 4/4.  specifically we are beaten in the head with 4/4 and about one division of it "1, 2, 3, 4".  Nothing wrong with it, but its only easy if thats what you are familiar with.  Rock drummer from that time period certainly played 4/4 pretty much always because thats what the music was written in.  And plenty of prog drummers stick to 4/4.  

And again I assume when you mention drummers of the 50s and 60s you are strictly referring to a slew of rock and roll drummers, yes?

Oh my.  There have been so many more incredible Jazz drummers in that twenty year span that still have yet to be beat by any rockers!  Elvin Jones, Tony Williams, "Philly" Jo Jones, Jo Jones, Buddy Rich, Paul Motian, Jimmy Cobb, Art Taylor, Billy Higgins, Charlie Persip, Kenny Clarke, Roy Haynes, Max Roach, Sam Woodyard, Shelly Manne, Albert Heath, and Art Blakey just to name a few of the stand outs.  And these guys are dealing with a hell of a lot more than rock and roll guys than a matter of time signatures.

Correct, nothing is wrong with 4/4.  And the other time signatures aren't difficult either! They are all as easy as one another.

Big whoop!  

And considering my knowledge of drummers playing progressive rock music in different time signatures or for that matter sticking to just one is not encyclopedic I can't name one, but it is extremely likely there are several out there.  

Agreed. He was a standard drummer as far as ability goes.

 

Let's face it, none of The Beatles, with the possible exception of McCartney, would be considered at the top of the heap technically in terms of instrumental prowess.  As vocalists and songwriters it's another story.  So that must be why a bunch of incompetents came to be one of the most influential bands in rock history.

 

We could probably say the same of the Beach Boys, the Rolling Stones, and Bob Dylan (anyone here ever cringe at a Dylan harmonica solo?).

 

The point being it's not all about technique. 

 

 

 

 

He's a fine rhythm-keeper I think.

As a drummer, and as a BUFFER-MEMBER of the Beatles...

 

And, as I wrote on another thread, his drumming in the song "Rain" is awesome.

 

Excuse me... No need to shout.

 

I guess Ringo was a shock-absorber between the other three talents in The Beatles.