awesome. And it was a great band, and the people loved that music and that band. And it was the first time since 1968, they had played together as Buffalo Springfield.
[ WM ] I saw them a lot. I was even at their final concert in Long Beach. And I mean, it was so emotional.
[ Joe ] That’ s amazing that you saw them live, because remember, we’ re in Ohio back then. They didn’ t travel to Ohio. To us, they were a West Coast group and good luck ever seeing them, because back in the day, tours weren’ t like that. I mean, the big bands traveled around, but they had just got started. And we’ ve just figured, well, we’ ll probably not get a chance to see‘ em live. But we really loved their music back here in Ohio. Like I said, I played in the band, they were called The Measles. It was actually one of Joe Walsh’ s earlier bands, and they were called The Measles. And we played, we did nothing but Buffalo Springfield.
[ WM ] That’ s amazing. Well, listen, I want to talk to you a bit about drumming here. I know that you and I both hear many young drummers today, and some of them are great, and some of them are seemingly playing a tom-tom fill for three minutes. What’ s your take on that? What are they missing?
[ Joe ] Yeah, I keep going back to Ringo and drummers like that who are musical. They play the song and not the chops. And I mean, the reason I work a lot with different bands is because of that. I’ ve done drum solos and who hasn’ t? And that stuff is, to me, it gets boring. It is cool for your peers and to show off your chops and all that sort of stuff, but every time you think you got great chops, some guy’ s going to show up and kill you. Right?
I’ ve always loved the drummers that play the song and that play the perfect part for that song. And it could be a hat and a kick and a snare, and that’ s it for the whole song. But it’ s perfect.
Joe with Ringo Starr
“ I keep going back to Ringo and drummers like that who are musical. They play the song and not the chops... The reason I work a lot with different bands is because of that... I’ ve always loved the drummers that play the song and that play the perfect part for that song.”
And Ringo came up with so many, I never was in a Beatles band or anything like that, but through the years, I’ ve sat in, played Beatles’ songs with different club bands or whatever, and I know all of Ringo’ s parts, like every drummer by now should know most of those parts. And when you play a Beatles’ song and you play what Ringo played, the way he played it, you start to realize what a genius he was. You don’ t look for chops or anything like that. That’ s not it. You look for the creative part that he came up with it.
And I loved the Young Rascals and Dino( Danelli), I loved it. He was such a pocket drummer. Of course, everything that Hal Blaine did and all the Stax and Motown guys. And then all of a sudden we’ re introduced to John Bonham and Carmine Appice, and that’ s a whole other level of energy that we never heard. And that got me involved in a double bass drum kit. And I did a lot of stuff like that with the early Joe Walsh stuff.
I tried to play and learn as many styles as I could. And I’ m very thankful for that because I
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