Big Drum Thump

Sad, sad day, fellow thumpers. Mitch Mitchell, the legendary skinsman behind Jimi Hendrix, is no more. He was found dead in a Portland hotel room earlier today. At this time, it appears the 61-year-old drummer died of natural causes, though an autopsy is planned. We’ll keep you updated as details become available.

Update [11/13/08]: The accolades for Mitch Mitchell are deservedly hitting the Web today. DRUM! has kindly posted a feature the magazine did on Mitchell in 1998. Modern Drummer also posted an excerpt about him from the “Drum Gods” series. Ratt drummer Bobby Blotzer remembers Mitchell here.

Update [11/14/08]: Matt Sorum also pays tribute to Mitchell.

Mitch Mitchell obituaries:

• BBC (includes a short video performance)
• The Guardian
• NME

Jimmy Carl Black, the original drummer in Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, died on Saturday at the age of 70. Cancer was the culprit. Along with stick wielding, Black also handled some vocals in Mothers. He continued to perform (and sometimes resort to “real” jobs) throughout his fairly long life.

It’s been a tough few days for all drummerkind. We almost lost Travis Barker this weekend, and sadly we did lose drumming legend Earl Palmer. After a “lengthy illness,” he died last Friday at his home in Los Angeles. Palmer is the guy you’ve heard a thousand times on hits by Little Richard, Fats Domino, B. B. King, and many others. Instead of reading any woefully inadequate eulogy we might cobble together, you should instead click over to Drummer Talk Dave’s four-part retrospective on Palmer. Along with providing a good bit of bio information, it traces Palmer’s musical legacy and in effect celebrates his life—an excellent tribute for a great drummer.

He manned the Replacements throne from 1990 to 1991, but now Steve Foley is no more. He died last weekend from a prescription drug overdose; he was only 49 years old. Doubly tragic, he’d also been working as a car salesman in Minneapolis before his death—no way for a brother thumper to spend his final days. Check out the MTV vid below for a little bit about the Replacements’ final year on the road and how Foley got the gig.

Jazz kat Bobby Durham succumbed to lung cancer on Monday. He was 71. Along with his trio work, Durham is best remembered for playing with Duke Ellington, Lionel Hampton, Oscar Peterson, and Ella Fitzgerald. He also had some flippin’-sweet skull warmers.

Daihachi Oguchi, the guru of contemporary taiko drumming, was hit by a car Thursday and died Friday of excessive bleeding. He was 84.

We here at BDT admittedly know precious little of the rich history of taiko (save of course that it must be hellaciously fun to whack ginormous drums with big sticks), but if the vid performance below is any indication, the fiery and loud-lunged Oguchi will be very much missed. We’re betting he didn’t go quietly into that good night.

[Update: His obit appeared today in the New York Times.]