Well, Zak Starkey is definitely not manning the Oasis throne any longer (though we still don’t know if he was booted or jumped off), and the brothers Gallagher have wasted no time in announcing a replacement—Chris Sharrock.
…Who the hell is he? Sharrock is none other than the drummer who until a few days ago had spent over a decade backing up Robbie Williams. And just who the hell is Robbie Williams? He’s that Brit dude who did “Angels” way back in 1997 and still makes a good number of 30-something Continental hotties swoon.
Because Oasis still makes only a small number of 30-something music geeks swoon, we’re not terribly sure Sharrock made the right decision. (A side note more interesting than the actual news item: swiping Sharrock is apparently quite a catty coup for Noel Gallagher, who once called Williams “the fat dancer from Take That.”)
We’re sorry to report that Lit drummer Allen Shellenberger has been diagnosed with a brain tumor. Test results and his prognosis are all pending at this time. The band has released the following statement on its MySpace page:
We are sad to have to be writing you all this letter. Our brother, Allen Shellenberger, is currently in the hospital undergoing testing and treatment for a brain tumor that was just discovered. We are still not sure what his prognosis is and we are all standing by and waiting for test results to come in. Please say a prayer and keep him in your thoughts.
Unfortunately, we will not be able to make the shows this week in the UK and Europe. We were all so excited to come. At this point we have to just stay put and be by Allen while he goes through this difficult time. We will make it up to you as soon as we can. We know some fans who made travel plans from other countries to see us and we apologize for the inconvenience.
Our West Coast dates right now are on hold until we know what is going on.
We will post another update soon. Allen sends his thanks for the well wishes and he’s sorry we had to cancel these shows. We’ll be showing Allen the Lit myspace page with your comments of support.
All of us here at the BDT have our sticks crossed for Allen, and we’d like to thank the Lit guys for the song that made listening to mainstream radio in 1999 possible:
Oh yes, BDT loves us some bucket drumming. And now our feelings finally have validation by way of a bona fide competition. Granted, it’s being sponsored by bucket manufacturer Sto, but we’ll take what we can get. The details:
Make a video between 30 seconds and 5 minutes long of your best bucket thumping.
Post it on YouTube under the “Sto Bucket Drumming Contest” group.
Choose the appropriate category—solo, ensemble, drumline, or children.
Sit back, relax, and keep your sticks crossed you’ll get one of the cash prizes (finalists in each category will win $500 to $1,500; the overall winner will receive another $1,500).
The deadline for entries is August 1, 2008. So stop reading this and start rehearsing.
Two surprises today regarding Zac Hanson: the little drummer dude is now a not-at-all-little 22 years old, and he seems like a pretty thoughtful fellow. In this interview with Second Supper, he chats about the history of his band and the future direction of the music industry. He also gives the second negative comment about Def Jam records we’ve read this week from a drummer. Zac recounts:
We ended up on Island/Def Jam. The fact that Def Jam was involved made it not a good home for us. The way they run their business—and you see this more and more—is based on a quarterly model. Records take more than three months to make and promote, and you can’t be successful in a setup that demands immediate payoff. So we were in a terrible home, with people from legal backgrounds instead of creative. This isn’t an industry that is looking to build careers. Labels are starting to do a 360 Deal, where they want to own your Web site, merchandising, touring, not just your recording. We don’t want to be in a dying industry. It was time to go, so we forged our own label….To me, the future is in building partnerships with passionate fan bases. The quality we offer needs to be what brings the fan back. The business of selling music is still alive and well, but the industry is dying. We want to create a new model, using tools like the Internet to level the playing field.
Nicely put. And now for the obligatory “MMMBop” video.
The Roots released Rising Down this week, so drummer Questlove has been making the publicity rounds with characteristic forthrightness. First up is an interview in which he lambastes the band’s record label, Def Jam, for failing to promote the new album successfully:
They don’t know we shot the Rising Down video. They just know they approved an [electronic press kit] budget.
And then he chats with the New York Post about the problem with hip-hop in general:
Hip-hop is like a 34-year-old single woman with two children right now….The excitement is totally missing. Plus, there isn’t anyone really talking about anything relevant.
Sit down, shut up, and click on this link. It’ll be the best thing you visit on the Web all day, a superb collection of photos taken by master drum maker Ronn Dunnett at Musikmesse 2008. He’s posted over 1,000 images (everything from great gear shots to even greater drummer pics), so turn off your cell phone and your IM before you begin voyeuring: such seriously hot drum porn deserves your undivided attention.
Oh, sweet lady Absinthe, wrecker of brains and livers, what did Mikkey Dee ever do to deserve the likes of you?
While in Prague, the Motorhead drummer took a couple shots of the toxic green booze, and by evening’s end he was naked in some other dude’s bathroom. His confession:
I woke up…with a man screaming at me. I had been sleepwalking, walked into someone else’s bathroom and fallen asleep. I ran out and discovered that I was naked and without my room key. I had to take the elevator, an elevator made out of glass, down to the hotel reception.
Awesomely good times. If your cable company happens to offer the show Extra Extra! on Sweden’s TV3, you can watch Dee tell the tale himself. Let us know if strapping metal drummers blush.
Of course this would happen. We spend a few days unplugged in Seattle, and the whole friggin’ ‘Net explodes with great drumming news. Case in point: Rolling Stone‘s recently posted interview with Lars Ulrich. In it, the Metallica drummer talks about the future of brick-and-mortar record stores, why music video games are fucking awesome, and how the band may one day release and distribute music through the Web. Ulrich says:
We want to be as free a players as possible. We’ve been observing Radiohead and Trent Reznor and in twenty-seven years or however long it takes for the next record, we’ll be looking forward to everything in terms of possibilities with the Internet.
Really? Did Lars just hint at a name-your-price option for downloading a Metallica album?…Did the rulers of the recording industry just take a collective crap in their bohemian-chic designer pants?
And now there’s a study that proves it. Swedish researchers played a rhythm for a group of 34 participants with no musical training. The 34 newbies were then asked to tap out the same rhythm with a drumstick. Those who best held a steady beat were also those who scored higher on intelligence tests. What gives? According to the article:
The study suggests a biological basis for intelligence related to the regularity of nerve cell activity in the brain….In addition, the researchers found a relationship between high intelligence, the ability to hold a rhythm, and the volume of white matter found in the frontal lobes of the subjects’ brains.
So take that, guitar players. We got science on our side.
The guys over at Drummer Connection have posted a longish, picture-replete review of two Famularo clinics. Dom apparently tore it up, and John Blackwell even put in a surprise guest appearance at one of the shows. The thing we really want to know, though, is this: did Dom manage not to knock off his glasses this time?
[Update 2022: Alas, Drummer Connection is no longer active. The site was very cool, especially for the time, so hopefully the owners will revive it at some point. Also, the amazing video of Dom accidentally knocking his glasses off while ripping a drum solo is no longer available, and that sucks because anyone who plays with that much energy always gets mad props from us. It needs to be witnessed. If anyone locates it, please drop a link in the comments.]
Whoa, remember Loudness, Japan’s contribution to ’80s crotch rock? We’d completely forgotten the group even existed until Blabbermouth reported yesterday that drummer Munetaka Higuchi is fighting liver cancer. After finishing up a few gigs this week with a replacement drummer, the band will go on hiatus until Higuchi gets back to stick-wielding shape. We wish him a speedy recovery…and send him and all the Loudness guys a hearty thanks for this side-splitting trip down leather-studded lane:
No big shock there, eh? But this particular Tommy tattooing actually is something special. It’s the first to be done aboard a jet traveling at 40,000 feet. Star artist Mario Barth did the work, and the Guinness Book of World Records was on hand to document the high-altitude inking. No word (or pic) yet on what the new tat looks like or where it is…but given that Tommy doesn’t have much bare skin to work with, we’re hoping the location is fairly scandalous.
IconsofPunk scored a great, candid, and pretty longish interview with Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante. When asked to chat a bit about the band’s new singer, Dan Nelson, Benante responds:
To be honest with you, and it sounds funny for me to say this but, I didn’t want to make a big announcement about it, because we are still in the early stages. We were almost kind of forced into making the announcement now because of the internet; it ruins every surprise. One asshole finds out about something and they post it somewhere. You know?
And then after a little Star Wars smackdown (“…those last three movies for me were just movies to be made to sell toys”), Benante busts out with this prescient commentary about tabloid music-journos:
For me it’s like, what have you accomplished in your life that gives you any credit to criticize anyone in music, or in anything? It just kind of fucking freaks me out sometimes. People think “Well, my voice needs to be heard about this!” Who gives a fuck about you? The people who do that should probably pay more attention to what’s going on in their city, their country and fucking start protesting. The way they used to do it in the ‘60’s, about shit, you know? This country, to me…I’m a proud American, but when I see bullshit about fucking sixteen year old girls getting pregnant and I read comments from stars like “I fully support her”, I’m like, Fuck You. Don’t fully support her. Kids look up to her because she’s on a fucking television show. And try explaining that to your sixteen year old kid. I wish that whole thing would all come to an end. All of them, I just wish it would end. It’s just gossip and it’s disgusting.
So true, brotha drummer, so true. Down with celebrity gossip. And hack DIY journalists.
Except for us, of course. Everybody needs to know what the fuck we think. So we command you all to watch the following drum duel between Benante and John Tempesta.
Poison drummer Rikki Rockett was arrested Monday at LAX on a “strong-arm rape warrant” issued from Mississippi (oh, how we hope it didn’t involve a pig). Details are completely nonexistent at the moment, but it appears Rockett was released and is a free man as of today.
[Update: The rape allegedly occurred on September 23, 2007, at a casino in Mississippi. No pigs were involved.]
[Update: Rockett was released Tuesday morning after his arrest. The alleged rape occurred at the Silver Star Casino. According to the complaint filed, “The subject, Rikki Rockett, forcibly had sex with an adult in one of the hotel rooms.” Prosecutors in Mississippi are still deciding whether to extradite the drummer.]
[Update 5/10/08: Ah, it was only a matter of time. The celeb-hunting journos at TMZ finally got a comment from Rikki Rockett about the alleged rape: “We’re doing a press conference next week—this whole thing will be over. And it’ll be the end of it.” Rockett goes on to say that he doesn’t even know his accuser. See the 49-second video here.]
