n00b query: What are the hallmarks of a great drummer?

The real answer is that a "great drummer" is the same thing is a "great musician". So, ask what makes a great musician, and watch the thread die a quick death.

Five drummers I've been listening to lately: dude from Mars Volta, dude from Spoon, Dave King, Matt Chamberlain, John & John from Tortoise on It's All Around You and the Savath + Savalas record.

This child is going to become the greatest drummer ever.

There's something fantastic about a drummer who uses his kit like a tuned percussion instrument - eg Jim White out of the Dirty Three, who plays as if he's a soloist rather than sticking to a set pattern and has to be my favourite drummer ever - but it's damn hard and has the potential to just be egregious.

xposte

(Sorry Moulty and the guy from Def Leppard)

My favorite underrated drummer is Ralph Molina from many classic Neil Young albums.

Ok, thank's for letting me get that out of my system. Carry on.

-they play something at the same speed every time, regardless of the time.
-they understand that sometimes less is more both in what music they play and the size of the goddam kit. they aren't blinded by technical ability. they know when to add and when to deliberately leave out.
-they have FREE ACTION, that ability to deviate from the standard rock and jazz beats. usually requires them to be able to move all four limbs independently.
-they can play loud and soft. most drummers cannot play soft. and some cannot play loud.
-they are nice dudes. (of course, no one's perfect and many of the greatest anythings are also huge assholes. and who wants to work with an asshole? heh, well, i know a few people, ahem, but that's a different subject.)
m.

What does this mean, exactly? Tempo?

The Keith Moon blurbette above made me think about why I love the Who. The Ox was often playing melody and keeping rhythm at the same time while Keith was treating his drums like the percussion section of an orchestra (with a more cracked-out flair). I still can't get over his hi-hat substitute of waving his hand back and forth whacking 2 crash symbols. But seriously, stick Keith in any other band and he's one of the worst drummers ever. Stick him in the Who, and he's brilliant (at least at times).

I hate to say it, but I think when it comes down to it, it's all relative. Or in other words, how does it fit in with the rest of the band's sound?

Oh yes, and my favorite drummer joke:
Drummers are people who like to hang around musicians.

oops, i suppose that was very confusing... yeah, a good drummer can reproduce a tempo over and over. this is a very hard thing for many people to do especially so when you move away from 4/4 and the basic timings. that is what i was talking about with respect to "regardless of the time"... i should have added "signature" to the end of that sentence.

again tho, not being good with tempo is sort of low on my list. it's nice sometimes tho considering that the rhythm section is going to be what everyone else is going to try to ride on.
m.

So true. It took me a long time to realize that weird drum parts on records often work because another instrument is provided the steady part or filling in the gaps, you can't just toss it into anything. And really, everything is (or can be) a percussion instrument.

Also great is his drumming throughout 'Exile'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICDuYKaMGQ8

Yukihiro Takahashi age 6 but a girl, cool!

Saw a short video where Steve Jordan was lamenting the death of shuffle beats, saying that "nobody can play shuffles anymore." I took that he was talking about rock drummers specifically and the demise of any kind of swing/shuffle playing in pop and rock. Made me wonder if it's true! I can imagine that kids coming up on metal or indie rock maybe don't have a lot of exposure? I have no idea how people learn drums these days.

Haim's debut album included a song called "The Wire" which has Danielle playing a shuffle in 12/8.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TffpkE2GU4

...which on upon relisten reminds me a bit of Don Henley on "Heartache Tonight", to my ears at least.

Yeah good call. And that album in particular had very '80s grooves so it makes sense.

How does one identify the 12/8 time signature in "The Wire"? My baby brain only hears 4/4.

where’s the one

xp each 1 of the 4 is divided into 3 (sorry i don't know theory)

1-2-3
1-2-3
1-2-3
1-2-3

if you can imagine it really really slowed down it's easier

Yeah I mean it’s 4/4 but with a triplet swing.

The Wire is totally 4/4, lol. But yeah, triplet hi hat groove on top.

You could count it in 12/8, but there's no real advantage to it, so functionally it's 4/4. An example of tune in 12/8, that needs to be in 12/8, is the "Pirates of the Caribbean" theme

HAIM beat reminds me of Gary Glitter more than anything

yeah or "son of my father"

Sorry, but wouldn't three beats per quarter note make it 12/12 time? (xps)

Anyway I think Steve Jordan's point is that blues-derived shuffles have largely receded from pop and rock, so drummers aren't coming up versed in them unless they're into more retro stuff. I find it hard to believe this is some permanent development, because I feel like rhythms cycle in and out of currency.

Sorry, but wouldn't three beats per quarter note make it 12/12 time? (xps)

― Indexed, Thursday, June 25, 2026 8:28 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

no because the triplets (1-2-3) would be 8th notes (12 8th notes in each measure). there wouldn't be any reason to count anything in 12/12 time, because it would just be 4/4

Anyway I think Steve Jordan's point is that blues-derived shuffles have largely receded from pop and rock, so drummers aren't coming up versed in them unless they're into more retro stuff. I find it hard to believe this is some permanent development, because I feel like rhythms cycle in and out of currency.

I think it's true, the shuffle isn't coming back for pop music. And even if there's a 12/8 feel, it'll be very strict and quantized. But all the best-feeling music has some element of combining triple and duple feels, and today I think you only really get that in the vocal...rap drums are perfectly straight usually, but the vocals can be in a triplet feel or anything in between on top of that, so there's still some good rhythmic friction.

I agree that shuffles are very difficult even though they sound simple. It's the same as swing, playing exact triplets is not always the funkiest or most appropriate shuffle feel. Sometimes it's a little longer, closer to 8th notes, sometimes it's tighter (closer to 16th notes). Also a personal thing.

And the hand motion, where the second note in each double is accented, is just different and probably harder to keep consistent than even 8th notes. There are also so many ways to divide the shuffle up between the limbs, which is fun (and also can be a signature thing).

A good well-known 4/4 song with a weird triplet feel example is Everybody Wants to Rule the World.

it's funny to mourn the shuffle when one of the most popular songs of the past year is olivia dean's "man i need," which has the strict and quantized "12/8" feel that jordan is talking about. (at least in the verse, the groove feels more like a straight 4/4 during the chorus)

Which was the subject of an instagram drum meme where everybody would twist it into various superimposed 4/4 feels ('metric modulation')

xp

Btw this has been on my mind because I have some gigs with a rootsy organist/singer in a few months, and have had to get serious about shuffles for the first time in awhile. Those and the extremely slow 12/8 blues are the hardest ones to nail, even though they sound so simple when someone's playing them well.

vc, if you break a quarter note in half, you have an eighth note. If you break it into three...you still have an eighth note?

People still talk about quarter note triplets, eighth note triplets, sixteenth triplets for relative rates of speed. 6 quarter note triplets in a bar of 4/4, 12 eighth note triplets, etc.

The hallmark of a great drummer is being able to play 'in the pocket' without moaning about how boring it is and what people really want to hear is them bashing out a jazz-fusion odyssey through all the verses. This makes Neil Peart a bad drummer and Mick Fleetwood a good one, so maybe the theory needs a little tweaking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TwO2Wfn46o

mick fleetwood and neil peart were both great drummers for their bands

mick fleetwood in rush, neil peart in fleetwood mac...that would have ruled

haha, sorry i wrote 12/8 upthread when I indeed meant triplets. Her drumming is great but it doesn't really show up until about halfway into the song and very subtly at that.

Everyday I'm shuffling.

Speaking of the 'Mac... Danielle (Haim) drums on this cover of a shuffle:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83-QNVnos2k

I think there definitely IS an advantage to notating something like the Haim song in 12/8. Otherwise, you would have to be notating triplets with little threes all over the place. Conversely, I don't see any advantage to notating it in 4/4.

I think I remember a music professor saying "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" was 6/8. Ignoring the triplet division, you would say 2/4.

It's 4/4, but the repeating melodic phrase is 12. Kind of like how "Turn It On Again" by Genesis could be counted as 6/8 and 7/7 parts back to back, but really makes the most sense as one 13 beat (13/8) phrase (which iirc Mike Rutherfood somehow counted to himself as 4/4 anyway).

xpost I dunno, I actually think counting it in 12 actually complicates it. The right hand/triplet groove could be pretty much any pattern (like a Peart or Copeland ride pattern) as long as the snare and kick are in the right (4/4) place.

xxpost I'm not sure I would call that a shuffle, but it's pretty dope. Sounds like the Latin Playboys.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57NFjGTUkkg

I think with 6/8, 9/8, and 12/8, you don't really count off the eighth notes. That would indeed make it difficult - like, it would be silly for the drummer or one of the musicians to count the song in that way. I'm sure the Haim song gets counted off as four. I wouldn't notate it that way, though.

Good video here on the Tears for Fears beat (there are a ton of videos on this beat out there, this guy breaks it down cleanly). This is one that I struggle with if I consciously think about the "missing" triplet notes on the hi-hat, but if I just go with the feel of it I can put it together.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBp_PvBqxWI

A lot of these sorts of songs, the primary beat itself is not super tricky, but the hi-hat or other rhythmic patterns on top are.

I can imagine that kids coming up on metal or indie rock maybe don't have a lot of exposure?

― paper plans (tipsy mothra), Tuesday, June 23, 2026 2:40 PM (two days ago)

Indie you say????????

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FK7tZyMRLik

Death cab for shuffle

Tbf Gibbard is almost 50.

I think there definitely IS an advantage to notating something like the Haim song in 12/8. Otherwise, you would have to be notating triplets with little threes all over the place. Conversely, I don't see any advantage to notating it in 4/4.

― timellison, Thursday, June 25, 2026 8:30 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

The main disadvantage would be that many people who want to play along to the Haim song probably don't have the musical education to read music in unusual time signatures

Notating anything is a necessary evil, I agree that it's correct to separate it from how music is actually heard/felt.