John Bonham Drum God: Modern Drummer Magazine
John Bonham had it all: deep groove, huge tone, high energy, genre-busting creativity, and impeccable phrasing. His influence is enormous amongst drummers, but I dare say that this does not come across in much of the modern rock I hear.
It would often seem that young players want to emulate the Bonham hugeness-of-sound, but misinterpret this as being achievable simply by hitting really hard. Hitting hard is all fine and good but Bonham achieved his sound not by wailing, but by getting as huge and wide a tone out of his drums. He knew how to hit the drums and draw a big sound out without having to slam them. I compare Bonham to the late great Art Blakey in this respect. Blakey was referred to as a “loud” drummer, but he was always in full control of his dynamics. He just had a very wide, sonically rich playing style that some people mistook for plain old loudness. Contrast this with many of today’s young drummers who hit the drums with a very loud transient and yet have a very thin tone!
At some point music will take a turn away from constant over-compression and drummers that have tone and know how to groove will shine again in rock music. Thanks to John Bonham for showing us how it is done!
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