Ringo's Drumming Ability After 1973

They also double drum on a few tracks of Living in the Material World.

 

There are few drummers that I can readily identify just from their playing as soon as I hear it and Ringo is one of them. He plays one song on the Beach Boys 1985 album and plays on Jeff Lynne's / ELO Zoom album. The Ringo tracks are readily identifiable. George's slide playing is the same, btw.

 

Some of my favourite Ringo work is from this era, playing with Yoko, Stephen Stills and Doris Troy.

 

I was a bit surprised by his playing on Peter Frampton's first album. Harder hitting than usual.

 

Just goes to show how often I listen to that LP (which is to say, not very much!)

Yeah, I don't know who Ringo thought he was fooling using the "Richie Snare" pseudonym on Stills' records- it is so obvious that it's Ringo drumming on "As I Come Of Age": his style, his sound, everything!

 

Nice example of Ringo's current work (well 2010).

Listen to what he does towards the end! Nice!

 

Mark Hudson even said in interviews at the time that they consciously set out to feature Ringo's drumming on that album.

 

I remember reading that Ringo had surgery in 2004 to remove bone spurs from his shoulder. I thought that I read somewhere else that he had had both shoulders operated on over the years. He may have been in pain long before going under the knife which affected his playing. Who knows what he went through before deciding to go ahead with surgery?

Hasn't Phil Collins given up or been restricted from playing the drums because he was physically unable to do it anymore? That's someone that's 11 years younger than Ringo.

 

Although not a huge Ringo fan I think to assess where Ringo is as a drummer one only has to look as far as the solo disc by quintessential side man Mark Rivera's 2014 effort Common Bond. Ringo takes a turn on the track Money, Money, Money. Say what you will, but it only takes a listen or two to see that Ringo did what many on this thread indicates is his strength, he plays exactly what the song demands. In this current point in the evolution of music this is a rare skill given that so many players wish to show you every parlor trick in the first bar of any given song. For this Ringo is to be applauded and not only accorded the title of drummer, but more importantly "musician"

 

Yeah, Lennon's phrasing on piano at the beginning of "Remember" is one of those "What the f-- are you doing, mate???" moments from a drummer's perspective, where it's likely that Lennon was changing it a bit each time and was just going by "feel." Kind of like Syd Barrett's guitar playing (especially post-Floyd). There's a charm to that, of course, but it requires that the drummer simply wait for some more consistent cue that he can adjust to--like Lennon starting the vocal.

 

Love the version of "Remember" on The Lennon Anthology that's getting faster & faster until JL curtails it with an expletive

 

Ringo hit his stride with the Beatles in 1966 going until they broke up. It was probably his most innovative work. He could have been a fine session guy going forward from there, but it occurs to me that he chose to be a front man. His solo records have always been more of a gathering place for his famous friends. Often with some very nice results. With everything he's put out, I like to think that he's got 1 really great double album of stuff after his "hit" 70's solo work. He plays some very solid drums on some of those tracks. I've seen him a couple times in concert -- he's a ring master up there. But he's not the "drummer" for those bands. I think it's OK that way because we'd be disappointed in the end if he spent the whole show back behind the kit.

 

Not me. I would have gone to his sole all star concert in Denmark if he had been just the main drummer and only sung a few songs.

 

Wow, that's some cool playing. Good groove with some nice Ringo fills.

So maybe the true answer to this thread is that Ringo's ability is fine and we're just greedy. I want more!

 

Fine fine drumming.

 

His show is a lot of fun. Exactly as billed. His band is great and it's worth a ticket any day of the week.

 

Yeah, I especially liked that Caveman movie he made that had her running around half-naked. We have Ringo to thank for that!

 

Put another way, his ability is fine, but in recent years he hasn't really concentrated on being a drummer, preferring to be frontman/ringmaster. Which is entirely his right.

 

"Ringo's a damn good drummer. He was always a good drummer. He's not technically good, but I think Ringo's drumming is underrated the same way Paul's bass-playing is underrated. Paul and Ringo stand up anywhere with any of the rock musicians." -- John Lennon

Ringo could be the best rock ''n'' roll drummer -- or at least one of the best rock and roll drummers ... He does fills which crack up people like Jim Keltner. He's just amazed because Ringo starts them in the wrong place and all of that, but that is brilliance, that's pure feel." -- George Harrison

 

Yep. Ringo is a master of feel. If I had to pick my top 5 examples of Ringo's brilliance:

I Feel Fine (his ride cymbal work is great)
Rain (Ringo's (and my) favorite )
A Day In the Life (those tom fills)
Happiness is a Warm Gun (very tricky part)
Old Brown Shoe (he really works the hi hat)

 

Ringo is one of my favourite drummers. So musical, solid and economic. An absolute perfect fit for The Beatles, and some of his later work such as Plastic Ono Band is just fantastic, but he seemed to have very low self-esteem as a musician, which I'm sure contributed to him phasing out the drumming more and more. He certainly went to some dark places at times.

Maybe this isn't the right thread to discuss this, although it is somewhat related to the point I make here, but I'd like to learn more about his unintentional (?) suicide attempt. Was that around the time he briefly left the band, or later? The only place I've read about it is in the 1988 interview with Maureen in Le Chroniqueur, quoted below.

Q: What would you say is his greatest weakness?

A: His inferiority complex, his low self-esteem. I think, in a way, that was why he turned to drinkin' so heavily. I think he used it as a cloth to hide his weakness. He would drink to get plastered to hide from it, but he knew that eventually he couldn't. I remember he even tried to commit suicide once.

Q: Really?

A: Well, I shouldn't say he did it intentionally because it took place when he was drunk (or at least I think so). He tried to cut his throat with his razor in the bathroom. He really frightened me at first, but I knew he wasn't conscious of it. It was something that he wouldn’t have done if he was conscious and I knew this.

 

Perhaps his alcoholism was too bad to do more complicated drumming

 

Not a dig at Jim Keltner at all, but the only time I really notice distinctive drumming with hooks on Harrison's "Cloud Nine", outside of GMMSOY, is on "When We Was Fab".

 

That would be Jeff Lynne's influence. Keltner is surprisingly quite an idiosyncratic drummer when able to stretch out.

 

I didn’t say he was bad. I said he was he was not great. He is not and never was. Good? Sure, I’ll buy that for a dollar.