Brendan Buckley
INTERVIEW WITH BRENDAN BUCKLEY on Hot Sticks Drum Show, transcript below.
Plus, see more about Brendan Buckley on the “Adventures of Power” Official Site.
Brendan Buckley
Hi. Can you hear me?
Ari Gold
I can. So greetings. I'm just pinning, pinning this pin away. Pin away greetings. Good morning. Where are you?
Brendan Buckley
Los Angeles. You?
Ari Gold
We could have met in person.
Brendan Buckley
We still have time. Where are you?
Ari Gold
What part of town? Oh my god. So my was 31. Lakeview we are a few blocks. You could probably shout out the window and and say hi to me.
Brendan Buckley
Do you live there?
Ari Gold
I am here for a couple of days. I used to live here and I'm sort of become a perpetual traveler. But But yeah. How was that thunderstorm last night? Huh?
Brendan Buckley
Yeah. Last night and this morning? Yeah, I got up early to do I had a like a little class to do this morning. And it was thundering the whole way through.
Ari Gold
It's nice. A class meeting you were you were teaching something online or?
Brendan Buckley
No, I went to a like a wrestling martial arts beat down class at 7am this morning. And it was it was fun because it had a soundtrack this morning.
Ari Gold
Yeah, that followed by the car alarms.
Brendan Buckley
That also. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well, there's much much needed rain here in California. So it's welcome thunderstorm.
Ari Gold
Yeah, exactly. Well, thank you so much for joining me on HUD six.fm. Otherwise known as their drummer.com. We have once video once audio. You are a master of many genres as a drummer. I see you've actually even got the drums behind you. For the audio version people will not be able to see that but is that are those real drums Rosetta green script.
Brendan Buckley
I'm at a studio. This is my avatar. Now this is a drum set that I use yesterday on a recording for a friend of mine. So it that's a plug in. Well, this is just a assortment of different things here. I mean, if you if you look around the room, there's drums everywhere. But this one happens to be my 60s Ludwig kit with a snare drum is an odd one. It's actually called a Sherwood S H E R WOD I think. And I bought it at pro drums in LA, just because it looked old and cool. And and it was very affordable. Because what's the Sherwood and then I looked it up on the internet apparently it was like an offshoot of Ludwig for a year or two. It's the same thing. So it's like a 40s Ludwig snare, the different badge on it and it sounds incredible.
Ari Gold
A jazzy feel in some way.
Brendan Buckley
It can. It can.
Ari Gold
I mean, there that existed before rock music, which is kind of cool.
Brendan Buckley
There are certain drums like maybe in the 90s ice, they take every drum I would audition to buy. And I would just take it and start whacking rim shots on it and say sounds good. Take it home. Whack, whack, whack, Whack, whack sounds pretty good, because that's how I played in the 90s basically. And now there's certain drums that sound really good when you just do the tip in the center of the snare drum, no rim shot thing. And it's other drums that sound really good when you nail them like a like aluminum baseball bat on a pipe, you know. So you have some tips. So sometimes I'll look at drums I'm like, I don't think that's the bashing rim shotty drum that's more of the 30 in the center kind of drum and so you have your your pile of snare drums that's more for that style and the pilot snare drums. It's more for whacking two and four with a rim shot and you kind of separate them.
Ari Gold
How many how many snare drums do you have in your
Brendan Buckley
play? I've lost last count. It varies from from, I don't know 30 to 50 I guess. Well, it depends depends on on how much money I need or I sell a bunch and then I buy a few Again, this it fluctuates.
Ari Gold
As an air drummer, I can play all of your snare drums in my mind. Yeah. It's very cheap.
Brendan Buckley
Very efficient also. Yeah,
Ari Gold
yeah. You're you're with DW for hardware or
Brendan Buckley
I played I've been with DW drums since 2000 or 2001. I can't remember exactly when I signed with them. But yeah, I bought them for over 20 years. drums and hardware, and LP percussion Sabian cymbals since the late 90s. Remo, Vic Firth. I've been with the same companies for Yeah, 20 years or longer
Ari Gold
on the board. He's such a wonderful guy over at GW. And do you do? Well,
Brendan Buckley
yeah, I do. I'm only like, slightly over an hour drive away from their factory. So I'll get the random email or phone call, like, Hey, what are you doing on Friday morning, you want to come up and do something with us. And I'm a big fan of drum education in general, just all forms of drum education. So anytime anyone has any type of idea that involves getting drums out to the masses on down, so I think DOM is really good. But that stuff
Ari Gold
is great with it. I mean, he was ahead of the curve. You know, these days, obviously, there's so many Instagram drummers, people who are kind of getting their chops, but never playing with other people because they become really proficient against, you know, playing with their phone, playing along with the music, and I was talking with him about the difference between the kind of education people get from watching some Instagram drummer, versus an actual, you know, pro drummer who plays with other people and kind of can talk to them in a, in a, you know, more measured way. I mean, what do you what do you think you provide when you go up to a jump channel, as a teacher online that that someone isn't going to get from, you know, an Instagram drummer with a million followers who, well,
Brendan Buckley
if, if I'm, if I have no prompts, and they say, just teach something, then I'll usually teach what I either whatever I'm working on, or what I find works for me, or what helps me play the drums better. I'm always looking for cheat codes to get better at the drums, you know, like discarding exercises that have no meaning to me, and finding exercises that actually make me better at what I do. So if I find one, I'm like, Oh, this is great. I wish I knew this 20 years ago, I'm going to share this exercise. And so that's usually what I teach. If someone asks me, you know, just, you know, show us something. However, what I found, what also works well is people just wanting, wanting me to tell stories about different things. What what it was like, going from my teens to my 20s, or what it was like moving from here to here or working with this person working with that person. So I find that when it comes to when it comes to teaching, part of it is me, like consciously passing on drum exercises or advice, and part of it is just me sharing stories.
Ari Gold
Yeah, I mean, I having you on on how to take some, of course. Well, no, of course, but I love hearing stories that you know, I got my own special questions based on your incredible roster of people you play with, like, you know, playing with someone like DMX and playing with Miley Cyrus, you know, like, those are pretty, like, a pretty different energy that you're gonna have to bring on stage. Can you talk a little bit of working with DMX? I love DMX. And
Brendan Buckley
oh, yeah, that was a random thing. I was. I was living in Miami. And I did a lot of studio sessions when I was there, just all sorts of things. And one day, a guitarist friend of mine said, Hey, I gave your number to the DMX crew, they're looking at putting some live drums on their next album. I'm like, Wow, that's awesome. I love this last record. So cool. And then sure enough, I got a call from his manager saying what are you doing? Can you come by whatever things criteria studios, and so I showed up with a drum set, and there was just an engineer there. And they said, he'll be here with his crew any moment now. And that any moment now was probably six or eight hours later. So to kill the kill that time we just recorded drums. We just set up the drums. I said, Well, do you have the song The first song he wants to start with? Like I do. So he played me the song and I just played through it several times. And we just fold it just the engineering I just pulled around. And then finally he came in You know, shook hands Nice to meet you listen to it once and then went into the vocal booth and track vocals on top of it track to double track the vocals did a hype track on top of that said I love it we're done he wasn't even there for me recording it and he had no notes for me or anything just walked in love it. I'm gonna wrap on top of this now. So any freestyle a bunch of lyrics and I was blown away by how good he was and how quick he was. And that was it and and then at the end of the night he's like, Man, this is a great vibe you want it you want to go on tour with me? I'm like sure, but that wound up never happening but I was totally excited to try that.
Ari Gold
Yeah, yeah, that would have been a someone else. So I another one that I have to ask about is Julio Iglesias Jr. Jr. A bow that would be senior senior. That's that's pretty bad. So you was that in studio or live or both?
Brendan Buckley
That was live but that's the to roll the girls I've Loved Before that, that Julio. So it was that was also in Miami and his longtime drummer Lee Levin was a friend of mine and he was leaving or at least taking a hiatus from the band. So I got called to to either fill in sub or take over the gig and my audition was they sent me a 90 minute cassette tape of a live show. It said learn the first six songs and fly out to our next soundcheck. And so I did that I flew out to the soundcheck I met him, I sat down, I played the first six songs of his show with the band and he said, I love it. You will play the show tonight. And I said, I looked around I'm like, Well, I only learned the first six songs. He's like, well, then you just play the first six songs tonight. And then my other drummer will hop back on the stage and, and that's how I got the gig. Well, yeah, it was great. Because I was some I might have been, I think 21 at a time.
Ari Gold
So who down there you didn't know you had the gig and you were flying on your own dime to
Brendan Buckley
know they paid they paid for me to fly into a store basically a soundcheck rehearsal.
Ari Gold
Okay, okay, that's, that's gentlemanly.
Brendan Buckley
Yeah, it was an audition. But I wasn't expecting to get the gig back quickly. I thought I was gonna fly home and come out two weeks later or something.
Ari Gold
Yeah, you're not expecting to play that night. So so they were they were basically under studying you and get you on six songs. And then and then you were good to go. The next day, essentially. That that night? Yeah. I mean, after those six songs, because they had you play six and then they had the other drum.
Brendan Buckley
Yeah. Then I had to quickly run across the mall. I mean, across the street to a mall and get a, you know, a long sleeve button down shirt and pants because I probably had a shorts and a tank top at that point. So I'm like, oh, shoot, I gotta go get ready. So it was fun. It was great. while it lasted.
Ari Gold
Yeah, like so. You know, we're talking about drum sound and snare sound and all that. So when you're doing a gig like that, you get with the whatever the drum tech is set up in front of you, you're gonna play that or do you bring your own heads or symbols or snare or, or your you know, your foot pedal? Or what do you travel with, when you're like a journeyman like that?
Brendan Buckley
I would. It's, I actually actually have to say it's different for every situation.
Brendan Buckley
For instance, certain gigs, I have my entire setup, customized down to, you know, measurements and everything. And that all goes into cases and goes on the road for eight months or 18 months and travels around the world with me and my drum tech and I set it up once. Mark everything memory, lock everything and it's that way every night for the rest of the tour. Right? Okay? The total opposite is I often fly into shows where they rent a kit from some local backline agency like an SAR or center staging or some company like that. And they just get as close as they can to my specs. So I'll email them Can you get me this? Can you get me a DW with a 13 rack? 22 inch kick 16th and 18th floor Tom's a nickel over brass six by 14 inch snare drum three crashes right hi hat and, and they say well, we'll get as close as we can to that and then I show up to the venue and I see what they have. And and I make it work you know if it's a Yamaha drum set with Evan heads and pro Mark sticks and and Zildjian cymbals I'm like, Darn it. Well. Let's let's do this anyway, and we make the show happen. And then if there's in between sometimes if I feel like being specific, I'll fly with my stick bag, my airs, maybe my charts like notes I mean, and a metronome, maybe a pedal, maybe my cymbals, maybe a snare drum. But I have found that traveling with less is easier. So I try to get by using as much rental gear as I can, unless they can fly all of my stuff.
Ari Gold
Right, okay. Yeah, I mean, I'm traveling around as a filmmaker, I've now got like this mini kit that I bring with me, one camera one lens, one gimbal. And, you know, I can bring it into carry on. And I find for me, it's really nice to, you know, of course, I have the gear I might want, but I have a beard that I can carry, that I can carry on to a plane, which is a nice feeling of like, you know, capability in the sense that, you know, that you can do your job anywhere. And then I was in Latvia, and I got called to film in Ukraine a few weeks ago. And I shot a lot in Ukraine and have friends there and have a lot of emotional connection there. And so having the opportunity to like fly off somewhere, like, it was a, you know, sort of like your Yglesias thing it was the accurately of Schreiber was going in and needed someone to drive around with heaven. And it was like, okay, when are you planning on doing that are like tonight. So, you know, there I went. And,
Brendan Buckley
and I suppose that your little travel kit is something that you maybe couldn't have had 25 years ago, either. Maybe you would have either a Giganto bay with a VHS tape in it or even like, some kind of real the real thing. And yeah, like, now you got you can have a portable little technological Oh, I have
Ari Gold
three microphones, camera lens, a gimbal. And it's like, you know, just big. And I've shot a lot on it. I went down to Brazil and shot there recently for this show I'm putting together and and yeah, having a portability. I mean, I made a movie about air drummers, where the idea is that you will always have whatever the the heartbeat is, whatever the thing is that you want to create in the world has to be in you. And you can't rely on the gear, whatever it is, you know, so try to live my life as as well as my character in the movie does, you know in the sense of like, finding that finding that capability within yourself. And being ready at all times. And obviously technology has made that easier recently with, you know, film stuff, but not so much to drum drums you need your drums. I think someone is asking about someone saying you sounded great was do Brooks in Perry F. So as soon as Perry Farrell you want to talk about that?
Brendan Buckley
Oh, Perry Perry Perry is the best. I started working with him. I think in 2018 he released a solo record. And I got called to join his what will be his solo project called kind heaven. And yeah, Stu Brooks now plays in that band. It was Chris Chaney prior to that he's the basis for Jane's Addiction. And so and now Steve is doing it. He's great. And it's a fun la all star cast, killer musicians. And yeah, Perry's just wonderful. I grew up listening to Jane's Addiction and wonderful Pireaus. So it's it was so it was kind of little odd to work with him in the beginning because I, I had seen him live so many times. But He's great. He's just so nice. He loves music. He's super positive. He's He's a joy to work with. We did a European tour. We were gonna do a South American tour, right as the pandemic hits. So that was a bummer. But I do have a gig with him next week. So we have rehearsals this week. And I'm looking forward to seeing them again.
Ari Gold
Okay, well, you can tell him I saw him with James's addiction at the stone on Broadway in San Francisco. And I think there were maybe maybe 17 people
Brendan Buckley
there. Yeah. What year was that?
Ari Gold
That would have been like, late 80s. Somewhere, like 88.
Brendan Buckley
I'm guessing that sounds about right. That was still that was when they were still playing for 17 people. Yeah.
Ari Gold
So it was it was a inspiring album. And the show was a bit of a mess, I'll say. And it was a charming mess. But I was like, wow, they they're been good enough sleep would be a way of putting it but
Brendan Buckley
yeah. So I got I have a gig next week with so Perry is going to do a show here in LA where half the night is going to be his solo band. And half the night is going to be plentiful. Pyros with Steven Perkins. So it'd be a he's, he's so nice. So he's got the stage with him.
Ari Gold
Yeah, I'd love to have him on the show. I've been I don't know if I've ever met him. I feel like I've met him. Paul. Simply add an N ozomatli show but you play with those a motley to write
Brendan Buckley
I did I did I was I might be another crazy good band when I first moved to LA their drummer at the time was Mario Killary whose was the drummer for the wallflowers and a bunch of other acts. And he asked me to sub for them and it was to this day one of the hardest gigs I ever had the sub, like learning that material was super challenging. Because yeah, it was so so varied. There were so many stops and hits in unison sections and, and they do everything different every night. It's all on cue. So watch the basis for this watch the saxophone player for this. So I I almost had a breakdown learning that set, but most time you have to and I think I practice for two weeks straight, like every day for two weeks trying to get that show together. And then I flew out to their first show notes. No rehearsal just soundcheck got there. We ran maybe six songs at soundcheck and said all right, cross your fingers. Let's see how this goes. And we went into a festival tour and all over like we started in California. And then we went to Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand, and it was a blast. It was so fun. I'm still friends with those guys. They're so talented.
Ari Gold
Yeah. Can you talk about your biggest choke on stage because I'm sure there's people out there who you know, think about prepping for two weeks to play with those a mildly or prepping for whatever it was two hours to play with Julio Iglesias. You must have had some some things go sideways on stage. Can you share some like something that where you were really embarrassed? And, you know, just to make the the students feel better? You know?
Brendan Buckley
Oh, no, I mean, let me let me say like Murphy's Law style, like, if it can go wrong, it will go wrong. There's there's, you have to expect things to go wrong. It's not like you wish them or but but you have to practice. And in your mind while you're practicing saying you have to say, what if the singer doesn't come in here? What if my high hat falls apart here? What if I can't hear the click track anymore? What if the computer crashes? What if my bass drum head breaks, you know, you have to have all of these scenarios in your mind while you're playing. So it doesn't shock you when it actually does happen. So I think that's one of the things I have now is so much experience where when I go to play a show, I'm already I have the show down in a perfect scenario. But then you also have to start thinking, what if it's not a perfect scenario? Can I still get through the show? It might not be a plus, but can I get through the show, even if something goes wrong? Because it will go wrong. So I mean, there are tons of times where so a lot of acts I play with now have tracks some kind of computers running with tracks. So that's, that's a whole mess, where it's gonna crash at some point, something you weren't scanning, you were like in in yours. And then also ones on top as a backup if something were to fall out of your ear, because there's something you're working with all that click and you got stuff falls out your you got problems, right? Well, here is what? Okay, so what I normally do is I have one set of ears, in my ears like headphones, coming out of my ears going into a pack, the pack is wired, meaning there's nothing wireless, no signal, it goes straight into the monitor board. I also have a second set of ears on stage with me, just next to me lying lying on my like little table. And I have a second pack on my belt, which is a wireless pack. So in case the first one dies, I just unplug it and plug it into the second one. Right. Okay, I also have, I also develop a communication with anyone who's running the electronics on the side of stage with various cues as to how we're going to start songs, how we're going to stop songs, how if something goes wrong, what are we going to do? If someone gets lost? How are we got to fix that? Who do we follow? So this all has to be talked about in advance. So when it happens for the first time, you're not all on stage looking at each other, like what is going on? You know, you have to say, okay, singer singer didn't come out in time from their wardrobe change. We're going to shut off the computer, we're going to vamp the intro. And when I look at you start the first chorus, you know, you have these queues all set up. So it's just, you know, just working through all the possible scenarios is what you have to do. So if you want me to share stories, there's just too many because there's everything can go wrong. As far as the gig can fall apart. Give
Ari Gold
me the like one word you actually got home when you were like wow, I really didn't you know the one that we felt like a nightmare. If there is one just because you You know, people like to be humanized. I mean, you know, there's that saying, you know, you don't know who you are until your face down in the arena, you know, and your faces in the dirt. And everyone's seen you down there. And then how do you stand up again? That's what I'd love to hear. You got it?
Brendan Buckley
Man? No, I feel like there's no, I feel like there's there's dozens and dozens of moments like that, where I just have to say, Well, that was that was one show gotta move on, you got to move on is you know, just keep on it. You don't point fingers. You don't freak out, you just move on. And I think a lot of it has to do with electronics and monitoring. So I think I was doing a show once where I was subbing for a drummer, a friend of mine. So it's not my show. It's not my rig. It's not my drum set. It's not anything. I just learned the music. I sit down, I start playing this show, live audience. And second song, my ears stop working. I don't know why they stopped working. I started looking around. I'm like that anyone else lose the click and the tracks and everything. And everyone else is keeps playing. So I'm like, No, it must be me. So I start looking around like, I can't. I don't know what I can't play anymore, because I can't hear the music. So I just kind of slowly drop out and everyone looks at me, I'm like, I don't have headphones anymore. And I would normally have backup packs, I would normally be able to see the monitor engineer, I would normally be able to see the the guy running the tracks. I would normally have a talkback mic next to me so I can communicate to everyone. But it's not my show. So I'm just going by what they had. So I had to sit there until until they fixed it I had to sit there for was probably 30 seconds but felt like an hour. Yeah. Well, they sorted out the problem, which is why I'm pretty adamant about having a system in place for things to go wrong.
Ari Gold
So when you say you dropped out, so the bases kept going, was there a percussionist or was there any percussion or backing tracks?
Brendan Buckley
Or when they were just loops, loops and things? Okay, so
Ari Gold
it wasn't a total dropped out of rhythm section?
Brendan Buckley
I don't think so. I don't remember. But I mean, it's that kind of thing. It's yeah, I guess yeah, just things always go wrong. And the thing is, you have to be be good enough where the audience isn't gonna notice. You know, the band might notice the man might freak out. Oh, my God, what happened? But, but make sure that it's not evident to the to the spectators, you know, make sure they have a good time still.
Ari Gold
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't know if you've seen my movie adventures in power yet. But he his stool collapses at the end of the movie, and he keeps air drumming. The show must go on. This is actually one of the for the video version of this. This is the German I pulled this off my shelf. Because I had been away for so long came back to my house. And I remembered I have a German language version of the DVD, which says lift guitar by guest on which means air guitar was yesterday. Or drummer movie.
Brendan Buckley
That's a model to live by
Ari Gold
a motto to live by. Yeah. So who else would I love to ask about me, Shakira? How did you end up working with Shakira?
Brendan Buckley
That that happened through again, a Miami thing where I was. Let's see, Gloria Stephon has had had a recording studio there that was pretty prominent at the time. I don't think it's around anymore. So I used to work there from time to time. And Shakira came through Miami to record one of our records. And the producer and the engineer called me up and asked me to come by and throw what they called some rock drums on one of the songs. So I came by and I did that. And well, okay, so that was that was when someone like that asked for rock drums. What does that mean? Like, rock click, it means that at the time, so this was 1998. So at the time, I think it meant that she's a pop artist, but she wants to sound a little more rock, rock more rocking. So kind of stuff as opposed to, you know, programming dance beats and stuff like that. So I think that's what that means normally is, is well, the demo is probably all have electronics on them, but they think it'd be nice to add acoustic drums to it to give it a little more beef. So I think that's what it meant in the Nautilus was so much. Yeah, so much. Like John
Ari Gold
Bonham, or Steve Gadd be, yeah, it could be.
Brendan Buckley
Yeah, it could be depending on the song, but I think a lot of people when they're making their music, they start with electronic demos. And then they stay say, Hmm, this is pretty good. I like the way it sounds as is or they say So let's replace these chintzy little electronic parts, like fake violins or fake bass or fake drums with real musicians, and they slowly replace the parts with session musicians. So that's pretty standard now, actually is people create demos first, and then they decide what parts they can keep and what parts need to be replaced. Right, right. Okay, so that was that and then I wound up playing on, I guess, maybe six songs, the in the span of two weeks there. And then from that point on, I started playing live shows with her and her band, and I've been doing it ever since then.
Ari Gold
So when you came down to Florida, were you expecting at that point you How old were you when you moved on Florida?
Brendan Buckley
I moved down to Florida from New Jersey when I was 18 years old.
Ari Gold
And were you expecting like why? Why? As we were growing up playing drums and in Jersey, what was your style? Who were your influences at that point?
Brendan Buckley
I liked a lot of heavy metal and punk rock music. And I liked everything. Everything from Slayer and Metallica to rush and foo Ghazi and Bad Brains. Miners?
Ari Gold
Neil pure is the inaugural episode of Hot sticks. So you're you're in his company on this show. Wow. That's great. And, and we had Dave Lombardo on as well.
Brendan Buckley
In that episode, yeah. Yeah.
Ari Gold
But so you weren't necessarily at that point, you know, as a punk and metal drummer from Jersey expecting to go into kind of flatten and pop and Gloria Estefan and that whole world, or did you kind of suspect that what happened when you went to Miami?
Brendan Buckley
No, I had no expectations. I while while being a lover of punk rock music, I also took drum lessons. From Tommy, I go when I was in high school, he was my drum teacher. So he, he taught me jazz, he taught me classical, percussion, classical snare drums, he taught me marching rudimental drumming, so I got a lot, I got a wide range of drum appreciation from him. And then when I went to music school, I just wanted to get better, I didn't think about what I wanted to do with it, I just wanted to get better because I felt so insufficient at the drums. So I just I just went, I applied to a bunch of different music schools. And I wound up choosing Miami, I went down there, and I just fell in love with the music school and I fell in love with the city itself. I made a lot of friends, I played a lot of gigs. And I just tried to repair or fix all my deficiencies as quickly as I could. And that meant getting better at jazz getting better at Latin, getting better at funk, getting better at pop, getting better at session music, getting better fusion music. So I just just practiced a lot and tried to suck a little bit less every day.
Ari Gold
And now you're helping people suck less, or you're teaching also sometimes at Musicians Institute is right or I do
Brendan Buckley
teach there from time to time. Yeah, my friends are the faculty members there. So I'll teach there from time to time or privately either here at my studio, or either you know, on Skype, or zoom, or sometimes even when I'm traveling, I'll pick an off day. And I'll reach out to some people and say, I have a day off in New York City because I don't want to do lessons. And I'll just get a rehearsal room somewhere and teach a bunch of local students there and anything I can do to help people deal with the problems that with this inherent problems with this instrument that they're running into. Because we all as we learn the instrument, we run into coordination problems, or music, musical problems, or all sorts of things. So I think, you know, anything that I've gone through that I can pass along that'll help them get past a hurdle or speed bump, I'd love to pass along so don't have to suffer.
Ari Gold
Yeah, it does seem like these days, drums you know, have become such a technical instrument in the, in the, on the tech side, actually, because you're talking about sync, you're talking about working with track, you know, backing tracks, and, you know, we think about like the old days of drums. I would imagine that like you know, this 50% of your brainpower now is dealing with a level of tech that someone playing in 1972 for a rock band or whatever, wouldn't have had to even think about like they got a monitor and they're playing as loud as they can so they can hear and that's it. How do you think that has affected the kind of people who end up you know, prospering as drummers and as And, and your own process were like, obviously playing pumpkin metal as a 15 year old you weren't dealing with any of that tech I would imagine you're probably just in a room somewhere hoping to hear the bass player if you're lucky. But now you got all this other stuff going on how does that affect your playing? How's it fit your sense of freedom?
Brendan Buckley
Yeah, that's a good point. I think that you have to approach every era as a different set of problems and goals and accomplishments I if you look at a drummer from the 30s 1930s or 40s they were playing a different style of drumming different style of music, maybe they read a lot better maybe maybe they sight read better. Maybe they played a different volumes. Maybe they could simmer at a burning fast tempo but quiet and see with a different skill sets. And, and the 70s that was kind of where studio drumming got really specific. But there still wasn't computers. So guys had guys had to get really good at going for takes to two inch tape, you know, maybe without a click track. So there was no editing and Pro Tools back then you had to that's why those drummers excelled the guys who can play super steady with great tone and get, you know, three amazing takes in one hour and boom, they're done. And those whether it's Jim Keltner how Blaine Jeff Porcaro, whoever it is, those guys except for a different skill set. And now we have a skill set where you don't actually in the studio have to play for more than eight bars if you don't want to, because they'll just cut and paste you anyway. But, but there's different things to achieve. Can't do. Can you get current drum sounds? Can you? Can you record yourself? Can you play to a click track really well. Live? Are you familiar with triggering? Are you familiar with Ableton? Are you familiar with all the things involved with, you know, the blend of acoustic and electronic drumming? So yeah, you just have to prepare yourself for what's what are the demands of this current era of drumming? You can honor things like you say, I love Buddy rage, or I love Art Blakey, or I love. That's cool. I love Ringo Starr. That's great. But that's the history of drumming. And that's important to study. But there's also what are the guys right now who are excelling? What are they doing? That's allowing them to excel? And that's a different thing to work on. You know?
Ari Gold
Yeah. I mean, I, I confess that I play drums a little bit, you know, I confess, because as a, as an air drummer, I'm not supposed to play real drums. But, but I've never had, you know, I always played in bands, where it was just plug in and play somewhere. So I never had to deal with any of that level of tech. And it does sound to me, like, you know, it's a strange experience to imagine having to have my mind, you know, not just the four limbs, playing different things, but also the mind on on the click, and, you know, maybe you're playing with the, you know, you're playing with a pre record at the same time of other drums. And, wow, it sounds really harsh. It sounds cheesy. Yeah,
Brendan Buckley
I mean, maybe if you're only in your maybe if you're a drummer who only plays in one band, then you master those challenges. But if you're a freelance drummer, and you're expected to play with a difference, artists or artists every week, you have to constantly adjust to a new situation. So you develop your skill sets to be able to accomplish your job. And by plopping yourself in a new room every week, and that's, that's where you, you really see what is necessary, you know, what things are necessary, you know, how do you communicate with the rest of the people in the room? How do you accomplish whatever the job is, if it's recording or performing a show or rehearsing? And yeah, it's, it's, it's fun. I have a what I consider I have a close knit group of guys here in LA, that all do what I do, and they do it really well. So we share stories and say, like, have you ever had this happen? Or how would you approach that? And it really, it's really good that it's not just me, like, just like trying to fight my way out of a paper bag, but I feel like there's a bunch of guys who all do this job. So you can ask them. Have you ever had a situation where this happened? And how did you approach that and we all give each other advice and encouragement?
Ari Gold
Yeah, yeah, it sounds like the community of drummers. So there's kids playing here is that super loud on the mic or it's okay. Is my next door? No,
Brendan Buckley
no. Are they random kids? Or do they belong to you or
Ari Gold
other my next door neighbor, I just didn't know how loud my mic is picking it up. So
Brendan Buckley
I don't mind.
Ari Gold
Okay. Curious to know if there's any beats that you feel you invented and we talked about, like someone like Gad, or you know, you mentioned, Pokhara, who, you know, synthesizing a couple other people's shuffles to make his own shuffle are there is there a Buckley beat that that you consider a signature? Or is that a kind of silly way to think about Trump? I mean, I, you know, as a non professional drummer, I love when a drummer, like comes up with something that I can identify as them. Do you have something like that in your repertoire?
Brendan Buckley
No, that's I don't think it's silly, because, okay, this is something I actually think about a lot. Because I am, I am a drummer for hire. So I enjoy learning other people's music and playing it perfectly to their liking. But also, I like to inject a little bit of what I consider my identity, also, not so much that I'm disrespecting their music, but enough where I think that Why am I here unless I get to be myself a little bit too. So I try to always find where that line is, with every which each person with whom I'm working, like, do I have to be more true to all their classic recordings? Or can I do it just however, I feel musically, or some blend of in between. So I do that with I do that all the time. And sometimes it's very subtle, where you won't really notice it's not a quote unquote, Buckley beat because I'm taking what they do. And I massage it in a way where I think it works better to my, my ears. And then sometimes when I'm in the studio, recording a song sometimes I say, I want to play something that's never been done before. And that's a lofty goal, because everything has been done already. But I say let me just shoot for the stars. And maybe I'll land on the moon, you know, like, like, so there's times where I say, let me just keep on working on a beat. That is unconventional and you tell me if it's awkward or stupid, I should just go back to Can I can I fool around a little bit? And it depends on the artist. If they say no, no, go go keep on experimenting. Or sometimes they're like, why are we still working on this song? Boom, boom, cha, boom, boom, Cha is the beat. You're like Sorry. So I'll go back to the original. But I think about I used to play in a band called pedestrian with a friend of mine named Joel shear. And if you look up an album called pedestrian ghostly life, that was the name of the alphabet played on. There are a couple of beats there that I feel like like there's one called humming bird on a wire. And it starts out. It starts out with a four bar drum and show that I think I invented a really weird drum sound like we got it. We got a super old Gretsch kit or Slingerland kit, I can't remember. And we miked it when only maybe four mics and we ran the mics through a bunch of guitar pedals. And then I just played some beat that sounds a little backwards right before the vocals come in. And when I listen to that, I'm like, Cool. That was kind of different. But that could have been that could have been way more down the middle Charlie Watts, but I decided to kind of turn it upside down a little bit. Right? I don't know if you're familiar with Alan Meyers, from Devo, the drummer for Devo. But I love his drum parts. And if you listen to the their cover of I can get no satisfaction.
Ari Gold
But one of the most amazing drum parts ever. It's so fast, so
Brendan Buckley
strongly ever. I think best Yeah, beat ever. Yeah, so that's the kind of thing where I'm talking about like,
Ari Gold
it shouldn't work. It's a groove. That shouldn't work. But it works so well. And I guess it pissed off a lot of Rolling Stones fans when they did it. So that's even more amazing is that they like had this groovy bizarre beat that made you know, made the older people angry. Yeah,
Brendan Buckley
snare drum on beat one. It's so bizarre. I actually when I first moved to LA LA I just coincidentally like befriended Alan Meyers. He's he's passed away now. But we were friends and I, I reserved my fandom for a while and just was nice to him. And at a certain point, I said, I'm sorry to do this, but I can I ask you, how did you come up with a beat for I can't get no satisfaction. He said they weren't rehearsing in in the studio. And he was listening to a lot of classical percussion, music, like Bartok and things like that at the time. He said he couldn't find a beat that worked for the song. He went for a walk around the block. He came back in the studio and sat down and played that and that was the beat. They kept and I'm like, I love that story.
Ari Gold
Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's, that's the muse. You have to you have to get the body away from the idea for a second you'd like I find that you know, whether when I'm writing something or working on a film thing, You put the work in and you grind on it. And that part is important because it gets the mind working and then you got to get your mind off of it. And then when your mind is off of it, that's usually when the answer comes.
Brendan Buckley
I've got another story for you. I have a friend of mine named Michael Miller. He's a songwriter, and I was recording drums for one of his albums called, I made you up. It's called I made you up Michael Miller. And we were in the studio with a live band, cutting a bunch of the songs, and you know, acoustic guitar vocals, guy playing Oregon, bass, drums, guitar, things are going really well. I'm playing brushes on a song and, and a guy playing keyboards is His name is Rami Jaffee, who's the keyboardist for Foo Fighters. And at some point, we're recording a take. And I just hear him go. Boring. And I'm like, right in the middle of song. And he's like, this is Am I right? Is this is so boring, right? Why don't we do something different? And I'm like, Dude, you just ruined a good take. But then I thought about it. And he and I'm like, he's kind of right. We're playing really simple, predictable singer, songwriter, music. So everyone, like, gotten to their bag of tricks and gotten some funky pedals out. And I threw a bunch of stuff on top of my drums and played with some weird broken sticks or something. And then we we tried the same song kind of in a weird, Herky jerky way. And it was so much hipper. And I looked at the singer, like, is this cool with you? And he's like, I love it. And then we did the rest of the album like that, like, don't do the most obvious choice, the most obvious choice might work and might be great. But try something different first. And if it doesn't work, then you can always fall back on the obvious choice.
Ari Gold
Yeah, yeah, my brother is a singer songwriter, Ethan golden. And he, he did all the music for my films. But also, we were talking yesterday, because he's been in the studio. And he was saying that, you know, a lot of times will be with musicians, and they do something that like, the groove is perfect. It's totally, I mean, they exactly this thing, like it's, but they're playing what you should play. And if you're playing what you should play, it's fine. But you're not going to discover something amazing. And so he's always trying to push, you know, when he's when he's not playing the parts himself, pushing the people to be like, can we turn this upside down? Can we like, yeah, you know,
Brendan Buckley
sometimes. Go ahead.
Ari Gold
Oh, it's just, you know, we were talking about, I was talking about bass with my brother yesterday, but you know, talking heads, bass is so amazing all the time. And, you know, one of the main reasons Talking Heads, in my opinion, are so good is because of Tina Weymouth bass playing and she came out of tuba. You know, when she wanted. She, she sort of, I guess she started learning bass and, and they were like, We got to figure out how to, she was like, I gotta figure out how to get good. She studied with the tuba player. And so that she didn't play like rock bass. She played these melodies, like a tuba player. And that's one of the reasons why those songs. You take away the band, and it's David Byrne. It's not I mean, it's cool. But like that band, because of her. Always doing unexpected parts.
Brendan Buckley
Yeah, makes it just super funky. Somehow those Talking Heads records or are just unassumingly funky? I'm so impressive.
Ari Gold
Listen, listen to what she's doing. And realize like how much of talking heads is Tina Weymouth? In my opinion? Yeah. Yeah. But we're, we're I usually try to keep it to about 45 minutes I had some go way way over but I don't know if there's like a podcast sweet spot. But maybe we'll we'll move towards signing off and I'd love to just get from you if there's something you want to say to the people who you know, it looks like you have a lot of fans here who are inspired by you what like what's your what's what what little piece of wisdom can you drop for everybody before we weigh the charts
Brendan Buckley
a lot of pressure a lot of pressure to I have to be wise now.
Ari Gold
You don't have to be wise Actually, I'll say one thing. You know, it's the song that I'm gonna listen to after we hang up is pedestrian ghostly. Is from its from its pedestrian. It's from the album, ghostly life, right? Yeah, yeah. And it's Hummingbird on a wire. I have hummingbirds right outside the window here. And I have the Henry Miller book. standstill like a hummingbird. Which beautiful phrase and I think a drunk I think that's a perfect phrase for drummers like you've got all this like energy of intensity, but at the same time, you're you've got to be right in the pocket the whole time. So how do you stand still like a hummingbird? What's your warm up here? That's a question. That's more that's less open ended question. What's your warm But before you go on, how do you get in the right zone?
Brendan Buckley
My warm up, basically consists of just a full day of just doing everything I can to play great that evening. So I try to get enough sleep the night before. That usually doesn't happen. But I try to eat a healthy breakfast. I try to exercise that day.
Ari Gold
Even try closing that night?
Brendan Buckley
Oh, yeah, no, I always, I always think that you can't go on stage cold. You can't go onstage like you just got out of bed and you're like, No, I feel like you have to be loose and be awake. Like, prior to hitting the first note of the show, in my opinion. I don't like feeling as though I'm warming up while the show is happening. Yeah. Like, I'll be ready by song five, I don't think it's you're doing any service to the show, if that's the way you're playing. So I always go to the hotel gym, and I jog or I stretch or I, you know, so that's all those things are important. I might warm up on a drum pad at some point, I might jump rope at some point I I like to go for a walk around the city of wherever I'm playing. So that I feel as though I am actually, I'm not just going from basketball arena to basketball arena or something. It's like, I want it to feel like I'm doing something different every night for a different audience.
Ari Gold
So that's a big one for touring drummers. Because you know, some or any touring musicians, you know, talk to musicians who were like, Yeah, I didn't even know I was in that town. And I think that's where, like, depression and drugs and all that stuff, you know, can be tempting for people because they're not connected at all. And if you're taking the time to take a walk, even if it's like you pull on somewhere, and you only got 20 minutes to do it, and you're doing that that's a really great tip.
Brendan Buckley
Yeah, if you go from the bus, to your dressing room, to the stage, to your dressing room, to the bus to another dressing room to a different stage to address him to a bus for 45 days straight. You start to go cuckoo, you know, so I tried. I mean, Uber and Lyft are a wonderful thing. You for $8. You can go to the center of town, walk around, get an amazing cappuccino and some kind of, you know, veggie wrap or something and come back and you feel like a million dollars all of a sudden, and you're like, I'm ready to play wherever St. Louis now let's do this. Yeah, that's important. So everything, everything for the show. My warm up is the whole day, basically, it's just getting in the right position where by the time it's it's showtime, I feel great. You know, I feel positive. I'm excited. I feel like I know all the songs. I know, all the changes that we made from the prior night are, you know, that's it. I was thinking about you asked for wisdom or advice. And I would say this, I was just thinking as I was talking. This might sound pessimistic, but it's not meant to be pessimism. You can't please everybody. In life, you can't please everybody. So if you're an artist whose goal was who's wearing your heart on your sleeve, and you're offended by the fact that not everybody in the world, 100% of the people in the world love what you do. You're never going to get that. So what you have to do is you have to just kind of look more inside and like what you're doing, like the improvement you're seeing, say like I'm making incremental improvements at what I'm doing. And I am working towards something. I don't care if I don't sound like that guy, or I don't care if I don't look like that guy or I don't. I don't have her gig or his gig. I'm working on my own thing. And you just track your incremental progress. That's much better than trying to please a world of critics who some adore you some hate you. And that's always gonna be the way it is. Yeah. So I think that's something that for mental health, with our social media age, and comments and likes, and well, Twitter, and I think we need to all kind of revisit that idea that you know, why are you doing this? And, and look inside and ask yourself, Am I happy with my own progress? And if I'm not do things about it, if I am happy, then keep up the good work. Don't don't reach for external adulation, you know, get it from inside.
Ari Gold
Yeah. That is fantastic advice. And I appreciate you taking the time to talk with me and with with with us. And I wonder if I say, Brandon trying to figure out how close we live to each other.
Brendan Buckley
I think I heard something.
Ari Gold
So nice to meet you. Maybe we'll meet at the dog park Sunday.
Brendan Buckley
You got Yeah, you got it. Yeah. Thanks for asking me to do this. This was great. Yeah.
Ari Gold
Thank you. Cool. On the flip. Thank you.
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