On 18 Aug 2005 00:25:36 -0700, "Reverend Beastly"
Post by BoomPost by Reverend Beastly2) David feels kind of slighted that he isn't regularly playing with
the DEVO live entity anymore (heard this from David as well), and the
reason for his not playing may be that the band doesn't think he
actually hits the skins hard enough (from a second-hand source).
No offense to David, but I kind of agree with that assessment. I also
think David simplifies the more complex stuff too much ("Satisfaction"
and "Jonee" are a couple good examples), and plays everything like a
typical rock drummer would. Plus you'd think by now that he'd speed
up "Gut Feeling" properly, but even on the Japan DVD he still plays it
too slow. David is a nice guy and a world class drummer with a lot on
the ball, but I never thought he was a good fit for Devo. Would I
work with him if he wanted to? Absolutely! But I'm not Devo. Well I
am, but not musically.
Agreed 100%. It's sad because I think David is a really
cool guy who rather fits in with the whole image. But
his drumming is quite uninteresting compared to Alan's.
And he even managed to boil old Alan-Devo songs down to
more mundane versions as you mention above. I noticed
that bigtime in 1989 during a show they did in Detroit.
Josh certainly does the old songs way more justice, but
I haven't heard any Devo songs that where had a hand in
the recording process like David had with Total Devo and
Smooth Noodle Maps.
I'm also a drummer, and I certainly am influenced by Alan
(and Jet Black of the Stranglers and Keith Moon). In 1993
I got fired from a band because I wasn't rocky enough. The
subsequent drummer was vastly better than me (way louder and
he could do many technical thingamajigs I could barely).
However, all the new songs after I was gone (and even playing
the old songs created while I was in the band) became way
blander and lacked difference from one to the other. I tend
to treat every song as an island.... and create an idiosyncratic
drum part that's as different as the vocals or guitar part might
be from song to son. As a result each of our songs definitely
had a kind of "thing" going for it... maybe you can call it a "hook".
I've never taken drum lessons and I certainly would never make
it in a very commercial band, but there's one thing that Bob1(?)
said to Rod Rooter that has stuck in my mind since I was around 17
years old: "I guess we like ideas".
f-erenc