The Police’s Stewart Copeland recently had an interview with Wired, where he answered questions from some fans. Upon one of the questions, he made a list of his favorite drummers:
“Well, Buddy Rich, Mitch Mitchell… There’s a lot of drummers that I really like that aren’t famous names; they just have a great lope, they just have a great feel to them. Taylor Hawkins just had a great feel to him. Ringo Starr, Charlie Watts…no chops there, but just that groove is way, way cool.”
Going for a drummer with a heavier sound, he went on:
“Now, on the younger end of it, I would say Joey Jordison – sadly departed with Slipknot. That little bastard had chops! You know, kids these days, they start out where we left off. And it’s like the Olympics where every year they can jump a little higher, run a little faster. How’s that possible? Has the human species evolved in one year?! I dunno! But Joey Jordison, doing things with his feet that I aspire to with my hands.”
The ‘Greatest’ Of All
A few weeks before this interview, Copeland talked about ‘the greatest drummers’ in another chat with Rock History Music. Back then, he revealed Mitch Mitchell as ‘the guy’ for him when it came to drumming. Comparing him to Joey Jordison, he explained:
“It’s an amazing thing. You listen to live records, and you can hardly hear them, but on the albums, the drumming there has not been surpassed, in my opinion. He’s the Mozart of drums. He’s the Joey Jordison of his day. He had more chops than anybody, and he changed the formula of how drums operate in a band.”
Thoughts On Jordison’s Skills
Copeland heard Jordison’s playing for the first time when he was still a Slipknot member. The late drummer’s skills impressed him at the time, as he told Ultimate Guitar in 2017:
“When I got the Tama kit with a single bass drum, I had to relearn how to do it on one foot. Once I’d gotten over a hump there, I was a whole better drummer. Then years later, I saw Slipknot with Joey Jordison and the shit he does with his feet, I aspire to do with my hands, and then I got me a double bass drum pedal.”
Watch Stewart Copeland’s full interview in the video below.
