Unknown: And I'm tempted sometimes to learn the new
cheese diddles and stuff, but I also realize, do I really need
this? I don't think so, but I think it's really cool that
what's a cheese
diddle? First and foremost, it's, well, they
sell them in the chip aisle, yeah, are
they? Are they a new item at buckies Cheese dittles
are like, like, a flam with a drag and then another. You know?
It's
like, imagine a paradiddle. Okay, right, left, right, right.
So put a flam on the first right. And as well as a diddle,
dig it, that, dig at it, that, dig it, do that. He loves me.
And then once you get used to that, now start it the other the
other hand. Because even though you're alternating right to
left, so on and so a lot
of people think you're just a leather jacket wearing long
haired rock drummer that rules, but no, but you're, you're
actually the guy that was like, Okay, now I'm gonna do this
exercise with my feet. I
would get, I would get, part of the reason that I can do a lot
of the stuff I can do is, like, I get bored middle school, I was
playing drums seven hours a day. Yeah,
this is the rich Redmond show.
Hey, man, you know, it's the drumming and doing what you'd
love for your life is your youth pill.
We did. We have a guy here who works for us. You met him
before. His name is DC, and he's a professional bearder,
competitive bearding. It's a thing. And I mean, his beard is
amazingly beautiful, but the work,
the work that goes into that beard,
beard grooming, the oil, I
do that with my beard. Do you do that? Like the oils? Yeah,
my wife makes some concoctions and stuff, and I'll put them in
there. By the way, those are amazing
truffles. It's a box of truffles, right? The
main thing is, I wanted to get them out of my house, yeah?
I'm like, don't do that. My mother brought over. I don't
know why she had them, but she had those Ferrero shades. Yeah,
those things are,
like, those are incredible, because I got a little crunch in
them. She don't have the crunch, but they're richer. Like, the
milk is like, these cows are like, princes, kings, or
whatever she
brought over the multi pack original dark chocolate and
coconut Yeah.
Oh, coconuts, my jam, like coconut milk, coconut shavings,
coconut shrimp, anything, coconut carrot cake. I'm with
coconut flake on top, and it's got to have the cream cheese
frosting, not the confession, not sugar, nope. If you're gonna
go
do
Oh, do do it. Go, big, just do it. Yeah, do it. You're gonna do
it. Do it, right? I tell you what, Jim,
what did you think of the
truffles? Do you like the truffles were good? I had I had
one, and only one. That's good, because I'll eat that whole box.
You're
doing your thing. You know where it came from? It came from my
friend Stan Z Stan's lot, Koski. I want to give him some some
praise on the show, because he's kind of like a, oh God. He is a
supporter of the arts, an Erie PA, Cleveland, you know, I did,
just did the weekend with him. He had me in for my kind of,
whatever you call it, Master Class clinic, one man show,
motivational event, and he hosted, and he had it catered,
and he was showing me all around town, and it was just a great
time. And he said, Here, take these truffles. And I just
wanted to get them out of my house, because sounds like it's
your kind of party, you know, you Oh, boy, you gotta. This is
what I tell everyone. You gotta, if you don't have to get ready,
if you stay ready. And our tour is one month away. So, you know,
I've been hitting the gym and drinking tons of water, doing my
vitamins, doing my stretching, lifting the weights. Got the
paradiddles going, so I'm ready to go, but you need to play on a
kit, though, right? Yeah, you know, all my friends at Remo
love you. Chris Hart, I've been with Remo since 1995 dinosaurs
roamed the earth, but I just ordered a set of those silent
stroke heads so I can practice, you know, because I just moved
into a new crib, and I haven't built a studio yet, and I want
to be sensitive to the neighbors. I just don't want
them to be eating me right out of the gate.
Is dw, they've got the electronic kit out now, yes, and
they offer to send me one, and I got to take them up on it. There
you go. Yeah, do it. There's your answer. There's all sorts
of answers. Bluetooth thing. So who's that? Who's that that's
talking to me across the way from the Rosenberg 90th
anniversary drum. Case, you know, while we're here, let's
give props to our friend. Mike Berg, it's an American company,
90 years in business. Congratulations, Mike,
absolutely. And you're also an artist, right? Chris, I am all
right. So here's the deal on Chris. Christopher Williams,
hailing from Greenville, South Carolina, calling Nashville home
since 2008 he's not even 40 years old. He's a rock star.
Look at all the people that he's played with. Gene Simmons, Ace
freely, except Andrew W K Rex, brown, Derek, saying homes we
share. That did a little bit with Derek. Derek, Mick, Mars,
Blackfoot, Lee green. Kid Rock. Peter Stroud, what a player her
1000 horses. The list goes on and on. He's played with members
of P funk, lit love, those guys, the stones. We have to hear that
story. Kiss, slaughter Cinderella. He works a lot
around town and on the road with Phil s house and Jeremy as
Brock. Sort of like the as Brock, don't say that too fast,
the kind of like, sort of like the three kings of like classic
rock. You guys disagree. Yeah, doing the thing, man. And we're
gonna talk about his education and his background and what he's
doing. But really, the latest thing is, since 2015 celebrating
10 years, he has been the drummer with the legendary metal
band, except you got your balls to the wall kick. We're talking
about our friend Christopher Williams, What's up, buddy,
Brother, how are you rich? I appreciate you making the trip
out here. Absolutely.
Where's you coming down from? Where do you live in Hermitage?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a bit of a drive. That's all
right, but
you're right by the airport, which is great. That's the
best part. Yeah, and there's several means to get to the
airport from Hermitage. Yes,
it's very, very convenient, speaking of the three kings,
when we are all kind of living in those houses, living in those
houses, and Donaldson and Hermitage, you know, we all
lived in these band houses, and then we had to get to the
airport. It was, like, amazing. And of course, this was pre
Uber, pre lift. So we would call those cowboy cabs the the
minivan, yeah. And we'd be like, we've got a lot of gear, and we
have a flight to catch. Don't be late. They were always every
like, so it was, there was like a 20 years ago, it was difficult
to get reliable transportation. Now everything is in our pocket.
Uber Lyft. You can order it the night before. I always get
worried, like, I got still late, dude, 3:45am sometimes my pickup
is like, 3:45am and I'm like, Who is going to do this? And you
can't blame
them around here, though, because Nashville became
Nashville and it's overcrowded.
Yeah, as soon as those three through three cabs showed up,
that's when the game changed, really. That's when it was when
you you started seeing them pack the the parking spaces on broad
and all that, and the cops would pull in and have to shove them
out. That's around that time is when Uber and all that started
in the city, yeah, and then it was completely different. You
could get what's now a $20 ride. You could get it for three, four
bucks. Oh, wow. You could go from I lived in Inglewood for a
period, and to go from there to five points. It's like three
bucks. Wow, really? Yeah, I used to go to Red Door East all the
time because of that. So
what is this? A different thing that I don't know about, a
different type of cab. Is what you're saying. No, no,
I say. And that's what Uber used to be, yeah, back when the first
came in, because all those cabs were taken over and they were so
much money, yeah,
they were trying to get market share by offering it cheaply.
But
now they're just like, we all. You all love us. You need us.
We're integrated over your life. Rape,
you're gonna, yeah, what part of your delta sky miles account?
Because
as soon as I land in Nashville, I hurried to the baggage claim,
and as soon as I physically have that bag in my hand, I'm
already, like, pre ordering, because then it's surges, yeah.
Yeah. So
you're doing that from that from the airport to Spring Hill now,
yeah, that's a that's a lofty price, 70 bucks. Oh, my God
bless
you. I know 70 bucks. Do you get to expense that tax return?
Yeah? Well, yeah, totally
keep a track on it. But a lot of
times I'll drive, and then I'll park at one of the parking flies
or whatever. And then, while you're there, you can get your
car washed, and then you come back to a nice, clean, tidy car,
because who wants to wash their car?
So basically, you're looking at $140 to and fro, right? Yeah, I
wonder how much would be cut to just park
that's why I asked for so much money when I play drums. Well,
it
used to be nice.
It used to be, it was like 27 bucks a day or something for,
like, the VIP parking. Yeah,
I actually, I do the off, like the park and fly, park and fly,
but I use trade bank. What's trade bank? Funny, you should
ask rich trade bank nashville.com, go check them out
there. I'm just gonna give them a little bit of a plug. If you
have a business and you've got extra things lingering on the
shelves. And, you know, you can't really move them. You can
trade them with other businesses. So that's what I do.
I trade my voiceover services such as on hold and automated
attendant messaging, yeah, with other businesses who need it,
and I get trade dollars. And I could trade those trade dollars
in for vacations, for parking, whatever. It's
a great idea, isn't he a promo sexual it's incredible. Love it.
No idea what you're talking Kevin Murphy gave me that
nickname, and then I almost said
to Jim, and you had to give him a nickname in return, the
delightful curmudgeon,
yes, yeah, that's good. I mean, he would have a killer podcast,
amazing podcast, because he's not afraid to say anything. No,
I love Kevin. Kevin. Kevin and I get along great.
He's very entertaining because of that. Yes, yes. He just
doesn't care. Kevin myself and Russ Whitman.
Russ Whitman, yeah, man, he's in that click. It's the only time
I'll ever see him if I see Ben Caesar, Keo, Kevin and Russ.
Yes, crazy, yeah,
Russ and Kevin and I sent some stuff to each other that will
not be repeated
now, hopefully no one catches your browser history or your
text
messaging incognito.
Thank you, Google. So you know how you came
on my radar. I really thought it was early on, like I moved here
in 97 so I really thought, like in 2000 or something. Our our
mutual friend Paul, aren't the bass player the place for Lee
Greenwood was telling me, you know, he always had some sort of
side metal project, and he's like, man, there's this new kid.
I've been playing with him. He's fantastic. He's like, so young.
He's like, 19 or 20 or something. I'm like, oh, yeah,
cool, cool. And then must have but it was 2008
2008 Yeah, late, 2008 when I met him. And what's funny is, I
remember meeting you prior that, yeah, Danny Archer put us in
touch. And I think we went to frothy monkey or something like
that, yeah, just briefly, and you're like, Oh, well, there's
forks. Go there. Meet people. Go to, you know, third and lensley.
Go to these places around town. That's where you're gonna start,
the network, the watering holes. Yeah, it's where you're just
gonna meet your community and get your foot in the door.
And you did. Man, yeah, what was the first non Paul ARNs
opportunity if you're listening to this podcast, it means you're
already looking to improve your drumming, why not level it up in
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drummers from around the world have traveled to Nashville to
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development, positive mindset and much more. Of course, we
address all your questions, and my deep curriculum has helped
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What was your first you know, were you playing around town? Or
did you get a road gig right away? Or,
yeah, well, I moved to town. I was already planning to move,
but a couple weeks ahead of winter Nam, I was looking around
Nashville Craigslist for jobs still living in South Carolina,
yeah, and I saw an ad for percussion specialist wanted,
and I clicked it and said, Oh, what's sure, you know, and you
know, sent in a resume and all that. Here's what I do. At one
point in Greenville, I worked for pin tech who manufactures
electronic drums and cymbals and triggers and pads. Yes,
I remember those, those trigger pads. Ray Gray was using them
for
a little bit. Were they similar to heart dynamics back in the
day? Very were they Okay?
Dows pads and all that. Yeah, yeah. Dan, Dows, what's up?
Yeah,
shout out. So I was manufacturing, and whether it
was drilling aluminum castings or soldering or doing any of
that stuff. And so I sent that in, you know, I have a
background in this, background in that. And then it came back.
It was Juan over at minel, Juan Barrios. And he goes, Oh, and I
go, Oh, actually, I'm going to be at winter Nam in a couple
weeks, if you just want to meet up and talk. Yeah. So I did an
unofficial, official interview for vinyl as a sales rep during
winter Nam. And then it becomes, okay, well, you got the gig. Can
you start March 3? Okay, well, that's four weeks I have to find
somewhere to live. And I reached out and met a couple people
online. One of those was the definite, I'm moving in. Then
that fell through a week before, like, Okay, who else do I know?
Somebody called somebody that had a room for a month. I was
like, Okay, that'll just get me there. I'll start the job the
first what led to the first opportunity was a co worker of
mine was actually playing at Legends, and I went down to see
him one night. They had a substitute drummer who
introduced me to the power trio he'd been playing with. He had,
he was expecting a baby, he and his wife, so he was unable to do
the Summer Tour. Three of us got on stage, sat in jammed, and
then we talked afterwards, and then it's like, yeah, cool.
Well, let's do it. Yeah, you know, well, we'll meet at Si,
our room five, and we'll jam some of the material, just to
make sure. But yeah, if you're Kane, let's go. And that was
Richie Shoal.
Oh yeah. Richie Shoal, like an American artist, yep.
Yeah. Awesome dude. Ozzy Queensland, yes, you know, does
he so? Does he live here? Yeah, okay, and he and I are still in
touch. Good man. That was, but that was the, the first
Nashville like
gig. Give him my pass, because I think I've known a lot of
drummers who've come through his band. Yeah, it's like a rite of
passage. Yeah, you know, it is cool, man. And your background
in in Greenville, when did, like, when did you start
playing? Because it says, Here you remember the Carolina gold
gold, Carolina gold drum and Bucha amazing on snare drum,
yep. And then you did some you won a gold medal during the
annual individual and ensemble competition. Yep, for drum set.
Nice. Yeah. So when did it all start? Were you coming? Coming
out of the womb? Did you have a musical family? It was
in the womb. My mother tells stories of, you know, she and
dad would be spinning records, and, you know, they'd push the
furniture to the wall and dance in the living room or whatever,
and I'd be kicking and when the song stopped, I would stop. Wow,
something going to concerts, and so, I mean, and then, of course,
what
were they listening to, like Kenny Rogers Greatest Hits, that
kind of thing, or staying alive, bit
of that. But it was a bit of everything, the real one, what,
what mom calls what always gave her happy feet, long before the
Disney thing was Stevie Ray, oh yeah. I attribute being able to
swing and shuffle to Chris Layton all day, every day.
Stevie's. Stevie's, one of my dudes. What
a great artist, just regardless of the genre. And they have
Chris Whipper, Layton shuffle, have you been did you meet him?
Have you ever met him?
Once I met him at the fender booth. He was playing with Kenny
Wayne Shepherd, nice during an am show, yeah. And just got to
shake his hand and say, Thanks, man. Because of you and Stevie
and Tommy, I know how to boogie, yeah, so I appreciate it, yeah.
And that's what I was playing and listening to even before I
got my first drum set, you know, while watching Motley Crue. I've
got a brother that's five years older than me, so there was that
musical influence from him. There was mom and dad's record
collection. Dad passed away when I was really young, and so mom
couldn't listen to that music anymore hurt her too much. So
then she got into the country of the late 80s. So Alabama,
Alabama, Tanya, Tucker, Clint, black. My first concert was
actually the Kentucky head hunters, the picking on
Nashville too. Yeah, because I was born and raised in
Greensboro, North Carolina until I was 11. I think just before my
12th birthday is when we moved to Greenville, so, and those
were my formative years in Greenville. So that's why I
always just kind of say that's home, yeah, even though all the
families in Greensboro, yeah. So it's two homes. I
always get those, you know. I get Charlotte and Charleston,
you know? And I get Greenville and Greensboro. Well, there's
also a Greenville North too. Yeah, that's really confusing.
Greenville
north in North Carolina. Yeah, it's by the coast.
No, it's, I think it's near Winston Salem, is it? I think
it's on that on the western side. I could be wrong. It's
getting back to you mentioned shuffles before rich, did you
know that Christopher can put a feather in his cap? By he is my
biggest influence on shuffles. We discussed, you know, I've
been, I've been deep diving shuffles because of the Huey
Lewis gig may 28 the city winery in Nashville. Don't miss it.
Don't miss it. Get your tickets now,
while it lasts, hey, if you don't promote yourself, nobody
else will. No
one cares as much about you. I'm horrible
about right? So he came in horrible. You know, we practiced
a little bit, and it's kind of like I appreciate these podcast
episodes, because we keep on talking about my journey up to
this monumental event, which happens to you guys all the
time, and learning, you know, because not it's not a very
typical like, not many drummers going, Oh, I'm going to pick up
the sticks and learn to shuffle. You know, it's the boom smack
that they want to get into, typically, right? Yeah. And I
was told, Well, hey, you get you're almost there, but you
need to make it bounce. We want you to kind of fall a little bit
behind. Bit behind the beat. And I told you this, and you kind of
scoffed a little bit, if you did, you scoff. I heard a scoff
when, when we were talking about, like, playing behind the
beat, or ahead the beat, or something like, I just try to
play in time, right? You know? And then, and I So Christopher
walks, and I said, you know, I'm trying to figure out what they
mean. He's like, Oh, it's just like, this play like a flam, and
I'm going, Oh,
but this, Christopher, did you guys? You guys already spent
time together today.
We did, like, deep dive, man, I don't know where you were. Oh,
my God,
I was, well, I was probably peeing because, you know, the
bladder over 50,
it happens, dude. So, so kudos to you. Thank you. Thank you.
Christopher, absolutely.
Yeah. Plus, he's got a, probably a really mean double bay
shuffle.
Teacher, the Simon
Phillips, Jeff Beck, thank you. Jeff Beck, yeah, and Virgil was
huge for me. Billy Cobham, spectrum, oh yeah, I, I don't
even know if I had my first drums. That when my uncle gave
me that album, Uncle Peter turned me on a Cobham and just
said,
what so many drums that three floor toms, two bass drums. He
put so many hurdles. He put the LP
on one side of a cassette. So there was Billy Cobham spectrum,
and the other side was Herbie Hancock, head hunters. Oh, wow.
And I don't know if I even had my first drum set that was
Harvey Mason, yeah, but I remember at one point just
sitting to the kit and just jamming those records, because I
knew them from listening to them for a few years already.
Now, when you do your double bass shuffle, do you do left
foot lead depends, depends either one it really, yeah.
If I'm, if I'm doing the Van Halen stuff, it's always left
foot lead, yeah? Because if you listen to Al, it's that gallop,
yeah. And that left foot, his left kick drum was always
important
on the right. That's what I got from Greg bisni. Because Greg
business, like, here's the secret, you know, you're always
using syncopated rhythms on the upbeat, or whatever, on your
right hand, on your right foot, and then you're always keeping
time with your high hat on. That's always doing the
downbeat. So now all you got to do is put your foot over on the
double pedal, and literally you are doing this, doing the same
thing. Yeah? So
I learned the hot for teacher shuffle, just the opposite a
buddy of mine. You remember Jeff vidy, yeah, yeah, up in
Connecticut, right? So he was a drummer and guitar player, a
big, huge influence from Eddie Van Eddie Van Helen, and they
had a double bass electronic kit back when I was starting to
play. And I thought I was like, maybe salivate to play double
bass, yeah. And he's like, you know how to play hot for
teacher. I'm like, hell now. He says, Think about if you if you
only have a single kick, just do the gun to gun them. Yeah, I'm
like, Oh, I can do that. He's just didn't add any other foot.
That's nice. He's already a good teacher.
Oh, okay, that new accept record that you guys did in 2014 you
tracked the drums your house sounds amazing. It's got the,
you know, the road so clean dudes, just driving it, killing
it, driving it. And then when you go to do the fills, and
that's, that's the challenging part, keeping that so clean
while you're doing hand stuff. But you've been doing it a long
time. I mean,
it was, it's just practice. It's yeah, everybody wants the the
quick and easy, yeah? And what's the hack? It's not, yeah, you
know how to get
to Carnegie Hall practice, yeah?
But you buy a ticket. But, I mean, it's, you know, it's the
thing of you practice, you practice, you practice, and then
at some point the light bulb just goes off. Yeah, for me
anyway, and I've been fortunate in that sense, where when the
idea clicks, then it's there, whether it's doing the virtual
stuff, or just, you know, like crazy, whatever you can think
of, or the split lick, you know, right hand, right foot, left
hand, left foot. But that thing that took forever goes but I
never practiced it, yeah, and then one day, I sat down with
the double pedal in the pad for about an hour, walked away, came
back and figured rhythmically and feeling, not just thinking
about it, but felt the relationship and those gaps in
your spacing in your body, yeah, boom. It's
a cool lick too. It's a great it's a it's like, I've been, I
sit there, like this morning at my BNI business meeting. I'm
just, like, just just doing that whole thing. They loved it,
yeah, yeah. Well, that makes turn. It really does.
But the cool thing with that one too, as as with anything, you
know, I'm, I'm of the School of, if you can play it this way,
play it backwards, nice. Oh, you know, because with drum corps,
that was one thing that we learned, if you've got 300 guys
auditioning for 10 snare spots, and you've got seven of those
snare spots returning, even though they still got a re
audition, it's pretty much a shoe in, yeah. So there's two
open, three open spots or something, yep, or right? And 10
snare drummers, yeah. And when they start making cuts, you
know, you'll have a line of 20 people. And the caption head is
walking up and down and cutting people stick high, or is looking
at or if everybody's perfect, if they've got it down to the final
12, they'll go, all right. Play it off the left, reverse the
sticking in your brain like that. Go now, oh my
god, do it. That'd be interesting.
That never had, that never happened to you. Well, now going
back to, you know, because you're North Texas, core and
marching band are different things I did eight years of
marching band, right? But, you know, I had a conversation with
Greg Bissett about this. I was like, hey, you know all the, all
the advanced rudiments that the ones that are 46 and above your
cheese diddles and Flam didles and all that. I said hybrids.
Those are the real those are the get you fired rudiments. And he
goes, You're so, right? Yeah, you know what I mean. So I like
my hands, and I'm. Attempted sometimes to learn the new
cheese diddle and stuff, but I also realized, do I really need
this? I don't think so, but I think it's really cool that
what's
a cheese diddle first and foremost, it's,
well, they sell them in the chip aisle, yeah.
Are they a new item at buckies? Cheese diddles
are like, like, a flam with a drag and then another. You know?
It's
like, imagine a paradiddle. Okay, right, left, right, right.
So put a flam on the first right, and as well as a diddle,
dig it that, dig at it, that, dig it, do that. He loves me.
And then once you get used to that, now start it the other the
other hand, because even though you're alternating right to
left, you're always going to have the weaker hand and your
brain as soon as you walk start with the opposite hand. But that
by that training is
universal, which goes back to George Lauren Stone's book,
which is like, look at if you're going to go right left, right,
left, you want to go left, right, left, right. And if
you're going to go right right, left, left, you're going to want
to go left, left, left, right, right, and
you better go between the exercises seamlessly, without
stopping and without changing tone, because you go
right, right, left, left, right, right, left, left, right, right,
left, left, right, left, left, left, left, right, right, left,
right, left, right, left, right, right, left, right, left, right,
left,
right, right, left, right, yep, yeah, that's how, that's how I
would build my feet, build my hands. Nice, all that stuff. Was
doing pyramids, just Yeah, committed plate, singles,
doubles, triples, quads, Quince, all the way up to 10 or 12, and
then come back down. And then do it on the left hand, and then do
it with the feet. Double the note value, half the note value,
so on. And so
a lot of people think you're just a leather jacket wearing
long haired rock drummer that rules, but no, but you're,
you're actually the guy that was like, Okay, now I'm gonna do
this exercise with my feet. I would get,
I would get, part of the reason that I can do a lot of the stuff
I can do is, like, I get bored. When middle school I was playing
drums seven hours a day, yeah? Like, wake up, play the pad half
an hour. Go to the bus stop. Play the pad. Get on the bus.
Play the pad in between classes, like, Race to the next class.
Play the pad, band room during lunch break, like, finish up
early. Run in the band room. Play the drum set, go to the
next class, pad, soon as you got home. Play the kit for two
hours, get off the camera, do your homework, get back on the
kit, be done by nine, and in the evening, as a courtesy, it was
like seven hours a day. Love that dedication. And then, yes,
I would get bored, and I'd set the drum set up left handed and
play it like that for a week. Oh, wow. I'll teach myself how
to play left but my right foot hi hat still is not great, but
it doesn't need
to be. You ever have your main kick drum pedal go out on you?
Oh yeah, you know,
several times I've never done that where you're setting up the
kit backwards, but did you ever work on that Gary Chester new
breed book? No, yeah, because you would be great at that.
Because basically you're not turning the drum set around. But
the whole idea is you have these systems, like these melodies,
like an ostinato, and then you do some reading against the
ostinato, and then you also he's got, like, a counting thing
where your voice is the fifth limb. So you might want to be
counting down beats. You might want to be counting up beats.
And then you're leading what sounds like, it's like what, you
know, we'll win. That's
the stuff that I like. You can see the smile. That's kind of
stuff I might smile. Yeah, that's,
that's a Time Eater. I mean, it's like, oh my god, where did
the last 10 years go? Oh yeah, the new breed. Yeah, you know
what I mean. I mean,
but, and the thing is, are you gonna get hired for left hand
out in that chops or any No, it's not
like the Thomas Lang thing, right? You know, he's a monster
on the kit, yeah? And he can do all sorts of Sure, can, you
know, all the things. But when it comes down to brass tax, he's
just playing what needs to be played. Yeah,
you know, I mean, Virgil, too. Virgil had like, the Tina Marie
gig and all these pop gigs in Australia in the 80s before
anybody knew who he was. Right for being Virgil, yeah, before
any of that stuff. But you know, that wasn't really where he
wanted his career to go. He was just like, Man, this is what I
want to do. That's me.
Haven't heard from Virgil in a while what he's he's still
doing, clinics, tours, his original stuff.
I think his last album was, like, 17 or something.
Well, he's a true artist in the sense that he puts out, you
know, and that's something I want to add to my repertoire.
That's something to check off the list, which is sort of like
a solo drum record, but, you know, very musical, yeah, you
know, where you where, you know, it could almost be licensed, and
then it's not gonna be, it's gonna be a, okay, it's gonna be
a Jazz, Jazz flute record. Yeah, it's gonna be a jazz fusion
record, but like approachable, polite fusion, like you could
still clap two and four, that kind of stuff, just not one and
three. So I want to do that. No. Well, that's, that's for our
debut at the Grand Ole Opry. Yeah, exactly. Thank you.
So between the two of you guys, hit the
symbol sweatpants,
I'm. And shut up and play two and four.
So between the two of you guys, I'd love to see more video
content on all those things that you guys can do, because people
have, like, that preconceived notion that this is all you can
do. Rich. You were like, Oh, you rock, you play country music.
But I'm like, Oh no, yeah, I've seen him riff before. He is, oh
yeah. He's got a deep well of knowledge. And his chops are, I
mean, because, I mean all these guys that are like, dominating
tick tock and the reels and all this other stuff, they can't
hack it. They didn't put the time in for the touring and
studio sessions like you guys have. But they're circus guys on
online and like, hey, you know, here's this, you know, really
lightning fast riff. We
met Ellis the parrio backstage, right? Yeah, Alice The party is
the Spanish guy, right? That smokes weed and plays with,
yeah, with one hand, right? I didn't even know he was there.
He was playing with somebody that day. I just came out of our
dressing room and he was in the hallway. Yeah? Oh shit, dude,
yeah. Photo. Well, we could, we
could you and I could be creating more content. But, I
mean, he's, he's out there, you know, playing. He's got his
balls to the wall. He's, like, playing the 20,000 people. He's
standing up with the kick drum, getting people. I mean, you're a
freaking rock star. Well,
and, and, well, thank you. But I it's weird for me, man. I don't,
I don't feel the rock star thing, you know, I Well,
people tell me, Oh, you're a rock star. Like, what I, I hang
out with rock stars, or
what we, we were lucky enough that our dream came true. Yeah,
that shouldn't change who we are as human beings, no. And I, I've
never felt myself as the person to just throw myself out there
just because, yeah, like, if anybody wants to ask a question
or anything great, yeah, awesome, but I don't want to
bother anybody. Yeah, you know, I'm terrible about self
promotion, yeah? Well, you did all right, buddy, yeah, yeah,
but I need to be better. I've got 10 years worth of drum cam
footage with accept. Well, you could probably put all that on
YouTube, 15 or 20 terabytes of raw footage. Would those
guys be okay with you putting it out there? I don't know.
Maybe. I mean, it's, there's no board feed, no mix, nothing like
that. It's just, it's two or three cams on the drums.
Is it one shot? You got to actually meld the shots? No,
it's, it's, it's three separate go. So, yeah, I would have to
drop it into they're not switched. No, okay, and I would,
I've thought about doing that and throwing in Final Cut and
doing all that. But the other thing too is, man, when I'm
home, I just want to be home, right? Yeah, I get, I still, you
know, we have the studio at the house, which is awesome, so I
can record remote in my pajamas, and that's fun, or we can just
be creative, you know. And that's I
want to get into, that. I
weld. I did to your woodworker, woodworking business, yeah, I'm
getting into a bit of the vinyl business for drummers.
Okay, okay, so many skill sets. So you were telling me your big,
gigantic you have several drum set, drum sets for except you
did the welding for your rack. That's one huge hill skill set
in the story. But now you're saying a woodworking business.
Are you like building furniture for people? Yeah, yeah. Do you
have like, a website like Christopher Williams
creations.com or something
the it's CDW Woodworks, and that's with an X on the end,
yeah, W, O, R, X, you're
designing custom furniture for people. Yeah,
that is key. Recognize the wood of the table you're
sitting at. Yeah. This is what's called an ambrosia maple. And
you know
where I got this on auction. I think we have more of it in the
back shop. I want to talk price. You You got pay pay attention to
mcmore auction. McCarthy more auction. Okay,
see, we always breaks the fourth wall. They used to reload it.
It's that sometimes
they'll have wood that comes up because we just found rices are
not cheap, and they auction it off for pennies on the dollar.
So we got a whole bunch of this stuff. My guy who just worked
here, excited. I
just got wood, but actually, and they backfilled it and
everything. All the wormholes are back filled. Well, we
had a guy who worked here who was a woodworker as well, yeah.
And he put this table together. I told him how big this
is Star bond adhesive. I know what that is right, because I'm
a dork,
because those are, those are two layers of wood that are
sandwiched together. Yeah, you do this
in your garage. Is that your Yeah, shop
Nice. We've got so it's a, it's a two car garage. Half of it is
the shop. And yeah, I mean, I've got an armoire on the list to do
for my in laws as a wedding present. Nice as a thank you for
them. Got a bunch of stuff to do for the house. Next up, some
friends want a custom Island. I just rebuilt a 20 foot stretch
of fence for a buddy of ours because I grew up doing
carpentry and stuff outside of music. I built my first deck
with my uncle. Lee, when I was 12 or 13, your
own hands. See, what did you have the attitude of, even
though it is a form of a backup plan, I'm not going to rely on
that. I'm still going to, yeah, no, it's,
it's, it's just always been a hobby. Yeah? I mean, I would
watch norm Abram on PBS, whether it was New Yankee or this old
house. And then when TLC became a channel, you know, they had
home time and all those shows and, you know, get in there, get
your hands dirty.
You got to have a knack for it, though, which you do? Obviously,
yeah, it's great. You've done
electrical work all kinds. Yeah, I
do electrical. I was in the trade for a season. But I love
hearing stories like that with the welding and the woodworking,
because it reminds me of Troy laketa, yeah? Like we were
interviewing him, and we all of a sudden, he's like, oh yeah.
And I do a roofing business, and you kind of went out, you kind
of went back in the drums. I'm like, no, no, no. Hold on time
out here for a second stop. What? What did you just say?
You're a roofer? He goes, Oh, yeah, I've
done that too, right? Hard. July, many moons. Oh, it sucked.
I did it in August. Oh, I did it for about
which is the prime season to do it, because you have to do it.
Talk
about a farmer's hand.
The only part that's where I developed the fear of heights,
yeah, really, the only part that ever really bothered me, aside
from that, was just doing tear off, you know, because you're
tearing off all the shingles and like, the inside of your elbow
is just coated with asphalt chips and just
the well, and also it's, it's, it's a hell of a way you can get
hurt easily.
Oh yeah, that's hard work. And I left because the company was
taking steeper pitch roofs with no safety harnesses. I mean,
we're talking toe boards five feet apart, where you're like,
struggling to make that gap happen. Wow. And I remember
being on a third story roof with my brother one day overcast. We
shouldn't have even been up there. He and I showed up to the
site. First the materials were there. The supervisor said, go
ahead and he and I are sitting off, hanging off the edge of
this house, with our feet dangling, nailing on starter
strip over the gutters, and just going,
I don't think I'm coming back after race stories, man, I'm
pretty
and that was like, I was still in South Carolina, but I was
starting to gig regularly. I had just gotten picked up by the
booty band to do a fall tour. Is yo mama's big fat booty band.
I was like, a funk, funk trippy band kind of thing.
Seven piece, original, seven piece funk band with a horn
section, yeah, we went out open for P funk and fish bone Harris
brothers did all kinds of head festivals and craft brew fest
when craft brew was just kind of becoming a thing, yeah,
alongside podcasts,
you like the IPA? Oh, I love IPA. Oh, yeah, if I have to go
craft I like a West Coast IPA, like a, you know, Sierra Nevada
style. I
dig Well, Chris, the happier the more bitter. Oh, he wanted, if I
could get away with drinking space dust all night, I would.
Space dust is nice. It's home style.
It's just 9% so you can't really hang out and drink that well,
Voodoo Rangers like that, the tall boy range, the green one,
they will. They've got you to freaking sleep. They've got the
7% one, the orange version of the IPA. Very fruity. That one's
really I love space dust. Yeah, space dust and also means
a different thing now than it did back in the day. Oh, yeah,
thankfully Yes. You
want a good podcast to listen to, the ales and tails podcast.
Make sure you check
that out. Nice. Jim got in his five promotional points. That's
right at the front of the show.
It's a podcast, a buddy of mine, Mercurio. We're friends with
Mercuria. He's our financial advisor and a beer expert. Oh,
he's a nice, very articulate, very intelligent beer expert.
So you got a guy that drinks a lot of beer hands,
but he's so thin you're like, where you put it? Just kidding.
He's He's freaking real. He's a gymnast in the making. But he
it's, it's makes you have an appreciation for because I never
did. So like, Okay, what is this, you know, what kind of
notes are you getting on the nose? And I'd just be sitting
there looking at the other people going, I don't know. It's
gotten to the point I was like, burps. It's
like, it's like, wine and bourbon, you're right, scotch
and stuff now, where you're just like, what? Right? But it makes
sense, because if you think about it, you go to the store,
there's that wall nowadays full of craft beers. Yeah, you don't
know where to start, but having something like that's cool. It
is because otherwise you just reach for the same two or three
standbys, and
you figure out what you like and everything, even, you know,
with, you know, the whiskey having a couple of nips every
now and then, I'm like, I'm getting a taste for this stuff.
This is kind of dangerous. Oh yeah, it's all dangerous. And
then we got into dude, the Evan Williams eggnog. We
got, we also got in cigars. I got in cigars about five years
ago.
Are you an eggnog guy when it comes to the dude? Neither was.
I I've Evan Williams just, I'm telling you two words, two
words, China, China. Evan Williams, Wuhan.
Wuhan. China's the popularity has dipped. It's
the China virus is terrible, terrible. Oh, I'm working on my
trump impersonation. Hey,
the kid from Nashville. You know the does Trump on SNL is spot
on. I
had a guy in here yesterday, Brian, Austin, whatever his name
is, on my on my podcast, the mostly Middle Tennessee business
podcast. Check it out. MMT bp.com, I
love it. It's, I can't wait to read the show
notes. Jim promotes. Jim promotes. Jim promotes.
I thought this was the rich, rich Redmond, oh, my God,
that's so funny. Man. That's like, he's on fire right now. I
love it. So, so listen, we do want to hear some we do want to
hear some stories about, like, you know what? The, you know,
the what it's like working with except, I mean, and they, I'm
sure you listen to him as a young man, and now you're on
stage with him, which is, which is amazing. But you also want to
hear about, you know, some gene and a stories. You know, you're
working with your rhythms. Did you ever get to work with Paul?
He seems like he's, no, you know he's, he's like, less out there,
yeah, but he'll go and he'll be, my mom saw him in Toronto. He
was, he did the Phantom of the Opera, yeah? Like, he'll
do that was 99 Yeah, yeah. 99 I remember notes and everything.
Okay? I guess he went into, he went into voice training for
that, and when they did the farewell tour with the original
lineup in 2000 you could definitely tell the difference
in his voice, really, yeah, because
it was Michael Crawford in the original cast, and he hits that
one note when they're down in his area, the Phantoms basement,
whatever. Yeah, and he's got Christine talking about at the
end, you know, no, it's actually in, I want to say the first he
takes her down, first time he takes her down,
yeah, my wife will watch that, and the hair will stand up on
her arms. Yeah, that's that kind of a note, yeah. So, I mean, for
someone to hit that with the power
Gerard, Gerard Butler in that movie, nothing were awesome. No,
no,
no, he could not hit that. Remember
when le Miz, all the actors, the big Highland actors, did le Miz,
you know, Hugh Jackman. Hugh Jackman is a song and dance man,
for
sure. Yeah, even the greatest showman. I mean, they had,
there's a video on YouTube where they're playing, they're
rehearsing from now on, which is a great song, very deep. And he
just wanted to stop by, encourage the cast and make an
appearance. And he just had, like, sinus surgery or some sort
of cancer removed from his nose, and they told him not to sing,
and he did it anyway. Oh, and he just belts the crap out of it.
Man, gorgeous performance. Sebastian
Bach did Jekyll and Hyde. Yeah, I think on Broadway.
Wow. People will go out of just out of curiosity to see how they
do, yeah, totally. And it's like, they're like, Hey, I don't
care, like, if they nail it, they just want to go see it. I
just found out recently, your boss did a rendition of, I
remember you. Do you recall that? Wow, oh yeah.
It was one of the first things that we ever recorded with Dean
in 99
Yeah, yeah. Speaking of Aldean, yeah, I've talked to you about
it before, but how loud
my click is? No, it's because remember what? Remember one time
you said I heard the click coming from your ears.
They're one feet away. There's that we produce the
volume now we, I'm on, like, straight up at like noon, on the
ears, on the pack.
I'm I start there and go down as the show goes, nice, bro, yeah,
I mix. I put the pack on noon, set the mix myself on an iPad,
yeah. And then just try to bring it as the night goes. Just let
my ears re attenuate so I don't blow them out. Great.
I don't usually go above 1pm on the on the
that's, that's overkill. If you need to. You're vibrating your
brain. Then don't go
to two. Don't do it. Your cochlea is being rocked. This
goes to one
major, I got to give major props. We've talked about it
before, and I listened to it again in the car. Your drum part
on back in this cigarette.
Oh, fucking brilliant. Oh, thanks fucking bro. So long,
long ago,
but I remember hearing that shortly after moving to town and
just going, this is a new breed of like sessions country,
because there's like you're lick going into the second verse. But
Acton. But the way you execute it, the Hi Hat foot splash on
the outro, where you're playing on the rim, and then you go to
the snare March and all that stuff, just swampy, almost like
second line outro thing, dude. Thanks. Before you kind of
gracefully bow out with the symbols and. Little side stick
on the edge of the cymbals. Nice man. Appreciate Phil's
everything in that song is just perfect.
I appreciate it, man. You know what's so funny is, is that it
was all done in like, under an hour. And, you know, I got to
give props also to Michael Knox for being so encouraging and
open minded to percussion, because for the first nine
records we would get. I mean, he would say, Yeah, bring in your
stuff. And I would dump out my toy box of all my interesting
stuff that tracks got like an like some shakers and
tambourines, finger snaps and suspended symbol rolls, and
got that constant right off the get go.
Shakers are so powerful. I mean, for 20 bucks, or an old Advil
bottle that you fill with rice, it's just one of my favorite
instruments. That's
the cool thing with it too, is you can have so much fun. You
can go out. And I remember going into forks a couple years ago.
There was a minor double row, uh, brass jingle. That's like
the 10 inch one with the little inset handle. And getting so
excited over that, because it was the first time I remember
hearing such a clean tone for your tambourine, yeah, for a
tambourine. No mics, no nothing. Just in the corner, just it,
just Oh. And then I got you a minor guy. No, oh, Sabian.
Sabian.
Okay, we're both with Sabian. Shout out, Chris. Thank you.
Yeah, isn't it nice, like to be able to have a friend in the
business where you're like, Who you calling? Who you on the
phone with? Oh, just my buddy and Burbank. I'm just getting
some new symbols. I mean, it's just so cool.
Yeah, man, yeah, I love stinky. He's just, he's a lifer. He, he
took a chance on me when I was,
I don't know younger, yeah,
20 in your 20s, 2011
I was with Leroy Powell, yeah, we had just gotten a tour
opening with Kid Rock and stuff, because he used to come down on
Broadway and jam and stuff. And, you know, Leroy had, I guess, I
don't know if it was through shooter Jennings, yeah, but
Leroy had some connection in there
now, now, Pearl is celebrating 75 years in business today,
yesterday or today, we had Jason Hartless on, yeah, some of your
colleagues, Keo, um, so you've been with them, and you got a
lot of drama. So when you order a new kid, it's like, I need a
1020, need a 1012, 1316, 18, 220, fours. Call
the bank, get a loan, second mortgage. Yeah, yeah, it's a,
it's a big drum set lot.
And then you're, I mean, you're going like, like, 15 inch hats,
16 inch hats,
14 inch hats. Oh, why use the AX accelerators. Oh, nice, but big
crashes, but it's double hats. Because I don't I could do the X
hat thing over here, but the honest truth is, when you have
an X hat here versus playing cross, believe it or not, you
hit the symbols differently, and now you've got a secondary mic
that's got all this additional bleed from whatever else is over
it. And sometimes your band mates don't want a pan or any so
I do the Tommy Aldridge thing where I've got the closed hat on
top of the open the pedal hat. Yeah. So if we're doing double
bass, I don't do a drop clutch or any of that. I just have it
barely sizzling for French kissing, yep, and just do that.
But they're both right here, so I can play open or crossed on
them, yeah, depending on what I'm doing. But I've got two
nineteens and the and the models change year to year, but two
nineteens up front, 219 inch China's hovering over that 80s
style, yeah, and then 220s usually thinner. Crashes back
here, the big wash, but then they're all pitched, you know,
bing, bing, bing, bing. So depending what riff is being
played, or whatever, I'll play the symbols. Nice attention to
detail. Not that anybody's gonna hear that, but I hear it when I
record the song. Yeah, anyway. And that's kind of the muscle
memory and
everything with a band like, except you need a giant mega
bill, the mega Bill ride,
the HH power bill, yeah, Vinnie Paul ride. So that
used to be, that's kind of like sabian's equivalent of the zill
Bell, yeah. I mean, no,
that's, that's like the Zildjian mega belt. Zildjian did a 21
right? And they still do. They just reintroduced the Z custom
line. But Z thinks that's nice. I think that's kind of where it
started. And then Vinnie went to Sabian, and they did that for
him. I could be wrong, but if I'm not mistaken, I
finally got to break some bread with will Calhoun. I mean, I had
vivid, living colors, vivid on cassette Yeah, in 1988
or 89 visit and time's up. Amazing,
yeah, dude, sorry, but he had that mega Bell ride. Yeah, it
was just all Bell. The whole thing was a bell cult
of personality got me fired from a bit.
Well, no, he was using back then he was using either the earth
ride. Or he was using the Z heavy power. I've got a couple
of those 20 fours, and I, I'm just waiting for the Sabian
custom shop to open up so I can get the Roy Mayorga ride. Ooh,
because it's, it's basically that, it'll give you tennis
elbow and break all your sticks. But you will hear that ride the
next county over.
Oh, I used to even at a younger, younger weighs 14 pounds.
Oh, my gosh, it's a 24 inch ride, though, 24
inch 14 pound ride symbol, because I
used to have the 24 the AA bash ride,
but it wasn't 14 pounds.
Yeah, go. Just look up Roy Mayorga, whether it's with stone
sour or ministry or eighth inch easily. Oh, that's crazy, yeah.
So it's dumb, and I've been telling stanky for years. I'm
like, Dude, come on. Come on. He goes once custom shops pumping
out. We'll get you on nice,
because I had, back in the day when limited to green, green
tractor hit the airwaves. I think it was like oh eight or oh
nine. I had a 24 inch Sabian, heavily a rock ride. Very Pinky,
huge bell. You can still wash it a little bit, but mostly ping
you late. You know, you shoulder crash it. That was, was that
when you, that was when you had the natural kit, wasn't it the
natural flats tour, yeah,
yeah. I don't know who's got that. Now, you know, I sold a
lot of my sonar stuff to Gary Asher, the drum collector. Yeah,
slash drum. I don't even call him the drum pusher. They called
Don, they called Don Bennett the drum pusher, because he buys, he
bought car mines, Kitty bought, you know, ringos kits. Today,
it's the last big purchase that, because I just got to spend some
time with Don. He bought all of aerosmith's their warehouse. He
bought everything, wow, in the Aerosmith warehouse. And then
slowly but surely, took the time to trickle everything out and
sell each item one by one. And of course, he's patient, and he
was able to, like, quadruple his profit.
Oh yeah. I knew he had, he had Kramer's, the purple swirl DW
with the white hardware for ever, yeah. And I always was
like, man, love that color combo.
Were you into the aposy a piece brothers? Did you like those
guys? Yeah, yeah,
yeah, respectively, on their own. I mean, I mean, I had the
realistic rock book with the poster totally, you know, with
his leopard Pearl syndrome, yeah, concert, Tom's right up
front. I love
Carmen. I love, I love his, you know, his vocabulary is his
vernacular. Yeah, it's good stuff. Absolutely, he invented
all that shit. Okay, well, what about some of these stories? You
got any funny stories here? Working with Gene, working with
ace, working with Mick Mars lives in town. Of course, you
can always tell the Lee Greenwood story about how you
how you had to prepare for that. There's
that one. Yeah,
we could start with that one. Start with that one. It's
kind of odd though. Even like all you have all these heavy
acts John Karabi, except Gene Simmons, ace, really? And then
you have the one that stands out, Lee Greenwood, yeah, this,
one of these things is not like the other.
So that came about with our buddy Paul arts, who was, I
think he still is with Greenwood, I think so. But
forever, what's up? Paul? Paul arts, woo, woo, but I was
renting out his house, and there was a studio downstairs. We had
a band together, like a little metal side project. We jam and
stuff. And there was a casino gig, I think in Oregon, maybe it
was where, last minute, whoever their artist for that weekend
was got sick and bailed and they needed a band ASA, bless you.
Lesson, yeah, so
Andy wasn't available. Their their drummer at the time, and
Andy Hall, yeah, yeah. And their keyboard player wasn't available
either. So Paul calls me and goes, Hey, they just called
Greenwood and asked, What's up with this gig. Can you do it?
You know, well, I'm missing a couple people, but let me see.
And Paul calls me, and I said, Yeah, man, cool. He goes, All
right, let me confirm it. I'll call you back. So I'm like,
eating nachos, watching TV.
Paul calls nachos. Yeah. Paul calls back. A half
hour later. He goes, Okay, the gigs on. I'll send you the set
list as soon as I get it. Okay, so now it's like 10am 10
o'clock, something like that. And he goes, Okay, here's the
set list rehearsal tomorrow, 9am S I R, God, get like 22 songs
we're doing. 20 of them get 11 hours. Learn this, learn these
other two. Yeah. And I go, okay. He goes, go downstairs to the
studio. The center drawer on the desk there's. Two iPods. One has
the board tapes, the other one has the album versions. What's
an iPad? Yeah, he goes listen to the board tapes, but reference
the album versions as well. So I did, and just did the best I
could, skeleton charting, but
specifically you read specific, you obviously read notation.
Yeah, yeah. Big, help,
massive, massive. But I didn't have enough time to actually do
a full transcription of every song. It's a guide chart, so it
was, yeah, skeleton sheet, certain licks, you know,
signature parts, whatever. Bang. Bang. Just got through it. Slept
a few hours, got up, Paul came over, and we went through tunes,
basically, ins and outs, and he's like, okay, went to, sir,
do the rehearsal. Lead. Didn't even play through the full
songs. We get, like, up to the bridge, maybe halfway through
the bridge, and you go, all right, that's good, fine. Yep.
We're like, Becky on keys. She and I are like, Becky priest,
yeah, sorry. And we're like, No, we need to do this for our sake.
And he goes, No, you'll be fine, nice. Okay, so the gig comes,
so
we leave, yeah, we leave, sir, at 6pm we've got a 6am flight to
Oregon. Yeah, get there. Quick line check, and then just again,
just study study study study study do the gig. Two minor
mistakes the whole time. One was a rhythmic figure I played
backwards on a fill, and it was something quite literally like
instead of Pat Boone, Debbie Boone, Debbie Boone, Debbie
boom. Pat Boone. The only other mistake which was not
technically a mistake. Yes, Lee would start this ballad
downstage, right on a keyboard, and he starts it himself, all
the board tapes I referenced, he just starts free form. He turns
around and looks at me and goes, give me a tempo. Brain fart,
yeah, deer in the headlines felt like 20 minutes. Yeah, it's
probably like two seconds. He's give me a tempo and go, you got
it. And he just, he laughed, and just started coming in play,
just playing pads. You're playing pad chords while you're
talking to the audience. You don't need a tempo like, are you
just messing with
so great to be here again. This is a beautiful theater that was
literally it beautiful crowd. But
he wanted me to, he wanted me to, to count him in for that.
Yeah, and I didn't have it free. It's, I didn't have a tempo
marking on that one because I didn't play on that song. Yeah?
So I'm like, Cool. He's good. He starts it himself. He's got it.
So did you only do one gig with him? Yep. But the main thing is,
is that you were given that opportunity. The door was
cracked. You end up kicking the door open. Then now you have
Paul, who's championing you. All the other people that were in
the band are championing you. And that's that thing that just
gets that ball roll. Absolutely. Yeah, man, do your homework.
Kids, preparation. And I say over preparation is the key to
success. But the thing is, is you were willing to not sleep
for one evening of your life, yeah, to get the ball rolling
through your career. And
I and played with a Grammy Award winning artist like, yeah, man,
after being in Nashville less than a year, yeah, I think it
was 11 months at that point, 1011. Months, were you doing
the day job over at the mineral at that time I was out. Yeah.
Now tell us how you came across Phil and Jeremy, your brother,
rhythm section brothers, yeah. So
that was, I was playing with an artist at the time. Her name was
Missy Johnson. Missy McCarthy, now married to shaker, who was
with Southland shaker. Yeah. What's he doing? I don't know. I
haven't talked to him in years. Yeah, me either. But I was
playing with Missy, doing her original stuff, and she and I
are also like, major Zeppelin heads. Yeah, we have a tattoo.
Yeah, I got the I got the rings, yeah? But so we had this tribute
night coming up where we were calling the band Roberta plant,
you know, nice, and that's great. We'd worked up all the
material, and the mighty Dan halen was going to be
headlining. And that was Phil. That was Phil schus on guitar,
Paulie Simmons on drums. Phil's wife, Raquel, who played with
Maggie rose for a while, nice. She was on base. And then rest
in peace, our friend Matt Harris, who did a lot of writing
with Leon Russell. Wow was our Dave, and he was Dave, like,
like the ashless chaps,
not that far. But, I mean, just, but like talking to him in
general, he was Dave, and he could do the wow, that split
vocal thing. Oh, but so anyway, we're all set. They're gonna
headline. We're gonna open flood hits, May of 2010
May of 2010 the 100 year flood. Yep, flood hits.
And you. I guess Polly's something at Polly house had
gotten flooded. Phil's basement, where they rehearsed on 12th
South had gotten flooded, and they pulled out of the gig, and
I I called in desperation. I got Phil's number because I had met
him once or twice before playing with when he was with Karabi.
And I was like, Dude, I know that that Dave era, like the
back of my hand. Let's do this. And he goes, Nah, man, that's
cool. And, you know, to his credit, if you don't know
somebody, that's, that's a lot. So he's no thanks. So we ended
up just, we still did the gig, but we did a mixture of Zeppelin
and missy's original material, but those guys still showed up
to support at the Rutledge, yeah, and that's where I met
Jeremy for the first time, and Matt and Raquel, and they were
just like, Damn dude, yeah, we should hang out. We should, like
do some more playing. And that's where, sorry, I doubted you.
Yeah, yeah. And that's where that started. And a week or so
later, Phil invited me over to the house. We're hanging out and
talking music. And you know, what's your favorite record? Oh,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it's my turn. And I go,
Well, nobody really knows it, I said, but it's King biscuit live
flower hour 1973 at Winterland, humble pie, wow. And Phil
Frampton, oh, no, I know. After Frampton, post Frampton, Clem
Clemson and he had the blackberries, which were Ray
Charles backup singers. Marriott had started playing lead guitar
again and harmonica and b3
totally obscure, but he was down with it. He knew Phil
knew it. And he goes, dude, what? And goes over and throws
it on the turntable. And I go, you know that records just
freaking out. And next thing you know, we're air guitaring and
jumping off the couch like children, and it always reminds
me of the scene from Step Brothers. Did we just become
best friends? Yes, do you want to do karate in the garage? Yes,
look at all this room for activities. It was that, hey, do
you like guacamole? It was that moment, and that solidified the
bond. And then through Phil and Jeremy, I was brought into that
rock and roll community, which really threw the doors open.
Yeah. I mean, because, you know, I mean, I fancy myself an
overeducated rock drummer, but there is this underbelly of rock
and roll in Nashville more than ever. But I mean, you three guys
have really made a name for yourself in a country town being
the go to rock guys, absolutely. And what was, what was the Rock
and Roll residency? Is that still happening?
Sometimes they're, they're actually doing what, I'm not
sure when this will air, but they're doing one Friday
actually,
okay, this is probably come out in what, seven weeks, or
something like that. Okay, yeah, yeah. Well, never mind Strike
that. But anyways, this Friday would have happened. So this
Friday is where East
Side bowl, oh, the East Side bowl, because now they they do
it once, twice a year.
Hey, man, that East Side bowl is becoming quite a popular venue,
like rad. Man, a lot of music.
There's three different stages in that place, and they're all
completely different. Who owns it? Does Grammy own? That chark
Ken solving, I don't know him. So chark built and designed the
sound and the stage and everything over at basement east
with grimy Gotcha. But chark also did cannery mercy, high
watt and several other venues. So
he's a total venue entrepreneur,
and he is, you can ask him any question about any band, and he
can give you all the details. He's
that guy. He's that guy. So he's a student and fan of the genre
Absolutely,
and he's a killer guitar player too. Shark, yep, something.
Hopefully doesn't listen
to this and go red man, you're an asshole. I met you two years
ago, like, but I don't know well, he still might call you an
asshole either way. But yeah, I mean, I get, I'm sure I'm being
called things as we speak. So well, that's great, man, man.
And so you guys have got this thing, and so where you kind of
like, lift each other up, and you got this three headed Hydra,
you know, and
then you've also got, I've got to give a major shout out Jared
Pope, because he's actually, he's the drummer for
the rising role residency. Yeah, who did do some work with
Thompson square? Yep, he was
with Thompson square for a while. Brother Kane whiskey
falls Tom Kiefer's drummer, yeah, for years now. Jared,
what's up? Man, we'll get you in here. Damon Johnson, we had
David Johnson early. Okay, yeah, yeah. Man, Jared killer, too.
Man, total rocker, but Vinny chops, oh, nice, like, yeah,
he's a bad dude. Nice, yeah. What's up? Jared? Whoo, we'll do
the thing. Man, yeah. So who else dude?
Funny stories here,
ace, I guess I mean, Ace is a character. Come on.
Yeah, anybody that's ever been around ace can do aces voice,
it's like that guy, but like a serious, Long Island accent.
Yeah, deep. He's
from the Bronx. He's Bronx
boy tuxedo junction in Connecticut all the time. Yeah,
and buddies of mine, the guy I told you about, Billy Willie,
yeah, yeah. They used to go see him all the time and do the
exact things that we're doing now, kind of, yeah, mimicking
them and stuff like that. He's greatly comet. Fraley's
Comet, yeah, with Anton, yeah. But yeah, we were in Japan with
ace. We did three nights in Tokyo double shows, and then a
night in Osaka double show. And so the last night in Tokyo, we
had finished the final performance there. And, you
know, Ace is all over the place. I've got one of those Gene
Simmons vaults, because we had just played with gene in
Australia. And Ace opened, and then he would come out at the
end of the night, and we were the band for both gene and Ace.
Yeah, myself, Phil s, Jeremy asbrook, and Ryan cook. What's
up, Ryan? So I get this 40 pound wooden box full of all these
unreleased CDs of demos and stuff, fly it to Japan, because
there's no way I can ship it home, and it's cheaper just to
pay the extra baggage fee. So I've got it backstage last
night, and Ace sees it and goes, Oh, what's that? I go, Oh, it's,
you know, Gene's vault. You want me to sign it? And I go, Yeah,
man, that'd be great. This is great. I roll it over and Gene
when he would, when you'd purchase one, he would sign the
top of it and do this little meet and greet and stuff. Well,
mine was a gimme from the record label. You know, hey, we've got
some extra ones. And I pestered the rep long enough there. He's
like, here, I don't want to ship this home. You take it so a sees
it, and he goes, Oh, Gene didn't sign it. I go, No, Gene doesn't
know I have it. And it goes, good for you. Don't give him any
more money.
Those guys are like, still, yeah, right. They love each
other, but
it's still they got to give each other crap, knowing full well,
could probably come back to him. So gene
you know or so ace signs the whole thing you know, Keith
LaRue, who you know works like day to day, Paul Stanley's guy.
But he also is their official photographer with Kiss. He runs
the website, does the contest, conventions, all this stuff.
Awesome dude. He's asking ace. He goes, acety, you have Oh
yeah, jank, I made one of these. Have you listened to it yet?
Listen to what the box set the vault. It's a box
ace. There's 10 DS and 10
discs in there. Why the hell do I want to listen to his crap he
didn't put out like just die and laugh. And so ace signs it. We
all say, you know, good night, because the next day, we're
flying to Osaka, packing our bags, and ACE has decided that
this band is going to go on the kiss cruise in a couple months.
And so ace is leaving. He goes, All right, fellas, we'll see on
the cruise. And I go, No ace, we'll see you at the airport
tomorrow. And he goes, what? I go, we'll see you tomorrow
morning at the airport. We have two shows in Osaka tomorrow
night, sold out. And he goes, Wow, we'll figure it out. So
wait,
so you're cool enough there to figure out he wouldn't mind you
doing this impersonation. No,
okay, any anybody that knows ace Does he still ace is great. I
see anytime. No, he's been clean and sober, probably like 15
years good
for him, yeah. Now gene and gene never touched a thing that is
insane. I
think the only time that gene ever got messed up he there was
some after party early on in the kiss, days like pre destroyer,
you know, first two or three records, it was an after party
or something like that. And there's jeans. Have got a major
sweet tooth. Ah, that's his thing, sugar. There's two trays
of brownies. Oh no, yeah, hot brownies. One's fully leaded,
the other one's unleaded. Well, he starts digging into the
fully, you can't eat the full. And he apparently had to ride
that out for a long time. Yes, yeah. But according to him,
that's, that's the only time he's ever been messed up.
What a businessman and were those guys? Are those guys like
task masters to work for? Are they pretty much like you guys?
Sound great. We'll see you at the gig. Done. Gene
was great. Gene was totally you guys are the band. You guys know
what you're doing. You're great, awesome. I had a blast with
Gene, yeah, like from day one, because Eric Singer is a good
friend of mine. Yeah, I was gonna ask you, if you ever met
Eric. Oh, yeah, yeah. We text all the time North Hollywood
guy, right? Yeah. He's, uh, Vegas now. Oh, in Vegas. Okay.
Oh, really, yeah. So Eric really that that may, that, in May of
that year, was at a we were at a kiss convention, and Brent Fitz
was on the gig. He was, he was Jean's guy. Love Brent, but
slash was getting ready to go out and do the thing again solo.
And that's his gig. That's his money maker. So Eric goes, dude,
Christopher, why don't you do the gig? You know, all the
stuff, it's perfect for you. Why aren't you on the gig? And I go,
Well, if you know Ryan and the guys call me, Sure, great. Like,
you know, initially I was supposed to do the gig and I was
on tour with accept, you know, whoa is me. Yeah. So, yeah, then
that came about for doing the gig. But Eric said, you know,
when you work with Gene right out of the gate, just bust his
balls. Oh, he likes that. And I was like, No, I can't, man,
that's, that's the dude, that's the demon. I can't do that. And
he goes, No, trust me, do it or he's gonna walk all over you.
He'll respect the hell out of you for it. So he the first gig
we did. Gene walks into the dressing room, sees the other
guys. He doesn't know me yet, and, you know, I've got the long
hair down and everything. And he's like, hey, guys dotted Oh,
Jesus, so good for you to join us. And I go, behold, bu, I have
risen just for you. And he goes, Ah, you know, you're one of us,
right? Meaning Jesus are Jewish and everything. And I go, Yeah,
him, but me, not so much. Booby, you know? And immediately, just
the rest of the night just started ripping each other,
great. And then from then on, traveling through airports, he
enjoys that. Oh, yeah, he's a practical joker. Ah, Eric is
too. Eric's like, they just constantly mess with, yeah,
yeah, a slapstick and stuff, you know. I mean, if you ever left
your coffee around gene, he's like, you paid $5 for a cup of
coffee and left it sitting there, and he would just dump a
bunch of salt in it, you know. Look at this, you know, like
Gene always keeps his phone tucked down into his boot, yeah,
and then puts the leather pants over the boot, and he goes, Look
at this. This is a $1,200 hand computer, and people just leave
them laying around. But Paul walks into a room and just sets
it down, as well as the keys to his Porsche, and walks off.
Somebody could just take the you're like, You got a point?
Yeah, he's not a point. Why does he put in his back pocket? It's
harder to answer if it's tucked into your boot. Leather pants.
Gotcha tight leathers. Tight leather pants. I got my tight
pants. I got my tight pants on.
Now you see the leather pants, don't you? Well,
yeah, Gene was a blast to two are with man. He was absolute,
and he's a gentleman too, believe it or not, yeah, believe
it or not. He's a really, really good dude. And,
well, that's great to hear. And then how did this accept thing
come along and give me the history of accept? Because I
know that. You know the I know that you've got your balls to
the wall 1983 which was like a year or two before you were
born, and now you're playing with this band, right? So that's
my
ball buster, by the way, because I'm the youngest in the band by
10 years. Yeah, so. But
I mean, is it the original singer, the original guitar
player? Like, what? What is made up of Wolf's the
last original dude that's there,
Mark turnello from TT quick marks, been there since 2009
when they reformed the band after about 1015, years.
Is that the singer the original guy? Yeah, look like, turn the
oil. So Joy Z boy, yeah. So he's the original fellow, Sparky,
yeah, the way union guy. So it's becoming,
um, sort of a foreigner,
kind of a there's only one original member that's was
either Mick or Lou, yeah, and then everybody else's side,
guys, yeah, yeah,
pretty much, yeah. With the exception of, though, Mark, when
he joined the band, they put out a record called Blood of the
nations, yeah, which still to this day is one of their biggest
sellers, really and completely reshaped the sound of the band,
yeah. So it went from, you know, the Udo type vocals, so now
you've got a guy that can still do all that, but this guttural,
powerful just
is that you're drumming in the blood of the nations.
No, I joined. I joined midway through the blind rage tour.
First studio record was rise of chaos. Then we did too mean to
die at my place. And then we did humanoid, which is the record we
just finished the touring cycle on. Okay,
so those years are so I can look them
up. Let's see. Rise of chaos was 2017, to mean to die, came out
January of 21 I think. And humanoid was 24 nice. And then
there's two, I think it's two. Might be three. No, yeah,
there's definitely two live albums I'm on. We did a record
that came out early 2017 called restless and live,
live record, yep. So how did you guys? Was it truly live, like
you didn't touch it? Did you just like a mobile recording?
Here's the set.
So, pretty much, yeah. I
mean, you have the technology. If you want to tune a vocal a
little bit, you should the vocal,
all that stuff was there, yeah,
minor stuff, if a guitar was out. We did a festival in 2015
in balling in Germany called bang your head, yeah? So when
you get restless and live, you get the DVD of that show. That
thing's Full Tilt, yeah, the audio from that, because there's
one moment where there's this giant, long catwalk, this big
thrust going into the audience. Peter baltis and Wolf are out on
the end of it. Peter's the original bass player who's no
longer with the band. Peter and Wolf are out there jamming, and
Wolf turns around and heads back because, you know, we got to
sing. And Peter just jams a little bit too long and realizes
it last minute. No, there's about four steps going down from
the main stage level to the thrust, and Peter's up there in
in shit kickers and cowboy boots, runs like the wind to get
back up and caught the tip of his boot on the top step at
stage level, face planted, slid all the way up to the riser on
his base, and then just sat up on his knees and threw his Hands
up,
like I meant to do that. If
you watch the DVD, I don't remember what song that happened
in, but if you watch that DVD, you'll see it shows Peter on the
catwalk. I think it cuts the wall for Mark, then it cuts to
me, and I'm dying.
I am just in tears. And every time he wasn't, he wasn't hurt.
No, he was
fine, and everybody else is in tears. But the crazy thing was,
he got up and his base was still in tune.
Amazing. Oh, wow. So did you hear it like, oh yeah,
oh yeah. So we cut that part out, yeah, we fixed that,
yeah. But amazingly enough, it stayed playing. But
then there's also, there's two CDs that come with it, which is
live audio board tapes from the full year. So it was like, I
think there was a show or two in Russia that we recorded that
year. There's some stuff in Greece. There's stuff throughout
Europe, South America, maybe all kinds of stuff. So it's, cool.
So that's restless. And live from 2017 and then in 20 later,
2017 we headlined the vaak festival in Germany. So that's
the biggest heavy metal festival in the world. Wow. It's
something like over four or five days, it's 300 bands or
something like that. Distortion, the main, the
then, when you ran into anvil, the story of anvil, yeah, one of
them,
the main. And it's one of these where they do, you know, Europe
has its stuff together when it comes to festivals. They know
what they're doing. Two giant main stage, stages right beside
each other, and what they call the infield. So that's the main
big act headliner. Stage, 85,000 people in the field beyond that
barricade, though you have all the like elevated platforms that
can hold a handful of 1000s, and they're scattered all over the
place, plus their delay towers in the other field at different
stages, whatever bands not playing on that stage, they're
streaming the live one the main stage we played when we
headlined. We did it with the Czech National Symphony
Orchestra, full on 60 piece orchestra. Wow. Bombs fire. The
whole deal. 85,000 people in the field. Over a million people
live streamed it, and it was simulcast in seven different
countries. It's amazing. And my mom and my now wife, yeah, you
know, were there to witness it.
So that was cool. Hey, tell us about that. That COVID. Going to
get your Musk off the show. So
my wife, Ainsley, is an artist rock and roll Americana, but she
also has a company called ainslie's essential blends,
where she does all natural cleaning products, smells and
you name it. And we came up with this. It's a roll on scent for
him and her called Rock See, he's breaking the fourth
wall now, yes, yeah, leather
tits.
It smells like leather. And I
joke, I said, just because you look like a rock star doesn't
mean you have to smell like one or no, just because you party
like a rock star doesn't mean you should smell like one, ah,
it's great. But, yeah, it's, it's leather and and a bit of
musk, but it's soft enough to where, you know you smell it on
a woman like, Oh, hey. Well,
how do you get a leathers? How do you get a scent of leather
into a bottle? Talk
to her. She knows all that magic. I don't think she's gonna
divulge details that's incredible. Is there a website
or anything? Ainsley central blends.com? There we go, look
into the camera and say it now, ainslie's essential blends.com.
Now say it
this, ainslie's essential blends.com.
That's right, rock and roll on yes
for him, and
yeah, dude, we even made, we made a cheesy commercial because
we make fun of, like the perfume and cologne commercials all the
time, like so dramatic like the one where Johnny Depp buries his
damn jewelry in the desert and a wolf house. What does that have
to do with a Sauvage? Sauvage, yeah, or, like, the sausage,
what's her name, walking through, like, the Egyptian
temple, and Joe del deal, yeah,
yeah, Natalie Portman, you know, yeah, all that stuff, yeah.
I so we're like, man,
let's just get silly. We'll make one of those, and we'll both dub
the voices, and I'll do the super low, sexy,
and we'll just make it as silly as possible. But it
works, yeah, man, that's like, get remind you ever see the hype
reels of certain you know, like, do you follow any of these like
gurus online now? No, so Well, okay, I'll look at cats Cafe is
thought leader. Thought Leadership type of videos. I
follow a lot of these guys. And they'll do these things where
everything's in slow mo. They'll have the the car, the Porsche,
will pull up and the the door opens slowly, and they're
getting out and putting the sunglasses on for some reason,
and then going to their and, you know, and they're going to their
private everything, slow mo. And it's just life, man, this is
just, this is just me every day. And it's like, I want to make
one where I'm doing the same exact thing, looking how I look,
getting out of my banged up 2008 Honda Odyssey. And just, you
know, if you want to learn more about success, follow Jim,
that's really
funny. There's one out there,
you know, the the like Russian blonde with the Bentley, or
whatever, scratching like the ASMR AMS, whatever that thing
is, she's like scraping her nails across the grill and bent
le, flicking, you know, the hood ornament, bent le. There's been
so many parodies of that where somebody comes up and, like,
knocks on the hubcap and
goes or slams the door.
Yeah. Like the knockoff of a Honda. Man, yeah, hey, they came
a long way. Man, yeah. Man, Kia, so you got C Williams,
drums.com, for people to reach out to you, and you guys got to
tour this year, right?
Yeah, we actually accept worldwide.com
Yep, except worldwide.com/tour
beautiful. I gotta say, I'm looking at the website now, and
you guys look so metal. You're not gonna bruise, you're gonna
rust. Well, you know what? The the rule of heavy metal photos
is, smoke
back lighting, and you're not really you're missing. You're
missing all of it. I'm but I'm this is what I'm seeing. I'm
describing what I'm seeing. You're not really smiling, but
you're not grimacing or looking mean at me. You're kind of
smirking. All of you guys are kind of like, like, you're
almost crazy, where
the Phil likes to joke that we're the happiest metal band in
the world. Yeah, that's great. And I love the
fact that you're not holding drumsticks, yeah, you know,
because that it's like, I just want to make sure that, you
know, I'm the drummer. Yeah, those in shirt and the fact that
you also have a font that has a voice Sabi on it, well, it's not
like that. It's more like
except is a German heavy metal band
with legendary impact and an iconic reputation. Nation
spanning over four decades. You too can get
your thoughts to the proverbial wall, yeah,
but that's it has that voice. It's like a Trajan font. I want
to say, but I was going
to say the most important part about taking photos with a heavy
metal band, the the underlying, unspoken rule, first one that
smiles gets kicked in the nuts,
really? Yeah, no smiling. This is working. You have to look
like you're holding a secret. You're
holding you, or you just have to go full on. But
it's really, it's really hard to get a great press shot for so
many drinks, my last
beer, right? Did I just it's like, you know, did I just drink
piss? Yeah, because that the look.
It's like, you can't be by the railroad tracks, you can't be in
the alley or against the
brick wall. Skid Row already did all. It's like, Are
you guys familiar with the building in Chattanooga? You
guys familiar with Chattanooga? Yeah, that's the multi like, as
you make the curd the cover on the river, it's on the right
side. They're destroying it now. But every time I drive by it,
I'm like, That's a perfect place for a heavy metal video. Yeah,
perfect. Yeah, just an old run down industrial mill. Windows
are
broken somewhere in Franklin. There's a building like that
that actually is a photo shoot place where they've actually
curved the bottom of the wall and painted it solid white so
they don't have to hang the fabric. Oh, really. We did a
video shoot in there, like as a promo release. When UVA and I
joined the band in 2015 we just did a half of a song called fall
of the Empire. We did that there, and we did the all the
press photos there as well.
What's a music video? Come to think of it, now that we're
we're getting visually descriptive, like, for some
reason I'm thinking like the old war for territories video from
Sepultura. What's the one that kind of resonates in your mind
as a favorite that kind of inspired you as a drummer,
because, I mean, Igor was a freaking beast. You mean? Video,
yeah, I don't, you know. I don't know. Well, odd question. The
one that sticks out when I think like metal. Video, just the
overall look and theme was Skid Row monkey business, great,
where baz is standing out on the railroad tracks, and then
they're jamming. How
about rat? Bobby, blots are round and round. Funny. Well,
even
blots is like the king of the Doom. Lay it down. I want to
bring that groove back, dude. It'd be good missing that. Bring
that back. But yeah, the shuffle, the mega, massive,
iconic one for me as a kid, was wild side Motley, oh yeah,
watching that and the drums, and just like I like
that shout at the devil video, because the girls are just so
ready to go and looks. I was, I was like, I was like, a, you
know, a horny pubescent teen. I was like, Oh my gosh, she does
have
the looks that kill and she's crawling over the rock
King Bell being Bing bell.
And I love it that he actually hit a bell. The clock strikes
midnight, even though the bells this big dude, Tommy.
Tommy is just such a rock. He's
such a drazor monster. Another
cool story born to be a rock. So, you know, they always say,
don't meet your heroes and everything. And for years and
years, like Tommy's top five for me, I
was gonna ask you, so he's in the top five, who? What's the
what's the list? Tommy
Lee, Randy, Castillo, Jerry Shirley, uh, Bonzo, of course.
And then probably Vinnie, because you just have to Vinny
Collier, Vinnie Paul. I mean, Paul's in there, but if you're
talking about top five that have, like, shaped me, it's
those dudes about
that Joe's Garage record. Brother, oh, let me so we don't
go down either. What
is the Lars hate justified? Do you think? I mean, he's not. I
mean, back when I used to listen to them, like pre Black Album,
and even the documentary they did, he was solid, man, is he
just kind of phoning it in. Now he thinker,
no, I mean, it's just his meter. You know, that's the thing. Like
his drum parts are solid, right? He's great in that, but it's,
it's just his meter. Everybody bags on, which, you know is
true, but there's no Metallica without him, right? He's the
brainchild, yes, both he and James, but Lars probably more.
So yeah, is the driving force and
a spokesman for the band, absolutely,
he's the business guy too,
you know, and it's, he's the gene Absolutely,
isn't it funny
that, as drummers, usually have some sort of second, third or
fourth, hustle, slash skills, something else that we bring to
the band, whether it be like our marketing or our socials or our
graphic design or. Or something, you know. Voice, absolutely.
VoiceOver,
well, the thing with about Lars is the fact that I think he he's
got to be aware of, you know, with social media roasting and
stuff like that, he's letting
him all the way to the
bank. Does he care? He still takes it? Well,
the pool, I get it, having a cocktail, I
know, but you still, there's got to be a level of where, you
know, it kind of stings, but he takes it, at least on the
surface, he's a good sport about it. You know, you got to give
him that, yeah, I'm sure, you know, yeah. Because, I mean, you
see him on stage, he's pulling kids out of the audience,
letting them sit with them. It's, that's cool, man. I mean,
I don't have to do that. And
the other thing too, is, like, think about it, and in this
sense, Tama drums, he single handedly, drove the ship for
them, and still does realistically, like, you know
how many 10s of 1000s or hundreds of 1000s of drum sets
that guy's probably sold because company, he is
kind of like the Ringo star of that brand. Because, I mean,
sure, you love Billy cotton, you love Simon Phillips, you love
Kenny Aronoff. They, they might sell some Stuart Copeland, but
like Lars. Lars,
yeah, he's the back in the 80s, it was the two top, the Pepsi
and Coke, if you will, were tama and Pearl. You remember back,
that's what I got into. Yeah, yep. Pearl was my first entry
into brand new drums, yeah, man. And then you
had Ludwig. Was Ludwig was 70, somewhere in there, trying to
compete, but they had
a big presence in the 70s thanks to Zeppelin. You know, Neil was
a Slingerland guy at first. Then he went to Tama he went to tam
two. And then, of course, you had Alex playing Ludwig gene.
Alex
was always Tama hardware too. Well. I thought
he was playing, I remember reading an article with him. He
played ghost bass drum pedals. And I've always wanted to look
those up. Those were
the tama pedals. Were they idea? I think those were the the, if
I'm not mistaken, I I've got a pair of Stefan Kaufman's old
Tama pedals, really, where it's, you know, it's that 70s design
strap, leather strap, yeah, but it's, but the spring assembly is
actually going up, and it's,
oh, yeah, but you're not going to Ludwig for hardware. Let's
face it,
no, well, not back then anyway, yeah, the Alice stuff's pretty
solid. But, I mean, he was all Ludwig drums, but as soon as
they started making some cash, it was Tama hardware, and that's
where the octa bands came in, the bombs. Well, Tama was also
the rosewood snare. Did you
say Stuart Copeland? Yeah, okay, yeah. Because he's the one who
kind of brought that to the forefront too. And Tama became
aligned with being, well, Kenny Aronoff was a Tama
guy. But what's cool though, that a lot of people overlook,
you know, Stuart gets the credit for the octo bonds or whatever.
It's actually Billy Cobham really. COVID was the very first
one in the 70s to have the gong drum and the octagons. And they
were the acrylic ones. Those were the first ones for the
clear acrylic tubes. He's got
the history of drums right here, man, hey, I tell you what. You
know, our friend Bart, Vander Zee, he's got that drum History
podcast, oh yes, a couple couple of 100 episodes. And what he
does is, I gotta, I gotta reach out to him, or see him at a
trade show, or just get him on the phone. I think it's a great
show. It's very it's very buttoned up, it's very
researched. But he'll be like, they'll do a focus like the drum
gear of Alex Van Halen, the drum gear of of Nico McCarthy, the
drum gear of Ringo Starr. And they do a deep dive. And he
brings on experts, and they talk about what that guy had through
the different eras. And they'll do like, the history of the bass
drum pedal, the history of the high had something like the
history of electronic drums. It's a really educational
podcast. That's
another world that I'm really, really into is the electronic
drum world. Yeah,
love it. Did you guys follow? Remember when we had How did I
unfollow this guy? That's weird, vintage drum catalogs. You
follow that on Instagram. Remember we had him on? Yeah?
Maxwell shaft. You know Maxwell from person from KHS apex, and
then he plays down at Roberts Western world. So much cool. He
collects all these vintage
they're great. It's such a great walk down memory lane. It's
incredible. Hey,
what's your favorite color? We got a red. Yeah, what's your
food or dish? Mexican, dude, Tex Mex, or just straight up mole,
mole. Straight up Mexican. Mexican. Where do you go in
Nashville? Where's the spot? Is
it? Nolensville road. I mean, yeah, Galton road. It depends on
what I'm getting. Yeah, believe it or not, like there's a spot
toward Mount Juliet. I don't remember the name of it, but
it's one of the few places I've had that have killer tamales.
Tamales, yeah, I like the green around Christmas. Oh, my God,
because I grew up in El Paso, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's, like,
fantastic, yeah. What about your favorite cocktail? Favorite
cocktail?
Hmm, it used to be. Vodka crayons used to be, yeah, went
to that phase. And then something happened around 35
where this thing called the hangover started, yes, yeah.
Ainsley was the same way. It was right around the same time,
oddly enough, just like, Oh, Jesus, what? How, yeah, you
know, and those hang around for a
few days. She needs to make something for that, right?
Tell me about, yeah,
I'm a Scotch dude. Oh, wow, scotch and tequila. Don't mix
them. I haven't
experimented with
the scotch, but it's, you're very sophisticated, and
something you could sip. It
is, yeah, it is. That's why I dig it. Because, man, again, the
hangovers, yeah? Like great movies. You can, you can give me
beers and it's like four or five right off the bat, and then
mellow, yeah, and then just take it slow. Can't do that with
liquor, yeah? You got to respect it, or it'll kick you in the
face. Yes. So, I guess margaritas, yeah, yeah, what
they would call skinny margaritas, but a real
Margarita, yeah, where it's lime juice, you know, some form of a
triple sec,
yeah. And do you like the reposado or the BLANCO when
you're just doing your tequila? Uh, we'll do reposado,
yeah. And then I'll sip on your host and mezcan,
hey, get this. I got a friend, Greg Sobel. He's I met him like
over 20 years ago in Southern California. We were playing the
Galaxy Ballroom in Santa Ana, and kept in touch on and off all
these years. And he just developed the first kosher, the
world's first kosher tequila, and he sent me a bot, two
bottles of stuff, a reposado and a Blanco killer. It's kosher.
What makes it kosher, though? Um, he's gonna explain that, but
it's basically the idea, whatever that process is where,
you know, like, involved in animals whatsoever. There's no
clovid feet.
There's a process where it has to do with the ingredients, and
then what, you know, what they approve the priest, there's a
priest involved. Or, like, you know, unless there's some sort
of a process, I know it's, it's like, super clean, there's a lot
of rules. And so anyways, we figure maybe we'll get him on
the show, because he's a true, you know, he has an
entrepreneurial spirit.
He bring you some samples. Call your boy. I'll tell you what.
Yeah, you know, I just can't wait. That's I got the tequila
Jones from our Singer, Mark, yeah, except he's a tequila
head. I see he's so there's for for beer drinkers. There's an
app called untapped, yeah, where you can kind of sign in, do all
that. There's one for tequila, where, wherever we are in the
world, he gets on there and looks at the map and finds
what's near us, because that's that's our game, myself, Mark
and our rhythm guitar player. UVA, if it's not Mexican, we
will find the Irish Pub. Ah, we can be in the middle of a
desert, yeah, and around the corner, there's somewhere with
Guinness on tap, and the lines are clean so it doesn't taste
skunked. We will find that
place. Give Guinness another shot, if we're
playing in your city, yeah? Either, like, where, you know,
the grandmother is in the kitchen, cooking, yeah? We're
either going to be eating that Mexican food, yeah, or we're
going to be at the Irish Pub a little
some fish and chips and a Guinness. Have you been to the
Guinness factory in Ireland?
I was in Dublin once, yeah. But we got in at like, six o'clock,
yeah. So I missed it, but I went, I went drinking an Old
Town, which was maybe a half a mile from our hotel, where all
that is, yeah, and it was the most delicious Guinness I've
ever had in my life. It's also where I discovered, like the
Jameson castmates before they came here, and then, like the
Jameson single barrel, like the Black Label, that's like, super
smooth and little bit sweet, but not too much. Yeah,
what are your some of your favorite spots to visit in
Europe? You're probably being there so often that you have
your favorite go to spots in each city, country, states, you
know, like,
I love Hamburg. It's a water city. So just walking along, you
know, the docks and everything, just, I love water in general.
It gives me peace, yeah, especially in this crazy, hectic
thing that, that we do, that we do, yeah, Hamburg is great.
There's a city called Leipzig in Germany that they've got one of
these old beer halls that's a couple 100 years old underground
called Auerbach Keller, and it is the most amazing meal I've
ever had. Awesome. It's reindeer. Oh, I've had reindeer.
Yeah, slow roasted, marinated with the gravy. They've got the
red cabbage and canola, which is like this. Puffed up potato
dumpling type thing, amazing. You want to go to sleep right
after you eat it, but it's the best thing. Yeah,
I had the reindeer in Stockholm. Yeah, yep,
uh, Munich's great because of hofbrow house. Yeah, I love
that. One of my favorite beers. Have you
been there for Vegas? Did you go to hofbra house, Vegas by
chance?
No, no, I didn't know they had one. I knew there was, there was
like a replica in like Chicago area, kind of like Rosemont, or
somewhere around there.
I play like Rome. We
not Rome. We've played PISA
Florence. What's Napoli? I Milan. We played lots were the
most handful of times well dressed people in the world, in
the cathedral, yeah, we
played there a handful of times.
Not much in Italy. And a great spots to buy fashion, forward
fashion.
I
saw a pair of overalls, yeah? Like a Versace label, or one of
these, like Mega monies, with factory grass stains and scuffs.
And it was like five grand for a pair of overalls. And looking at
it going, Dude, we can just go to Goodwill and I'll walk on
them, yeah, if you want this
car hard it up. We'll just, you gotta put, we gotta put Tractor
Supply in the map. We just
gotta buy, gosh, it, right? I wouldn't do that, but I'm just
saying it's like, um, grow if you're in Paris or Rome or
Milana, you're gonna, you're gonna find some nice threads,
man, yeah,
no, I'll lose me. I'd
rather, I'd rather buy drums.
Snare drums are gonna last longer, and they'll actually
appreciate, Hey,
Jim, ask your question, and we then we have a bass player
coming in. Ooh, amazing, ooh.
So my question would be, what part of a kids movie completely
scarred you? I'm sorry,
ouch. Of a kids it could be like that. Could be like Pixar or or,
you
know, something you watched when you were a kid. That was a kid's
movie.
Oh, I see, you know, that scarred me. I don't know,
bambi's
mother gets killed, yeah, that kind of thing. Now,
okay, how about this one,
stinker, I don't know it was like horror. It makes
you think that does, dude, pet cemetery scared
the hell out. Hi, there you go.
Upstairs.
My, my, my brother loved that movie again. Five years older,
scared the hell out of me. I didn't go to sleep that night. I
couldn't see the cassette tape without getting scared. So my
mother would hide it on top of the refrigerator. VHS, yeah. But
then my brother would also pull crap, like, if he was
babysitting me, you know, I'd be in mom's room watching TV, and
he'd reach in and cut off the light and pull the door close
and go, Oh, wow, and scratch the door. And I'm, you know, you're
like, five years old. You're not thinking, I can get off this bed
and just go turn on the light. It's just him, like, That was
Friday the 13th, right? Yeah, all of those. He had the full
box set when they came out. Oh, yeah, Freddie, all of them.
Jason takes Manhattan, all of that stuff.
Michael Myers is quite a character. But, I mean, that
question. Michael Myers, but,
but he grew up, you know, watching it like Freddy Krueger
was hilarious
too. Yeah, I'm your boyfriend now and
through the phone. Yeah, hilarious, but yeah, it wasn't
until years later I got into that genre. Now I love it. Oh, I
love it. Just messed me up. Messed me up. I've seen them
all,
see that was a good question. It yielded fruit, yeah? How dare
you throw shade. That was fruitful. Yeah?
But the first one was, that was a stand was, that was
a stinker. Yeah, it wasn't.
That was it went into a different version of the
question, Hey, man, I'm just Gene Simmons, and you, I know
you're freaking roughing me up here. What's an issue you got?
We got to talk about something. What do you
mean? I'm funny. What's so funny about me? No,
no, no, he's a big boy. Do you said it? He knows what. Let him
talk. Let him talk
when he's when he stabs him in the trial, yeah, God, brutal. My
just go have then they just go eat dinner. Sunday
dinner. Yeah, not much. It's the, what do you call it? The
Paw, the paw, the hoof, the hoof. Ma, it's a sin. It's a
sin. Great movie, all the good fellas
and all the godfathers, dude, I'm telling you, this was so
long overdue. Yeah, man. And I appreciate you coming out.
Appreciate you having me have an amazing tour this year. Thank
you, brother. Yeah, I get to hope you get to visit. Are you
gonna be able to visit those spots you're talking about?
Yeah, yeah,
yeah. Hopefully. So I know we're doing,
we got like, four or five weeks in Europe this summer. Now you
guys go to Asia. We're doing Japan
couple weeks. Tokyo isn't gonna be a bus. Haven't done it. I
love Tokyo the other planet,
right? Osaka is my favorite other place in the world. If I
could live anywhere else, I'd move to Osaka. We
got the Osaka Japanese steakhouse up the street. It
looks actually little different,
topical. But by the time this goes. Is out. It's not going to
be so topical. I want to go visit Bangkok. Yeah,
never been to Thailand. Have
you guys seen the videos? I connected
Shanghai once in China. That sucked. Yeah, you mentioned we
had a flight connection. We were flying to Australia from Tokyo.
Again. Connected in Shanghai, China. Oh, wow. That sucked.
That was not fun. Did you guys
see those videos this week that came out from the big earthquake
over there? Oh, my God. You see like, all the like, the, oh, is
that the building? The building? Yeah, the pools were splashing
out and falling down, and
all this happened so far away, and the effects came all those
miles. Yeah. So get this one, of, one of my gals went on the
roof, good friends, Sophie monk, she's a celebrity. She's a huge
celebrity in Australia. She hosts like, you know, Australia
has got this and, you know, the dating shows over there. And she
was in Bangkok when it happened, really, and survived, okay. She
got out of there. Yeah, yeah.
Because it reminded me when you were talking about earlier,
being three stories up now, I mean, imagine being up on a
building, and it starts swaying,
man, there was a video of, there was a couple in, you know, it's
an infinity pool on top of a roof, but at least there's a
glass wall, but they're on the top of the building, yeah,
swimming. And then you see the water
start swinging around. Don't swim, guys kids, the guys
holding on for dear life. Yeah, don't
do Nope.
There's this glass wall on the edge. On the Edge,
yeah, in the infinity pools, it gives the illusion of an edge,
but there's actually a splash area on
a proper infinity pool. Yeah, it flows over and there's actually
a basin, but it looks like it just goes forever. Yeah, this
was that theme, but a giant, thick, I guess, Plexi or acrylic
wall, probably the depth of the pool, and maybe another four or
five feet above the deck, so not that big, and you're swimming
and looking down at the Earth as the water is no, I'm good, get
out of that pool. Are they literally getting in that thing
anyway? You kidding me? They
got videos of the pool water splashing down. I think one of
the pools, like, emptied completely, and people on the
ground got like, washed away like a tidal wave,
broken necks, probably, no, no, God, that's horrible. I won't
even do the Chicago the ledge or whatever, with the cracked
floor. And then there's, is it in Vegas? There's like a room
you stand in that actually tips? Oh, yeah, I think
that's Chicago too. It's not for me. Yeah. No,
not for me. I'll keep my feet on the ground. Christopher
Williams, C Williams drums.com, also check out his woodworking
business. Check out his brides business. It's just called
wensley's
essential blends. Yeah, love it. Anglesley Music official.com.
Amazing. My personal socials, YouTube, Facebook, all that
stuff is at C Williams, drums, CDW, Woodworks with an X. CDW,
metal works with an X. Hey, bro. And soon to be launched,
kick logos.com Oh, so you're gonna start doing logos.
I've been doing custom heads for myself and for years and years.
Great. What happens? You're a remote guy, yeah, right. You're
a DW guy, right? You got a red kit, right? You want a red logo
on a fiber skin head. But who's got it? Where do you go? You got
anybody in town? No, not anybody in town. You want custom
graphics to go along with that? No, call your boy. How you doing
it? Like laser printing or something, or is like, dicotter.
We gotta talk off and then offline, and then graphics.
Yeah, I'm doing out
as well. Smart buddy. See, you're really smart, and if one
of your revenue streams goes away. You're cool because you
got five others, yep,
and Lord and out of the house. Lanc studio, that's right.
Third. How
many inputs? 24 inputs. 3232
inputs of drums to your inbox. By Christopher Williams, thanks
for being here, buddy. Thanks for having I appreciate it, man.
Good to meet you. Likewise, yeah, Jim, thanks for all you do
is brother. And to all the listeners, we appreciate it. Be
sure to subscribe, share, rate and review we there's you know,
it helps people find the show, and we've been noticing that you
guys have been believing some nice reviews. So keep it up. We
appreciate it. We'll see you next time. Thanks so much.
Thanks. Chris, thanks, Jim, this
has been the rich Redmond show. Subscribe, rate and follow along
at rich redmond.com, forward slash podcasts. You.