Best Drum Solos


I'm finding that I've been REALLY enjoying drum solos on my system lately. They seem to work the whole speaker, from the kick drum in the woofers, to the tom-tom in the midrange, and the cymbals and high hats in the tweeters. And when it all comes together, they are the instrument I have the easiest time seeing in front of myself.

I searched the forums titles to see if there were any good drum solo discussions going on, but I didn't see any. So here we go. In no particular order, here are some drum solos I've found to be very high quality:

Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers - The Drum Thunder Suite
Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers - Caravan
Dave Brubeck Quartet - Far More Drums
Led Zeppelin - Moby Dick
Max Roach - Max's Variations

What are your favorite drum solos to listen to on your system? 
128x128heyitsmedusty

Loomis, Jim Capaldi was a very fine drummer, very cognizant and respectful of the singer’s phrasing and dynamics, as well as the song's structure. Being a singer and songwriter himself, that’s not surprising, I suppose. Now that you mention Jim, perhaps it was he and not Winwood would enlisted the services of both Roger Hawkins and Jim Gordon for Traffic!

Grant Hart I’m not familiar enough with to have formed an opinion. From afar, he appeared to be just another punk drummer. Speaking of that, did you ever read what the great Tony Williams said upon hearing Marky Ramone? "Now THAT’S a great drummer" ! I don’t think he was being facetious, either.

Doug Clifford was adequate for the music of Credence, but was what I consider a "pedestrian" musician. No original ideas, no personality, not very interesting. I feel the same about Springsteen’s Max Weinberg. Call me a snob!

Since this thread was asking about solos, but has taken a detour (sorry ;-), there is one drummer who should be mentioned. He was a big band drummer, and they were expected to play, and were routinely called upon to do so, a solo at some point in a live show. Dave Tough was loved by the other musicians in the Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, Woody Herman, and Artie Shaw bands in which he played, in spite of his limited abilities as a soloist. They loved how he made the band swing harder and better than did ANY of the great drum soloists, and how his accompaniment made each of them and the entire band sound better. The Rock ’n’ Roll equivalent would be Ringo Starr, who, though he couldn’t/can’t solo like Neil Peart, John Bonham, or Ginger Baker, was a great ensemble player, making the song itself sound as good as possible. Those are different talents, and rarely are both found in a single player.

Speaking of players of songs, here is just a small sampling from the over 18,000 (!) that Buddy Harman played drums on:

"Pretty Woman" by Roy Orbison

"Little Sister" by Elvis Presley

"Ring Of Fire" by Johnny Cash

"Crazy" by Patsy Cline

"King Of The Road" by Roger Miller

and a favorite of mine, "Stand By Your Man" by the great Tammy Wynette. So tasty! The drumming, I mean ;-).


bdp:
agree with you on jim capaldi and doug clifford--thanks for the validation. i raised grant hart because a non-punk friend of mine, who's a great pro-caliber drummer pointed out that hart's tempo and technique were very hard to replicate--he was very impressed with his cymbal bashing.
in any case, i went back and listened to "disraeli gears," generally regarded as cream's masterwork and got derailed by the attention-grabbing drumming. despite the very wide song variety, baker uses the same 3/4 offbeat pound and quick drumroll on virtually every track; contrast with, say, jim gordon on "layla" where the beat is just seamless.
+1 bdp

all excellent drummers!

I agree about the importance of tasty groove drumming that just carries the song

I think Steve Ferrone deserves a mention too

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk3N84ArTno

and Chad Smith who is just a fantastic groove pocket drummer (note how Chad doesn't need an expensive kit to sound great - it is all about the drummer?)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=dQghnflsBjE
reminds me of a joke my musician friend (great guitarist/record store owner) told me years ago.  "You know why a sneeze is like a drum solo?"  "No, why?"  "You know they're both coming but you can't stop them"