A bite-size insight from our interview with Mel Gaynor, the Simple Minds drummer. This is one moment from a longer conversation, and you can watch the full interview on the Drum Dog YouTube channel.

Mel explains how he approaches John Bonham’s drum parts, and the difference between drummers who sit on the beat and drummers who sit behind it. He covers Bonham’s lazy feel, Jeff Porcaro, Buddy Rich holding back, and Phil Rudd’s groove. His closing point is that feel counts for more than technique.

You can find our interview with Mel on our profile or on YouTube,

🥁 Less scrolling. More playing.

The full Drum Dog lesson library gives you somewhere useful to go when you have ten minutes, half an hour or a proper session behind the kit. No grades and nothing to prove, just good ideas from drummers who have lived them.

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👉 https://link.drum.dog/join

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Apple → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/drum-dog-podcast/id1806605706
Amazon → https://music.amazon.co.uk/podcasts/b859c830-c051-46c6-a094-cc9b92973e4a/drum-dog-podcast

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Video essay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDp_tV8MhOc&t

Omar Hakim is the drummer you've heard on more classic records than you probably realise: David Bowie's Let's Dance, Sting's The Dream of the Blue Turtles, Miles Davis's Tutu and Daft Punk's Get Lucky, plus years behind Madonna and a spell in Weather Report.

Drawing on his own interviews, this video follows his path from the jazz clubs of Jamaica, Queens to the biggest stages in the world. It covers the Weather Report call he took without an audition, the Let's Dance session, how he made Money for Nothing by almost playing nothing, and why he believes a room full of humans still matters.

00:00 intro
01:34 Growing Up in Queens
03:31 The Weather Report Call
05:02 Bowie, Dire Straits and Sting
07:41 The Frame Around the Picture
11:11 Daft Punk
12:22 Freedom, Soul and Legacy

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🥁 You can learn plenty from what a drummer played. Sometimes you learn even more from why they played it.

Drum Dog membership brings together artist stories, interviews, performances and practical lessons, helping you stay close to the music and players that made you want to drum in the first place.

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Studio tips for drummers from Rob Brian, who’s been making records for 35 to 40 years and says he’s still picking up new tricks.

Rob has recently worked at Abbey Road and Real World Studios. Here he shares what he’s learnt about walking into a session ready to play.

We cover what gear to bring (and why a few spares in the car always pay off), how to choose kit, heads and cymbals for the style of music, and why you should carry plenty of drum keys, including a slotted one for house kits.

We also get into working with engineers, producers and everyone else in the room, and why being easy to work with keeps the calls coming. Then Rob talks through preparing for a session with your own charts and questions for the artist, and what to do when you’re handed nothing.

Plus staying consistent between takes, keeping your head in the game, and whether the room changes how you play.

00:00 Intro: studio wisdom with Rob Brian
01:19 What gear to bring to a session
03:11 Choices: sticks, heads and tuning tricks
04:34 Why you need a pile of drum keys
05:28 Getting on with everyone in the room
07:23 Why being easy to work with gets you rehired
08:59 Preparing the material
10:48 Walking in cold: counting bars and tape pressure
13:04 When the producer changes the plan
14:04 Consistency between takes
15:04 Staying in the zone (no phones)
16:51 Give them more takes to choose from
17:37 Does the room change how you play?
18:44 Match grip requests and the “naive” sound
19:50 Outro

👉 Check out Drum Dog for more lessons from world-class drummers: https://drum.dog

#RobBrian #StudioDrumming #DrumDog

🥁 Less scrolling. More playing.

The full Drum Dog lesson library gives you somewhere useful to go when you have ten minutes, half an hour or a proper session behind the kit. No grades and nothing to prove, just good ideas from drummers who have lived them.

Take a look inside. Membership comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee:

👉 https://link.drum.dog/join

🎧 Listen to the Drum Dog Podcast wherever you get your podcasts:

Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/2s8IAlRWNnu3SGOZo0BxTW
Apple → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/drum-dog-podcast/id1806605706
Amazon → https://music.amazon.co.uk/podcasts/b859c830-c051-46c6-a094-cc9b92973e4a/drum-dog-podcast

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Four working-class kids from one of the roughest corners of Birmingham picked up guitars, bass and drums with no plan beyond getting out of the factories - and ended up inventing an entire genre. This is the story of Black Sabbath: the blues club circuit, the accident that nearly ended Tony Iommi's career before it started, the album that gave heavy metal its name, the firing that could have finished them, the singers who came and went, and the final, impossible night 57 years later when the original four stood on a stage in Aston one last time.

00:00 Intro
01:06 Earth: Blues, Jazz and Birmingham
07:06 The Debut Album and the Sabbath Sound
11:04 Paranoid to Never Say Die: The Ozzy Years
14:13 Ozzy's Exit
15:25 The Dio Era & The Revolving Door
19:20 Reunion
23:45 Legacy

#blacksabbath #ozzyosbourne #heavymetal

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🥁 You can learn plenty from what a drummer played. Sometimes you learn even more from why they played it.

Drum Dog membership brings together artist stories, interviews, performances and practical lessons, helping you stay close to the music and players that made you want to drum in the first place.

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Had a great chat with Pat Garvey ahead of Ozric Tentacles' UK tour to talk about 32 years as a working drummer. He tells us how he landed the teaching gig at BIM, how he went on to start the Brighton Drum School, and what it was like recording drums for the new Ozrics album, Harmonic Mind.

We also get into how to stay professional (and pleasant) on the road, why the portfolio career has taken over, and how social media is changing the way young drummers learn.

If you've ever wondered what it takes to last as a professional drummer, this one's for you.

00:00 A Day in the Life of Pat Garvey
01:47 Who Is Pat Garvey?
04:14 Joining BIM and First Day Teaching
07:41 Balancing Teaching and Touring
09:35 Skills Beyond the Kit
12:40 Staying Professional on Tour
14:17 How Young Drummers Have Changed
17:44 Ozric Tentacles Tour and New Album
21:38 The Sound of Ozric Tentacles
24:20 Freddie G's Drum Camp
29:19 Hosting Drum Events That Hold Their Value

👉 Check out Drum Dog for more lessons from world-class drummers: https://drum.dog

#patgarvey #ozrictentacles #drumdog

🥁 Less scrolling. More playing.

The full Drum Dog lesson library gives you somewhere useful to go when you have ten minutes, half an hour or a proper session behind the kit. No grades and nothing to prove, just good ideas from drummers who have lived them.

Take a look inside. Membership comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee:

👉 https://link.drum.dog/join

🎧 Listen to the Drum Dog Podcast wherever you get your podcasts:

Spotify → https://open.spotify.com/show/2s8IAlRWNnu3SGOZo0BxTW
Apple → https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/drum-dog-podcast/id1806605706
Amazon → https://music.amazon.co.uk/podcasts/b859c830-c051-46c6-a094-cc9b92973e4a/drum-dog-podcast

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Video essay - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHajaWKSomo&t

Bernard Purdie reckons he has played on 4,000 albums for 2,500 artists, and the striking thing is that almost nobody in the business thinks he is exaggerating by much. Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Steely Dan, King Curtis, Louis Armstrong, Hall & Oates. If you have ever owned a radio, you have heard him.

What I keep coming back to is that a man with that CV built the whole thing on playing less than everybody else. This one is about the philosophy behind the pocket, where the Purdie shuffle actually came from, and why the loudest mouth in the studio spent sixty years preaching restraint.

00:00 The Man on 4,000 Records
01:16 From Elkton to 104th Street
04:20 Stay Out of the Way
09:11 The Purdie Shuffle
14:10 In the Room
15:31 Legacy

🫶 Support the channel: / offbeatmusic

For any enquiries: offbeatmusicchannel@gmail.com

🥁 You can learn plenty from what a drummer played. Sometimes you learn even more from why they played it.

Drum Dog membership brings together artist stories, interviews, performances and practical lessons, helping you stay close to the music and players that made you want to drum in the first place.

Take a look inside:

👉 https://link.drum.dog/join

Membership includes a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

Simon Phillips is one of four people we're interviewing at the UK Drum Show 2026 in Liverpool, so this week I'm digging into why his Voice record with Hiromi is on repeat, plus the four culprits behind rushing and how to fix them.

00:00 - Cold open: UK Drum Show 2026, Simon Phillips & the science of rushing
01:00 - Drummer Spotlight: Simon Phillips, UK Drum Show 2026 interview in the Drum Dog Experience Room
02:27 - Heavy Rotation: Hiromi, Voice (feat. Anthony Jackson & Simon Phillips)
03:48 - Think Piece: Why drummers rush (adrenaline, anticipation, tension & empty space)
06:53 - Outro & fanmail

Referenced in this episode:
→ UK Drum Show 2026 tickets: https://theukdrumshow.com/drum-dog-experience-room/
→ Book your seat in the Drum Dog Experience Room (25 max per session): https://tinyurl.com/2z4hfrxa
→ Join Drum Dog (members get early access to book and a free UK Drum Show ticket, use code DD10XR for 10% off): https://join.drum.dog/upgrade

Got a drummer you want spotlighted, gear you reckon I should check out, or an album that's been on your heavy rotation? Drop me a message:
📩 Spotify fanmail (built into the app)
📷 Instagram: @drumdoguk
✉️ dan@drum.dog

New episodes every Tuesday. Hit follow so you don't miss out on any drum chat!

About Drum Dog:
Drum Dog is the UK membership platform for drummers, combining world-class lesson packs, live events, gear discounts, and an ad-free community. Join at drum.dog.

#TheBackBeat #DrumDog #Drumming #Drummers #DrumPodcast #SimonPhillips #Hiromi #UKDrumShow #DrumTiming #DrumCommunity

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Video essay - https://youtu.be/Lbf0SU994Qg

With the White Stripes, Meg White tore rock’n’roll down to its bare bones. Alongside Jack White, she created some of the most exciting music of the past 25 years, with a fiercely elemental drumming style that flew in the face of its critics. This is what made her quite such a force.

Intro: 00:00
Career: 00:55
Style: 05:41
Legacy: 10:19

#whitestripes #megwhite #jackwhite

Music credit: That One Bar Scene - RKVC

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