Last August marked the first anniversary of the death of an iconic musician such as Charlie Watts (1941-2021), the drummer for the Rolling Stones. An artist from jazz who achieved glory and fame through what, for many, is the most important band in rock and roll.
Although in the shadow of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, his leading role within it as an instrumentalist was decisive, and that is what Sympathy for the drummer is all about. Why does Charlie Watts matter, the work of the American writer and drummer Mike Edison and originally published in 2019, with his subjective, knowledgeable and foul-mouthed verb, and whose Spanish version (Libros del Kultrum) has just appeared.
The best drummer in the world?
In an interview with La Vanguardia from his home in New York, Edison avoids the maximum categories so common in music literature and journalism when he has to assess the artistic weight of Charlie Watts. “If you think that at one point the Rolling Stones were the greatest rock and roll band in the world, then Charlie Watts was the greatest rock and roll drummer in the world. But if you ask if he was the best drummer in the world, I would say no. But that does not matter".
The important thing is the roll
He believes that the band led by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards “had their own style and what Watts brought was his sense of swing and rock and roll. And I have to emphasize that in the rock and roll formula, the roll is the most important part. Roll is sex. I want to say that while roll is anticipation, rock is penetration. Let's see, before the climax in sex, before penetration, the most exciting part is just what happened before. And Charlie had this sense of no rush or urgency and swinging the group, and bringing them closer to him. Although the name of the band is inspired by the Muddy Waters theme Rollin' stone, "it is already a sign that they are called Rolling Stones and not Rocking Stones. Rock is easy, roll is more subtle, and it precedes the history of jazz and rhythm and blues. Another important thing about his way of playing drums in a rock band is that it is more difficult to play slow than fast, spaces and pauses are more difficult when you play blues instead of rock, where you have the motor on a hundred kilometers per hour.
how to play poetry
“No two batteries are the same. He was a jazz one, and he found a way to stay that way within the music of the Rolling Stones. And he played it in a totally different way than any other drummer out there and that's why you can't duplicate it... the most you can do is try to understand it. With other drummers, like Led Zeppelin, John Bonham, who I love... you go to Youtube and you find thousands of videos on how to play like him, and instead there are none about Charlie Watts. Because it's impossible, because his is more like poetry and jazz. And you can see that right away in that in normal rock there is no conversation between the drummer and the rest of the group, like in jazz, where everything is more fluid. Watts's musical contribution is summarized in the book as follows: "Charlie, who had never taken a single drum lesson, a jazz musician who did not have the skills to play like his jazz heroes, who did not have the left hand that could slide into the box, creating a seamless flow of alternating urgency and romp like his drum heroes Philly Joe or Tony Williams, he was creating new ways to get into the song, climbing into the guts of the piece and spilling it out for everyone to see. I saw them. He may not have been pretty, but he sure as hell was a hit. That was the world of the Rolling Stones”.
The bosses accept him
Back in the early 60's when the Rolling Stones started, Mick and Keith told Charlie that he had to listen to some blues records like Jimmy Reed's, who apparently make very easy music but are actually super hard to play with. the pulse with which those bluesmen do it. And Charlie got it and that's why Mick and Keith, who were very blues purists at the time, and Brian Jones too, liked it.
What is virtuosity?
Edison speaks of the virtuoso drummer getting wet, commenting that this concept is often confused with that of other excellences. He said it above all when talking about Ringo Starr and also about Charlie and “it's a lying concept. I have seen Muddy Waters play a single note, and with it he won my heart forever. And no one questions that he is a supervirtuoso. On the other hand, I don't remember a single note by Jeff Beck that has reached me, and he has a reputation as a virtuoso, while Jimmy Page from Led Zeppelin is, because he has understood that the guitar is rock and the drums are roll. Watts can be considered a virtuoso, why not. I am a good drummer and I don't know how to do what he does”.
What is now, pure capitalism
We always remember the maxim that Keith Richards once said (“No Watts, no Stones”) about the fundamental role of the drummer in the very existence of the band and its sound. And Edison confirms it by assuring that "without Charlie the Rolling Stones would have rolled, for sure." And now that the drummer is not with us for obvious reasons of force majeure, the musician-writer believes that "the current formation of the Stones without Charlie Watts is not a group, and it is difficult for me to speak of it as a formation in the same terms than in the past. What is now is a stadium show, with great successes, and this is capitalism, that “the show must go on”, that the show must last forever. This is pure and simple capitalism. Putting another drummer is not putting a cat for another cat, it's insulting. The audience that currently goes to the Stones enjoys it because it's fun, it's easy going and it's a great show, but it's not an authentic experience. Now you can bring your family and children, because there is no sense of danger and sex in the air anymore. The ones that come out now are nothing like when they used to go out and play Street fighting man, Simpathy for the devil or Gimme shelter: then they were not only the best rock'n'roll group but the most dangerous.
charlie nearby
The image of the drummer outside and also on stage used to be impeccable. "Dressing was always on point, elegant and very stylish. And that in the seventies was especially striking when most of the musicians went around like dirty hippies. But one thing that I found out after he died and a lot of people I didn't know contacted me about writing the book, is that everyone told me that Charlie was very nice and had a huge heart. He was the glue that held the group together, especially back in the days when Mick and Keith were high on drugs and going superstars, and Charlie was the one with his feet on the ground. Or when Mick started his solo career and thought he was God.
-And you never thought of leaving the band?
-No, he was an iron horse, like Superman.
