Ringo's had enough

quote:

Ringo ... he's not a great songwriter and singer

Are you sure, Fred? Please click here. Sounds a pretty fine and well sung song to be; thing about Ringo was that he always got by with a little help from his friends.

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:

quote:

Ringo ... he's not a great songwriter and singer

Are you sure, Fred? Please click here. Sounds a pretty fine and well sung song to be; thing about Ringo was that he always got by with a little help from his friends.

A fine song and well sung, but I stand by my opinion that Ringo is not a great songwriter. A decent songwriter, sometimes even good, but not great, certainly compared to Lennon and McCartney.

And I think Ringo would agree with me on that.

All best,
Fred

quote:

what's wrong with being grumpy?

In doing this Ringo appears arrogant, & dismissive of his fans IMHO.

He's also a talentless dick.

fred, ringos talent or lack of was nothing to do with pete best being dropped,infact lennon didn't agree with it,ringo was put in for political reasons not talent,which he dosent posses,and as a average layman,to put it in your words,i can hear that ringo is a very average drummer.

quote:

Originally posted by fred simon:

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:

quote:

Ringo ... he's not a great songwriter and singer

Are you sure, Fred? Please click here. Sounds a pretty fine and well sung song to be; thing about Ringo was that he always got by with a little help from his friends.

A fine song and well sung, but I stand by my opinion that Ringo is not a great songwriter. A decent songwriter, sometimes even good, but not great, certainly compared to Lennon and McCartney.

And I think Ringo would agree with me on that.

All best,
Fred

Hi Fred

I have to agree with you there - Lennon & McCartney were rather special. Ringo's singing on the various Beatles albums though just seems to work for me. I guess it is the skill with which it is put together.

Read an interview with Keith Emerson where he said he had been doing some singing to encourage athletic pursuits as anybody who heard him sing suddenly started to run.

I think humour has a very important place in music and that is why I'll always treasure Ringo's contribution both as a drummer and singer, which I know you do too. I don't know why he has reacted to his fan mail as he has - perhaps there is more to it. Shirley Collins and Nigel Blackwell hand write replies - I know they don't get the volume that Ringo must get, but ... Karine Polwart sends out a newsletter. Still I forgive Ringo (not that I have ever written) as his contribution to my enjoyment of music has been immense.

ATB Rotf

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:


I think humour has a very important place in music and that is why I'll always treasure Ringo's contribution.

ATB Rotf

yes i agree Roft,he could have been a comedian.

I wish I was a comedian or at least a lighthouse keeper, my father was a lighthouse keeper, watched the ships going down.

I'd like to be under the sea
In an Octopus's Garden in the shade.

ATB Rotf

quote:

Originally posted by 151:

ringo was put in for political reasons not talent,which he dosent posses

Why in the world would artists as creative and as committed as Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison disregard a musician's supposed lack of talent and hire him for political reasons only? And then go on to create a musical revolution? That doesn't make any sense. Do you think the other Beatles were poor judges of talent?

quote:

... and as a average layman,to put it in your words,i can hear that ringo is a very average drummer.

Then why do so many of the world's best drummers consider Ringo to be a groundbreaking, joyously swinging, solidly grooving drummer? Are they wrong, or is it at all possible that you are?

To be clear, whether or not you like his drumming is a matter of opinion, yours alone and no one can argue. You don't dig him, fine. But that's got nothing to do with whether or not he is an excellent drummer ... your taste and an objective assessment of his musical ability are two separate things, whether they intersect or not.

All best,
Fred

Hi, reading this post I have finally got an idea of what human sensitivity and gratitude are.
Cheers.

And guess whom I'm talking about..

quote:

Originally posted by fred simon

Then why do so many of the world's best drummers consider Ringo to be a groundbreaking, joyously swinging, solidly grooving drummer? Are they wrong, or is it at all possible that you are?



All best,
Fred

because they are being polite or they feel sorry for him.

quote:

Originally posted by 151:

quote:

Originally posted by fred simon

Then why do so many of the world's best drummers consider Ringo to be a groundbreaking, joyously swinging, solidly grooving drummer? Are they wrong, or is it at all possible that you are?

because they are being polite or they feel sorry for him.

Well, I've read a lot of interviews with great drummers, have spoken to a lot of great drummers, have had the good fortune to have played with some great drummers, and I'm even married to a great drummer. All of them think very highly of Ringo's abilities, and none of them feel sorry for Ringo ... quite the opposite, in fact.

Here is just one drummer's opinion:

THIRTEEN REASONS TO GIVE RINGO SOME RESPECT
by John Bryant (drummer for Ray Charles, producer, session drummer)

Source URL: http://web2.airmail.net/gshultz

Ringo Starr, the luckiest no-talent on earth. All he had to do was smile and bob his head. Oh yes, and keep a beat for three of the most talented musicians/songwriters of this century. What other impression could one have when judging the role that Ringo played in the success of the Beatles? Did Ringo really make a difference? Upon listening to the latest release by The Beatles, Anthology 1, you get a chance to listen to Pete Best and two other drummers play on over twenty songs. Was Ringo simply in the right place at the right time? The following items may help in going beyond the image:

(1) Ringo was the first true rock drummer to be seen on TV. All the Rock & Roll drummers featured with Elvis, Bill Haley, Little Richard, Fats Domino and Jerry Lee Lewis were mostly R&B drummers that were making the transition from a swing drumming style of the 40’s and 50’s toward the louder and more “rocking” sound that is associated with “I Want To Hold Your Hand”. They were dressed in tuxedos and suits and held the drumsticks in the “traditional” manner of military, orchestra, and jazz drummers. Ringo showed the world that power was needed to put the emphasis on the “rock” in Rock & Roll music, so he gripped both sticks like hammers and proceeded to build a foundation for rock music.

(2) Ringo changed the way drummers hold their sticks by making popular the “matched” grip of holding drumsticks. Nearly all drummers in the Western World prior to Ringo held their sticks in what is termed the “traditional” grip, with the left hand stick held like a chopstick. This grip was originally developed by military drummers to accomodate the angle of the drum when strapped over the shoulder. Ringo’s grip changes the odd left hand to match the right hand, so that both sticks are held like a flyswatter. Rock drummers along with marching band and orchestral percussionists now mostly play with a “matched” grip, and drum companies have developed straps and accessories to accomodate them.

(3) Ringo started a trend of placing drummers on high risers so that they would be as visible as the other musicians. When Ringo appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, he immediately caught the attention of thousands of “drummers to be” by towering over the other three Beatles. Elvis’s drummer was looking at a collection of backs.

(4) These same “wannabe” drummers also noticed that Ringo was playing Ludwig drums and they immediately went out and bought thousands of these drumsets, thus establishing Ludwig as the definitive name in Rock & Roll drums at that time.

(5) Ringo changed the sound of recorded drums. About the time of Rubber Soul (released Dec. 6,1965), the sound of the drumset started to become more distinct. Along with help from the engineers at Abbey Road studios, Ringo popularized a new sound for the drums by tuning them lower, deadening the tonal ring with muffling materials, and making them sound “closer” by putting a microphone on each drum.

(6) Ringo has nearly perfect tempo. This allowed the Beatles to record a song 50 or 60 times, and then be able to edit together different parts of numerous takes of the same song for the best possible version. Today an electronic metronome is used for the same purpose, but the Beatles had to depend on Ringo to keep the tempo consistant throughout the dozens of takes of the songs that you know and love so well. Had he not had this ability, the Beatles recordings would sound completely different today.

(7) Ringo’s “feel” for the beat serves as a standard for pop-rock record producers and drummers alike. It is relaxed, but never dragging. Solid, yet always breathing. And yes, there is a great amount of musical taste in his decisions of what to play and when to play it. In most recording sessions, the drummer’s performance acts as a barometer for the rest of the musicians. The stylistic direction, dynamics, and emotions are filtered through the drummer. He is the catcher to whom the pitcher/songwriter is throwing. If the drumming doesn’t feel good, the performance of any additional musicians is doomed from the start. The Beatles rarely if ever had this problem with Ringo.

(8 ) Ringo hated drum solos, which should win points with quite a few people. He only took one solo while with the Beatles. His eight measure solo appears during “The End” on the “B” side of Abbey Road. Some might say that it is not a great display of technical virtuosity, but they would be at least partially mistaken. You can set an electronic metronome to a perfect 126 beats per minute, then play it along with Ringo’s solo and the two will stay exactly together.

(9) Ringo’s ability to play odd time signatures helped to push popular songwriting into uncharted areas. Two examples are “All you Need is Love” in 7/4 time, and “Here Comes the Sun” with repeating 11/8, 4/4, and 7/8 passages in the chorus.

(10) Ringo’s proficiency in many different styles such as two beat swing (”When I’m Sixty-Four”), ballads (”Something”), R&B (”Leave My Kitten Alone” and “Taxman”) and country (the Rubber Soul album) helped the Beatles to explore many musical directions with ease. His pre-Beatle experience as a versatile and hard working nightclub musician served him well.

(11) The idea that Ringo was a lucky Johnny-on-the-spot-with-a-showbiz-stage-name is wrong. In fact, when Beatle producer George Martin expressed his unhappiness after the first session with original drummer Pete Best, the decision was made by Paul, George, and John to hire who they considered to be the best drummer in Liverpool - Ringo Starr. His personality was a bonus.

(12) The rumors that Ringo did not play on many of the Beatle songs because he was not good enough are also false. In fact, he played on every released Beatles recording (not including Anthology 1) that include drums except for the following: “Back In The USSR” and “Dear Prudence”, on which Paul played drums due to Ringo temporarily quitting the band, “The Ballad of John and Yoko”, again featuring Paul on drums because Ringo was off making a movie, and a 1962 release of “Love Me Do” featuring session drummer Andy White.

(13) When the Beatles broke up and they were all trying to get away from each other, John Lennon chose Ringo to play drums on his first solo record. As John once said, “If I get a thing going Ringo knows where to go, just like that…” A great songwriter could ask no more of a drummer. Except maybe to smile and bob his head.

Again I'd suggest that you might be letting your personal taste cloud your objective judgment.

All best,
Fred

If further evidence is needed, here are some testimonials from some folks who know what they're talking about, neither "polite" nor pitying.


Kenny Aronoff -- "I consider him one of the greatest innovators of rock drumming and believe that he has been one of the greatest influences on rock drumming today... Ringo has influenced drummers more than they will ever realize or admit. Ringo laid down the fundamental rock beat that drummers are playing today and they probably don't even realize it. (Modern Drummer,Oct. 1987) . . Ringo always approached the song more like a songwriter than a drummer. He always served the music." (Modern Drummer, Dec. 1987)

Editor of Modern Drummer magazine, presenting the Editor's Achievement Award to Ringo -- "What is beyond question is Ringo's impact on an entire generation of drummers who first became drummers as a direct result of seeing and hearing him play in the early days of The Beatles. Literally hundreds of thousands of players -- including some of the greatest drummers playing today -- cite Ringo as their first motivating influence."

Max Weinberg -- "D. J. Fontana had introduced me to the power of the big beat. Ringo convinced me just how powerful that rhythm could be. Ringo's beat was heard around the world and he drew the spotlight toward rock and roll drummer. From ;his matched grip style to his pioneering use of staggered tom tom fills, his influence in rock drumming was as important and wide spread as Gene Krupa's had been in jazz." (The Big Beat, 1984)

Jim Keltner -- "I will always be there to support him. He's more than a dear friend. He's like an idol. He's everything to me. I still think of him musically every time I sit down and play drums. He's a very important guy to me. (Discoveries magazine, April 1993)

Phil Collins, drummer for Genesis -- "I think he's vastly underrated. The drum fills on A Day In The Life are very complex things. You could take a great drummer today and say, 'I want it like that.' They wouldn't know what to do." (interview for The Making of Sgt. Pepper, 1992)

Alex Van Halen -- " One of the most interesting things about Ringo is how he manage to maintain a level of self-esteem -- in addition to being a great player, of course. But he wasn't overshadowed as a human being by McCartney, Lennon or Harrison. I think he did a wonderful thing for drums because drummers would see him and think, "Hey, he's part of it, too." (Modern Drummer magazine, July 1993)

Rory Storm -- "During the four or five years Ringo was with us, he really played the drums. He drove them. He sweated and swung and sung. Ringo sang about five numbers a night. He even had his own spot. It was called 'Ringo Starrtime.' " (Beatles Companion by Ted Greenwald)

D. J. Fontana -- "I was playing maracas or something behind him, just listening to him. I swear he never varied the tempo. He played that back beat and never got off it. Man, you couldn't have moved him with a crane. It was amazing. He played a hell of a back beat, Man, and that's where it's at." (interview for The Big Beat by Max Weinberg)

Don Was -- "As a drummer, he influenced three generations of rock drummers. It's not very flashy playing, but it's very musical. Instead of just counting the bars, he's playing the song, and he puts fills in unusual places that are directed by the vocal." (The St. Louis Post Dispatch, 1992)

George Martin -- "Ringo always got and still gets a unique sound out of his drums, as sound as distinctive as his voice. ... Ringo gets a looser deeper sound out of his drums that is unique. ...This detailed attention to the tone of his drums is one of the reasons for Ringo's brilliance. Another is that although Ringo does not keep time with a metronome accuracy, he has unrivaled feel for a song. If his timing fluctuates, it invariably does so in the right place at the right time, keep the right atmosphere going on the track and give it a rock solid foundation. This held true for every single Beatles number Richie played ... Ringo also was a great tom tom player." ( Summer of Love, 1994)

Kenny Aronoff -- "He consistently came up with new ideas that always seemed perfect for the song, but it wasn't just a matter of him picking a basic beat for a song, because lots of drummers could do that. Ringo definitely had the right kind of personality and creative ideas for The Beatles music. You will rarely find a Beatles song without something noticeable that Ringo played or didn't play." (Modern Drummer magazine, Oct. 1987)

Al Kooper -- "Sgt. Pepper was the album that changed drumming more than anything else. Before that album, drum fills in rock and roll were pretty rudimentary, all much the same, and this record had what I call space fills where they would leave a tremendous amount of air. It was most appealing to me musically and the sound of the drums got much better. What I had to figure out now was what am I going to do to get drums to sound like that." (Summer of Love by George Martin, 1994)

Martin Torgoff -- "If I could think of a single passage in which Ringo's quintessential style as a drummer is most identifiable, it could well be something as, say, the drumming behind George's guitar solo in Paul's "Let It Be" after the organ trails off. There, in simple 4-4 time, Ringo comes in with a trademark thump of his base drum, clear tattering snare, and his insistent smashing of the high hat, unvarying, unyielding, yet distinctively Ringo, and you can't help but smile not for its banality but because it is so perfectly adequate and because one can readily envision Ringo behind his kit as he plays, his beringed fingers clutching his sticks, swaying beatifically from side to side as he gets on with his work, blinking those astonishingly saturnine blue eyes." (The Compleat Beatles, 1985)

Max Weinberg -- "More than any other drummer, Ringo Starr changed my life. The impact and memory of that band on Ed Sullivan Show in 1964 will never leave me. I can still see Ringo in the back moving that beat with his whole body, his right hand swinging off his sock cymbal while his left hand pounds the snare. He was fantastic, but I think what got to me the most was his smile. I knew he was having the time of his life." (The Big Beat, 1984)

Martin Torgoff -- "As a drummer, he was a natural, purely intuitive, remarkably tasteful, spirited, but always basic, a proponent of less is more school of minimal drumming. ...He had an uncanny understanding of John's rhythm and Paul's base line. Time and again, the Beatles rode his backbeat to glory. Precisely because he never overstated a beat, or over accented a phrase (unless it was appropriate) he managed to get more mileage out of his licks than most drummers could ever dream of. The results were extraordinary." (The Compleat Beatles, 1985)

Don Was -- "Ringo's drums are one of the greatest things you can have on a record."

Hal Howland -- "It is fascinating to trace the drummer's stylistic development from rock-steady club veteran to studio innovator ... Ringo's command of an exhaustive list of arrangements and new originals is matched only by his versatility. (review for Modern Drummer magazine, June 1995)


All best,
Fred

Really, all of these explanations and informations are interesting in themselves and worth the outmost consideration, but I really am bewildered that such an argument may have been brought up. Is there really anyone who thinks it proper to question Ringo Starr? Must all four die before they're left in peace and given their place in pop's history?

I hear you, Max.

It's just that this unfounded myth of Ringo's alleged mediocrity has stubbornly endured for 40 years, and it really rankles. It has no basis in reality whatsoever.

All best,
Fred

Fred,
I agree entirely. It's still sad to see a childhood hero acting like a prick though. These guys were like my family. They were the big brothers I never had. He could have done it better. Maybe he, like many of us, needs a breathalyser on his PC.

quote:

Originally posted by TomK:
Fred,
I agree entirely. It's still sad to see a childhood hero acting like a prick though. These guys were like my family. They were the big brothers I never had. He could have done it better. Maybe he, like many of us, needs a breathalyser on his PC.

I agree he could have handled it much better. Maybe he's fallen off the wagon ... who knows?

But everybody ... every single human being (including even me!) ... behaves badly from time to time. True, Ringo is a very public figure, and casts a very large shadow, but we all live in glass houses, don't we? I say cut the man some slack ... acknowledge his poor showing here, yes, but put it in perspective. It's ironic since throughout most of his career he's been lauded as a genuinely great guy, a real sweetheart.

All best,
Fred