From: ujwb@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu (Jeff Beer)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.allmusic
Subject: Re: Cobham/T.Williams/It's A Beautiful Day
Date: 23 Jan 1993 12:14:35 -0600
Organization: Educational Computing Network
NNTP-Posting-Host: uxa.ecn.bgu.edu


it probably would be good to explain exactly what i mean...

on Cobham, rightly or wrongly, i always considered him a rock
drummer, and if you look at his contemporary, Jack DeJohnette,
you can see what I mean.  Even when playing rock, I think you
always have to look at DJ as a jazz drummer.
If you look at how Frank Zappa defined a jazz polyrhythm as
"rubato", you can see what I mean.

What he is talking about isn't exactly rubato in the classical definition of 
the word, it might be a micro-rubato.  This type of rubato is confined within 
the confines of a single beat or perhaps within consecutive strong accents.  
However, after you have four beats, there is no rubato, the tempo stays the 
same.  (Free jazz is different of course.  Here we are talking straight ahead 
jazz)   It is these dynamics that give jazz such a wide dimension of grooves, 
or feeling of swing.  For instance, Elvin Jones has a very circular triplet 
feeling in his behind-the-beat grooves.  Tony Williams charactaristically 
rushes and plays on top of the beat, and the sound drives forward more 
linearly.  Again, we are speaking generally.  Each tune at different tempos 
may not follow these specifications exactly.  In fact, a drummer
typically adjusts this micro-rubato to go along with a soloist's
phrasing.  Now if you program a drum machine to play a Roy Haynes drum 
solo note for note, why doesn't it sound like Roy Haynes?  It comes from 
having this orientation to time.  You can use this approach if you are 
playing rock or fusion.  That is why I always considerd Cobham as a rock
drummer, and Jack as a jazz drummer, regardless of the style of music
they play.

Cobham has a "boxy" shape to the massiveness of his fills from a very 
straight 16th note feel.  His ride cymbal pattern also has a similar shape.  
Taxonomically, the phrase patters and more importantly, the "swing" feel
is from the rock tradition.
He is able to function like that even when playing a jazz date, and he 
has played many jazz dates.  So he might play on a jazz date, but stylisticly 
has a rock thing. It is like he has a rock style, but makes a jazz
contribution in relating to the soloist in whatever band he is 
playing with.  By contrast, Jack is loose, all over the place on 
the 16th note level even when playing a straight 8th thing.  And his
straight 8th ride pattern is generally broken up.  So there is
the jazz style, ala Frank's definition of jazz polyrhythms.  
So it is Billy Cobham, a rock style even when in a jazz setting.  Jack 
DeJohnette, a jazz style even when in a rock setting.

Bloom thinks Cobham is not a great rock drummer, and he might be right.
On certain standards, he is certainly right, but, and it is probably 
ideological, I never have been into pounding downward on the beat.
I think the beat should always be on the upswing, with a lifting
effect.  Rock drumming doesn't seem to be about that, maybe its 
beauty is about something else, and I am not going to be able to 
go that way, so be it.  If that is a bias, I conceed that, but I am 
not going to apologize about it.

As for Bruford, I am not sure what you mean by his jazz.  For
instance,  I know that he said he used to play jazz before he
played with Yes.  But if you judge him on Earthworks, I really don't
think it shows as far as jazz goes.  I think in Earthworks he is very
good writer and arranger, but playingwise, they have always struck me
as being Weather Report wannabees.  You know something, one time he
was in Chicago and he did a radio interview, and one of the reasons why he
went to Yes was that he was bummed at the London jazz scene, because 
he thought it was "scraping and scratching", and he of course 
was talking about the free jazz scene.
Well, he has the right to his tastes, but the London free jazz scene
has developed into one of the premiere jazz scenes of the planet.  I saw
the LJCO (London Jazz Composer's Orchestra) tour last fall, and they 
have so many players that can do it.  If you use basketball analogies,
they could come in and beat the Dream Team, because they have more
weapons.  Who do they have?  Tony Oxley, while not in the LJCO is still
a part of the London scene, is Cecil Taylor's choice on drums.  Evan 
Parker, arguably the greatest utilizer of saxophonic sonics on this 
planet.  On bass, Barre Phillips and Barry Guy.  The trio of Parker, 
Guy, and Paul Lyton.  Trombone ensembles, trumpet ensembles.  Everything
is covered.  They make a contribution to the art form that nobody can 
touch.  Nobody is in US is working, so while the talent might be there,
nobody works enough to develop such an all inclusive orchestral thing as 
they have.  It is not that the London free jazzers are better players, but 
they have developed their game to such a strong level in so many
areas.  They wouldn't necessarily be able to come in and cut everybody.
But they do have their own music developed such that no one from outside
their scence is going to be able to come in and blow them away at their
music.  You can't say the same thing about Bruford's band.  If Bruford is 
not into the London free jazz scene, fine, but when he takes the alternative,
that is to say Earthworks, it is more like what happened last summer at
Barcelona.  That is to say, the Dream Team blowing away everybody.  
And I don't mean Bruford being the Dream team.  For instance, go hear
John Scofield live.  They have a drummer named Bill Stewart.  Who the
hell has heard of him, but who can be solid with his group as well as
he can?  When has Bruford ever been in the face of his soloists the way
Stewart does with Scofield and Lovano?  When you talk about jazz 
drumming, that is what you have to talk about doing.  Tony Oxley 
certainly can kick what Cecil Taylor is playing.  Of course, in all 
fairness, I don't think Bruford's sidemen would know what to do if 
they ever had a drummer on top of them the way it is normal to have 
in jazz.  Were not even talking about drummer lead bands such as Andrew
Cyrille, Paul Motian, Shannon's first Decoding Society, Elvin Jones, and
Blakey.  Drummers whose style defined the band's individuality.  
By contrast, Bruford's band is playing licks twice removed from Weather Report
15 years ago.  If you want to judge on a different level, say as, playing 
their part, fine, they play their parts.  But on the blowing level, on the 
ability to create an edge,  I don't see them as being there.  Not on
LJCO's level, not on Scofield's band's level, and not on the bands lead
by drummers that I refer to.

I respect Bruford as a creative musician and he is a great drummer.  But it 
is in something other than jazz.  What Bruford does in Crimson is more
like what the piano player, or in bebop, what the bass player does in
jazz. It is a different role.  And that's cool, there's nothing wrong
with that.  You can be creative in different ways.  I am not saying
that because it isn't jazz that it by definition is not good.  Let me
put it this way, there isn't any point in saying that Charlie Parker was
a good Mozart interpretter.

Jeff
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