Brian Blade

He is hella fun to watch play! Speaking of which, there was a point where he was going off and killing the ride he had on his right side and the wingnut on the tilter came loose and the cymbal bent over. Joshua Redman went over to hold the cymbal in place and actually grabbed the cymbal to keep it in place. Brian was so engulfed in the moment and in the music, that he didn't immediately realize that the cymbal was no longer ringing, AND to make matters worse, he didn't realize that he was also beating the hell out of Josh's hand! Repeatedly! When he finally realized what was happening, the look on his face was hilarious, Josh was laughing as well though, and him getting his hand bashed in had absolutely no effect on how brilliant his playing was that night. And I meant to say that I saw him with Joshua Redman and Wayne Shorter that year. Again, an absolute beast on the the drums and one of my heroes. Dude's on my short list!
 
Brian Blade to me is one of the greatest players of our time. So musical. His dynamics and ideas are incredible. The best example was the chick corea/john mclaughlin tour. I was the band with Vinnie Colaiuta which was like a drum clinic, and then I saw them with Brian Blade. Without taking anything away from V.C, BB took the music somewhere. Playing shapes, colors, and deep time. His technique doesn't match many of today's "popular" players, but yet I'd rather listen him any day.
 
I love Brian Blade's approach. Polly if you like Brian's passion check out this guy Steve Hass. He's not as famous, but at school lot's of drummer's talk about him. Brian's new band Black Dub is pretty awesome. Female front person who plays double drums with Brian!
 
Drumbob, saw you in the Hass thread. Interesting point. That just goes to show you that when these super groups get put together, music is not the defining factor. Names are. These drummers Vinnie and Brian, will completely change the sound of the band. Obviously a consistent sound was not Chick's goal. If Vinnie was the first choice, then maybe they should have called Gary Novak to sub.
 
I was lucky to see Brian a lot when he played at Smalls on a lot of Wednesdays at Smalls in NYC with Sam Yahel or Larry Goldings..It was10 bucks for the whole night! Ah, the good old days! Someone mentioned Brian doesn't have the chops of some of the other drummers out there these days but I think he has more than a lot of them like say someone like Thomas Lang...Because the incredible dynamics, ears/listening/reacting/ super melodic/ musical playing that Brian does ARE HIS CHOPS! Those are the only chops I care about anymore...

No, disrespect to Lang, but I think it is harder to play the way Brian does than Lang...The creative musical stuff is harder than the athleticism aspect I feel..Not that the types of chops someone like Lang has are easy..Just my opinion based on my own experience in dealing with both "worlds" over the years....
 
I love Brian Blade's approach. Polly if you like Brian's passion check out this guy Steve Hass. He's not as famous, but at school lot's of drummer's talk about him. Brian's new band Black Dub is pretty awesome. Female front person who plays double drums with Brian!

April, I couldn't find any vids of Steve Hass with decent sound. Thanks for reminding me of the name of Brian's non-jazz band. I saw this vid a while ago and couldn't find it again http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KO2vY1brMDU. The group is incredibly good ...
 
Poly, The Blue Note vids have ok sound for a low fi live recording. Pretty amazing stuff. There used to be more videos, but I heard Hass had them legally removed because he will be doing video lessons soon. I don't know if that's true or not. I heard of Black Dub by going to Hass' myspace. He has mentioned them. BTW his myspace has some beautiful tracks of him with Scofield, Ravi Coltrane and other artists. www.myspace.com/hassbeat.
 
It seems as though that album will be a great one, as long as they don't mees up the songs in the studio like they have already done with one of them
 
No Black Dub for sale? That was so enjoyable on my laptops speakers, I would love to hear it though my quadraphonic Blaupunkt!
 
I really liked the Black Dub tunes also.
I never saw Brian play that kind of music before.

I have really been studying Brian's playing lately.
I started checking out a lot of the stuff that he did with Redman.
I'm really beginning to get a lot of good feel for some of the things that Brian does.
 
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:D

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=118752&id=117435358150
 
I really liked the Black Dub tunes also.
I never saw Brian play that kind of music before.

I have really been studying Brian's playing lately.
I started checking out a lot of the stuff that he did with Redman.
I'm really beginning to get a lot of good feel for some of the things that Brian does.

You and me both. I've been a fan since I first caught him at the Toronto Jazz Festival many moons ago. There was a lot of buzz about him that week. When I heard he was working with Daniel Lanois a few years back I simply had to check it out. He's so bloody musical, he just makes everything work. His own singing/guitar stuff is pretty cool, too.
 
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