Was on the evans site and saw a interview with him why he switched check it out
http://www.evansdrumheads.com/EVMediaDetail.Page?ActiveID=2949&MediaId=8889
http://www.evansdrumheads.com/EVMediaDetail.Page?ActiveID=2949&MediaId=8889
I bet a bunch of artists will be headed to Evans soon, just watch....
Vic Firth's AR guy is now working for Evans, so he is probably calling a lot of his former artists with vic and pitching Evans to them... this kind of thing happens all the time. When I left Regal Tip, they hired a guy in my place who worked for Sonor/Sabian.... as soon as he was brought in Regal signed a bunch of guys who are Sonor and Sabian players...
I think at his level, the main reason is money. Thats just what i think. Both heads are great you know, its how you tune, and im guessing that guy can tune!
Unless you know for a fact that Evans pay their artists, don't make claims about it being for the money. Very few companies pay their artists to play their brands (DDrum is the only one I can think of, and even that is really only going by what I've heard from other sources, not DDrum directly).
More often than not, artists switch because of quality (subjective or objective), availability on the road, the way companies treat them and various other things. Jojo would get free drumheads regardless of what company he used, so maybe he found that he liked Evans better, or maybe Evans was able to get him heads while he was on the road in obscure countries. Maybe he didn't like the artist relations guy at Remo. Who knows?
Yes, I don't know why he'd switch to Evans. They really are the "deadest" heads on the market. Very durable, yes, but not very resonant heads at all when compared to Remo Ambassadors or Aquarian Modern Vintages or the like.
Then again, Jojo's Sonor kit in the studio shots on his Modern Weapons instructional DVD sounds rather dead--very muted.