Exploring the favourite drummers of Keith Moon
Keith Moon burned bright but all too fast. As he passed away at age 31 in 1978, he left a legacy that would last forever. Despite not being the most technical drummer or all too interested in sharpening his skill, he not only inspired hoards of players in the future but looked up to a select group of players from the past.
Moon was an utterly unique drummer. While some players dedicate their lives to learning the craft and becoming as technically sound and precise as possible, he was never interested. Sure, he loved his instrument and obsessed over its possibilities, but more so than that, Moon seemed to simply love music, loud noise and getting up to chaos. Playing drums was merely one part of his passion for the hedonistic lifestyle of a rockstar.
That’s reflected in his playing. Moon became infamous for his wild, almost animalistic style as The Who grew more significant. In fact, it’s even been said that the player was a major inspiration for the Muppets character, Animal, thanks to his flailing arms and desire to make as much noise as possible. While drums are usually supposed to hold down the track and keep the band on time, Moon wouldn’t be held in by the constraints of technical patterns or rhythms; instead, he wanted to rock out just like the rest of the group and let the music flow through him and out through the sticks.
He didn’t care about being the best drummer in the world as he was content to declare himself “the world’s best Keith-Moon-type drummer”. Moon wasn’t really inspired by any drummers, as he once said, “drum solos are fucking boring. Any kind of solo is. It detracts from the group identity.”
“I don’t really have a favourite drummer,” he added, instead preferring to look at music as a whole rather than a sum of parts. “I have favourite drum pieces and that’s it. I would never put on an LP of a drummer and say everything he did I love because that’s not true.”
However, there were a few players that he admired, even if he wasn’t exactly inspired by them. When he first began learning drums, Moon was taught by Screaming Lord Sutch’s Carlo Little, another loud contemporary player. This meant that his education on the instrument always stayed in the worlds of pop, rock and the cool side of jazz rather than straying too far into more technical jazz or classical playing.
As he grew up in the early 1950s with Elvis Presley blasting from every radio station, that was an early musical memory. “D.J. Fontana [Elvis‘ original drummer] is one,” he said as his first favourite player.
“Let’s see, the drummers I respect are Eric Delaney and Bob Henrit [from Argent],” he added, covering the pure rock drum sound he would come to represent. Jazz does creep into his zone of reference as he declared: “Technically, Joe Morello is perfect.” However, while he might have admired Morello’s playing, it never inspired him enough to work on his own technicality.
Going on to become a legend in his own right, Moon now sits alongside his idols in the league of the finest players the world has ever seen. But while they might represent trained and technical skill, The Who’s drummer brings unrivalled spirit to the mix.
