“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 …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 … Ringo always approached the song more like a songwriter than a drummer. He always served the music.” – Kenny Aronoff, drummer John Mellencamp etc. (Modern Drummer interview, Dec. 1987)

“Starr is vastly underrated. The drum fills on the song “A Day in the Life” are very complex things. You could take a great drummer today and say, ‘I want it like that.’ He wouldn’t know what to do.” – Phil Collins, Genesis drummer, on the making of “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”

“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.” – George Martin, Beatles Producer

“We loved him. And we just thought he was the very best drummer we’d ever seen. And we wanted him in the group. We were big fans of his.” – Paul McCartney, The Beatles

“Ringo was a star in his own right in Liverpool before we even met. He was a professional drummer who sang and performed and had Ringo Star-time and he was in one of the top groups in Britain but especially in Liverpool before we even had a drummer. So Ringo’s talent would have come out one way or the other as something or other. I don’t know what he would have ended up as, but whatever that spark is in Ringo that we all know but can’t put our finger on — whether it is acting, drumming or singing I don’t know — there is something in him that is projectable and he would have surfaced with or without the Beatles. Ringo is a damn good drummer. He is not technically good, but I think Ringo’s drumming is underrated the same way Paul’s bass playing is underrated … Ringo is Ringo, that’s all there is to it. And he’s every bloody bit as warm, unassuming, funny, and kind as he seems. He was quite simply the heart of the Beatles.” – John Lennon, The Beatles

“Playing without Ringo is like driving a car on three wheels.” – George Harrison , The Beatles

 

Just a quick post this time to wish a Happy 75th Birthday this week to the luckiest drummer in the world — but also the most exuberant yet grounded, down-to-earth Beatle of the bunch. More than anybody else, except maybe my super-cool elementary school English teacher Mr, Nestor, Ringo …Starr made me want to be a drummer from the moment I heard those early Beatles records, and then saw him in glorious black & white concert footage playing those equally glorious pearl Ludwigs (I owned a presumably cheaper version of that set, but a mid-60s black diamond pearl Ludwig kit nonetheless).

The same might be said for “She Said, She Said,” also a Lennon-penned track from “Revolver,” and the laconic spray of snare and cymbal that opens and then rolls through Lennon’s “Strawberry Fields Forever” (yes, I’m a John fan). His subsequent work on the George Harrison-penned “Something” from “Abbey Road” is particularly, well, something.  And listen to “Come Together,” also a Lennon track from that album, to hear the marvelous inventiveness Ringo brings to a marvelously inventive song. Although John, once asked by a reporter if Ringo was the best drummer in the world, responded by cheekily saying, “He’s not even the best drummer in the Beatles!”  his work on many of the Fab Four’s tracks say otherwise. (Now, his singing on the other hand … notice I haven’t mentioned the singing).

How important and integral was Ringo to the sound and chemistry of The Beatles? To get a sense of what he meant to the band — as a drummer and as a person — you need only to remember the episode around the so-called “White Album,” when Ringo — fed up with the prima donna acts, divisiveness, and bickering between at least two of the other three Beatles, stormed out of the studio and announced he was quitting. Recording stopped. Beatles pleaded. And a big bouquet of flowers and note of apology was left on Ringo’s drum seat. It may have been the first, and only, time the Beatles were actually scared.

As if all of this wasn’t enough to convince you of his cool, Ringo married “The Spy Who Loved Me” Bond Girl Barbara Bach, after reportedly meeting her on the set of the otherwise wretchedly awful movie, “Caveman,” he was “starring” in (I say “otherwise” because the only redeeming thing about the flick was that Barbara at least made the price of admission up to my teenage theater-going self by wearing a loincloth a la Raquel Welch on-screen for the entire duration).  That’s right. Ringo met the Bond Girl who would become his future wife on the set. Now THAT’S what I call perfect timing.

Listen to Ringo make “Something” even better! (Oh, and some nice video of Patti Boyd too, plus those other guys): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FX92FJ-lwXI

Listen to Ringo on “She Said She Said” right here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wp91YPGnLw

Listen to Mr. Starr on “Strawberry Fields Forever” here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nehRB1FTeTo

Ringo brings us all together on “Come Together” here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAmn4eMusZk