Interview with Kenny Aronoff, Drummer

What was your very first experience with making music?

I was 10 years old, playing outside with my twin brother in western Massachusetts. There was nothing to watch on TV. My mom screams for us to come in the house immediately. I thought I was in trouble, of course, and usually was. She's pointing to this black and white TV set with the rabbit ears, and it was the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show. When I saw that, I'm bouncing off the walls. I'd never seen anything like that in my life. I said, 'Mom, who are those guys?' She said, 'The Beatles.' I said, 'I want to be the Beatles. Call them up, get me in the band.' I loved how Ringo was way up high, and his hair, and the whole thing was so cool. I knew I wanted to be a part of it.

My mom didn't call the Beatles up, so I started my own band two weeks later. All I could afford was a cymbal or a snare drum, and we played Beatles songs.

What drew you to a career as a musician?

Without realizing it, that had ignited in my heart what my purpose in life was, before I even understood what those words meant. Your life is very short, and realizing your purpose in life comes from a place in your heart, not necessarily your brain. When you live your life by your purpose, you will be authentic, you'll be undeniable, you'll be unstoppable, as I am. I'm the guy that can't wait to wake up in the morning to do what I do, and I'm also the guy who doesn't want to turn the lights off at night because I'm still digging what I'm doing.

All I could think about was rock and roll and the Beatles. All through junior high and high school: bands, bands, bands. Self-taught. By the time I was 16 I was on three varsity sports, so I would play sports, go home, do my homework, and then I'd have rock and roll band practice from 8:00 till midnight every day.

What was a great moment for you as a musician?

Jack and Diane. I came up with that part. I was fighting for my life. It was kind of a do-or-die: either come up with that part at the moment or I'd probably lose my job. And I scored a touchdown. It became John's biggest number one hit single, probably one of the two most air-drummed parts on pop radio ever, with In the Air Tonight, and it's been on the radio for 38 years. I reached my goal as an employee. I made the corporation John Mellencamp a lot of money because of that song. That's my job. And it launched my career and blew his career up, because that album, American Fool, won two Grammys.

When Jack and Diane went to number one, I celebrated for about two seconds and then I went into fear. I was excited, but immediately I realized: just because you're number one today doesn't mean you're number one tomorrow.

How did your career as a musician unfold?

I had a huge classical background. There was no School of Rock when I was a kid. There wasn't even a teacher in my town to teach rock and roll drums. I was self-taught, but I started studying classical music, and I transferred to Indiana University, the number one school of music in the country. It's so hard to get in, but it's even harder to stay. I got into Tanglewood, which was four consecutive years of auditioning, rejected three times by Vic Firth. I got to work with Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, Arthur Fiedler.

I got into the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra. It's a big honor. My parents were ecstatic. They had put me through five years of college. And I turned it down. I basically turned down certainty for complete uncertainty, which is the rock and roll business.

In this business you're lucky if you get in a band that lasts 17 years with hit after hit after hit. We went from 2,000-seat venues to 20,000, private jets, living the dream. And then to make it as a session drummer is a whole other world.

What advice do you have for new musicians?

I went into my lesson with my teacher at Indiana the first day and I didn't have a pencil or an eraser. He threw me out and gave me an F. Never did I ever come into any rehearsal since without a lot of pencils and erasers and sharpeners, or ever not show up prepared. In the looseness and the coolness of rock and roll, you still have to be a badass professional. People then depend on you.

It's your attitude about life. It's being open-minded, compassionate, willing to learn from anything and anybody, recognizing the genius no matter what it is.

If you want to make it as a drummer or a musician, it's best that you make it in one area big, and then you can bring those other ideas into what you're known for. I made it big as a rock drummer, so everybody knows who Kenny Aronoff is, and then I bring in all that other stuff that I know. You should never stop learning.

What has been your greatest accomplishment as a musician?

To have a diverse catalog, where somehow, miraculously, I got asked to play in every style of music. The obvious is the Mellencamp, the Bob Seger, the Bob Dylan, the Springsteen, the Elton Johns, the Rod Stewarts, the Santanas. But then Tony Iommi from Sabbath, Michael Sweet from Stryper, Alice Cooper, the Smashing Pumpkins, Bon Jovi. Then Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings, the Highwaymen. Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, then B.B. King in the blues world, Buddy Guy, Ray Charles, Joe Cocker for 10 years, Chickenfoot. It's just all over the place.

I wasn't talented like that. As a drummer I just love music. It makes me feel good, so I was willing to play any kind of music. But what happened in the process is that ended up making me a badass session drummer, and a guy that people would hire to do anything.

Think about a demanding producer, bandleader or collaborator. What made them difficult, and how did you work with them successfully?

John couldn't speak the language that I did, and I got teased because I was a reader and schooled. John, on the other hand, was brilliant in understanding how to brand, market, and write songs for the radio. Even if he didn't know what to tell you to play, he knew whether what you were playing was good or not. He walked into the studio when we were doing the second record I played drums on, Uh-Huh, which had Pink Houses, Authority Song and Crumblin' Down, and he goes, 'Listen, you guys, I expect you to come up with creative, innovative parts to make these songs hits on the radio. And Kenny, if somebody has a cooler beat to play than what you're playing, you play it. Nobody owns their instruments.'

Back then I was like, God damn, what a jerk. His delivery was not very good. His attitude was intense, like a football coach or a Marine drill sergeant. But his concept was spot-on. John was tough, but I learned a lot.

How do you keep communication clear with the band and the people you record with?

When I walk in to do the Kennedy Center Honors, the Obama inauguration, all these big TV things, I've actually heard remarks like, 'Oh, thank God.' And it's not the drumming element. It's the persistence and the organization and the ruthless attitude that I will solve a problem. When we're recording and filming with 16 cameras live and you've got 25 artists, something's going to go wrong, and you're rehearsing up until an hour before the show.

I have all the tempos, all the count-offs. I know who to count off. I know to wait for two guitar players to tune. I know what the last four words are of whoever is talking. I know everything. So the producer and the stage manager and the musical director really count on me for those elements, aside from drumming. When they show up, I'm in position, ready to go.

Describe your style.

When I learned that less is more, the less notes I played, the more powerful I got with that left hand.

Playing marimba mallets, they don't bounce, so you learn how to lift with your wrists. Then I learned finger technique, wrist technique, and the double stroke. When I got into playing rock and roll more and more, I started using my arm, then the upper arm, and then I learned to use my body. I play from my belly button, like martial arts. That's why you always see me moving, because I'm trying to use my body as the power. Because I hit so hard, I play with my back two fingers. It's like a tennis player or a golf swing: the body is where the power is. It's one huge moving thing, and the wrist is just controlling, making sure you land in the right place. I developed that sound, I focused on it, and now it's relentlessly the same.

Tell me about a record or a part that was hard to get right. What was it and why was it challenging?

When I did my first record with Mellencamp, I didn't get to play on the record. After two days of recording, I was fired from the record. I was devastated, absolutely mortified, crushed, overwhelmed. I felt like a loser. I'd played with Leonard Bernstein and concertos, but that had nothing to do with getting songs on the radio to be number one. Back then there was no Pro Tools. You had to be able to play from beginning to end, in time, perfect groove, perfect fills.

John told me to go home. I said, 'I'm not going home. I'm going to go in the studio and watch those drummers play my parts, and I'm going to learn from them, and I'll get better, and you'll benefit because I'm your drummer. You don't have to pay me. I'll sleep on the floor.' So he didn't pay me, and I did learn a lot. I was humbled. One of the things I was told is that I wasn't hitting consistently. So after the four weeks in LA, I went home and practiced to records like the Stones, Creedence, Zeppelin and AC/DC.

Tell me something I may not know from reading your credits.

I was recording with the Rolling Stones. This is the greatest lead singer story ever. It's 4:00, 5:00 in the morning, and I'm playing a gourd with a brush, and Mick comes up to me, with Charlie right in front of me, and says, 'I love what you do, but don't get in the way of Charlie's feel.' And of course, when the album came out, I was mixed out.

But what that told me was he knows that a big part of the Stones sound is Charlie's feel. A lead singer, it's all about them, what does he care about drums? But no, he knew the feel of Charlie. Go ask Mick Jagger: he will not tour if Charlie Watts is not there, because of the feel, the personality, everything aside from the beat he's playing.