Charlie Watts: Our Complete 1994 Interview

On Historic Drummers, Drum Kits, the Blues, and the Rolling Stones

Charlie Watts promo photo by Jack English (Courtesy Virgin/Pointblank Record)

With Keith Richards’ nod, I was hired to write and edit a one-shot magazine, Inside the Voodoo Lounge, to be sold at venues and newsstands during the Rolling Stones’ 1994-1995 World Tour. The first part of my assignment was to fly to Toronto, where the Stones had taken over a boy’s prep school for their rehearsals, and interview each member of the band. I was especially thrilled to be talking to Charlie Watts, a favorite drummer ever since I first heard “Get Off of My Cloud.”

My first up-close glimpse of Charlie was in a van shuttling crew members and backup singers from the Four Seasons Hotel to the rehearsal. On the way over, he amused us with an anecdote about a tall Stetson hat his wife had just dissuaded him from buying. When we pulled up, Watts got out first, turned, and offered a helping hand to each of the passengers. As I disembarked, he politely introduced himself. Our interview began shortly afterward in the school’s large cafeteria. Forewarned that Charlie’s modesty could make him a tough interview, I thought it best to begin by asking about musical heroes. Our conversation took place on July 14, 1994.

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If you could somehow transcend time to visit any musical period or see any artists, where would you go first?

Good Lord! God, there’s loads of them, isn’t there? I’d like to have gone to the Savoy Ballroom – Chick Webb, I think. I’d loved to have seen Ellington at the Cotton Club and have dressed up for the occasion. I’d love to have seen Charlie Parker at the Royal Roost or something like that. Louis Armstrong, probably at the Roseland Ballroom in Chicago.

Which era?

1930, with a big band behind him. I like Armstrong with a big band. I mean, I like the Hot Seven and all those, but I like him with a big band.

Are you a fan of Jo Jones?

Yes. I just bought a record of Jo Jones, “Shoe Shine Boy,” Jo Jones Special. Yes, I saw him play quite a few times – Papa Jo Jones, you mean, the Count Basie Jo Jones.

Have you looked up any of the historic jazz drummers, such as Roy Haynes?

I know Roy Haynes. I know Micky Roker. I mean, I’ve met them. I think Roy Haynes is a wonderful player. One of my favorite drummers is Davie Tough – nobody knows anything about him, really. He’s one of the Austin High School Gang, out of Chicago in the ’30s. Played with all the big bands, and he played with the famous first Herd, Woody Herman’s. He’s the drummer on “Caldonia” and “Northwest Passage” and all that. He’s a legend. Every band leader wanted him in the ’30s. Skinny guy. And another guy I’d love to have seen play – this is drummers we’re talking about – was Big Sid Catlett, who was around for the same era. They were the two drummers that were famous – Big Sid and Davie Tough. Davie Tough was a skinny white man, really skinny, and was a really loud player, apparently, from what I’ve gathered asking people like Mel Lewis about him. And Big Sid was a huge black man, but very light. So they were totally contrary in their stature to the way they played, which is very strange. Ahmet Ertegun is the only one I actually asked a lot about this. Ahmet is very interesting, and his brother was.

What can a young drummer today gain from listening to these players you’ve just mentioned?

[Smiles] That there’s nothing really new. Georgie Wettling is one of the great Chicago drummers, a great, great, great Chicago drummer. In fact, Georgie Wettling is better documented than lots of people. He used to play with Eddie Condon. He’s a fantastic drummer, and he is so subtle – it’s like Freddy Below is a great subtle drummer, really, although he’s feet-first and it’s noisy. But it’s actually very subtle, the pick-ups he does. I mean, the thing with blues bands, like records, is you never quite know who’s on ’em, really. It’s all up to whether [Chess engineer] Ron Malo wrote the name down directly on the day. If you go further back you don’t know who’s on ’em. So if Freddy Below is the player on “Smokestack Lightnin’” by Howlin’ Wolf, that’s really clever drumming. That isn’t just straight-ahead. He plays lovely things with his feet.

As opposed to Odie Payne, the other Chess house drummer?

I don’t know who that is. You’d have to play a record for me to know him. Below, I know of and have seen. But there are a lot of guys unheard of, really, who play wonderfully. I mean, I personally like band drummers. All the drummers that I’ve mentioned or I admire – all the records I have of Roy Haynes, for example – are all rhythm records. You know, the Coltrane thing, A Different Drummer, and he did some wonderful records with Roland Kirk – Out of the Afternoon and all those. It’s not the drum solos I like, it’s the rhythm section drumming. Max Roach is another one like that, who’s a phenomenal player.

Who was your favorite drummer with Miles Davis?

Miles? Don’t know a favorite. He had a way of putting bands together so you never heard of them. My favorite of drummer, I suppose, on record would be Philly Joe Jones, and to see play live, Tony Williams – by a long way. And Tony’s more important, really, because he turned drumming around. Nobody played like Tony Williams did when he was 18. When I first saw him he was 18. Nobody played like that. You didn’t drop time. Philly Joe would ride, you know, and it would be straight through. Tony would drop. Have you got the album Four and More? That’s a classic example of Tony Williams’ way of playing the drums. The way I play and the way most guys played until he arrived would be to play straight through – you know, one, two, one, two, one, two. Foot, foot. Left foot, right foot, left foot, you know. But Tony would go tt-tt, tt-tt, tt-tt, tt-tt with his left foot, and nobody ever did that sort of thing. They didn’t play time like that. He would drop time, he would halve it. And him and Ron Carter invented this way of playing. Important. You know a guy called Scott LaFaro, the bass player? Him and Paul Motian used to do it with Bill Evans. They’d play a time inside the time, and nothing would be keeping time, except one note on the bass would be the anchor.

I saw you play alongside Kenney Jones at the ARMS Concert, and it was astonishing to see Kenney’s gigantic drum setup alongside yours, which is a case-study in simplicity.

That’s how I’ve always played. I have a hard enough job playing them; I don’t really want to play more.

Have you always admired the elegance in simplicity?

Yeah. I mean, Micky Roker is a beautiful-looking drummer. He just is wonderful. Philly Joe is. Elvin’s like that. When Elvin Jones gets going, it rolls. It’s like thunder and everything, but to watch him, it just rolls ’round. The arms go. When I was young, my favorite drummer was a guy called Joe Morello. And Joe Morello was all taste and elegance in his playing – superb ears and technique. You know, it’s very hard to play with just a piano. Piano, bass, and drums is one of the hardest things for a drummer to play, to support, because of all the textures you have to use.

Do you play styles your fans might be unaware of?

I’m not aware of it.