PJ's drummer

man, matt cameron is the best drummer pearl jam has had. whats the deal with people saying he is "too technical" thats just such a weird thing to say?!

he is technically good at what he plays and that only makes the music better. his live performance is also phenomenal and equalled by no other pearl jam drummer in terms of ability or stamina.

jack irons' playing on albums was weak and frequently poor in my opinion with his patterns between toms and bass drum leaving A LOT to be desired. he just didnt fit the band in terms of look, sound or feel either.

and also, it was dave Abbruzzese who did the drumming on animal, not jack irons.

it went:

original demos- matt cameron
ten: dave krusen
vs and vitalogy: dave abbruzzese
no code and yield: jack irons
binaural, riot act, lost dogs etc: matt cameron

Matt is my favorite PJ drummer, but how could someone say that Yield would be better had Matt played on it? Ridiculous! Just watch Single Video Theory.

well mccreadyisgod, why do you go on about matters of preference when all i said was "in my opinion". at no point did i say my view was "absolute". surely the whole point of this forum is to post opinions and express views?!

thats my personal view. fair enough if you dont agree.

My take on Pearl Jam--other than them being one of the greatest bands of all-time--is that they have always been about musical change and growth. Just think of the differences between songs on albums like Vs and then Riot Act, for instance. I think what will make them go down in history is that wide range of songwriting they've been able to create.

To say that one album would have been better with a different drummer entirely destroys what makes PJ better than everyone else. The change in drummers has helped them not necessarily change their style, but probably more allowed them to write in different ways or use songs that might not have been playable before.

As a drummer, it's hard to argue against Cameron: the guy is simply too awesome. But so was Jack, in his own way, which was excellent for Mirror Ball, No Code, and Yield. He added a sort of punk thing to those albums that Matt proabably would not have added. But then look at Binaural: a song like Grievance would never have come out like it did if someone other than Matt had played on it.

They're doing the evolution, baby.

Originally posted by alowishis
ac/dc is more of a heard one heard them all type but with pj it's a whole new experience with each album.

Hey, you didn't just go knocking AC/DC, did you? I mean, come on... Phil Rudd is a drumming genius!

I would kill to have a drummer in my band ala Dave Abbruzzese.

This is my ranking of Pearl Jam drummers:

1) Dave Abbruzzese (or however you spell it)
2) Matt Cameron
3) Jack Irons
4) Dave Krusen (but I love his drumming on Ten)

Mine would have to be:

1) Cameron
2) Irons
3) Krusen
4) Dave A.

Dave A., was way too busy with everything, hitting splashes like he was in the Dave Matthews Band or something. Listening to that stuff after several years of listening to other stuff, I think he overplayed a lot. At least Krusen could get into the groove and let others in the band fill up the space instead of him trying to cram every measure with kick drum triplets with accented sixteenth notes on two splashes . . .

Dave A. made Pearl Jam's Unplugged sound amazing with the cymbal abuse. I mean, just listen to Even Flow!!