Headbang Interviews Tommy Clufetos
Interview: Tommy Clufetos
This guy’s had one of the most amazing career paths any headbanger could imagine, but he’s astonishingly humble, viewing himself as a mere sideman and totally committed to professionalism and having a good time at work. Check it out:
What’s your background? Where are you from, when did you start playing drums, what kind of lessons did you take, all that stuff?
I’m from Detroit. I started playing drums when I was seven and I’m 30 now, so that’s 23 years I’ve been playing drums. I started taking lessons maybe when I was seven to 11 years of age, and then at 11 I started playing gigs five or six nights a week in Detroit, so I stopped the lessons and was thrown into the real deal.
How do you get hired by a professional band as a teenager?
My father had a band, and I played with his band all through my school years, and played with other people in the meantime. It was kind of a crazy lifestyle as a young kid, but it worked out for the best. You would think you would do stupid stuff being in that situation, but I learned what not to do. If you hang around a bunch of losers, you can either act like the losers or detest the losers and say “I don’t wanna be that way, therefore I’m gonna do this.” I chose to do the latter as much as possible, and I’m not saying I’m perfect, but you learn what to stay away from and where the pitfalls are.
I was doing some work with Alto Reed, who plays saxophone in Bob Seger’s band. He asked me to play drums on a movie soundtrack [Escanaba In Da Moonlight], Ted Nugent was gonna be playing a couple of songs on it, and [Ted] asked me if I wanted to be the drummer, and I said “Hell yes.” So we did that, and he called me after to go on tour with him, it went so well. It was one of those things. I’ve learned when you get an opportunity, and something may come out of the blue after working and working and working, you may get a little break, and in order to move to the next step, you have to jump on that opportunity and perform to the best of your ability and hopefully something spurs out of that one moment. So that’s how that happened, and I was with Ted for, I think, four years, and it was an amazing experience. I learned so much from Ted. He was an awesome boss to work for, and I still speak to him all the time. He called me last week, he heard that I got the Ozzy Osbourne gig and called to congratulate me on it. So we’re still very close friends and I look up to him. I can’t say enough about him.
What were the recording sessions for Craveman and Love Grenade like? Does Nugent work mostly live in the studio, with everyone playing together, or is it more of a multitracking, precision operation?
Yeah, Ted always cuts live as a band. He insists upon it, because it all stems from his guitar playing and his right hand on the guitar. His rhythm dictates how I should play. Usually in a band, the drummer dictates the feel, but with Ted, you really had to pay close attention to what he was playing ’cause he may feel things differently at a different moment. You may have rehearsed it one way, but you go in the studio and he’s feeling different, so the music is the boss at that point. So he always likes to cut as a band. Which I love, ’cause to me that’s how music should be. It should be a moment in time, and the more you try to perfect it, sometimes you lose it. The coolest stuff is spontaneous. You always get the cool takes when you say, “Let’s just try this and see what happens.” ‘Cause there’s not any preconceived notions. He’s as spur of the moment as you can get, while still having structure and knowing what he wants.
You worked with Alice Cooper after that—how did you get together with him?
I got the Alice Cooper gig because when I was with Ted, one summer we toured a little bit with Alice and the guys in his band saw me playing with Ted, and to make a long story short, that was kinda that one. They asked me to join the next year, ’cause Eric Singer, the drummer, went to join Kiss, and I took his place with Alice. Ted was taking that summer off, so it worked out perfectly.
When touring with artists like Nugent and Cooper, who have such a well-known discography, how do you put your own spin on the material? With Alice, I’d imagine the arrangements are probably set in stone ’cause it’s part of an overall show, but I imagine with Ted it might be a little looser.
Yeah, but still you have to play “Cat Scratch Fever” like “Cat Scratch Fever.” So when I get a gig, I go over and over and over and over the music. You have to ingrain the innate feel, especially being a drummer, in you so much so it just comes out like the original record as much as possible. I’m gonna sound like myself even if I’m playing the same beat some guy was playing. It’s just gonna come out sounding like you, but you can still stick to the same parts for the audience. As a listener, I hate when people change the songs too much. People wanna hear the songs as they know them. So you should play them as much as possible like the record and inject your own energy into them. Your own energy is gonna come out no matter what.
Right, like I’ve seen Slayer play songs with Dave Lombardo that they recorded with Paul Bostaph and you can absolutely tell who’s back there.
Sure, sure. Dave Lombardo’s gonna sound like Dave Lombardo. But to the average listener, they might not know that it’s a different drummer. Nor care.
After working with Alice Cooper, you joined Rob Zombie’s band—how did that change come about?
I’m what you call a sideman. I’ve never been a member of a band, where you get a piece of the pie. My job is based on me finding work, working for already successful acts. And it’s always been that way. So I was playing with Alice, and we played the Greek Theater in L.A., and Blasko, Rob’s bassist at the time, was there and he saw me playing with Alice and he mentioned Rob maybe needing a drummer in the future, and I said “I’m your guy,” and it spurred out of that. That’s always the pattern. Somebody always sees me play and then a gig comes out of that. It never comes out of me sending a demo tape or schmoozing this guy here or whatever. Somebody’s gotta see me play in order to see what I do. That’s what works for me, ’cause I’m not the best networker or anything like that.
Rob Zombie’s new album, Hellbilly Deluxe 2, had a more organic, four-guys-in-a-room feel than anything he’d done before – how much of that was the influence of you, Piggy D. and John 5, who’d all been touring with him for years?
It was more organic than the previous Rob Zombie record that I was on [Educated Horses], but it’s just coming up with riffs and then they stick those things together and then Rob makes songs out of them. He kinda has a different approach ’cause he doesn’t start with a melody or anything like that, it’s usually like, he likes a riff or a groove or something and then he puts little things together and kinda makes songs out of those. Which works great for him.
Yeah, ’cause he’s not a traditionally melodic vocalist.
No, he’s more like almost rapping in a way. It’s very much more based on rhythm and that kind of thing. And that’s not taking anything away from him. It’s just that he has his own approach.
How did you get involved with Ozzy? Were you brought in by Blasko?
I wasn’t really brought in by anybody. It’s a weird situation how it happened. Again, it was one of those things where they auditioned Gus G., and their drummer at the time, Mike Bordin, was out of town with Faith No More, and they asked “Who can play drums and knows all these songs and can make it comfortable for Gus to come and audition?” So they called me to go do that, I was in the right place at the right time, and it went great. Then a gig came up that Mike couldn’t make at Blizzcon in Anaheim, California, they asked me to do that, I played the gig, it went great, and they asked me to join the band out of that situation. It had nothing to do with me being in Rob Zombie’s band or anything like that. I just got a chance to get in front of their faces, the timing was right, Mike Bordin was busy with Faith No More and is busy with Faith No More, and I stepped in. That’s what it always is. When you’re a sideman, it’s always a timing thing. Somebody may leave, something may happen, and you’re there and they ask you to do it, as long as you’re the right guy and you can do the job. So nobody’s ever stolen me from any act. There’s not really such a thing as stealing. You’re asked to play, and you either accept the gig or don’t.
Have you heard about Rob’s comments about your recruitment? What do you think about all that?
It’s a shame he feels that way, because I had such a great time with Rob and I only have great things to say about Rob and my time spent there. But it’s just like saying that—you could say that he stole me from Alice Cooper. But I wouldn’t say that. I chose to join Rob Zombie for the betterment of my career, as a career move on my end, and same thing with Ozzy. I chose to leave. Nothing against the time I spent with Rob Zombie, it was a great time and I loved it, but I chose to move on to Ozzy. It’s the same situation. We’re all in it to have a great time and play music, and hopefully make a career where we can play music the rest of our lives. And I’ve always gone back to play with the acts that I’ve left in the past, and it’s always worked out in the end, so I hope we can all stay friends in the end. ‘Cause I’ve had a great time recording and playing music with all the artists I’ve been with so far. I’ve been so lucky and so blessed.
What were the recording sessions for Scream like? Your drums don’t sound like you—they sound really processed, like a machine on some tracks. What did Kevin Churko do that changed your sound, and did everybody record separately, or did the band play together much?
Honestly, I didn’t play drums on the record. The record was done before I joined the band. Kevin Churko handled all the drum stuff on that record. He came up with some amazing, inventive parts, which some of ‘em are a bitch for me to learn, that prick! No, no, he’s an amazing producer and an amazing musical talent. I think he really did a great job on the Scream record. It sounds like the perfect combination of something new and something old, and it’s still Ozzy at the same time. Ozzy always has a knack for progressing and changing his sound but still keeping the identity intact. Cause he has such a distinctive voice that no matter what, he could be singing “Mary Had A Little Lamb” and it would sound cool. Great songs, great heavy stuff, great melodic stuff.
Final question: Why do you think you get so much work from guys twice your age?
I think it’s my style. My drumming style is not really—if you read drumming magazines and stuff like that, it’s more about pyrotechnics right now. I compare it to all the shredding guitar players in the ’80s. Drumming is kinda like that now, what’s in vogue. And I was always taught coming up that you play with groove and feel first, and it’s not about how many notes you play but how you play those notes. And music was more based on groove back in the day, I would have to say. Black Sabbath—I mean, come on. Without Bill Ward, those guys wouldn’t be the same. As amazing as the riffs are, the feel Bill Ward added to those songs was just as important as anything else. And the same with Alice Cooper, the same with Ted Nugent. So I try to invoke those feelings in my drumming and I think that relates to their music, and on top of it, these guys want professional musicians who show up on time and have a good time, and that’s what I try to do. So it works, I think, and hopefully, knock on wood, it still continues to work for me. I gotta say, I am so lucky to do what I always wanted to do in my life and I couldn’t ask for a better career so far. Everybody I’ve worked with has been so great. I’ve had great experiences and played with great musicians. I’m a lucky drummer boy.
Thanks to: Headbang Superfans: http://music.msn.com/superfans/heavy-metal/blog/interview-tommy-clufetos/
