Keith Carlock Talks w/ Stanton Moore about Loosening Up | Academy Interview

For this installment of Stanton Moore Drum Academy Interviews, I sat down with Keith Carlock while he was in town for Gretsch Night. Keith is an accomplished drummer who's played for Toto, Wayne Krantz, Steely Dan, James Taylor, Donald Fagen, Walter Becker, John Mayer, Sting and Many More. In this interview, we talk about both of the similarities in our early years in school and how we transitioned to loosening up behind the drum kit! I hope you enjoy this one, it's always great to catch up with Keith.

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#KeithCarlock #SteelyDan #Interview

[drorale]

Keith Carlock is so damm good !!!! hands down !!!! style, feel, technique he got it all !!!! such an inspiration

[InnocentAbyssinianCat-ebge]

Really enjoy this needed discussion about getting the knots out of your physical technique and the knots of your mind being hung up on perfect techniques when playing the drums

[jefffelderman]

You don't have a longstanding gig with Steely Dan, along with the all the other great artists he has performed and recorded with, without being a total master of the kit as Keith is. He also comes across in this interview as a humble and cool person. Great to see this. I am a guitarist who has always derived a lot of my playing in a band from what the drummer is doing, so I have always had a strong interest in the role of the drums in a band and the need for a great drummer to succeed.

[DRUMNERD]

You have such a gorgeous drum/living room, real drum life goals! Thanks for being such a great drum mentor. Stay Safe.

[jonathanhume]

Man, I wish I could hang out behind the couches and just listen to Stanton and Keith talk all day. Thanks for the amazing content!

[r.a.]

Everything Stanton does is classy as hell and just groovy shit. Love it. Great convo and insight from two bad ass drummers.

[portnickos]

Hey, I know this duo!!! 😜
This interview is soooo cool...Keith is an amazing drummer and a hell of a guy!! Gotta love these SMDA interviews! Thanks for doing this, Stanton! 🙏🙏🙏

[GediSpock]

This is the best thing I’ve seen in ages. 👊😍😀👌

Two of my favourites sitting chatting.
Brilliant to have a 3rd seat.
Thanks very much. 🙏

[LittleDrummerChannel]

Two of the best...thanks guys!! Love what you both do!! 😎✌

[KhalDrogo]

Two of my all time favorite drummers - legends!!

[cymbalspecialist]

Thanks Stanton & Keith. Stories of personal evolution on the instrument are really helpful. We are all trying to figure out how to let go and let it happen, but all the technical instruction points drummers in the other direction. Truth is, we all have to evolve on our own. These conversations shed some light on that path.

[tmaddrummer]

Many this was good!!! Really enjoyed it!

[trevormcmanis]

I love that they discussed using the finger as the fulcrum . So many problems come from using the index finger.... IMO and experience....

[kevinmoore]

I'm a huge fan of both of you and thank you for this and all your youtube stuff and books/cds of which I've bought them all. The thing that got me to this video today is trying to find out whether and how Steely Dan and Donald Fagen use click tracks, especially live. When I compare the two new live albums (Northeast Corridor and Nightfly) the tempos are pretty much exactly like the studio versions and stay right on the money all the way through. Another thing I'm really curious about, which might be before your time, is that Wendal drum machine. I guess it was invented at exactly the same time that Linn was working on his first drum machine. Not even sure what my question would be but anything about Wendal would be very interesting. Thanks in advance.

[malonedrum]

I don’t know if this is up your alley for content for YouTube vs your premium site, but I would love if you did a walk-through tour of your studio space. Hearing you two briefly discuss it, I’d love the full tour from the outside door, to every little knock and cranny between!

[johnrobinson]

Another awesome video! I'm older than you guys but right now I'm going through trying to loosen up. I'm switching my fulcrum to the middle finger at times and it's really opening up new ways of playing for me.

[ThomasMetal]

I like how Thomas Lang put it once in a lesson video for an online school he was apart of when he said drummers should learn all permutations and sub-permutations of the instrument. His argument was that semi-knowledge is not good. What if you want to play or feel a certain way on the instrument and cannot because you never learned something? It's the same thing with rudimental and jazz/contemporary music. Both approaches are needed, and if you know how to use it and when in your music, you will be able to become valued by other musicians with gig offers left and right.

[xenprovence]

The Art of Rebound is the practice of keeping one's fulcrum still while the stick moves.

[TomBelknapRoc]

Great video, great discussion. I really didn't completely learn to appreciate hand grips and their importance until just recently, when I decided to try switching to traditional grip. But Stanton's point about feeling like "my hands and fingers are just there to keep the stick from flying away" is a sensation I can definitely confirm. I've spent many hours in the last year, just concentrating on keeping my hands as loose as possible.

Totally trying out the middle finger fulcrum thing tonight! Maybe I can finally hit that Soul swung sixteen sound??

[misfit]

Seriously good drummer and up there at the top end of the drumming scale