JPF Home Page Forums Musician Gear and Techniques Bass and Drum Forum Great female drummers?

Not to be sexist, but there simply is not a great abundance of outstanding female drummers out there? Can you think of any? There are only two that come to mind for me, and both are from "Indie Rock" bands:
•Georgia Hubley (Yo La Tengo)
•Janet Beveridge Bean (11th Dream Day)

Any others that y'all can think of? And why do you think this is the case?

Who was the woman that played with Prince for awhile? She was hot.

Can't think of any offhand. There have been a lot of all girl bands most of them sucked. I am not chauvenist just have not seen any good female drummers yet. Re the Prince thing I think she was more eye candy than a drummer. Could be wrong though.

Sheila E.
Yeah, I saw her live and she kicked some serious ass. Good call.

Sheila Escovedo is a LOT more than eye candy. I heard her live playing with Lionel Ritchie's band and she stole the show. Her dad, Pete Escovedo, used to play with Santana and had his own band.

She's the real deal.

Karen Carpenter could carry the mail, but she wasn't going to win prizes...great voice though. The gal from the Bangles is pretty good, and I liked the gal with the Velvet underground. Lenny Kravitz's drummer, Cindy Blackman, is pretty good. There's a great country swing drummer here in Nashville, but I can't think of her name right now...fantastic groover, really has country figured out (and there have been many, many fine jazzers who turned up their noses at country, but then couldn't cut the mustard with it...funny, some don't even "get" that they don't get it )

I think there'll be more and more exceptional female drummers as time goes on...probably a while, though, before there's a female heavyweight boxing champ. It's just not fair.

Hi Mike. I don't know about the others mentioned but Karen Carpenter didn't play on the recordings. It was Hal Blaine. Hal is a great drummer but a bit flat chested if you ask me which of course you didn't.

Oh there is a female heavyweight boxing champ, MY WIFE, she scares the hell out of me.
Re Karen Carpenter she wanted to play drums more than anything but they would not let her. With her voice they only wanted her to sing.

I have forgotten her name, but I have seen Bo Diddley a few times and his backup band was his daughter's group that she plays drums in. She is the real deal behind a trap set.

Most folks don't know this, but Ringo is really a girl. Whether or not she was great or just so so drummer was discussed at length in another thread. I wonder if the change in gender status will alter anybody's opinion.

ROTFLMAO

Short thread....

The girl in the Josie and the pussycats cartoons.

I don't know if she's "great", but definitely damn good is Lenny Kravitz's drummer {Don't even know here name, but saw them open for the Stones in 94'} Black chick...extremely competent and extremely HOT!

Karen Carpenter may not have played on the recordings, but she was an excellent drummer, IMO. And that voice... beautiful.

Jill Sobule is a pretty good drummer. I don't know about great, but if you know what you want, and can execute it on that particular instrument... you ring the bell.

I'm surprised no one's mentioned Gina Schock (the Go-Go's), Terri Lynn Carrington, Roxy Petrucci (Vixen), Bernadette Cooper (Klymaxx), etc,.


markus
stat songs publishing, ltd. (ASCAP)
www.soundclick.com/markusky
www.myspace.com/markusky
statsongs@hotmail.com

You guys aren't listing great female drummers; you are listing female drummers.

Damn! Truman and I agree on something! I'm gonna hear it for this one, but are there really any truly GREAT female musicians?
{There's plenty of great female SINGERS.}

GREAT female drummer: Sheila E (that one was nailed)
GREAT female bassists: Carole Kaye (on just about 40% of the non-Stax, non-Motown singles of the 1960's -- listen to The Doors' "Peace Frog"); and Tina Weymouth (Talking Heads), anyone?!?!
GREAT female guitar player: oh, hell the only shredder I can think of is Jennifer Batten.
GREAT keyboard players: don't get me started.

Maureen Tucker from Lou Reed's old band, The Velvet Underground.
If anyone here is familiar with them. Most likely many here are familiar with them, since I was'nt even born yet when they came out.
They are considered kind of avant, early pop but don't really have a genre. But they were a heavy influence on punk, new wave and modern rock in general.
By reading the posts, many here may not be a great fan of that kind of music. But the drumming was pretty interesting, if not tribal sounding.
The song "Heroine" is a good example of that.
At least it sounded that way to me.

Matt

You know that she played standing up? Playing the bass drum with a mallet in her left hand.

I don't know about Mo's chops, but she was certainly the right drummer for those early albums.

I mentioned Bo Diddley's daughter, who is an awesome drummer. I agree that most of them mentioned here have been simply female drummers. There are only a couple I have ever seen who flat knock me out. The only two I can think of right now are Sheila E. and Bo's daughter.

Don't worry about insulting women, they don't post here.

As I used to say in my youth, stepping off the bus, "Where's the women?"

See what I mean?

Well, that answers that. The reason there are so few women drummers is because they're not interested. They don't even read the drum posts. I guess they're too busy cooking and cleaning, buying makeup and trying to change their men. (Maybe that'll get someone posting?)

Yeah, it should have been titled great female homemakers (who play drums), then maybe some of them would have responded.

And fetch me a beer while they're at it!

Wow, we can't even get them mad enough to post.

Let's see, they're not cooking, not doing housework, obviously not posting they must be...not listening! And hurry up with Bob's beer before it gets warm.

Hmmm, maybe they're too mad to post. Well, gals, it's ok, I'm just kidding. Years ago I used to attend meetings of the local chapter of N.O.W....it was a great place to find chicks.

OK, I'm not joking now. It's amazing to me that there's a thread about female drummers, and not one woman posts. Is it possible that not one woman read this?

Mike , I think they're giving you the silent treatment.

My Grandpa used to call the silent treatment "The Blessing."

like i said.......Gina Schock, Roxy Petrucci, Terri Lynn Carrington, Bernadette Cooper, etc,.



markus
stat songs publishing, ltd. (ascap)
www.soundclick.com/markusky
www.myspace.com/markusky
statsongs@hotmail.com

Sheila E. will kick your ass. Period.

What? Nobody mentioned Meg White of White Stripes? Well, I'll give her the benefit of the doubt that she has chops but she hasn't showed it yet...

Ya'll need to check out Beyoncé's tour drummer Nikki Glaspie. She's quite accomplished.

Chuck

Thought I'd rename this thread to see if we can FINALLY get some women to comment.

Now, all jokes aside, last year while backing up Bernadette, we got to open the show for Michael McDonald and Steely Dan. Michael McDonald had an absolutely amazing drummer named Yvette "Baby Girl" Preyer. She's been in all the magazines and IMHO deserves the adjective "great."

Pretty trippy, your header on the Main Forum Page is quite different from the one listed on the Bass & Drum Forum...

I'm glad I'm not you... Yipes!

Chuck

Well, Chuck, I don't know how to get women to comment on this. I'll make another subject change, if this doesn't attract a comment or two from our sisters I'm going to give it one more try, then I just give up.

Well, I've tried asking, I've tried making jokes based on stereotypes, I've even renamed the thread "Men are Pigs," but nothing's worked. For some reason, women won't post here.

Perhaps they're not reading, though I doubt it. Perhaps they're mad at me for making jokes about stereotypes...and I was Mr. Mom, raising my kids. Perhaps the stereotype is true, women just aren't interested in drums. Maybe that's why men have those drum circles. All I do know is that any speculation is worthless without the perspective of women themselves, and if they're not interested then I leave it to them to ask themselves why.

Well, here is a woman commenting...LOL I don't really know too many women drummers. You guys did a great job naming some. There is a woman drummer in a punk rock band, Tommy Lee's sister they say, (but she's married to one of his best friends) Her name is Athena.

www.myspace.com/kottak

I think women are not posting here because they can't think of any women drummers...LOL

P.S. I love drums!!!! With a man behind them!

Perhaps they're too busy cooking and cleaning and fetching beer to read this post!

BC, How about mowing the lawn and washing the car?

And then put on some lingerie and dance for me!

BC, I originally had a comment in that direction but I edited it out. Thought it might be too risque.Glad to see that you have the onions to say it. Ben

Funny you guys should mention that, because I do some cooking, always fetch beer for my wife, mow the lawn, wash the car, and sometimes I'll put on lingerie and, while she beats the drum, I dance for her.

It's a good life.

There you are, Mike. Talking loud and carrying little sticks. ka-tink.

Hmmmm-Fetch me a beer, you guys may have hit on one important reason for a 'beer belly'.

Actually, women talk soft and carry a big stick to beat, er, encourage, their husbands and children to do the right thing. Mike, it sounds like your wife has been very successful.

Honestly, maybe I should care about the 'best' drummers, bassists, guitarists, etc. Is that part of music education to know who's who? For some reason it sounds like stat-keeping for a ballgame. I can't speak for any other women, though. Are there any female drummers who post at Just Plain Folks?

i am actually a female drummer, all the way from South Wales, UK. true enough there seems to be a lack of GOOD female musician, but i am here to change this.

I have an all girl band called 'Misdemeanor' we far from SUCk!

just thort i'd let you guys know there are a few talented chicks about!

Hey cutedrummer,

Get at it and change it. Good attitude, now work like crazy.

I believe we're going to hear some great female drummers in years to come.

Mike

Hi cutedrummer,

Welcome to the boards. Let us know when you have sound we can listen to.

We-ell, Mike, so I thought and thought, and realized, if I want to play ball, I should know who the other players are. A recording is not just successful because of the performer or songwriter, so I humbly receive some wisdom from my elders.