It’s International Drum Month & I’m naming names — You know how some strummers give their guitars nicknames? Like everything else about being in a band, that’s a little more difficult for drummers. But that’s cool, we’re used to it. Drummers play kits— a collection of many instruments assembled to make some righteous noise. Your basic kit has four…

A modest proposal for fellow middle-aged music lovers — I’m proud of us. It takes guts to show our weathered faces at a club filled with beautiful twenty-somethings. So what if a few of them giggle and mock our “Lollapalooza 1991” T-shirts and Day-Glo earplugs? Just sip on your overpriced club soda with a squeeze of lime and let the laughter roll right…

12 of the best songs from a lesser-known sub-genre — Coulrophobia is an intense fear of clowns. Although many people find clowns kinda creepy or a little scary, extreme cases of this phobia can cause nausea, panic, and anxiety. This is probably why clowns are such good fodder for rock and roll songs. Like the most memorable rock and rollers…

Endless online debates about a beloved pop rock genre. — Spend some time exploring power pop fan pages on Facebook and three things become quickly apparent: 1. This is a passionate and opinionated community of music-lovers. 2. There are a lot of super obscure bands you’ve likely never heard. 3. Almost nobody can agree on the definition of “power pop.” …

A Brief History of Punk Drumming in 80 Songs — I’m a drummer so that’s what I tend to focus on when listening to music. It took me a surprisingly long time to realize that this isn’t how most music-lovers hear songs. It’s safe to say that the majority of fans pay way more attention to the melodies, lead vocals…

A video chat with four talented punk musicians sharing their experiences. It’s impossible to underestimate just how much punk rock has changed people’s lives since it first burst out of ’70s New York and London. The same is true for subsequent generations of fans who were converted by countless sub-genres…

On publishing a physical fanzine in these digital days — I‘ve been known to say that the legendary punk fanzine Flipside was the first place I ever got published—but that’s not technically true. Prior to my article about a local band getting published by Flipside, it appeared in a photocopied/hand-stapled zine some friends of mine handed out around our high…

From the British Invasion to new wave, hair metal to hip-hop — ‘The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music’ by Dave Grohl Dave Grohl is the GenX poster child for how to earn and hold onto rock ‘n roll success. This book faithfully recounts his hyperactive childhood (loving mother; disapproving father), earning his punk stripes during van tours with Scream, landing the gig with Nirvana and their rapid ascent…

From British Invasion to punk, glam to grunge — Rock drummers don’t always get the respect they deserve, but plenty of great biographies have been written by and about them. These selections only represent a small sample of the many drummer books available (Dave Grohl’s The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music is next on my to-be-read list), but…