“Count Me In,” a fun music doc about rock drumming, is a must-see for all drummers, but you don’t need to know about drumming to enjoy it. You’ve heard the music of most of the drummers interviewed here, countless times on the radio, such as Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones, who, coincidentally, passed away on the exact date this movie was released.
What’s drumming? What’s its function? Drums are the world’s oldest, most ubiquitous musical instruments, and the basic design has remained virtually unchanged for thousands of years. Alligator-skin drums have been found in Neolithic Chinese cultures dating back to 5500 B.C.
Drums have always featured in heavily in shamanistic ritual ceremonies around the globe, not to mention the military usages: the Rig Veda, one of the oldest religious scriptures in the world, contains references to the use of the war drum. Drums are also used as a means of communicating over great distances, and even certain animals use drumming.
Which Humans Become Drummers?
I’m a classic example of a former, self-taught, drum-kid who became enthralled after watching a rock-band playing in a friend’s barn at age 7. I became immediately obsessed with how the drummer’s limbs did four extremely different things simultaneously and thought the hi-hat was some kind of amazing, hypnotic, brass UFO of time-keeping (how does it work?!).
Rock Drumming
Ringo Starr of the Beatles was always underrated. Charlie Watts and Ginger Baker of Cream were both jazz drummers in rock musician bodies. The jazz greats such as Buddy Rich, Elvin Jones, and Max Roach are mentioned, but Jon Bonham of Led Zeppelin is considered by the drummers of the ‘70s and onwards to have been the greatest rock drummer ever (a fun tribute and explanation is given by Samantha Maloney). The Who’s Keith Moon was clearly the nuttiest and hotel-room-trashingest. And Neil Peart of Rush—also considered by many to be one of the best drummers of all time—is strangely missing here.
I’ve been watching women over the last two decades completely destroy the glass ceilings separating them from former bastions of male-dominated disciplines, such as rock-climbing, all manner of extreme sports, CrossFit training, mixed-martial-arts, motorcycling, fighter-jet flying, bass guitar playing, and drumming. Women can do it all now. Except maybe playing nose tackle for the Chicago Bears.
All in All
As a musical discipline, drumming trains the body to punctuate, convey, and interpret musical rhythmic intention to an audience and to the other performers. “Count Me In” definitely won’t be enough for music scholars, but as a fun, get-to-know-them series of portraits of a few people you’ve heard a lot about but never knew who they were, and who consider themselves to have “the best job in the world,” it’s a fun ride.Much could be said about the role of rock music as a major contribution to the current downfall of modern society, especially the younger generations exposed to lyrics of increasingly explicit content, but this is a celebration of the art of drumming, and as, quite harmless and enjoyable.
