​                                                                          John Aldridge

Drum tech for the American rock band REO Speedwagon, vintage drum historian, famed engraver, and drummer.
Interview and photos by Mark Schierholz

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Mark: Thanks for taking some time out to chat with us John, You are the drum tech for REO, How did you come across this gig,

John: About 14 years ago, I had a short bout with a non-life threatening form of cancer. It made me take a look at what I was doing and how I felt about that. I decided I needed to push things a little harder physically to get back in shape. I knew I wasn't going to set the world on fire as an overweight, out of shape 45 year old drummer, but I also knew that my skills would translate to the touring industry. I had written about techs and techs who were artists, so it was a short leap to me to become a tech. It would get me out of the shop, into a more active lifestyle in a good working environment, but it wouldn't keep me from engraving between tours. I put out the word through some industry connections that I wanted to go out as a drum tech, and I got two calls: one from my friend Jack Bruno, who was about to embark on an eight month tour with Joe Cocker, and the second one with Bryan Hitt, who invited me to sub for a couple of weeks while he looked for an LA based tech. I didn't know if I could do an eight month run outside the USA right off the bat, so I went with Bryan, hoping I could figure it out well enough to see if I liked it or not.

M: how long have you been with REO?

J: This coming July will be the end of my 13th year!

M: Have you teched for others prior?

J: I rented instruments prepped to record when I lived in Nashville, but didn't go out as a tech until the REO gig.

M: You are not only a drum tech, you are a drummer, drum rack builder and an incredible engraver, how do you find the time for everything?

J: Those things sort of balance each other out. I could engrave all the time, but it's not a physically demanding thing, so I'd be out of shape in a month! I don't get to build racks all that often, so I tend to doodle and dream up more concepts than I'll ever get to build. I've even got a ton of tubing and clamps that I keep just to try out new ideas for racks in my locker. It's a challenge to build a frame that will support without being obtrusive for the everyday drummer like myself, while it's a blast to build a huge showy rack for a major tour.

M: Where did you learn the craft of engraving?

J: I watched an elderly gentleman for about ten minutes as he demonstrated the techniques used to create the patterns I showed him. From that point on, it was a matter of cutting on any metal cylinder that was handy until I got enough of a handle on it to try a real drum. It took about 3 years of dedicated practice before I was brave enough to tackle a good drum!

M: And as no two projects you do are alike, what's a normal time you would spend on one snare drum for an engraving?

J: Some snare drums take as little as two hours, while others take several days. It all depends on the complexity of the pattern and how hard the metal is. Harder shells take longer.

M: Who are some of the big name drummers you've done engraving work for?

J: Ringo Starr, Eric Singer, Jamie Oldaker, Matt Chamberlain, Bun E Carlos, Jason Sutter, Kevin Murphy, John Dittrich, Tommy Taylor, Chris Layton, Sean Waugamon, Myron Grombacher, Noah Levy, Bobby Rondinelli, Jerome Deupree, Garry Peterson, Patrick Keeler, Shaw Wilson, Greg Morrow, Todd Sucherman, Carl Palmer, and a whole bunch more I can't think of.

M; Do you do other than just snare drums too?

J: Yes, I've done hoops for entire drumsets, brass drumsets, a few guns, and a ton of flashlights. Even a few road cases! If you look around the REO Stage on any given day, you'll find something that I've engraved.

M: What drum companies do you do work for?

J: Drum Workshop, Ludwig Drum Co., Slingerland Drum Co., Tama Drum Co, Lang Percussion, Joyful Noise Drum Company, Dunnett Classic Drums, and A & F Drum company along with many smaller custom companies and individuals. I'm always open to new companies and individual custom orders.

M: Is there one piece you've done that is your favorite?

J: I did a Worldmax Black Nickel over brass drumset a couple of years ago that was really beautiful if I do say so myself.

M: On the drum racks, you put together the current set up for Bryan Hitt, how long did that take to engineer?

J: Bryan was very reluctant to let me build a rack at first. He didn't want a bar going over the bass drum or to look like a kit out of the 80s. This led me to work on the premise of racks that come from underneath and from the side rather than the typical three sided rack with random hardware all over it. I put together the first version of this rack back in 2010 after about an hour's worth of thinking how I could combine the drum hardware with a rack frame that would be invisible from the crowd. I accomplished that by removing all the tripods from his existing hardware and clamping it to two low profile side racks, and building a stealth rack to hold the rack toms and snare drum from underneath.

M: Bryan has a new kit coming, will you use the same rack or have plans for a new one?

J: We now have three identical racks in the curved bar configuration that Bryan and the band really like. For that reason, I'll be updating the cymbal tilters and some clamps, but the rack will stay the same for one more year.

M: Besides Bryan, you recently did the rack for Troy Luccketta, drummer of Tesla, nice job btw, What went into that set up?

J: That was a real challenge. I tend to count up how many bars, and how many of each clamp I'll need to build something and then order the parts. Tama doesn't sell their rack parts individually! They sell rack packages with either a front rack or side wings. Sam at Tama did an excellent job of taking my list of needed clamps, bars, memory locks and feet, and translated that into two front racks and 8 curved side rack extension packs! We only had to order a few more things to make it work.

M: Have you done racks for other drummers too?
J: Just for myself and my son, who is a drummer in Nashville.

M: When did you start drumming? Did you have a teacher?
J: I started playing drums in 1971 in 6th grade band. My band director, Mike Metze, is still around and he was my first drum teacher. I went all the way through high school playing in the marching, concert and jazz bands, and also played with the show choirs that were popular in high schools in the late 70s.

M: With the band REO, you are more than a drum tech, you really are a team player, you have a good team to work with, what's a normal show day like for you?

J: On a routed tour day (one where we go from show to show), I'll roll out of the bus whenever I wake up and head into the venue for breakfast and catering and a shower if I have time before load in. My first job is to pick the dressing rooms and plan for how the cases will go in and be arranged in each room. By the time the truck dumps, I'm in the dressing room waiting for the cases and ready to go.
After the dressing rooms are set up, I go to the stage where (hopefully) my riser is built and my cases are lined up in front of it. My routine is pretty set from there. Vacuum the riser carpet, build the rack, put the drums up, then the cymbals, then the gong, wire the triggers and set up the sampler and click track racks and wire them into the stage boxes or multi connectors. Once I'm ready for line check I can take stock of the kit and work on anything that needs attention. Cleaning and repairs and dusting the kit are daily chores.
If it's a head change day, I take one drum at a time off the kit and change the heads and tune it. In this way, if the rest of the crew is ready for line check before I am, I'm never more than one drumhead away from being ready.
Line check is next. Following the monitor engineers signals, I go through and play each drum or cymbal to insure that the microphone on it is working correctly. Once the other techs have finished doing the same, we usually play one to four songs for a sound check so that the sound crew can dial in anything that is different from the night before.
By the time I'm done with Sound Check it's time to cover up the kit with a black drape and push back our risers to make room for the opening act.
After that, I'm free until showtime to rest, work on things that need a little TLC, and clean cymbals.
Right before the show, I put drinks on the riser, do a last minute electronics check, and pick out a pair of sticks for Bryan to start the show with. When the band comes to the stage, I hand Bryan his sticks, turn on and adjust his wireless beltpack for his in ear monitors, and head to my spot on the stage so that I can light his way onto the riser when the house lights go out and walk on music rolls.
During the show, I sit behind Bryan and watch to see that he's OK and has what he needs. If he needs adjustments to his monitors during the show, he tells me and I run over to the monitor board to relay it to Pete, our monitor engineer. If the set list changes, I crawl up and make the changes in his list and show him what's changed.
I also run the click track and fly in two backing vocal parts on a few songs although, thankfully, REO doesn't run full on backing tracks. It's nerve wracking enough just to have the backup tracks!
After the show, I tear down the kit and stow it in the cases, then go to the dressing rooms and tear them down and pack them up. By the time I've done that, the rest of the crew and local crew have loaded the truck and are waiting for the wardrobe cases.
Once those cases are on the truck, my job is done. If we have a show the next day, I head to the bus, grab my bag and shower and change into bus pajamas to start it all over again.

M: How often do you change heads on the kit?
J: Snare drums every other show. Toms, every third show. Bass drum, once a month.

M: For those who don't know, what is the difference in the drum set up in different venues, say a small venue verses an open outside venue or an arena (cans) How do you approach these different sceneries, as far as the drums and working with front of house (sound engineer)

J: The only time I have to alter my sound is when we are in a very tight space situation as in a small stage or a private venue where there's no room to distance the drums from the lead vocal microphone. In those cases, I will sometimes mute the cymbals, and in extreme cases, put up broken cymbals to be as quiet as possible. Other than that, our FOH and monitor engineers have to deal with the headaches caused by different sized rooms.

M: Have you done anything special with Bryan's se up, like triggers, bass enhancers or anything to help him, if you can share?

J: Bryan had already standardized his setup by the time I got there. The one thing I did do was to build in triggers to the Groove wedge on his snare drum to trigger a crosstick sample, and added an internal trigger to the cowbell to enable it to be used as a trigger.

M: Speaking of being a team player, REO tours a lot with Styx, You and Paul Carrizzo work well together, How long have you known each other, and explain a little of the behind the scenes help you two do for each other.

J: I met Paulie when I met Todd back before I was working for REO. I was publishing a magazine for drum collectors (Not So Modern Drummer) back then and would visit Bryan often on the road as he was a drum collector as well.
When we tour with Styx, it's usually as a co-headliner where we alternate between being opener or closer. When REO closes, Paulie comes and helps me tear down my drumset, and I do the same for him when Styx closes. This way, the drum department is finished and out of there before anything else happens! Paulie is a superb drum tech and a great guy to tour with. He knows his kit like the back of his hand!
A few years ago, I fell off a riser and broke my shoulder. Had it not been for Paulie to help me out on the tour that followed (with me being one-armed for 9 months) I probably would have had to go home. Friends like the Styx crew are few and far between, but they are one of the main reasons I enjoy working on the road so much. I'm looking forward to our tour together this summer!

M: You are touring again this year with Styx, it's a great tour, but REO has had to cancel some shows this tour due to an illness of a band member, how does that affect you?

J: It was a bit of a surprise happening only a few days before we were supposed to be flying out to start the tour. I had cleared out all the engraving work in preparation for being gone for a while, so I had no immediate backup! Thankfully the band gave us a couple of weeks of salary to tide us over until we could get things going again. My friends who had been planning to wait on engraving jobs jumped in and sent me stuff to work on almost immediately! In other words, I'm fine. I've gotten enough drums to engrave to keep me busy the rest of the time until we do resume touring in March.

M: When traveling with the band, when you have an off day, or travel day, what do you do with your time?

J: I look for antique stores, drum shops, malls, good barber shops, good food, and occasionally a movie or sporting event if we're near a major or minor league ball park. Napping is good too!

M: Do you have any hobbies outside the drum world, or something you like to do outside the music?

J: Not really! Everything I do is pretty much related to drums, drumming, building or engraving.

M: What is your favorite food?

J: Lobster! Broiled preferably but I'm not averse to a good bisque or a Lobster Roll.

M: Do you have a favorite city you have visited or been with the band in?

J: Amsterdam!

M: Favorite Venue?

J: Red Rocks or The Gorge at George, for outdoor venues. The Hammersmith Odeon in London has some fond memories too.

M: Do you collect drums?

J: I used to collect a lot. Now I just maintain a few playable vintage kits that I feel are cheap enough for me to own.

M: What is your favorite brand of drums?

J: Vintage snare drums would have to be Ludwig Black Beauties, Deluxes, and Standards, in that order. For new drums? I like a lot of the custom stuff coming out these days. I love my John Aldridge model Joyful Noise snare drum, which is modeled on my 1923 Ludwig Deluxe. Johnny Craviotto was a close friend of mine and we did a number of drum building projects together, but my favorite drum of his is the second Timeless Timber snare drum that he built for the snare drum olympics back in 1998. It's a 4x14 10 lug in 600 year old maple. I'm also a fan of Slingerland Radio King toms and bass drums from the late 1930's to early 1940's. But I've found a few Ludwig kits that really trip my trigger as well. Mostly from the 1960s.

M: What type of music do you like to play on drums, who is your favorite band, and what drummers do you look up to, or have inspired you?

J: I like playing just about every kind of semi popular and not so popular music. I really like Little Feat and thought Richie Hayward was one of the most underrated drummers ever.
Just about any drummer who has persevered to play the kind of music they wanted to play is my role model. I was never "that guy" that was going to be a rock star, but I really like seeing guys who had to work for it make it in the music business. Nothing sells me like a good story.

M: Anything you'd like to add about yourself for readers and drummers?

J: I'm very interested in helping to pass along what I've learned as a drummer, historian, engraver, technician and person if it will help another drummer figure things out. If you want to talk over a rack idea and how to accomplish it, I'm interested! Even though I'm far better known in the music industry for my engraving, Not So Modern Drummer, and the Guide to Vintage Drums, I'd like for people to realize that at the very heart of everything, I'm still a drummer and I still love playing drums.