Drummers You Just Can’t Beat: # 27 – Steve Jordan
Drummers You Just Can’t Beat is an occasional series here at Off The Tracks— and now also part of “Sounds Good!”
Maybe there’s no greater groove player and all-around play-for-the-song guy than Steve Jordan. He’s certainly one of the players I think of when I think versatility; also one of the players I’ve possibly been listening to the most, the longest, without even knowing it a lot of the time. By which I mean, Jordan’s was one of the names I’d just continue to spot in album credits, after hearing songs. As I listened to more and more music from the records my folks had bought, and then the CDs too, I kept seeing a few familiar names. Those sessions stalwarts - Lee Ritenour on guitar, Willie Weeks on bass, Bobby Keys on saxophone, players of that calibre. Sometimes they were all on the same session, or very nearly. And sure there were drummers like Steve Gadd and Jeff Porcaro on so many of the records at home, but Steve Jordan’s name started appearing again and again as well.
I first properly clocked him as the drummer working with Keith Richard on his solo career. Keith’s first solo album dropped right as I was discovering the Stones’ back catalogue. I grew up in a house obsessed with The Rolling Stones, so my first Stones albums were Undercover and Dirty Work, two lesser records in the Rolling Stones canon, but albums I was in love with as a kid. Then, the greatest hits, and the work back through all of the classic albums. But that happened in my life just as Jagger and Richards were releasing their first solo records.
Steve Jordan was not just the drummer for Keith Richards though, he was also the drummer for the Blues Brothers Band. So straight away I had him pegged for versatility. Sure, the Stones and Keith come from the blues but the playing Jordan was doing for Keith was more dirty R’n’B if anything, and the Blues Brothers playing was in the Chicago style.
Suddenly I see he’s on albums by Chaka Khan and George Benson too, and find out he’s the house drummer for Saturday Night Live — for a time (hence the Blues Brothers thing).
He’s also sometimes a backing vocalist, a keyboardist, a bass player, a producer, a percussionist — his credits are subtly astonishing.
A bandleader too of course, musical director, and it’s this knowledge, this approach that informs his playing now. He is always thinking about the song, he is a human metronome, he is a groove-machine.
Jordan has chops galore but he’ll just sit on a 4/4 beat for days, using only the hi-hat or floor tome, the bass and the snare. He’ll hit cymbals alone, clear pure without getting big fills in the way. But if you want the big fill he can do that too.
He’s got me listening to people I wouldn’t bother with ordinarily. The classic example being John Mayer. This is not to shitpost ole John, but I am just not a fan. I do not get the fuss. He can play, competently, but I hate his songs, his breathy voice and his playing — to me — is ultimately generic. But when he formed a trio with Pino Palladino and Steve Jordan, I was there. And some of the playing on those records is worth putting my taste preference aside for, when it comes to the main player.
Jordan is now the drummer for The Rolling Stones. The only person you can imagine could come close to subbing for Charlie Watts. He is a student. He is playing the songs as close as he can to the way Charlie played them.
But, hey, dig deep and you’ll find Jordan on album cuts by the Bee Gees, Aztec Camera, Arcadia, Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, Billy Joel and so many others, across so many styles.
So much so I made a little playlist to showcase some of the variety.
A mere drop in the ocean from this legendary groover. If you want a play to start, a place to base yourself, a place to hopefully end up, Steve Jordan connects all points always.
Nice post Simon