AD Adams - Drumming Viewpoint

Cris: What is your overarching viewpoint about how you approach the drums?

AD Adams of Louis Prima Jr and the Witnesses: When we start, we are empty buckets. We only know what we've heard. We're not virtuosos at 10-years-old. We don't have this fount of musical information to draw from. All we we know is the records we have heard around the house or the songs on the radio that we like. So we start off imitating.

I'm an empty bucket. If I like John Bonham, I take a scoop out of John Bonham's bucket and I put it in mine. And I take a little scoop of Keith Moon and I put it in my bucket. And I take a little scoop from Ringo's bucket and I put it in my bucket. Pretty soon I am not Ringo, Bonham, or Moon. I am a blend of that. And that sort of becomes me.

And then you get other influences. Of course you get older, more sophisticated, and learn how to read music. You get more information and add to that. But I constantly want to add to my bucket. I don't want to take anything out. I believe very much in “in addition to” as opposed to “instead of”.