Last Night BBC TV Drumming with Aled Jones

[Wombat]

A nice albeit brief Stewart appearance on the program last night.

Why don't you like drum clinics and why do you have to do ONE every year?

Wombat

[gezellig]

I was thinking that. They said he never gives drum lessons and went on to say he hates the one he has to do every year. Perhaps he has to do a seminar for Tama for getting his free kits?

Anyway, loved his centipede analogy and his guitar playing. And fair play to the boy Jones, he pulled it off in the end.

G~

[Divemistress of the Dark]

Quite probably he'd be totally beseiged by people begging for lessons if he started doing it in earnest...

or maybe he really is *that* humble. I'd say maybe a combination.

[sockii]

Hoping I get to see this (one of my UK friends was supposed to record it for me.)

[GinaSuperCat]

This is Stewart's answer about lessons/instructional dvd taken from Gert's wonderful interview, found at the following source:

http://gertonline.free.fr/scopeland-interview-en01.htm

Note it is the *first* question in the interview transcript <grin>

"Gert : In the eighties, your way of playing drums has blowned a wind of change in pop music and even nowadays, thousands of drummers are fighting to reproduce it. You truly are a great reference. First of all, how does it feel and how comes you have never released a teaching method or a video?

Stewart Copeland : hum... I enjoy teaching even though I don’t ever do it. I only teach my sons. Also, I like to talk to musicians so I don’t only have my own experience but I suck up the experience of other people too. I always talk to other bands, everything about how the group works, who write the songs, where the creative dynamic is and everything like that. So when I’m 90 years old I’ll teach but I haven’t got time to now."

Its a disappointing answer insofar as it doesn't look like it'll happen soon (this interview is during ESTPIO release but before reunion news...I mea if he was "too busy" then, LOL now...) but its also a wonderful answer since he is pretty much saying that he is still *learning* from others and doing...looks like we may have to be satified with the small gems of condensed wisdom we see here and there, at least for now

[Divemistress of the Dark]

[quote]I always talk to other bands, everything about how the group works, who write the songs, where the creative dynamic is and everything like that. [/quote]

I LOVE it. I just love it.

p.s. something tells me he's going to have to start teaching those daughters one of these days.

[Roxanne75]

I just thought again that Stewart was just again so very kind and happy passing his knowledge forward and supporting other people to play the drums. He is always so open minded, so friendly and enthusiastic! Adorable! And for this reason I am really happy that he is going to be on tour with The Police again !!

I was surprised that Stewart played the guitar as well, but actually this should be obvious, because this is how Stewart is: an energetic guy who just likes to make noise!

[GinaSuperCat]

Actually Stewart played all the instruments for the Klark Kent stuff, recording wise...and we all know he's Superman <grin> He once described drummers as frustrated guitar players, heh...

[hollo]

I was surprised to see stewart playing a guitar. Can stewart play many instruments? Can stewart play saxophone and bass etc

[Wait and See]

>>>http://gertonline.free.fr/scopeland-interview-en01.htm <<<

I guess this is not surprising considering Stewart's dad was one of the founding members of the CIA, but I always sensed we saw things similarly in some areas...and this confirms it to me. He's probably been "re-educated" to an extent by his time in the Hollywood gulags, but nevertheless, even this basic level of sense from a musician is refreshing :



Gert : You once said, “Sting and I have very different views of the world, different politics, different values”. Can you comment a little more ?

Stewart Copeland : We are not as different now as we used to be when we were kids. When we were younger, the cold war was happening, and for most, in everybody’s mind was the necluar threat. You don’t even think about this now. But when I was in college, we were all convinced that we were going to die. Somebody’s going to press the button and we are all going to die. Nuclear war is unevitable. But eventually the cold war ended. But back then, he (Sting) regarded America as the capitalists agressing upon poor Russia. He was really naive in his world view. I’m a capitalists and I regard capitalism as the only way to be free and everything... This is not even a discussion, the things that we argued about then are not even - you wouldn’t even know what the hell… - these are issues that don’t exist anymore. And so how am I going to try to explain the difference ? It’s kind of hard because my view is irrelevant now : the cold war is over. It’s no good me telling that I was right and he was wrong because it’s not an issue anymore. Also, I’m an open book. What you see is what you get. Sting is very mysterious, private, garded. Mystique is very important to him. I don’t give a fuck, you know ! And so we are just different kind of characters, he’s a cat, I’m a dog. I much prefer dogs.

[Divemistress of the Dark]

Guess he agrees with me too.

Stewart in the San Jose Mercury News, March 1, 2007:

[quote](On President Bush) Unmitigated disaster. Never has so much damage been done to the nation by a president. And what’s anomalous, in terms of foreign policy, he’s the worst president since Carter. And his father was one of the best presidents in terms of foreign policy – hard to beat. The combination of George I and Bill [Clinton], that’s when American power was at its height...Russia and China are now dictating to us again! After Reagan and George I won the Cold War, George II has now somehow figured out a way to lose it again.[/quote]

[Wait and See]

Well, there are a lot of people who feel that way. Clinton was asleep at the switch, though. I think there's no question the baby boom generation as a whole leaves a lot to be desired over their predecessors.

Although I have no way of knowing in depth, if I had to guess, I'd peg Stew as falling somewhere in the libertarian category. He seems to have a pretty keen bull$hit detector. I think if it was up to him he probably wouldn't be signed up to pimp for Al Gore, but that's just me. Sting is probably still a little naive in some areas, but sometimes with age comes wisdom...

[DirtyMartini]

Am I going to have to look up the quote where SC talks about being a pot-smoking hippie? Not that it's any more relevant, of course -- it's just fun.

Hollo, I know that SC plays guitar and bass and has some rather sketchy piano abilities, but I don't know about saxophone. He has described growing up learning a few different instruments in a number of interviews, but I can't for the life of me find any of the relevant articles right now.

[Wait and See]

>>>Am I going to have to look up the quote where SC talks about being a pot-smoking hippie?<<<

So was I at one point.

[GinaSuperCat]

Well here's one from a pretty funny interview for Discovery channel regarding the Leopard Son and there's several gems herein {LOL...the 'scumbag chord'...omg he keeels me...or still aspiring after 16 years? take up the guitar <grin>} but it also has some words on the topic of instruments he plays, a part of the interview where listeners submitted questions:

"KATIE: Another listener wanted to know whether or not you play any other instrument besides the drums. Now, I know on this sound track you're playing the piano.

STEWART: Yes. I'm not a great pianist. But with the help of midi, I can turn my lame piano performances into something much more sparkling. But I do play guitar. I'm a frustrated guitarist. I love playing bass as well. In fact I can ham it up on pretty much all the rock and roll instruments. My first hit before The Police even was under the name of Klark Kent where I played all the instruments myself. Actually, no, that's a lie. Klark Kent was this unknown person. His identity was never revealed. But occasionally I hallucinate and imagine that it was me."

Full interview is archived at the following location:

http://www.stingetc.com/stew2.shtml

Stewart's politics is his own bidness unless he decides to make it a part of his explicit persona...let's just sidestep a repeat of the whole Live Earth discussion, again...that's really an excercise in futility...someone can have a strongly attuned bullshit detector who is not libertarian, just as easily as someone who from a libertarian point of view can be unreflectively dogmatic (like re: definitions of private property)...being critical and aware is something that many people actually are, contrary to the popular story that everyone except an elite vanguard are sheep...and being critical and aware does not denote any particular politics/position <grin>