Carl
Palmer sat behind the drum kit in the 20th century “hammering the
plastic” for bands like Atomic Rooster,
Happy New Year Carl and thanks for agreeing to let me
conduct this interview. In 2005, you played a few shows in
I did that to help them sell
some tickets because they were playing to very few people. I was asked if I’d
be interested in doing something like that. I said okay and I went along to see
where we were and take it from there. It was fun but I didn’t enjoy that band
as much as I thought I would at the time. The guitar player is pretty good,
John Payne sings okay, and Geoff is always himself. Chris Slade played real
well, I can’t knock him. The show had a long acoustic section in the middle
which lost a lot of the show’s momentum from my perspective. I guess the real
John Wetton was recently quoted, “It is the intention
of all four original members to celebrate the 25th anniversary of
the creation of
I’ve issued a press release on this topic. I must make it clear that the current statements about a
reunion of the original members of
Tell me more about the North American tour with your
new power trio, The Carl Palmer Band.
We’re all very excited about playing in the
Are all of
the tour dates finalized?
We’re working on that now.
It looks like a full five-week tour which it needs to be to work out for me.
You can list these dates that have been booked so far:
May
31 Regent Theatre
June
1 Toad’s Place New Haven, CT
June
2
June
3 Ram’s Head Annapolis, MD
June
4 Keswick Theatre
June
6 B.B. King’s
June
7 The
Birchmere
June
8
June
9 Beachland Ballroom
June
10 The
Abbey
June
11 Skank Hall
June
12 The
Warehouse
What type of set list should the fans attending the
North American concerts anticipate?
The shows are
all-instrumental. The set list consists of “Peter Gunn,” “The Barbarian,”
“Hoedown,” “The Enemy God,” “Trilogy,” “L.A. Nights,” a version of “The Flight
of the Bumble Bee” featuring Paul Bielatowicz on guitar, “Bullfrog,” “Toccata,”
“Canario,” “Fanfare for the Common Man,” “Carmina Burana,” and a section of
“Tarkus.”
You’ve released two CDs, “Working Live - Volume 1” and
“Working Live - Volume 2.” They were recorded from 2002 to 2004 as The Carl Palmer
Band toured throughout
The Carl Palmer Band
consists of me drumming of course, Paul Bielatowicz is on guitar, Stuart
Clayton is the bassist, and there are no keyboards or vocals.
Three different versions of The Carl Palmer Band have
had lead guitarists instead of keyboard players. Keith
Emerson’s new band has a lead guitarist you’ve played with, Dave Kilminster.
What are your thoughts on classic Emerson, Lake &
Palmer material being performed with lead guitar?
I can’t speak for what Keith
chose to do, but The Carl Palmer Band has replaced
the keyboards with unique and innovative guitar interpretations of classic E.L.P.
material. I wanted a fresh, new approach to the material and that’s the musical
direction I’ve chosen. I hope music fans will pick up the CDs or come out for a
show to hear it for themselves.
How
difficult was it re-arranging the songs with lead guitar and no keyboards?
It was extremely difficult. Some of the
stuff sounded a lot better on guitar than it did on keyboards. It sounded more
modern, sort of spacey, and a little more rocky. Some
bits didn’t sound quite as good so we had to change things radically. But at the
end of the day, the proof is in the pudding.
After you give us a listen, tell me what you think.
I’d be interested.
How
have hardcore E.L.P. fans reacted to it when they attend Carl Palmer Band
shows?
Actually, there was no reason for me to
play with another keyboard player so I think they all understand what I was
trying to do. There’s an acceptance of it. They’d rather see that than nothing
at all. They understand that some of music really lives with guitar and some of
them prefer certain things on keyboards. Every man has his choice. I know I’m
enjoying it. It’s great! I love playing with keyboards, but playing with guitar
is very exciting. I think
Keith Emerson realizes that also and that’s why he has a guitar
in his band. You’ve seen the Keith Emerson Band play so I’m sure you’d agree
that guitar brings a new freshness to it.
Unlike some of your musical peers, you’ve really
embraced the Internet as a tool to market yourself, and as a way to sell
merchandise and self-produced CDs. Please share your thoughts on the Internet,
and its role as a tool for today’s musician.
To be honest with you, it’s
a complete nightmare today, it really is. It’s very difficult. People go into
chat rooms and lots of rumors and gossip gets started. Lots of artists are
active with their website, chatting with fans and writing diaries of what they
are doing but I don’t have the time for that small stuff. I appreciate the fans,
but I just want to tell them what I’m doing, how I’m doing it, and when I’m doing
it by putting up the information at my website. That’s what the Internet for me
is all about. The Internet can also be a big problem. People have gone on to my
website and corrupted the guestbook. I had to add all new filters to prevent
that. Who needs all of that? In general, I find it a bit of a bummer. It’s not
the most interesting thing for me. I try to do it as professionally as
possible. It takes up a lot of time, and you have to do it yourself to keep on
top of it. The minute you do that, you’re taking time away from writing,
practicing, or rehearsing. I do it, but I’m not happy doing it.
I’m
sure you’d agree that there’s a positive side to the Internet where artists can
record CDs without a label, as well as sell and market their records?
That’s very positive. The
Internet is good for the artist to put out information on what you’re doing and
to market new releases. All that stuff is wonderful. The technology these days
lets you get off the ground very easily and simply. But I don’t know about making
big money that way or getting distribution worldwide. It’s easy to record a CD, and younger bands
coming up can get their ideas across. But I’m not too sure how easy it’s going
to be to push out the big record companies. You still need to get your record
in the shops and on the shelves, I think. Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but I think
there’s nothing better than walking into a shop and buying a copy of a record. It’s
great that the technology allows us to record our stuff, but there are
drawbacks to promoting yourself only through the Internet.
Does The Carl Palmer Band have any plans to record new studio
material?
I haven’t planned for a new
album yet. I do have a DVD, which we are looking into marketing at the moment.
It’s an hour and a half of live material, recorded in
B.P.S. is another musical project for you, and joining
you are Italian guitarist Andrea Braido and American bass guitarist T.M.
Stevens. I have no idea what to expect musically from a progressive rock
drummer, a heavy metal funk bass guitarist, and a “Hendrixian” guitarist from
I’m going out with them
again in February for some shows in
B.P.S. did play a few shows in 2005. Please describe
the project’s musical direction and the type of material you played?
There’s no original
material as you can well understand since it’s just a fun project. We’re
playing some stuff from E.L.P., some stuff from Andrea, and some stuff of
T.M.’s. Andrea, as you quoted, does sound like Jimi Hendrix so we are having
fun. There’s no formal plans at all to record a CD or
DVD. We try to monitor what the fans are bringing into the rooms, but who
knows, there may be a bootleg being pressed somewhere.
Does B.P.S.
have any plans to tour in the
No, there are no plans.
Keith
Emerson told the audience a funny story on his 2005 tour about first meeting his
new guitarist Dave Kilminster. Apparently, Keith surprised you at a Qango gig.
He snuck up on stage unannounced for the encore, “Fanfare for the Common Man,”
and he destroyed your Qango band mate John Young’s keyboard. An old expression
is that there are two sides to every story, with the truth somewhere in
between. John Young tells me that Keith never apologized and never paid the
bill for the repair. You were there, what happened that night, and what’s
happened since?
Keith
did come up and play but it wasn’t a surprise. He made sure that I guest-listed
him. Keith enjoys telling a good story. It was an old keyboard, and I don’t
think it was too big a deal for John Young. Everybody likes to hear the rock
and roll war stories, but I don’t get too involved in them myself. To be honest
with you, Keith
came up and played, the keyboard fell over, and they stood it back up. That’s
how I kind of treat it. By the time you hear about it two or three years later,
it’s something really epic.
Emerson, Lake &
Palmer started playing together 35 years ago. Your hardcore fans, myself
included, are hoping and praying that the three of you will eventually record
and/or tour together again. Please be both optimistic and realistic, and
comment on the chances of an E.L.P. reunion.
I can’t
say in my lifetime to be honest but not for any particular reason. There’s no big grudges or fighting or anything of that sort.
It had its go and it did what it did. I believe, in my opinion and please don’t
read more into this, if we had been asked to play at
Live Aid we would have done it. A show of that magnitude would have to be
considered. Maybe with the perfect circumstances at the perfect point in time
we could do something. That’s off the top of my head without talking to any of
the other guys. We weren’t approached and people don’t think of us as
approachable. They think it’s easier to get Pink Floyd to play than E.L.P.
E.L.P. fans finally got
their wish when video footage of the legendary
We have
video footage, about 45 minutes worth, from the
In 1977, I was lucky to
attend the opening night and closing night of E.L.P.’s three-night stand in
Orchestras
change music radically because even if you write down the right notes and the
right rhythmic values, violins don’t play in time because of the nature of the
instrument. If you hit a drum, it’s on the beat or off the beat. Once you start moving a
bow on strings, for it to be perfectly in time or spot on, is very difficult. You
can have a section of 16 people all bowing in time together, but whether or not
it’s in time with the music they’re meant to be playing with is another thing.
When you have an orchestra, you have all these various permutations of
instruments, which do vary in time structure. The music changes once that
happens. Music such as the Emerson, Lake & Palmer
repertoire that was played with the orchestra was held together because the
band was a very solid unit. We could play exactly what we wanted to play, and
the orchestra could accompany us. We tried to make the parts easy enough for
them to play so that it would work, and not be so weird and wonderful that it
would take away from anything. That being said, I’d rather play as a three-piece
band than a three-piece band plus an orchestra. I wasn’t moved enough
emotionally by the orchestra. The E.L.P. experience was good enough, I’m glad
we did it, but I wouldn’t want to repeat it. The Carl Palmer Band is going to
be playing with the Cyprus State Orchestra. It’s something that I do, and it’s something
that I’m interested in. It just doesn’t have the musical gratification you
would think it has. It’s exciting in almost a melancholy way, and it does take
away the rock edge. It’s not what I’m all about, but it sounds good with the
music we play.
Can you pick a record, a song, or a live performance
from E.L.P.’s career (so far) that you would classify as the band’s defining
moment?
I would narrow it to a
particular recording, and the pinnacle of success for us was the record “Brain
Salad Surgery.” We never topped that, collectively or individually, and
Emerson, Lake & Palmer went downhill from there. “Pirates” was a great
piece of music, and it suited the orchestra. It didn’t have the imagination and
creativity of “Brain Salad Surgery.”
When E.L.P. reformed in the 1990’s and toured North
America and
Returning to
How did the advancements in music technology affect
and complement E.L.P.’s on-stage performance during the tours of the 1990’s?
M.I.D.I. technology let us
sound even bigger. Keith could play one keyboard and sound like four or five at
the same time. We embraced technology and used it toward the betterment of the
band. Keyboards are the ideal instrument to focus in on that type of technology,
more so than guitars. I went back to playing an acoustic drum set. They are
made so much better, the cymbals sound sharper, and the microphones are
better. I tried to stay away from all the
electronic stuff but I did trigger three or four pads. I used a couple of
samplers running in tandem with each other.
They were just to enhance the music, they
didn’t control what I did. If they broke down, I really didn’t care. It was
there for added color, and if it did, that was fine. If it became too much of a
problem I’d leave it out. I find that in general, drum technology is always
more primitive than keyboard technology.
On the box set “The
Return of the Manticore” E.L.P. covered King Crimson’s “21st Century
Schizoid
I’d like to hear Bob Dylan
singing “Are You Ready, Eddy?” [Carl laughs] and “Pictures at an Exhibition”
would suit King Crimson, making them more melodic.
There is an E.L.P. tribute CD called “Encores, Legends
& Paradox.” Your parts were interpreted by drummers like Mike Portnoy from
Dream Theater, Simon Phillips from Toto, and Pat Mastelotto from King Crimson.
Other performers on that disc included a few ex-band mates of yours, Geoff
Downes, John Wetton, and Robert Berry. On the CD’s liner notes, Keith Emerson
was quoted “thanks to a little ‘ELP from my friends, the music lives on.
They’ve done an incredible job.” What are your thoughts on that tribute CD?
The playing was very good on
that CD. It was a nice thing and a respectful thing to do. I was impressed that
people wanted to do that. Their interpretations were good,
I had no problem with it. Anytime somebody wants to copies you, it’s the
highest form of flattery. I was more than happy with that CD.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame recently announced its
inductees for 2006, and they include Black Sabbath and Lynyrd Skynyrd. In
previous years, this organization has inducted punk rock bands like The
Ramones, Talking Heads, and The Clash, and in 2006 it
inducts more punk rockers, namely Blondie and the Sex Pistols. In my opinion,
they have over-looked and snubbed progressive rock bands like E.L.P., Yes, King
Crimson, and Genesis. Please comment on the fact that there are no prog-rock
bands, other than Pink Floyd, in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Progressive rock has always taken a back
shelf. It never was as big as heavy metal or the corporate rock bands. It never
got the respect from radio stations. I imagine that people running polls or
museums don’t visualize prog-rock as important. I think it embraced technology
a lot more than other forms of music. It pushed the barriers a lot more.
Prog-rock has been ignored since day one so no, I’m not surprised. You don’t hear much prog-rock on the radio
unless it’s 4 o’clock in the morning somewhere in the middle of
Carl, you’ve been the drummer in two rock supergroups,
Emerson, Lake & Palmer as well as
Who would be your choices for: A lead singer? Lead
guitarist? Bass guitarist? keyboard
player? Lastly, either a horn player, violinist, or
even a second drummer if you’ve ever fancied playing onstage with another percussionist?
Elvis Presley singing, Jimi
Hendrix on guitar, Mark King from Level 42 on bass, Dave Brubeck on keyboards,
and Jerry Goodman on violin.
The Carl Palmer Band and B.P.S. are playing in clubs
when you tour and your band 3 played a
The venue doesn’t make a big difference to me at all
although obviously I’d rather play an arena. When I play in a club, I play with
the same amount of gusto and spirit. I have the same equipment, except I don’t
bring both gongs to a lot of smaller clubs in
Is
there “one question” you’ve always hoped an interviewer would ask you that has never been asked? If so, what’s the question and how
would you answer it?
People
never ask me why I do what I do or why I carry on doing it after so long. Maybe
the answer is taken for granted, but I think it’s an important question. Some
people do it for money, some people do it for fame, and some people do it
because they need to. That’s my reason, I can’t go a
day without playing drums. I still practice five days a week. I take weekends,
off but I only started doing that last year. I left school to be a professional
drummer and people say it’s in the blood. It’s more than that for me, it’s like eating or breathing. It’s just there and I
have to do it; whether it’s in a club, with a successful group, in a recording
studio, or at home in room. If I never played with another band again, God
forbid, I would still play because I do it for me. I never played for anyone
else. It’s a completely selfish approach that I’ve got,
I do it purely for me because I really enjoy it. It’s the one thing I’ve never
grown out of.
With all of that being said, you must be your
own biggest critic. How would you self-critique your playing these days?
I’m actually a lot more exciting these
days. I’m not as stiff
or as rigid like I used to be with E.L.P. I’ve definitely gotten louder,
which is not the norm. Drummers as they get older tend to hit them softer, but
not me. I don’t know why that is. I am a health fanatic, I run four or five
days a week, and I do lots of floor exercises. I’m
into looking after myself and it’s snowballed over the years, and the results
have gone back into my instrument. Drums are very physical so it’s important to
look after yourself. I’m getting the full payback now
at age 55. I feel stronger than the next man, I’m happy, and my playing has
advanced. There are some incredible drummers around at the moment who are
actually frightening. I’m always buying DVDs to check out the competition and
the new people.
It sounds like you’re
still having fun.
It’s still very exciting, but I have to do
a lot of office work. I manage everything myself working about 5 and a ½ months out of the year. My friend Bruce Pilato takes
care of things in the
Thanks again Carl for the interview. Do you care to
add a few closing comments for music fans worldwide?
I’m looking forward to
bringing my band to