Outstanding Drum Performances

Get the new Cream at Albert Hall. Ginger Baker does and 8 minute solo that is great.

Check out "Instant Karma" Plastic Ono Band. Great drumming by Alan White

Dream Theater and try to find some LTE (Liquid tension experiment).Mike Portnoy is somthing special.

Spectrum by Billy Cobham is really satisfying. It showcases the talent of the late Tommy Bolin on guitar too.
Also a couple of albums where the drums are mixed up front and also feature some good drumming are Landing on Water by Neil Young and Ghost in the Machine by The Police.

Ginger Baker. Some more jazz oriented and some more rock but all interesting and some great. Check out this link for some reviews of his work to see if anything appeals to you.

http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&searchlink=GINGER|BAKER&uid=MIW040511022117&sql=11:6gjtear04xf7~T2

"Miles Gurtu" a collaboration between some guy name Miles and Trilok Gurtu. A great recording and very interesting music that is heavily percussion based. Sorry I can't remember the details on the Miles guy but I'm not at home to look at the CD.

Buddy Miles "Them Changes"

Iron Butterfly/In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. There's three versions of this monster tune on the Rhino CD release R3 2304. You're on your own for the black light and lava lamp.

Don't forget the incense too.

http://cdbaby.com/cd/slagerij3

The Sheffield Drum Record by Sheffield Labs would get my vote as the ultimate reference recording for drums. One cut from it, a 7-minute drum riff by Jim Keltner called "Improvisation," is included in the Usher demonstration CD used and given out by Usher Audio at CES and Rocky Mountain AudioFest. It is sensational--far and away the best drum recording I've ever heard. When I play it for people, their jaws usually drop, and when I played it for my nephew, who is a drummer (as well as a budding audiophile), his response was: "How does he DO that?"

Jack de Johnette & Foday Musa Suso - music from the hearts of the masters.

Thanks for all of the input so far....I'll print this out and head to Borders & Best Buy later this afternoon to see how many of these I can come up with for the weekend. The Sheffield Drub Record sounds particularly interesting...hope I can find it. Thanks again to all!

Mattkimb96, Doubt that you'll have much luck looking for the Sheffield Drum Record at your local Borders or Best Buy. But you can find it and buy it online at Amazon.com, from Amazon.com marketplace sellers, and you can also read a couple of reviews of it there. Happy listening.

The Sheffield Drum Record is very good. My reference is a CD-R called Drum Improvs done by a guy in St. Louis a few years ago recorded live to hard disk of himself playing a huge drum set. It's not perfect but is far more dynamic than any other drum CD I've ever heard, and the soundstage is huge. I don't know if he is still willing to sell copies as he made it sound like a bit of chore for him to do, but anyone interested can contact me offline for his info.

One more you may want to try is Peter Gabriel's soundtrack to The Last Tempation of Christ. The music is Middle Eastern/North African influenced and, if memory serves, features some startling tuned drum passsages.

You might want to go to DRUMMERWORLD and check out the video section.As a drummer,I suspect you will be shocked by drummers you have never heard of,(many of which I haven't either.)If you change your emphasis to jazz,I will be happy to chime in.I have,in recent years been buying DVD drumming performances,as they generally are about the same price as CD's.Can't play them in my car,but I get to see the live performances,Several of which I never seem to tire of.
tracer

I'm suprised no one listed Dafos or The Rythem Devils. If you want something to showcase your system Dafos is one that will do it. I've seen more than one set of woofers go when The Beast comes in at high volume. It's not Rocknroll but Mickey Hart,Airto and others take you on a pretty nice ride playing percussion instruments of various designs. Hart spent big money having percussion instruments replicated from different time periods to play on this recording. Some of them now are in the Smithsonian. The Rythem Devils were Hart and friends left alone in a darkened studio with various percussion instruments and were told to come up with music for the movie Apocalaspe Now. It was suppossed to be used for the scenes when Sheen was going up the river in search of Brando. Both of these are Wilson Recordings and Dafos is on CD but I don't know about The Rythem Devils.

Try Simon Phillips on a cd by Mike Oldfeild called Discovery

Some of the recordings recommended above are not really rock which is your preferred music, though most are good. But style of drumming is very different so beware: I love Jack De Johnette but very far from Rock! For Rock, check out the remastered version Physical Graffiti, Led Zepplin. John Bonham is well ROCK. For some fusion jazz stuff which have some rock influence, check out Dennis Chambers's Outbreak and Stanton Moore's All Kooked Out both drummer led efforts which are killer albums.

without question Jeff Porcaro...his riff on Rosanna is just superb, totally makes the song, he is one of my all time favorite drummers, also check out his "Lido shuffle" by Boz Scaggs...can you say grooooove, I being a drummer would give my eye teeth to play like him, so musical,also agree with above about Simon Phillips, just a monster, he has got to have more than two arms, sure sounds like it. He has enough chops to fill the grand canyon yet is always musical

Steve Gadd on Steely Dan's "Aja"

Ghost_Rider ; also try to get Pete Townsend's "White City" Cd if you want to hear Simon really put one down -- the song "Give Blood" is friggin' incredible (again, drum performance wise) and is a pretty good CD overall.

Also, any Jean Luc Ponty CD/Album with a drummer by the name of Rayford Griffin. One of the most incredible, jaw-dropping and awe inspiring drummers ever recorded. He was a drumming god in concert too...

Denf, I have alot of Ponty so I know what your saying. Cosmic Messanger is still my favorite.

Ed Pias "The Ancestor's Halo"