The Carmine Appice Interview

When it comes to powerful, four-on-the-floor rock drumming, Carmine Appice's name invariably comes up. Since the late 60s, Appice's unique approach and style has kick-started numerous classic rock songs — from Vanilla Fudge's reworking of the Supremes’ “You Keep Me Hangin' On” to Rod Stewart's gyrating hit, “Da Ya Think I'm Sexy.” Along the way, he has kept time for just about anyone who's ever mattered in rock and roll — Jeff Beck, Rick Derringer, Ted Nugent, Ozzy Osbourne and Pink Floyd, to name just a few.

Never one to sit around and hedge his next big gig, Carmine epitomizes the meaning of the word “driven.” In the 80s, he formed King Kobra, raising the standard of musicianship in what eventually morphed into the metal hair band scene. In more recent years, he’s produced tons of records, including Guitar Zeus featuring over a dozen world-class guitarists. He’s also helped revive both Vanilla Fudge and Cactus to great acclaim.

These days, however, the drummer’s main focus is on Carmine Appice’s SLAMM, a theatrical showcase described as "Stomp on steroids" that features five drummers and one guitarist. Carmine and company explore the aural space by pounding on buckets, sticks, oil cans, car hoods, drain pipes, Dixie cups, and, of course, drums. In 2007, SLAMM played seven shows in New York City, along with additional east coast dates, much to the delight of classic rock and percussion fans alike.

The latest SLAMM venture stars the troupe in a big-budget promotional video for ESPN in which the group plays a NASCAR garage, beating the hood of a multi-million dollar NASCAR car to a SLAMM-composed NASCAR song. Carmine was relieved “NASCAR didn't make us pay for playing the garage!”

I have spoken to Carmine Appice many times over the years. I was even hired in the 90s to write some liner notes for a CD compilation he put together. An interview almost seemed inevitable. And so it went as we touched on virtually every aspect of his incredible career. Although he’s not exactly thrilled with all the changes in the 21st century music business, something tells me Carmine Appice will continue to be a dominant force and influence in rock and roll circles for years to come.

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Let’s start with the SLAMM project, described as “Stomp on steroids” and features you, four other drummers and a guitarist. What inspired you to put this together?

Well, you know, playing with Vanilla Fudge and Cactus lately, there’s always something wrong. Some of the musicians are always complaining, whining and stuff. I’ve just been fed up with it this last year, so my girlfriend, Leslie Gold (aka the RadioChick, a popular New York City DJ and talk show host) said, “If you wanted to do something, what would you want to do?” I said, “You know, I’ve played with everybody pretty much. Now, I’d like to do something like I did in ’83 where I did a drum show.” I did a drum-off combination with a drum show, took it around the country, sold out a lot of venues, and had a lot of fun. I didn’t have to deal with anyone but drummers and drummers are usually easier to deal with than other people, you know?

So I came up with the idea to do a drum show. The last time in ’83, that was before Stomp and Blue Man Group became big. So maybe there’s more of a market for it now. So, I thought it might be the thing to do. We decided to go for it. Because Leslie is based in New York, we based it in New York. I came up with the name Carmine Appice’s SLAMM and I started writing some material, which was basically (for) drums and a keyboard. And the keyboard has some guitar sounds. So when we ended up doing gigs, we added a guitar player who plays a little keyboards. It was a really cool thing, you know?

We did our first gigs about a year ago in New York City. We did seven shows at a small venue and we did pretty good attendance. It was filled up. And it went over really great — people were digging it. For our next gig, it took a while. We had to take pictures, do a video, edit the video, find some agents to book us, just a lot of different things. So the next gig we did was New Year’s Eve in Providence. A thing called First Night at the Providence Performing Arts Center. We played three shows and we had 6,800 people and a big stage. It looked great, so we did some more video to make a better promotion tape. We also videotaped all the people coming out of the theater and got their reaction, which was great. Have you seen our SLAMM video?

Yeah, I've seen it.

We did the seven gigs in New York, and that was our eighth gig. Every time we play, we sort of add stuff to it. And now we have the NASCAR video on there. In September, we’re going to add the NASCAR tune to the repertoire. It’s been going great. It’s a lot of fun to play. I really have a good time doing it. And the audiences really have a good time watching it. It’s different from what they’ve seen before. It’s more of a theatrical drum show and rock concert.

You mentioned you did some stuff for ESPN promoting NASCAR and you’re playing a few select dates on the East coast. Is there anything else coming up on the horizon for SLAMM?

We’re working on dates all around the country. The key is to get press going — we just started doing press on it. I just put the NASCAR video on YouTube. I thought that would be a good way to do it. I’m pushing it in all the interviews. I think that once when people get a chance to see it, they’ll see what the band is sort of about and see what the shows are about. That’s going to get the name out there and spread some talk, and that’s a good thing.

I’d love to see it when you get out to California.

Yeah, me too (laughs).

You’re also touring with Vanilla Fudge. I know you and Tim Bogert had been playing with other guys for awhile. How did you get the original band back together?

It happened with Tom Vitorino, who manages the Doors (editor’s note: Carmine is actually referring to Riders On The Storm, the band that includes Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek and guitarist Robbie Krieger). He had a tour with the Doors and the Yardbirds, and he wanted Vanilla Fudge. He thought the original band would be a bigger draw than to have me and Tim and two sidemen. So we put it back together. We put all the water under the bridge, all the bullshit that went on before. And we did that tour, and it sort of fell apart again. Last year, one gig came up with Deep Purple at Radio City, and we sort of got back together to do that.

There are some other gigs being booked for this year — like seven gigs total. We sort of got back together again because the manager of Deep Purple wanted to take over. He didn’t. So, we’re sort of back in the limbo area again after these gigs. These gigs are not the best in the world. I think they bring Vanilla Fudge down a notch. In Vegas, we’re opening up for the Cowsills. And that’s crazy. We used to headline every gig at Westbury Music Fair, and now they have us opening up for Foghat and Blue Öyster Cult. It’s embarrassing. I think after these gigs, I’m not sure what’s going to be happening with that. Pretty soon, we’ll be playing 100 seaters. It’s because there’s no manager.

What prompted you guys to make the Led Zeppelin tribute album Out Through The In Door?

I don’t look at that as a tribute album. I look at it as Vanilla Fudge doing what we do. When we did “You Keep Me Hangin’ On,” it wasn’t a tribute to the Supremes, you know what I mean?

Exactly. Funny how the word ‘tribute’ has worked itself into the vernacular. But that doesn’t describe what Vanilla Fudge does, does it.

What we do is rearrangements of other people’s songs. That’s how we made it and that’s how we’ll always be doing it.

Fair enough. So why a whole album of Led Zeppelin songs?

Again, this came from Tom Vitorino. He came up with the idea. With the other band, we did an N’Sync song and a Backstreet Boys song, and he said nobody cares about songs like that. He said, “You’d be better off doing an album of big ass songs, like the Stones, the Who, Led Zeppelin or the Beatles. Do one album of all their songs. That way it would make sense.” He gave us a choice and we picked Led Zeppelin because they were the closest thing to us spiritually. Led Zeppelin’s first album had a lot of Vanilla Fudge in it. So we decided to do Led Zeppelin because they were close friends of ours. We had a big part in the success of Led Zeppelin.

I know a lot of people are unaware of the impact Vanilla Fudge had on bands like Zeppelin and Deep Purple. You, in particular, made profound impression on John Bonham and even helped him get an endorsement with Ludwig. How would describe your relationship with him?

I had a really good relationship with him. When ever they were ever in America and they came to New York, we’d get in touch with each other. I’d go see the shows and we’d be backstage. Some times, be on the stage. Before that, when they were opening up for us, we hung out a lot. We talked, we did crazy things together. He was a fan of mine and I was a fan of his. I did help him get a drum set, and that drum set became a Led Zeppelin imprint. The look of Led Zeppelin and that big drum set. We had a great relationship. Even when he got drunk and he would be screwing around with other people and abusing other people, he always had a lot of respect for me.

Did you attend the 2007 Led Zeppelin reunion show in London?

I didn’t. Without John Bonham, it wasn’t really a reunion to me. John had a certain feel, a certain way he played. Jason is a really good drummer, but he’s not his father. The reason they broke up the band and they didn’t continue was because they felt the same way. And in those days after John passed away, there were rumors that me or Cozy Powell would join Led Zeppelin. They didn’t do it because they felt John was too important. I feel the same way. I talked to Robert Plant in 2004 and he told me he didn’t want to do any Led Zeppelin reunions because he can’t sing the songs like he used to, and he wants to move away, move on to bigger and better things. He was actually praising my career because I’ve had so many things and I wasn’t locked into anything. He said, “Imagine if you had to play ‘You Keep Me Hangin’ On’ for the last 40 years,” which I didn’t have to do. I didn’t have to play Vanilla Fudge songs; it’s only lately that I've chose to do that.

He was always stuck playing Led Zeppelin the way Led Zeppelin played it, and he told me he was sick of it. He said, “I can’t hit those notes anymore. Why do I want to do it? I don’t need money.” Hearing that from the horse’s mouth, I saw him at the Beacon Theater in New York and he took the Led Zeppelin songs and changed all the arrangements. You wouldn’t even recognize them. And they were cool and I really dug it. He really dug it, I’m sure. But if he plays with Led Zeppelin, he has to play them like Led Zeppelin because that’s what people are paying to see. I’d be very surprised if he did a whole tour with that. I was surprised he even did this (the London reunion show), but this was a benefit thing, a one-of-a-kind thing. So, I didn’t go. I saw them when they’re at their height — I saw them many, many times. Matter of fact, I ran into Paul Stanley at the airport, and he asked me if I was going to go see them. And I said, “Not really. I saw them already. I saw them 30 times, 40 times. I don’t know how many times. When they came out, they were my peers. I wasn’t a fan like you. You were a fan. In ’69, when they came out, you were a rock fan. If they had come out when you were Paul Stanley, the Kiss rock star, you’d look at it differently.” He understood.

You’re also playing with Cactus, once dubbed the “American Led Zeppelin.” What prompted you to bring them back?

Somebody offered us a Swedish rock festival gig in ‘06. And that’s really who thought of that. We enjoyed it. We played B.B. Kings a few days before and it was a magic gig. And we did an album. Years before that, we were just screwing around with Randy Pratt at his studio, but we didn’t have enough material for an album. Then we got offered a record deal for that album (Cactus V). So we did it. So now, we’re not really touring, it’s just like two, three, four gigs a year, you know? Cactus is not a band that was a big sell-out band, as far as we never had a hit single. We were an underground band. There’s always certain areas we can play and do well.

To say you’ve worked with just about everyone who matters would be a vast understatement. I want to step back briefly and touch on some of the other bands, collaborations, sessions and one-offs you’ve been involved with over the years. I’ll throw out a name and, if you could, share your memories, highlights, something unique about the experience, whatever pops into your head. Let’s start with Beck, Bogert and Appice.

It was supposed to come together earlier and Rod Stewart was going to be the singer. We broke up Vanilla Fudge to do that. And then Jeff got in a car accident and he couldn’t work for a year and a half. Me and Tim didn’t want to sit around and wait. In those days, when you broke up with a band, you usually didn’t break up on good terms. So it wasn’t like, “Let’s go back to Vanilla Fudge.” We had to keep moving ahead, so we put Cactus together. Jeff still had it in his mind to play with us, and he contacted us two and a half years after we had Cactus going and figured we’d still want to do something. So that’s when we gave notice to Cactus and joined him.

He was on tour with the Jeff Beck Group. Me and Tim just joined him in the Jeff Beck Group. And then the next tour was the Jeff Beck Group featuring me, Timmy and Jeff. After that tour, we did the album and went out as BBA finally. We never really got a second album out, but it was great fun doing it. We had a Top 10 album and we also sold out pretty much every gig we ever played, including the Spectrum and places like that.

Any chance of a BBA reunion?

Your guess is as good as mine (laughs).

How about Tommy Bolin?

I just did his second album, Private Eyes. I did a track or two on that. Before he coming to L.A. and joining Deep Purple, I jammed with him in Denver, so I was thinking — it was just after Beck, Bogert, and Appice, and Tim and I were looking to play with another name guitar player — but his name wasn’t big enough for us. I had come to Denver by way of L.A. to play with him and see what it was like. It was good fun. We ended up jamming at a place called Ebbets Field, and that’s out on CD somewhere.

After that, you spent quite a few years with Rod Stewart.

That was a great rock band. We were always compared to the Rolling Stones. Up to that point, I sold gold records, but had never sold multi-platinum. Everything we did was going to go at least four or five times platinum. We would do two or three Top 10 singles. That’s what Rod was doing at the time. Playing in front of huge audiences. I learned a lot about image, a lot about publicity, a lot about songwriting, a lot in general about the business playing with Rod and the way he ran things. It was one of the big highlights of my career.

You also played with guys like Stanley Clark, Ted Nugent and Ozzy Osbourne.

Ted and Ozzy, I played with live. Ted, I played on his albums, videos and live. Ozzy, I just did the “Bark At The Moon” video and about 10 months of touring with him until Sharon Osbourne fired me. She told me my name was too big and I needed my own band. With Stanley Clark, I was just sitting at home one day and I got a call from Jeff Beck, who was in town. He said, “What are you doing?” I said, “Not much, just hanging out. What are you doing?” I think I was playing with Rod at the time. He said, “I’m in the studio with Stanley Clark and we need someone to play drums.” I said, “Oh wow. That’s great.” So he said, “Why don’t you come down?” And I said I would. Then he asked: “Can you get your drum set here?” And I said, “Well actually I can’t because my roadie is using it, and he’s not in town. But I have a little drum set at the house. I can throw it in the car.” He said, “Yeah, do that. Come on down. We’d love to have you. We have a song we’ve put together and we want to record it.” And that song was “Rock 'N' Roll Jelly.” I went down and played it with Stanley and Jeff, and it was great and a lot of fun.

You eventually took Sharon Osbourne’s advice and formed your own band called King Kobra. What are your memories of those days?

Well, it was a drag we didn’t get the airplay and the label support that we needed. Later, they gave the label support that was needed for us and they gave it to Poison. Poison opened up for us, and they stole a lot of what King Kobra had — like the look. When Poison first opened for us, they didn’t have a look at all. Then they saw our look with all the blonde hair and they stole a lot of the look and they went on to make it. But King Kobra had better musicians, had better singers, better songs and it just didn’t go big.

After that, you got involved with one of my personal favorites, a band called Blue Murder.

That was a favorite of mine too (laughs). I went after that group to get into it. At first, Cozy Powell was in it. I loved the way that Tony (Franklin) played and I loved the way John (Sykes) played. So I went after it and I ended up getting into it, and it was really a nightmare. A lot of weird shit happened to the band. When we were going to Vancouver to record, Tony Martin was going to be the singer at the time and he called up the day we were leaving and said he wasn’t going. So, Bob Rock was producing it, and Bob said, “Guess we can just go anyway. We can do all the tracks and figure out the singing later.”

While we’re figuring out the singing, Bob did the Cult and Mötley Crüe, and he used drum samples of Blue Murder on these new albums, which were huge albums. Then we finally got the thing out, but by the time we got it out, we didn’t have a manager. We were on the Bon Jovi tour and we had videos on MTV and all this good stuff going on, and no manager. It was weird. You know, it was a great band, everything was right in there. We had the best of everything — from the record company (Geffen) to John Kalodner, Bob Rock, musicians, the studio. But the only thing we didn’t have right was the management. And when we got a manager, it was too late.

One song you played on around that period was “Dogs Of War” by Pink Floyd.

It basically came about by a phone call from Bob Ezrin, the producer. He left a message saying that, “I’m producing an album that’s screaming for Carmine drum fills.” I called him back and said, “What are you screaming at?” and he said, “It’s Pink Floyd.” And I said, “Wow! What happened to Nick Mason? Why isn’t he playing?” And he said, “Well, they want some fresh blood on it.” So I said. “Yeah, cool.” And I went down and played. The pay was OK— it wasn’t outrageously a lot of money, but it was a nice career move. After that, I played with Edgar Winter for two, three years. I had a great time with Edgar.

That didn’t lead to your meeting up with Rick Derringer, did it?

No, that was in the early 80s. After I left Rod Stewart, I knew I was a really big in Japan, so I put a Super Session tour together in Japan, and I asked Rick to go, because Rick was a friend. So it was Rick Derringer, Tom Petersson, Eric Carmen, Duane Hitchings and myself. We played the Budokan and other theaters. We did six shows and they were very well attended, if not sold out. Someone just gave me a CD of a live recording of the Budokan show when I was in Japan in December.

More recently you’ve recorded with Pat Travers.

That’s the Travers-Appice records. I really enjoyed playing with Pat. Only I wish it would have come out in the 70s or early 80s because by the time we got them out — the timing for radio and everything else was bad. We have some really good songs on that first album, It Takes A Lot Of Balls. Some really good songs. We toured with it. Everywhere we played, everyone loved the songs. We did well with it in Europe. Unfortunately, the European label didn’t do anything over here.

You’ve worked with a lot of great guitar players over the years. In fact, you featured a virtual who's who of guitar players on the Guitar Zeus project.

It was the greatest guitar players in the world on my solo album with Kelly Keeling and myself writing songs, and Tony Franklin on bass. We had everybody from Brian May to Richie Sambora, Yngwie Malmsteen, Steve Morse, Mick Mars, Vivian Campbell, even Steven Seagal played on it. That was a great experience. I produced the album too, so in essence, I produced all these guys. I had a nice little run in my production chops. I produced the Zeppelin album, I produced the Travers-Appice stuff, I produced the King Kobra stuff, the 2001 Vanilla Fudge album The Return, and the Cactus album. So, I’ve had a good run with the production thing, which I enjoy doing as well.

I don’t think a lot of people know how good of a singer you are. Have you ever toyed with the idea of doing a vocal album?

Not really. I did a solo album in ’78 that I actually finished and released through my web site called V8. I sing on half the album. I did another album in ’82 called Rockers, where I sing on the whole album. It’s available on my web site too. You know, I was talking to my girlfriend yesterday about that. My voice is too sweet for my drumming. I have a very tender kind of voice, like a ballad kind of voice. So when I’m getting vicious on the drums, my voice doesn’t fit. It needs to be a little more aggressive. My original singing started from singing doo-wop in the subways of Brooklyn, you know? That’s the kind of voice I have.

I sing with Vanilla Fudge, and I did sing on the Travers-Appice albums. That was a little different. Some of the songs are funkier. I sing a little in SLAMM. I front SLAMM pretty much. I’ve learned how to work an audience. I do everything that has to do with the audience participation in SLAMM. That’s really what I’m concentrating the most on. With all the stuff I have — playing with Pat, Vanilla Fudge — they’ve seen their day already, you know what I mean? I think SLAMM has a lot of potential to really go somewhere. My goal is to hopefully end up in a casino theater in Vegas or Atlantic City. Or go around playing in performing arts theaters and spend a week in one place, and move to another city and play a week there. That’s what I’d really like to do with this.

Let’s get into your drumming a bit. I love what Rick Van Horn, the editor of Modern Drummer, says about you setting the foundation for heavy drumming. How did you develop your style?

Just by accident. In the days when I first started playing, there were no P.A. systems. I had to turn the sticks around and order bigger drums to get more volume. And play harder and play louder and play with dynamics out of necessity. While I was doing that, I came up with a new drumming style that I didn’t know I was doing. I just did what I had to do.

When I came out, it was Mitch Mitchell, Ginger Baker, Keith Moon and myself. We were like the four forefathers of all the rock drumming that’s going on today, I would say. Out of all the stuff that really stuck in the rock thing, with the double-bass thing that me, Keith and Ginger had. And the big, heavy style that John Bonham sort of emulated from my style, and his own thing. And you add all the showmanship and the power of the drums, which came from me trying to be louder. And that’s still around. If you go to any rock concert and see anybody in a theater or arena, you see a lot of me in them (laughs).

Are there any new drummers you like?

There’s a lot of great, young drummers. I saw a kid who was 15-years-old a couple nights ago at a drum battle contest. The kid was just unbelievable and his name is Sharig. He’s a black kid from the Bronx. He was just unbelievable. I foresee big things for him. There’s a lot of players that are good — I’m just not crazy about the music they’re playing today. Some of the drummers that have really fast feet in some of these bands that just go: Uggggggggggh… Their feet are amazing. But a lot of it doesn’t have any feel. It’s all Pro Tools. I’m not that crazy about that kind of stuff.

There’s some drummers that are really not that famous. There’s another kid who plays with a group called Sleeper, a New York local band. This guy is great. There’s another guy named John Something, an Italian last name, who played with Yngwie and a couple of bands like that, who’s really great too. There’s a lot of great, young drummers around, and some you don’t know who they are.

You teach, do clinics and write about drumming. What do you get out of that?

I just have fun. Anything with playing is fun. It’s another avenue to get out there and play. Doing clinics, especially now, I do more clinics now than I do real, actual gigs. It’s the way my career has gone. That’s just the way it is. I play gigs with Fudge and Cactus and SLAMM. All total, if I do 25, 35 gigs a year, you know, that’s a lot. I can do 25, 30 clinics a year too. Where, it used to be when you’re on tour, you got 30 gigs a month. I kind of like it. I don’t mind going out, doing stuff for two weeks, and then coming home. Then you’re home for two weeks, then going out for two weeks. Like we did in ’05 with the Doors tour — that’s how we did it. That was good. I enjoyed that. Rather than being out two or three months. I think I’m beyond that mentally.

Like you said, you’d like to play in place for a week, then go to another city.

That would be great. I could go out for six weeks, do that, and then go home. That would be great. Or even do that, and have a three-week vacation every year. But to go out and play three months straight every night? I don’t know if I could do that anymore.

The industry has changed quite a bit over the years. What’s your take?

Well, it’s not good. The Internet is creating new businesses and it’s destroying old businesses. It’s destroyed the music business and the record companies. It’s destroyed the record stores. Like Tower Records going under. I was on Sunset last week, and the Virgin Record store is gone. Tower and Virgin are gone on Sunset Blvd. — it’s unbelievable.

And the fact that these gigantic companies are buying up all the radio stations, buying up al the promotion stations, buying up everything, so that you don’t have individual people coming up with different ideas that promote stuff and create different kinds of gigs. It’s all being done by one company, and they all do the same things at different levels. There’s no way to get airplay, if you have an album coming out. Everything is categorized ridiculously. If you’re a band like Vanilla Fudge, even if you’re a band like the Rolling Stones — there’s nowhere to get airplay. I mean, you know, Bruce Springsteen — no airplay. It’s incredible.

I don’t have a clue what’s going on. Like who’s a big group. I was sitting the other day at the table and somebody was telling me about a band selling out Madison Square Garden. And I’d never heard of them. Because if they get the airplay, what they get is airplay on Top 40 stations. And I don’t listen to Top 40 stations. All you hear on Top 40 stations is rap. I feel like Joe Morello did when I was in Cactus. Joe didn’t know any of the rock bands. I don’t know any of these rock bands. A lot of them know me. But I don’t know who they are, to tell you the truth.

Believe it or not, I never downloaded anyone’s album on iTunes. I just did it for the first time two weeks ago, and I downloaded Beyoncé. You know, eight songs by her. Because I heard some stuff on the Virgin America flight and I liked it. I loved the rhythms and she has an amazing voice. Very soulful and really great compared to a lot of the rap crap you hear. But really, I’m at a loss in the business. I don’t know what’s going on. I do know that a Number One record is like 50,000 records in one week. It used to be 300,000 or 400,000. That tells you right there, that the business is not good.

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