MUSICIAN BEATS DRUM FOR DRUMMERS
Glenn Young thinks drummers have taken a beating long enough. So the Mission Viejo musician has formed Drummers’ Network, an informational and vocational network designed to help get Orange County percussionists a little respect.
“We’ve heard all the jokes: ‘Oh, you’re a drummer? I thought you played a real instrument’,” Young, 38, said in an interview. “Even some of my friends still refer to me as ‘the drummer’--like some guy with no name and a carpetbag who wanders around the South.”
The main purpose for Drummers’ Network is to provide free job referrals for its members. Young based his idea on an informal organization he belonged to in Philadelphia, where he lived and worked before moving to California in 1974.
“That (organization) did a couple of things--No. 1 one being keeping jobs within our group,” Young said. “If I got a call for a job and couldn’t take it, rather than saying ‘no’ I could refer it to someone else in the group. We got a reputation for always supplying adequate players. So that was the fastest way for someone to fill a position with someone who would do a good job.”
In addition to the referral service, local musicians now have an information clearinghouse and a vehicle for communicating with each other in a monthly Drummers’ Network newsletter Young publishes. The newsletter includes roundups of new equipment, practice tips, lists and reviews of concerts, clinics and workshops and other events of interest to drummers.
Young also plans to take on a more active role by periodically organizing these special events in Orange County. He’s already lined up one drum clinic for Feb. 2 at the Musicians’ Hall in Santa Ana.
“I’ve talked to some instrument manufacturers and they are interested in sponsoring clinics down here,” he said. “But their big concern is always getting enough people to show up. This gives them the framework they need to tap into that audience.”
His publication also includes a list of local clubs where drummers are performing, in part as a hedge against the heavy toll that modern musical technology has taken on drummers. It’s been estimated that drummers in recent years have lost as much as 70% of club work and recording studio jobs to synthesizers and drum machines.
“With the advent of drum machines, this is a sort of a vote for live musicians,” he said. “It gives people a choice of establishments that use live drummers, so it’s a vote for ourselves as professional drummers.
“One of the things I’m hoping will come out of this is that pianists, bassists or sax players will say, ‘What a neat idea--our group could benefit from that, too.’ I thought about doing this on an industry-wide level for all instruments, but I really think that to do it right you have to be involved with the instrument. I don’t think one person could do this and be informed enough to focus on every instrument.”
Young, a member of the Orange County Musicians’ Assn., initially thought the musicians’ union might object to Drummers’ Network for doing referrals, a service also handled by the union. But after meeting recently with Local 7 president Doug Sawtelle, Young was given the union’s full support as well as an invitation to write a regular column on issues concerning drummers for the union’s own newsletter, the Score.
With the addition of union-member drummers to his current mailing list of about 150, Young expects to double that figure with his next newsletter.
Young said that band leaders or anyone else in need of a drummer can call the referral service at (714) 770-7760. Drummers interested in registration or other information should send a self-addressed stamped envelope to Drummers’ Network, P.O. Box 2711, Mission Viejo, CA, 92690.
There is no fee to join the network and Young shells out the $50 to $60 a month it costs to publish the newsletter. “Anyone who wants to contribute to the newsletter will get exposure, and the readers might pick up some tips they can use,” Young said. “It’s one of those win-win situations.”
LIVE ACTION: Ex-Black Flag lyricist Henry Rollins’ appearance Wednesday at Safari Sam’s has been canceled. England’s hot new punk band, the Jesus and Mary Chain, will make its Southern California debut Thursday at Safari Sam’s. . . . The Mighty Flyers will be at Marcel’s in Costa Mesa on Dec. 20. . . . Tim Weisberg will be at the Golden Bear in Huntington Beach on Dec. 28. . . . T.S.O.L. will perform on New Year’s Eve at Spatz in Huntington Harbour. . . . The Gyromatics will headline the New Year’s Eve show at the Sunset Pub in Huntington Beach.