Charlie Watts

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  • guitars4youguitars4you Frets: 14026
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    Jason said:
    Can't add anything to what has all ready been mentioned - Certainly a legend and has left plenty of great recordings and memories for so many - RIP Charlie

    Just a thought - Did he play the most famous cow bell intro/groove in the history of pop/rock/blues
    No that was Jimmy Miller. Apparently Charlie couldn’t get it, so he played it. Charlie has been quite upfront about it. He didn’t play on it’s only Rock n Roll either or some of Dirty Work. 

    I am genuinely gutted, he made them swing, he was the Roll
    Didn't know that story - Thanks
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  • Proper Gent.  R.I.P.
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  • JonathangusJonathangus Frets: 4436
    I won't pretend to be the world's biggest Stones fan, but their influence in the world of rock 'n' roll is undeniable.  RIP Charlie.
    Trading feedback | How to embed images using Imgur

    As for "when am I ready?"  You'll never be ready.  It works in reverse, you become ready by doing it.  - pmbomb


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  • Jagger was Charlies Singer....
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  • JalapenoJalapeno Frets: 6378
    Gutted :'(
    Imagine something sharp and witty here ......

    Feedback
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  • GassageGassage Frets: 30824
    The moment when Keef said 'You're my drummer' and Charlie smacked him in the mouth and said "Nope, you're my guitarist...."

    Loved him. 

    *An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.

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  • axisusaxisus Frets: 28280
    I've never been into the Stones music, but they are probably the most iconic band that is still going. Sad news indeed. RIP Charlie.
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  • HAL9000HAL9000 Frets: 9549
    A sad loss. As has already been said, an exceptional drummer with more ‘swing’ than most. RIP.
    I play guitar because I enjoy it rather than because I’m any good at it
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  • DavidRDavidR Frets: 727
    In that great music embellishes life, part of that just died.

    RIP Charlie and Thanks.
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  • PolarityManPolarityMan Frets: 7273
    I don't even like the stones but you gotta respect a nearly 60 years run as a drummer in a single band (one of the biggest int he world no less)! 
    ဈǝᴉʇsɐoʇǝsǝǝɥɔဪቌ
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  • Sad sad news, Keith is my favourite guitar player but Charlie was my favourite Rolling Stone
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  • darthed1981darthed1981 Frets: 11669
    RIP :(
    We have to be so very careful, what we believe in...
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  • BlueingreenBlueingreen Frets: 2582
    Jason said:
    Can't add anything to what has all ready been mentioned - Certainly a legend and has left plenty of great recordings and memories for so many - RIP Charlie

    Just a thought - Did he play the most famous cow bell intro/groove in the history of pop/rock/blues
    No that was Jimmy Miller. Apparently Charlie couldn’t get it, so he played it. Charlie has been quite upfront about it. He didn’t play on it’s only Rock n Roll either or some of Dirty Work. 

    I am genuinely gutted, he made them swing, he was the Roll

    Jimmy Miller played the cowbell, but it was nothing to do with Charlie not being able to "get it" (it's a very straightforward part).  It was a hand-held cowbell and it needed someone else to to play it while Charlie played the kit - since Jimmy was in the studio and also a drummer he would have been the obvious choice. 
    “To a man with a hammer every problem looks like a nail.”
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  • rze99rze99 Frets: 2260
    Gassage said:
    The moment when Keef said 'You're my drummer' and Charlie smacked him in the mouth and said "Nope, you're my guitarist...."

    Loved him. 
    Sorry, correction, it was Jagger. Not Richards, who told the tale of this in his autobiography. 
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  • scrumhalfscrumhalf Frets: 11262
    rze99 said:
    Gassage said:
    The moment when Keef said 'You're my drummer' and Charlie smacked him in the mouth and said "Nope, you're my guitarist...."

    Loved him. 
    Sorry, correction, it was Jagger. Not Richards, who told the tale of this in his autobiography. 

    According to today's Times Charlie was still pissed off the following morning and Keef had to persuade him not to deck Mick again.
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  • BebopperBebopper Frets: 129
    edited September 2021
    His lifelong friend (they grew up next door to each other) is jazz bassist Dave Green, so I've seen Charlie in the audience at a few gigs that Dave was on (most recently, bebop pianist Barry Harris in 2018). 
    He always seemed happy to be around jazz musicians and sit as a regular punter. A nod and smile of acknowledgement if you made eye contact but no-one bothered him.

    I know he quietly did a lot to help musicians he admired who were going through tough times. It's known in drummer circles that the royalties on his Vic Firth signature sticks went to jazz drummer Joe Morello and when Morello got back the kit he used with Dave Brubeck, Charlie paid enough for it to give Morello and his wife financial security in their last years.
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  • JasonJason Frets: 1102
    tFB Trader
    Jason said:
    Can't add anything to what has all ready been mentioned - Certainly a legend and has left plenty of great recordings and memories for so many - RIP Charlie

    Just a thought - Did he play the most famous cow bell intro/groove in the history of pop/rock/blues
    No that was Jimmy Miller. Apparently Charlie couldn’t get it, so he played it. Charlie has been quite upfront about it. He didn’t play on it’s only Rock n Roll either or some of Dirty Work. 

    I am genuinely gutted, he made them swing, he was the Roll

    Jimmy Miller played the cowbell, but it was nothing to do with Charlie not being able to "get it" (it's a very straightforward part).  It was a hand-held cowbell and it needed someone else to to play it while Charlie played the kit - since Jimmy was in the studio and also a drummer he would have been the obvious choice. 

    Yes, but the point was Mark said "did he play the most famous cow bell intro?"

    Charlie said this (from the BBC today) I've read loads of interviews about it and in some Charlie said he couldn't get it

    Interestingly, the cowbell itself isn't played by Watts but by the Stones' producer Jimmy Miller - and the band could never replicate his slightly stumbled intro in concert.

    "We've never played an intro to Honky Tonk Women live the way it is on the record," Watts said in the book According to the Rolling Stones.

    "That's Jimmy playing the cowbell and either he comes in wrong or I come in wrong - but Keith comes in right which makes the whole thing right. It's one of those things that musicologists could sit around analysing for years. It's actually a mistake but from my point of view it works."


    The Guitar Show, Cranmore Park, Birmingham | Website | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | Podcast
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  • BlueingreenBlueingreen Frets: 2582
    Jason said:
    Jason said:
    Can't add anything to what has all ready been mentioned - Certainly a legend and has left plenty of great recordings and memories for so many - RIP Charlie

    Just a thought - Did he play the most famous cow bell intro/groove in the history of pop/rock/blues
    No that was Jimmy Miller. Apparently Charlie couldn’t get it, so he played it. Charlie has been quite upfront about it. He didn’t play on it’s only Rock n Roll either or some of Dirty Work. 

    I am genuinely gutted, he made them swing, he was the Roll

    Jimmy Miller played the cowbell, but it was nothing to do with Charlie not being able to "get it" (it's a very straightforward part).  It was a hand-held cowbell and it needed someone else to to play it while Charlie played the kit - since Jimmy was in the studio and also a drummer he would have been the obvious choice. 

    Yes, but the point was Mark said "did he play the most famous cow bell intro?"

    Charlie said this (from the BBC today) I've read loads of interviews about it and in some Charlie said he couldn't get it

    Interestingly, the cowbell itself isn't played by Watts but by the Stones' producer Jimmy Miller - and the band could never replicate his slightly stumbled intro in concert.

    "We've never played an intro to Honky Tonk Women live the way it is on the record," Watts said in the book According to the Rolling Stones.

    "That's Jimmy playing the cowbell and either he comes in wrong or I come in wrong - but Keith comes in right which makes the whole thing right. It's one of those things that musicologists could sit around analysing for years. It's actually a mistake but from my point of view it works."



    No, that's not the point.  Mark asked the question, it was answered.  No-one disputes that Miller played the cowbell.

    The argument is about the idea that Charlie "couldn't get it".  This is a myth that doesn't survive 3 seconds of examining the known facts.

    The cowbell part is easy.  I've seen cover bands getting girls up from the audience to play it.  The idea that an experienced drummer couldn't play it is nonsense.  As I said before, there is nothing to get.

    What happened is that a lot of guys in cover bands stuck a cowbell on their kit and tried to reproduce the intro, ie play both parts.  They tended to assume, wrongly, that's what happened on the original, ie one drummer playing a kit with a cowbell.  And because there's a mistake on the original, which The Stones decided sounded good and they should leave it in, reproducing the original exactly is very difficult.

    So the intro got a reputation for being tricky to nail exactly.  And when people found out that Miller played the cowbell, they add up 2 and 2 and got 5:  it's a tricky part, Miller played it, it must have been because Charlie couldn't do it.

    But it's not a tricky part.  It's two incredibly simple parts with a mistake.  There was absolutely no point at which Watts could have thought "this is tricky, I'm not sure I can do it".

    “To a man with a hammer every problem looks like a nail.”
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  • JasonJason Frets: 1102
    tFB Trader
    Jason said:
    Jason said:
    Can't add anything to what has all ready been mentioned - Certainly a legend and has left plenty of great recordings and memories for so many - RIP Charlie

    Just a thought - Did he play the most famous cow bell intro/groove in the history of pop/rock/blues
    No that was Jimmy Miller. Apparently Charlie couldn’t get it, so he played it. Charlie has been quite upfront about it. He didn’t play on it’s only Rock n Roll either or some of Dirty Work. 

    I am genuinely gutted, he made them swing, he was the Roll

    Jimmy Miller played the cowbell, but it was nothing to do with Charlie not being able to "get it" (it's a very straightforward part).  It was a hand-held cowbell and it needed someone else to to play it while Charlie played the kit - since Jimmy was in the studio and also a drummer he would have been the obvious choice. 

    Yes, but the point was Mark said "did he play the most famous cow bell intro?"

    Charlie said this (from the BBC today) I've read loads of interviews about it and in some Charlie said he couldn't get it

    Interestingly, the cowbell itself isn't played by Watts but by the Stones' producer Jimmy Miller - and the band could never replicate his slightly stumbled intro in concert.

    "We've never played an intro to Honky Tonk Women live the way it is on the record," Watts said in the book According to the Rolling Stones.

    "That's Jimmy playing the cowbell and either he comes in wrong or I come in wrong - but Keith comes in right which makes the whole thing right. It's one of those things that musicologists could sit around analysing for years. It's actually a mistake but from my point of view it works."



    No, that's not the point.  Mark asked the question, it was answered.  No-one disputes that Miller played the cowbell.

    The argument is about the idea that Charlie "couldn't get it".  This is a myth that doesn't survive 3 seconds of examining the known facts.

    The cowbell part is easy.  I've seen cover bands getting girls up from the audience to play it.  The idea that an experienced drummer couldn't play it is nonsense.  As I said before, there is nothing to get.

    What happened is that a lot of guys in cover bands stuck a cowbell on their kit and tried to reproduce the intro, ie play both parts.  They tended to assume, wrongly, that's what happened on the original, ie one drummer playing a kit with a cowbell.  And because there's a mistake on the original, which The Stones decided sounded good and they should leave it in, reproducing the original exactly is very difficult.

    So the intro got a reputation for being tricky to nail exactly.  And when people found out that Miller played the cowbell, they add up 2 and 2 and got 5:  it's a tricky part, Miller played it, it must have been because Charlie couldn't do it.

    But it's not a tricky part.  It's two incredibly simple parts with a mistake.  There was absolutely no point at which Watts could have thought "this is tricky, I'm not sure I can do it".


    hey, I'm not arguing about this, but I've read many interviews where Charlie states that he couldn't get it, below is an example. This is in no way a criticism of Charlie, he is by far my favourite drummer


    The Guitar Show, Cranmore Park, Birmingham | Website | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | Podcast
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  • SRichSRich Frets: 762
    Charlie's passing is a huge loss to all..........he's another of ' the Good Guys' of which there are fewer and fewer in the natural cadence of life. Sadly, I'm not sure that the characters, such as he, are easy to replace.

    Steve Jordan is a bloody remarkable drummer with an amazing CV (inc the X-Pensive Winos with Keef of course) but if you were he, would you take that drumstool?  

    "There's things I want, there's things I think I want 
    There's things I've had, there's things I wanna have" 
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