Jeff "Tain" Watts Interviewon
The TrevBeats Show 

Jeff “Tain” Watts | The TrevBeats Show Cleaned transcript with timestamps Edited for punctuation and readability from the supplied subtitles and PDF. Bracketed words mark passages neither source makes clear. [00:00] Cold open [00:00] And then I worked on half of Wynton's first record. And so Tony Williams was on the other half and the group with us and Kenny Kirkland was on half the record, and Herbie produced it. So he was in the studio with us every day. So we made the record and then my family was like, go back to school. Because back then, you know, unless you was really into music, a lot of Black people, we didn't know, but nobody knew who Wynton Marsalis was. They couldn't even say his name. [00:29] Like Winston, who is the one, who's the one? What's his name? And so anyways, I went back to school and then they told me like, don't go back in the winter because we're going to start having gigs. So, so January, 1982, just go home for a while. And then we're gonna have you go move to New York in like a month or two months. I said, cool. So I went home and then I was just around the crib and my dad was like, what are you doing? He's like, what are you doing? [01:06] I'm like, man, you know, I'm here, but this dude, Wynton Marsalis, is gonna call me, and then I'm going to move to New York. And boy, who is this band you playing with? And I said, man, you know, it's this dude and this dude. And then my dad was like, is there any white people in this band? And I was like... [01:36] And he said, yeah, well, you know, he was giving me some good advice. He was like, you know, y'all could be good and everything, but if you have at least one white dude, then white people will come see that white person, and it'll be good for y'all. So y'all might want to think about that. [01:55] A note from Trevor [01:55] Real quick, if you're new here, welcome to The TrevBeats Show. Hit subscribe so we can keep building together. And to my regulars who show up every time, I see you. And your viewership means everything. If you ever wanna help fuel this channel so we can do even bigger things, you can grab some fresh gear from the merch store below or jump into the backstage membership next to the subscribe button. Now back to the show. The TrevBeats Show, The TrevBeats Show. [02:34] Introduction [02:34] All right, everybody, welcome back to The TrevBeats Show. Now today, you know, I hate saying this every show and I'm not gonna say it, but it just so happens that a lot of our guests just happen to be incredible musicians and culture shifting people. And today is no different. Now, my guest today, not only does he have multiple Grammys, you know, he's a band leader, he's one of the most powerful and influential voices for sure, for several decades in jazz, especially on my instrument, which is the drums. [03:13] And, you know, early on we saw him come out with, you know, Wynton and Branford Marsalis. We've seen him play with McCoy Tyner, Michael Brecker, Kenny Garrett, you know, we've seen him on screen in movies like Mo’ Better Blues. And then we saw him at the Tonight Show. It's just legendary is putting it lightly. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Jeff “Tain” Watts. Oh. [03:45] My God. Yeah, I'm not worthy, that's nice. Go ahead. Go ahead. Yeah. Yeah, man. How you doing, man? I'm gonna get one of them. I'm pretty cool. I mean, I do that in the morning or something. Go ahead, go ahead. Yeah, man. I'm so happy you was able to come get on the show, man. It's a big honor for me personally, man. And it's just, it's nothing much for me to even say, man. So as I deal with this little technical stuff here, because the computers now are all thinking for themselves. [04:23] So. They're taking over. They're getting ready to take over, that's right. [04:29] The name “Tain” [04:29] But yeah, man, so, Tain, you know, listen, man, I wanna kinda go back a little bit because since you've come on the scene, I mean, it's just been a whirlwind and everything changed when you came on the scene, especially on our instrument, the drums. But let's go back to, how did you even get the name Tain? How did that come about? Where did that come from? Yeah, that came probably like a year after I got to New York. It's a corny story, but I was on tour with Wynton Marsalis. [05:05] I left college to join his band. Branford recruited me into the band. That's when I moved to New York. So we had been on the road for about a year, and we were in Florida driving rental cars, I think, from West Palm Beach to Miami. So I was sharing, yes, I was sharing a car with the late great Kenny Kirkland, Extra Bad Man. Oh yeah. Well, yeah. And you know, there's a chain of gas stations in the South and other places. I think it still exists, but it's called Chieftain Gas. [05:40] And it has a logo with a profile of American indigenous, Native American, Indian, whatever we want to call it, with the headdress. And that was the thing: Chieftain Gas. And we stopped there, and Kenny Kirkland, he just liked to give people names, man. Sometimes it means something, sometimes it didn't. And then he was like, ‘Chief Tain, you're gonna be Jeff Tain.’ I was like, no, no, no, I'm not. No, I'm not. And then he just kept doing it, he kept doing it. And then the band started doing it. [06:11] And then people started writing songs. “For Tain,” “The Wrath of Tain,” “Tain’s Rampage”. And yeah, there's a whole bunch of them. Wow. Okay, okay. That makes sense because seeing all those songs come out and they were almost lightweight trolls kind of. They were like little gags. Oh man, they were all on it. Yeah. [06:35] Pittsburgh and Roger Humphries [06:35] So now, and we'll go back even a little further than that. So you're from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. So a lot of other, there's a lot of great musicians that came out of Pittsburgh from Art Blakey, Kenny Clarke, I believe, you know, Vinnie claims it, it's more Brownsville, but you know, it's like, you know, he claims Pittsburgh. But, yeah, so now you had an early mentor by the name of Roger Humphries, is that right? [07:07] Yeah, that's, you know, I mean, at first, you know, I started out just kind of like doing music in school and I had a little drum set, But Roger, I met Roger whenever I started going to college. So I'd already got to school music stuff and a lot of classical stuff. And I was a classical music major at Duquesne University. And on the drum set, I had been just kind of playing along with the radio, playing with whatever, James Brown, Stevie or Mandrill or whatever, whatever was on the radio. [07:39] And then my brother started getting me into fusion towards the end of high school. So 70's fusion. So I was jamming with some Mahavishnu and Billy Cobham record. I just hung out with John Lee. We was talking about the 11th house with Larry Coryell and Alphonse Mouzon's music and stuff like that. And and of course, we're turning forever with the great Lenny White. So I got to college and the jazz that I've been playing, I've been playing in school, in high school, like in the stage band. And I was telling somebody the other day, like, unless your director is really hip, they have a whole bunch of music that's for stage band, that's by like composers. [08:20] It's kind of like you could play in a big band in junior high school and high school and still perhaps not even know that much about the core of jazz or where it came from or the significance of African Americans to the music and stuff like that. You can go through all that, because it's kind of like a little world into itself. But anyway, I was in the conservatory at Duquesne University, I was a classical major and a timpanist. And a friend of mine, this pianist that you should know, he works with Hubert a lot, David Budway. [08:56] He's a great piano player, great classical player, great jazz player, and he has a club up in upstate New York. But anyway, I was trying to find out about swinging jazz you know, like swinging jazz or what they call mainstream jazz at the time. Because I didn't know anything. And he started exposing me. He was like, you know, this is this is some John Coltrane. I was like, OK, I kind of, you know, you kind of hear the names. If you don't know about the music, you kind of hear about Miles and Coltrane, maybe from like some last poets or a lot of people like, you know, Santana likes to talk about Coltrane and stuff like that. [09:35] So, I mean, I'm starting to find out like really who Max Roach is. And I told somebody the other day, I was like, when I used to be walking home from school in the Hill District in Pittsburgh, I would have my snare drum in like a shopping bag. And then you see the brothers on the street and they'd be like, yeah, go ahead. Max Roach, Max Roach. I'm like, I don't even know who Max Roach is. But like a cool name or whatever. Anyway, my boy David Budway, he was like, man, if you're really trying to find out about some jazzy jazz, you should call Roger Humphries. [10:13] And I was like, oh, tell me about Roger Humphries. He's like, man, just look at the phone book. He's in the back when you dealt with the phone book. And so I looked at the phone book and I found him. He lived on the north side, what they call the North Shore now. I guess that's where the Steelers play. Acrisure Stadium should be on the North Shore. But I went over there, I took like two buses and walked up the hill. And he agreed to give me lessons for like $10. So I went over his house on a Saturday or something like that. [10:45] And so it was, yeah, he was really great. But for people that might not know, most people at least know “Song for My Father” by Horace Silver. And that may be his greatest hit. And the great Roger Humphries, who is still alive and thriving and playing as great as ever, He's on that recording at 20 years old. Yeah, so he's still like one of the swinginest people in the world right now and he's a great educator and motivator. [11:13] Drum lessons by the pool table [11:13] But anyway, I go over to his house and then he had his main house and then he was kind of a mogul. So he would have his properties. He had some houses. He rented out apartments to people. He was a boss. And so he'd be like, come on, Jeff, let's go across the street. So we'd go to one of his apartment buildings and go up to the second floor. On the second floor, he had a pool table and he had a black Quadra Plus Vistalite drum set up. [11:49] Like that. You remember the QuadraPlus, right? Is that wild? Wow. You remember the QuadraPlus, right? That was, was it clear? Was it clear? It's not quite like the black one and the white one. They're not quite clear. They're just like kind of acrylic. Yeah, but he had one of those. And, um, and so he was, I'll go in there and then his, his boys would be there. His boys will be there shooting pool and they'd be having beers and stuff like that. [12:25] And I'd be across the room. Go ahead Jeff, go and play something. Go play something. I go and play my little stuff. And he's like, okay, give me something on six eight. Give me like African vibe. And I played that and then he'd be like, give me a shuffle, give me like a beat, like rock beat. And he would just listen and he'd be shooting pool. And then he'd come over and he'd demonstrate something and then he'd go back and like that. But he was really great and he's great right now. And, but then one of the hippest things was after a while, he would have me just come to his gig. [12:57] So I come to this gig and it'd be in the hood somewhere, the zebra room and all these, you know, I think that's what's kind of different now with, you know, jazz education is really cool, but then I feel like there's a percentage of kids that, you know, they can come up in this school program and they can go to all these camps in the Brubeck Camp and the Hancock Camp and go, you know, they can go through all this stuff, but without ever playing in a joint or playing you know come on come on come on man yes sir yes sir yes sir that's right yeah you know play you gotta look at people and try to get them get them into it and you know you might get hurt or something like that or something you know you might you know somebody is gonna give you some tough love just that vibration. [13:52] So I would go see him and watch him play the set. And then at the end of the night, he'd wanna get a beer or something like that and he would make me play. So that was one of the, it's almost like Suzuki or something like that. It's like I'm watching him play and then I'm trying to figure out man, how come the band don't sound like when he's playing? What do I have to do to get it closer to how he's making the music feel? So, yeah, so he was really great for me. Wow, man. And you know what? I didn't know. I mean, it makes sense now. [14:21] I mean, cause I definitely noticed that, you know, you definitely have real technique and I'm always looking at how you're using and holding the sticks and everything. You have a lot of technique, but I didn't know you played timpani at that level, you know, at the college level. [14:37] Classical timpani at Duquesne [14:37] So now the Duquesne thing, that was obviously before Berklee, right? Is that how that worked? You went there and then you went to Berklee to focus, was that to focus more on jazz or how did that work? You know, I went to, I was at Duquesne. I went for a year like formally taking classes. And like, so I would play in the percussion ensemble and orchestra, play a bunch of Beethoven. You know, they had a wind ensemble, percussion ensemble, they had kind of like a, a new music ensemble, which was good for me. [15:11] Like kind of like contemporary classical, It kind of opened my head up when a lot of experimental stuff and where you could make an instrument out of anything and that you could like kind of create your own notation. You know, if you want like another kind of universe to happen, you can say this equals this and go, you know what I mean? It just kind of opened the game for me. But yeah, so I went there for a year and then I went there another year and just kind of monitored classes. [15:42] And then I was really trying to transfer to a place. I was still trying to do classical. I mean, I was playing fusion. I started playing. I was in a funk band in college. Like we had a tune on the radio, a song, ‘The Gift of Love’. Yeah, it was on like regular R&B radio in Pittsburgh, you know, nice local band that they pulled me into. And so I put together a package and I was trying to audition at New England, Cleveland Conservatory, I think Eastman, West Virginia University, stuff like that. [16:24] So I think I sent a package to everybody. I went to West Virginia University and did a personal audition. I might've applied to Juilliard, long before they had a jazz program. But anyway, I think I really wanted to go to New England because I really wanted to study with Vic Firth. And I just came up, I grew up knowing about him and then I started getting his literature. He's got a great book, The Solo Timpanist and then he has a series of performance pieces, the Solo Impressions series. [16:58] You know, I was just like, you know, he just seems like a bad dude, seems like I should study with him. But then I couldn't get a personal audition at New England. I was gonna have to just send a tape. And then my teacher told me, well, they take like two people a year. So if they don't want you to come up there, then they already, you know, the Boston Symphony's there and they already have their people and man like that. So then in between that, there's a homeboy of mine in my neighborhood, you know, not the Hill District, but this place, [place name unclear], like about 20 minutes on a slightly on outskirts, like a black suburb and stuff like that. [17:35] And I had a friend, you know, we used to jam together And he, you know, he were playing bands around town. And I was at home from Duquesne and he had gone to Berklee. And he was like, man, you should check out Berklee, man. I'm up there, man. There's this dude, this dude, Kevin Eubanks is bad. He like John McLaughlin or something like that. He's nasty. And he was like, yeah, Tommy Campbell, you know, he was like, comparing him to like Billy Cobham or Lenny White or something, you know. And Tommy was a Mac. Tommy, yeah. [18:07] Very much so. He kind of opened up some possibilities for a lot of people. I don't know if he gets credit for that, but I will say. But he talked about Tommy, oh, this girl, this girl Cindy Blackman, she's bad. And blah, blah, blah. And he told me Mike Stern and just different people that were going to school. I hadn't heard any of them, but I trusted him. So he was like, check out Berklee. So I figured I'll go to Berklee, and then I'll try to get some private lessons with Vic Firth because it's down the street. [18:40] And then it was right down the street. And then, yeah, so basically I got in Berklee and I just started playing more drums. [18:47] Berklee [18:47] And when I got in Berklee, everybody was there. It was like [name unclear] and Billy Kilson and the people I named and Branford and Donald Harrison, Victor Bailey, of like Steve Vai, just a million people, you know, you know, like a lot of, you know, [name unclear] and, you know, but there's tons more, [name unclear], Jean Toussaint, you know, it's really like a long, long list of people that are all over the scene now from, you know, from popular music, you know, my man, the keyboard player with Kool and the gang, Curtis Williams, even in school with us, you know, Just everybody from, you know, my man, William Reinhardt was closely associated with Rick James for years. [19:40] You know, we have people all across the board. And yeah, so I just kind of got stimulated with that. And then there was a lot of, Greg Osby was up there. A lot of people, there were a lot of people that were, you know, trying to find out the history and the roots of everything. of R&B, of fusion, of traditional jazz. It was really stimulating for me to be around like this many people and this many black people that were investigating. [20:12] Of course. You know, so I just started playing more drums. And then so, I mean, so wow. So you really were a full blown timpanist at one point. And I was, you know, you were gonna go down that lane and for all my listeners that don't understand, they might only think that Vic Firth was the stick name. They don't realize that it was really the person that really was great with the Boston Pops and just one of the greatest timpanists of all time. So he actually was a person that was tangible and touchable and that you could go study with, especially to be on that instrument and was regarded as one of the greatest to ever do it. [20:51] So I find that interesting because, you know, giving what you've now done and how your career has gone, you would think that from day one, it was just jazz and that's gonna be my focus and it just seems like it ended up being that, but you had a whole different goal. That's amazing to me now, because now it's like listening to your playing. [21:16] Odd meters and polyrhythms [21:16] The one thing, I don't wanna get into this now, it's like, so you go to Berklee and you're developing your style. Now with that kind of class of people there, I mean, you had some of the baddest people around, period. So the energy of everybody that you mentioned, I mean, I can only imagine everybody being in the same space and walking down the practice the hallway hearing folks practice and it's Steve Vai or it's Stern working on his sound. And so you're developing and now, I mean, you talk about, you know, iron sharpens iron. [21:54] I mean, you guys had it all going on. So you're developing into this, your identity's coming. At what point did you start embracing being comfortable and existing in a way that is never clinical when you're dealing with odd meters? Cause the way you play odd meters, no one else plays like that. and it doesn't ever sound like an exercise. It never sounds like school. It's always musical. [22:26] And drummers know that you have to be very confident to be able to pull that off. So when did you really start developing your polyrhythmic concept? Let me see, I guess at the root of it, it's like kind of 70s fusion. So from a band like Mahavishnu, you become comfortable playing and easily five and seven, but also 11 and things like that. And that's part of it. And then also when I was in school, there was kind of like a linear kind of movement going on. It was like Tommy Campbell was part of it and there was Gary Chaffee, his teachings were around. And there was another guy, [name unclear], you know. [23:20] So there was all these linear things flying around. And you could use them in different ways, for, I guess, soloing in a funky kind of way or a broken kind of way. Or people would take these little fragments that imply polyrhythm. They would take all these linear fragments, it's kind of like the Gary Chaffee approach. And people were trying to use it to assimilate, kind of like a Garibaldi kind of thing or a Mike Clark type of thing. I played two fives, and then I played two threes and then that'll add up to 16 beats and blah blah blah. People were practicing every combination of that and then just from doing also from doing classical stuff I started to have a curiosity about what I would call kind of like more pure polyrhythms, like really playing five in the space of four or seven in the space of three and different combinations of that. And I find that that stuff is like, it's, it's kind of harmonic or whatever. It's kind of like you have to, you just kind of get accustomed to the sound of it. [24:28] Right. You know, I mean, you can kind of figure it out, but it's more of a more of a texture. Right. Then once you're comfortable, then yeah, so you make yourself comfortable with that. So I just started writing out different combinations linearly. And then after that, I became aware of the, you know, you can make kind of a common denominator kind of formula to calculate, you know, really calculate exactly four beats over five or three beats over seven and stuff like that, like using the groupings. [25:02] And so I just like wrote out every polyrhythm and I started just messing with it, messing with it. And then these linear things were around and they really almost came from, kind of came from India and Eastern Europe, but also from a certain amount of jazz that was influenced by that. And I started to be able to hear that in the work of Tony Williams, somebody like that. And, you know, so I'll just say, I was just trying to make myself familiar and comfortable. [25:40] And I always tell people, I remember when I first started trying to play, when I'm trying to play, and then you might get on an early gig and maybe you hadn't played in three very much. I hadn't. You know, most music you hear is in four-four. So you could, you know, classical wise, yeah, you just, okay, read some three-four and play the figures. But I just remember like trying I didn't have any vocabulary three So it's like, okay, here it is. And you start playing. [26:10] And I was kind of sounding like a baby playing a three or something like that. I was like, man, I don't want to lose this three. I had like two or three things I could do. But then, just like, you know, I don't know if you know what I mean, but it's been funny. A lot of down beats. Yeah, but it's like, yeah, yeah, it's like, it's coming kind of quick for me here. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You know, so I would just almost play the same thing. And then, you know, and so like any style or any grouping, you get a little bit of stuff and you get more stuff and more stuff and more stuff. [26:46] And then you're able to have a conversation in that time. So I tried to be able to do that with these different times signatures and superimpose them over each other and try to make it so it's comfortable. So that it's comfortable for me and that I can almost like improvise these different feelings. And then after a while, like kind of like where I ended up now, is you have your linear ideas, but that's chopping it up. [27:18] It could be Garibaldi, it could be Vinnie, Mike Clark. And then you have like pure polyrhythm, like really superimposing things on top of each other in the space or just cutting the pie up for a different group. You got six people for dinner, oh, this is somebody's seventh one that's coming. We got to cut it like this. And then once I got to New York, I've kind of augmented that with the way that the things that take place with African-based music. [27:52] So as far as Africa is like all that stuff is equal. It's like two and three and six and four is all the same thing. And I hear, you know what I mean? It's all the, they all coexist somehow. I hear stuff from Cameroon where it has a 6A feeling, but it's almost really truly in five, you know? and you just, you know, so I try to balance between things that you can really figure out and then things that are felt. [28:26] Yeah. Like that. [28:28] Black Codes and the Marsalis brothers [28:28] Well, I feel like that's fascinating because apparently it would seem at the time you were developing all that, here were two brothers that maybe unbeknownst to them were developing compositions that would completely lend themselves to that, right? So when you all mixed with the Marsalis brothers, when y'all got together, they had to be like, we finally found our perfect match for what we've had in our head all this time. You know what I'm saying? [28:57] Because you listen to something like Black Codes and who else could have played that but Tain, bro? You can't even hear them records with nobody else, man. That was so ahead. It was so ahead. It was so black. It was so African. It was so high echelon, musical acumen. I mean, it was just all these things at once, man. And it had a statement, you know what I'm saying? With the whole, it was just such a powerful thing that you all were doing. [29:27] So you mentioned Branford was there, so I imagine was Wynton at Juilliard or something at that same time or? Wynton was at Juilliard And then he started sitting there with Art Blakey, So then he became a messenger. And then by the time I was about to get out of school, that's when, I guess he was about to sign his record deal, but then he started playing with SOP [unclear], started playing with Herbie and Tony and them, like that. And so then you all hooked up and then it became both bands. [29:59] So let's talk a little bit about that period, with the Wynton band and the Branford band. I mean, I guess it was kind of co-mingled, because essentially, I mean, I guess, cause let me see, Kenny pretty much, did Kenny play them both too? Yeah, he played them both too, right? Oh yeah. Yeah, of course, yeah. So, I mean, you all had like a whole sound that was just, that was killing. I mean, how did that feel? So you were in Berklee and then all of a sudden this thing picks up like most of us do that go to school, the ball game happens and it's time to get to the ball game. [30:35] How did that feel? because you all basically became like rock stars in short order in the jazz world, you know what I mean? Because signings were happening differently with majors and jazz became, you know, there was that whole young lion concept and it was just became a viable thing. You all turned into stars immediately. Like how did that feel, man? Playing actual jazz with, you know, real music. You know what I'm saying? What was that like, bro? What was that like, man? [31:05] Branford’s invitation [31:05] It's pretty funny actually. I mean, it's kind of like, yeah, you know, Branford, he'll say, he'll say I was in school and you know, like some people didn't like, didn't like playing with me or they didn't understand what I was trying to do. And they had Jeff, man, I think he's getting lost. I don't know. I don't know if he's playing the right thing. And then Branford is like, yeah, I want to meet this dude. I want to just, maybe that's what I want to play with. You know, he sounds kind of strange. Let me get with him. [31:35] So anyway, so he pulled me out of school. I ended up then, you know, I started going back and forth to New York and like doing kind of undercover gigs. And then I worked on half of Wynton's first record. And so Tony Williams was on the other half and the group with us and Kenny Kirkland was on half the record, and Herbie produced it. So he was in the studio with us every day. So we made the record and then my family was like, go back to school. Because back then, you know, unless you was really into music, a lot of Black people, we didn't know, but nobody knew who Wynton Marsalis was. [32:13] They couldn't even say his name: ‘Winston? Who is that? What's his name?’ And so anyways, I went back to school and then they told me like, don't go back in the winter because we're going to start having gigs. So, so January, 1982, just go home for a while. And then we're gonna have you go move to New York in like a month or two months. I said, cool. [32:37] A question from Tain’s father [32:37] So I went home and then I was just around the crib and my dad was like, what are you doing? He's like, what are you doing? I'm like, man, you know, I'm here, but this dude, Wynton Marsalis, he's gonna call me, and then I'm going to move to New York. And boy, who is this band you playing with? And I said, man, you know, it's this dude and this dude. [33:08] And then my dad was like, is there any white people in this band? And I was like... And he said, yeah, well, you know, he was giving me some good advice. He was like, you know, y'all could be good and everything, but if you have at least one white dude, then white people will come see that white person, and it'll be good for y'all. So y'all might want to think about that. he was serious too it was funny but anyway yeah but anyway yeah so I'm moving to New York we started playing and we you know we're trying to find stuff to do we're playing stuff from the first record you know but you know we just kind of did an overview of of styles you know we started playing stuff that Miles had played. He started playing a little bit of like Ornette Coleman's music, you know. It's almost like, and he was trying to pick up, you know, it'll sound kind of corny now, but I guess he almost felt like the acoustic music could have gone further before fusion came. And of course it could, you know. So it doesn't have [34:22] Be like one thing versus the other. You know, this came from this and it's a branch is going this way, but this is still here. You know, just write some music and play it. And whatever. So he just tried to, he tried to pick up from where, where he felt that the acoustic music might, you know, there was still Cass playing, McCoy Tyner still had bands and Dexter Gordon and Woody Shaw and all these people were still, you know, playing, writing original stuff, but, um, you know, So we started getting into Ornette and Miles and some Coltrane and then later on, like to get more structure, a lot of stuff based on Thelonious Monk. [35:02] The Tony Williams assignment [35:02] And then, but in the meantime, they, you know, they kind of told me my assignment was to try to find some stuff that Tony Williams hadn't played. And so I was like, well, okay. So I would kind of take ideas from traditional jazz. I would kind of notice like Tony, he would put his vocabulary together and it would be a whole bunch of different stuff. But sometimes you can hear like, well, this is something Max Roach would play, but then there might be an extra note in it. [35:39] Or it might be a seven beat thing of Max Roach. Max plays six notes. Or it might be something, he played on a snare drum, He's playing it between two tom-toms together and the kick drum and stuff like that. So then that made me just kind of start displacing things. And then I noticed that if you're playing like swinging jazz, most of the time you resolve your phrases on the one, which is very powerful. [36:09] Even most music does that, too. Or you resolve, kind of resolve on the and of four or something like that, you know, just so that the music feels a certain way. And I noticed that when Tony Williams was playing like his more abstract things, it's almost like he would resolve a beat earlier. He reads that, when I listened to him, he would resolve a lot of stuff on the ‘and’ of three or on four. And just something as simple as that, it made the music feel the same way. So I just started to open my phrasing and I, and then it made me use the linear ideas, but be prepared to resolve them in different places. [36:49] And then I started to try to apply pure polyrhythm because I guess Miles and them had messed around with playing triplets above and below the tempo of the moment, experimented with playing off of a dotted quarter note in that same respect. And Mingus was kind of doing that too. And then Coltrane kind of had like the open thing, but a lot of giant quarter-note pulse kind of going across the bar, like kind of superimposed African kind of thing going across. [37:22] And so I said, well, I'm just gonna just jump right into this and I know he didn't play this. So I'm gonna put this five over four and this over here and I'm just gonna improvise the time. And so, you know, so that just led me on my way. Yeah. What a, what a incredible mix of all those things because you hear the influences, but it's still so original and it was never like, oh, you know, he just plays like so-and-so, which we see unfortunately so much today, like straight copying, you know what I'm saying? [37:57] It's like, you have such an identity, you know, and it's just like amazing to have been, you know, been able to see all that. So you guys get to cracking And then now all of a sudden we see something that we really hardly have ever seen, which is the unit kind of starting to be in other places other than just on the music. So you get the spike thing and you do the record and I mean the movie and you do all this other stuff. It was just a bigger than life thing, right? [38:27] Becoming a composer [38:27] And then along that, we start to see Tain as the composer and that starts popping out. You know, so I mean, obviously a little later, but you got your Citizen Tain and Bar Talk and all these things. What, you know, when you were studying classical music and all that, I guess my question is, when did you get into writing jazz music? Like, was that something that happened at Berklee or when did that start happening? Yeah, so I've been in the era for a while and I started working on Wynton's records and Branford's records and at a certain point, Wynton was like, man, why don't you write something, man? [39:07] Well, you got good ears, you can write something. But I hadn't really embraced the compositional tools that were given to me in class. But I always felt like I, it's like, like Kenny Kirkland was a master composer. He was like a music, yeah, already. Like he was already, when we had the first band with Branford and Wynton and Kenny Kirkland and various bass players, It's like, we were all trying to learn how to be jazz musicians. And Kenny Kirkland had already done everything. [39:40] Like by the time, by the time we got to him, he was, like, five years older and he had, you know, he had been in Elvin Jones' band and Dewey Redman's band, you know, he played with all kinds of pop people and been to David Crosby's crib and rehearsing and play with the ECM cats and [name unclear] and all these and Michael Urbaniak. And he kind of played with everybody. So he knew how to write. He knew how to compose like write true compositions and he knew what kind of attitude he wanted to bring to the music. [40:17] And I know I was still kind of piecing my thing together, but yeah, but I had a block. And so I told these two stories. [40:25] Luther Vandross [40:25] I started trying to like put little scraps together, but I was kind of shy with them. So then I tell, this is two stories. The one is I was playing with Wynton in LA at the Westwood Playhouse. Mm-hmm. You remember that? Oh yeah, right by UCLA. Yeah, Westwood Playhouse. Right by UCLA. So I was playing, I was getting ready to play there, but then we had a, for some reason I ended up at, at Maurice’s Snack-N-Chat Oh yeah. [40:57] I forgot about that. Wow. You threw me back. Oh my goodness. You can see. You can just see it. Yeah. We had like the afternoon off or something like that. Me and Marcus Roberts and Robert Hurst the bassist was sitting up in Maurice's. I probably had some smothered pork chops. Something like that. And then all of a sudden like, Mr. Vandross was across the room with a friend of his. [41:30] He's over there eating. And you know, see at that point, that's like, that's probably like around 1985, 86. The Wynton thing had been happening for a few years. And just those first few years, he was like such kind of like a little phenomenon that like you say, we'd be on jazz festivals, but then we'd be on every talk show, Joan Rivers and every award show, Joan Rivers and David Brenner had the show and the Tonight Show. [42:03] And we were just always on TV, on PBS or something. and the congressional black caucus and all the black, that stuff like that. So Luther knew he had seen me somewhere. So he's looking at me and he's like, hey, brother, where are you from? I said, man, you're the man, you're the bad man. But I'm in New York and actually I think the recording, think of one that we did with Wynton, we were actually tracking, there's a, I forget the name of this song. [42:35] At Media Sound, I think? I think we were upstairs tracking that and Luther was downstairs tracking like one of his records. I think [name unclear] was down there. And they were tracking on the same. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, he was like, you know, I said, man, you know, I said, we've been in the same places and, you know, it's just great to meet you. And blah, blah, blah. I said, what are you doing? He said, I'm out here. I guess Luther had done that one record with Gregory Hines where they sang stuff together for some reason. So he was like, yeah, I'm out here with Marcus and we're trying to get some material together because I'm doing this record with Gregory Hines and we're trying to get some material. Do you have anything? And I'll say, well, you know, I could get something together. I know I could. He's like, you took too long. [43:32] You took too long, I was like, oh man, oh man. So that's one thing. So he was like, I was like, hey, if I just had a little bit of music, I might have made some money or something. And then the other thing was, I was doing a recording with Geri Allen, this Blue Note record called The Nurturer. And that's like me and Kenny Garrett, Robert Hurst and the great Marcus Belgrave. And it's kind of like everybody had a song on the record, except me, even the percussionist, this brother Eli Fountain. And Geri would be like, you know, she was so much like my sister. [44:06] She'd be real sweet. She's, Jeffrey, what? You know, just trying to write something. I'm like, all right, I'll write something tomorrow. Yeah, just bring anything. And we'll work on it. And we'll make it into something. You know, if you don't feel good about it. And I just ended up not getting a song on the record. So I just, you know. [44:24] Kenny Kirkland’s advice [44:24] But the thing that made me write and get over it was actually like when I was seeing y'all, When I got to LA, I was like, [phrase unclear]. I was like, man, I'm out here, but let me try to get something done. And then me and Kenny Kirkland shared that house. We shared a two-family house. And so I was always in this crib, and we'd be working on music. And then he just told me, he was like, man, you worried about all these rules, but you have really good ears. [44:57] I have perfect pitch. So if I hear something, I can go right to it and say, this is what it is. I can kind of get to what I'm hearing. And then he says something that I try to convey to students and especially drummers, because you kind of, when you play a lot of music, you have to hear a lot of music. So you, especially drummers, we're sitting in the middle of everything. And even if you don't, like right now, I could not sit here and write a chord progression, but I can write from chord to chord and my ears will tell me if something is right. [45:39] And that's what he was saying. He was like, you know how music sounds when it's right. So just trust yourself. Don't worry about, you know, I didn't go to counterpoint classes like that. He was like, don't worry about that. Trust yourself. And then I started trusting myself. And I started coming up with tunes and then my friends would play it and they would make something out of it. And then now that's how I go. I just think of something and I hear it. I write most of it away from the piano, then I throw it in Sibelius and it's about 98, 92% there and I'll go to the piano and somehow it works. [46:18] Yeah, man. Well, I mean, that's ultimately the most important thing because obviously now we'll get into it later, but there's a lot of instruments to now get ideas there, but you gotta have the idea in the first place. And even though back then we didn't have the technical stuff that we have now, what you just said, which is basically like the musical version of the gift of discernment, is real. I mean, there's a lot of people that have all this pedigree and I got this degree and nobody wants to hear a song from them. [46:52] I don't wanna hear any song that you wrote because it doesn't make me feel like anything, but I'm reading an exercise. So when you have that gift, that's the true creativity. The rest of it is the mechanics, but the creativity is what fuels the whole idea. We can get the mechanics to get it tightened up, but it gotta come stem from that idea. So you, along with a lot of drummers we've seen in history, Narda, you know what I'm saying? A lot of other drummers. [47:22] You know what I'm saying? That have done other stuff, have the idea, and then eventually the mechanics catches up to it. So that's important. I'm glad you told that story because a lot of drummers as writers, and we have a lot of drummer viewers, sometimes are always hitting me like, hey, I wanna get into the writing thing. That's the whole, I wanna get into the writing thing. It's like, man, can you write a song or not? If you got some ideas that are good, somebody wants to pay you for it. [47:52] So it's like, you know, it's like, it's one thing. People think that there's some grand plan that has to happen. It's like, no, all you gotta do is have some ideas that people like and they wanna get, people want to pay you for that and they wanna listen to that. So I'm glad that you, you know, mentioned that. [48:11] Mo’ Better Blues [48:11] Now, this is something new that I didn't know. Not only did you act, but did you score something in Mo’ Better Blues? Or were you just part of the score? Yeah, I'm just, you know what, that's a funny thing. It's kind of like we recorded all the music. So I just played on the whole soundtrack. Got it. You know, with Branford's group, with Terence Blanchard added. Right. And that was it. Right. You know, it was like, and I think we was recording one of the tunes that Denzel ended up reciting on in the film. And it's kind of like, yeah, Wesley Snipes came down the studio, then nobody knows who he was back then. He came down and gave us like a vocal track and stuff like that. I was like, wow, that's cool. [phrase unclear]. [48:59] But it was funny. We did the music and then it was just done. And I didn't I didn't hear anything else about it. And then I would go to Branford would have like next tickets all the time. And so he'd be like, man, come on to the game. And if he was out of town I could go and get the tickets from his assistant and go to the game and stuff like that. So we go to the game and Spike would always come up from course at halftime. He'd come up and visit. He was out in the air. You know, because everybody was in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. You know, it was like everybody was to get Chris Rock. Everybody was together. It was crazy back then. And so he came up one time and he said, man, I you to be a consultant on the movie." And I said, what do I got to do? And he said, I want you to teach this brother to look like he's playing the drums. I was like, really? [49:54] He said, yeah, you'll get paid, you'll get paid. And so I was supposed to teach the actor, Darryl M. Bell, from A Different World, [phrase unclear]. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, he was supposed to be the drummer. And so I was supposed to teach him and get paid. And I was like, yeah, I'll do it. And so then I didn't hear anything. So then I didn't hear anything. I didn't hear anything. So check this out. It's kind of like somebody talked with Spike or something and they determined that they needed a real drummer because drums are so visual. [50:27] You know, if you play a trumpet and you play a bad note, nobody can really see it. If you play trumpet. But drums, it's just like, boom, but it's supposed to be, psh, you know, it's messed up. So anyway, I found out later, he didn't even want, he didn't even ask me. Now I was the last person he asked. So he went, he was in New York and I think he had auditions and people told me that like Carl Allen and Will Calhoun and Smitty Smith and all these people went down and auditioned. [51:00] Nobody told me, even though they had [phrase unclear], my good friends could have told me, but they didn't. But that's okay. but they went down and they read for it. And I guess they was all corny or they couldn't read the thing, the dialogue, right? So something was wrong. So then I was playing in Chicago with Branford and Spike had flown to Chicago to find the female singer and to find a drummer. [51:31] So he was there. And I think, I don't know if you know my man, Steve Cobb, I think went down and he used to play with Ramsey Lewis, just a whole bunch of Chicago cats. Yeah, a whole bunch of Chicago cats went down and read for the part. And then he couldn't find anybody. So we were playing in the club and he came down the club to see Branford. He came down and I was at the bar and he was down in the dressing room with Branford and Kenny Kirkland. He said, yeah, man, we found a singer, man, but we just can't get a drummer to read this dialogue. And Branford and Kenny was like, why don't you just ask Jeff? [52:09] And he's like, yeah, I guess so, I guess so. So then he called me down, he called me down and he was like, man, do you want to try to do it? I said, yeah, you know, I don't know. Yeah, I'll try to do it. And so he gave me some pages from the script and he said, meet me in New York next week. Then come and read. So then I met at RCA studio and then I memorized it on the train. I was on the train, you know, it wasn't that much. I remember I came in and I did it for him and he just like, here's the script, boom. [52:41] I was like, really? It's like that? So it's like two weeks after that, I'm at a table read with Denzel and Wes and all these things. I'm like, it's incredible. This is like crazy. Wow. Whoa. Wow, man. Yikes. Yeah. That's bananas, bro. That's bananas. It's interesting too that he didn't just call you off rip, but you never know with these movie things who know what they're thinking, man. But that's crazy and ended at the right place. [53:12] Plus, nobody's going to pantomime your stuff better than you anyway. You know what I'm saying? When it comes to the play. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know why they didn't do it. Sometimes, there was a period of time when Branford's management was kind of making sure that was available for him. So some little things would come around. If it wasn't like something, I mean, it seems like that would be something where they'd tell me. They were scared it was going to go away. Yeah. [53:42] Yeah, yeah. Well, at least we got the real Rhythm Jones, man, with the Rhythm Jones authentic, man. That's crazy. Hold on. I got the drum here. Right here. Hold on. Oh, wow. Oh man, yeah, come on. Yeah, come on man. Yeah, that's crazy bro. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, and [54:12] Sonor, Vic Firth and the octagon cymbal [54:12] That that's good that you showed me that because it brings me to my next question, which is man you're playing the same stuff you've always played pretty much. I've never seen you play anything different than Sonor. Tell us a lot of companies that you rock with. Okay. Yeah. I mean, just Sonor and Vic Firth and I guess Remo. I haven't ordered heads in a hundred years, but I guess I can tell myself that. Wow. But that's about it. There's a whole bunch of other little stuff that you can get, But I just don't have the patience to do it. [54:48] But free drums are wonderful. Yeah, yeah. And no one ever, I mean, no one really used the octagon cymbal that Sabian had back in the day till I saw you use it. I mean, it might have been out, but it wasn't popularized until you kind of brought it back out of obscurity. You know what I'm saying? And so we see Chris uses it now and stuff like that. But that's all because of you. You feel me? So you don't have to even ask, speculate about that. We know that's what it was, because that's where we all saw it first. [55:22] You know what I'm saying? So it's interesting, because they just tried to bring something else out that's kind of like, if you took that and kind of made it in half, it's this other cymbal now that's like this weird ring. It's almost like they took one of them cymbals and cut it in half or something like that. It's interesting. Yeah, interesting. [55:42] AI in the studio [55:42] So now this is a question we were just talking about writing earlier. This is a very important question now because I love to get everybody's take on this. So what are your thoughts being one of the innovators, the legendary kind of foundation for a whole, several generations of jazz musicians, especially drummers. What is Tain's thought or what are Tain's thoughts on AI? Ooh. Ooh. [56:16] Either way, we want all the smoke. We want all the smoke, man, however you feel about it. You know what I'm saying? Ooh, I'm afraid, man. It's just like, I'm afraid of what it's gonna do to people's minds more so than it's taking over the world and killing me or something like that. You know, I mean, there's always, you know, before there were laptops, you know, if somebody told you, you know, 20 years, you're going to have a camera on your phone and your phone can be tracked. [56:51] You can make a movie. You can do this and that. And everybody can talk all over the world. You know, I will, you know, I wouldn't have thought it was weird, but, but I'll tell you, there's a sushi place I go to out here in Easton. And I was in there and this tune came on. And it was kind of like jazzy Brazilian or something like that. And it was almost something I knew. It was almost like a Herbie tune or something like that. [57:23] It was like two thirds of a song. And I kept waiting for the song to finish. And it would be like, what's a good standard? [standard unclear]. Then we go somewhere else. I was like, what is this jam? What's going on here? And so then somebody would almost sing a solo and they'd be like, do do do do do do do do. And then I would sit there and I'm like, man, this same song's been on for like 25 minutes. [58:02] And nobody realizes it except me. I'm like, the same song is just going over and over and over again. And then, I think I shazammed it or something like that. It was like free music from [source unclear] and blah, blah, blah. I was like, it was one of them. It was some early AI music. It was just like, please give me something jazzy for atmosphere. And so I'm more concerned about people because people were just digesting this. [58:35] This is like, well, all we do is talk over music anyway. So this fulfills the function. This is really cool. I don't have to think about it. It doesn't take too much of my attention. I can talk freely over it. I'm not missing nothing. Somebody just called me from a friend. I was recommended by a friend that we both easily know. And they called me for a session and there were some notable jazz people on it. [59:12] But I kinda, I didn't cancel on it exclusively because of this, but I could just feel the AI on it. It was like, okay, we're gonna play this track. And then everything was kind of like variations on the track. So it's like, well, okay, there's a version that's kind of swinging. It's kind of like a rock version. Like, and it was kind of like a Brazilian version. [59:45] And whatever, there was all these different versions of the same thing. And, you know, I just feel like it was like to develop like a rhythm bank of, okay, well, don't call Jeff; just get one of him playing brushes, you know, they already have it. Somebody already took anyway. But, you know, I guess it could help some people. Maybe they maybe they should just let doctors use it so they can find some, you know, some health cures or something like that. But yeah, I don't know what to think about it. [1:00:22] But somebody was telling me that it's restricted in some countries, like for kids, until they get to high school, at least, you know, they think for themselves. And that's good, yeah. Yeah, there's a lot of different legislations. Different states have different laws, even on the books right now. Stuff is actively being debated. I mean, it's very early. You know, you hear about some of the lawsuits or some of the labels and what have you and that are getting settled and then they have partnerships. [1:00:55] I think it's interesting hearing that coming from you who's such a creative force, but I do understand what you're saying in that regard, but I have to state what's the obvious, AI will never be able to do what Jeff “Tain” Watts does. So it doesn't matter how advanced it gets because the one thing as jazz musicians that we all kind of have is that we're living in the moment. So, and we're making decisions based off what's happening in the moment. [1:01:26] That's how come when you go see somebody play jazz, you don't hear the same show every night. So the thing about AI is it has to be trained, which means that it has to exist off something that already happened. So in a musical sense, I think jazz may be the only kind of safe music because in other forms of music, everything is so processed already, you almost can't tell the difference. But a set of cats really playing some real music, you could just feel it. [1:01:57] You could feel when the rhythm section has a thing and when there's a lock, it doesn't sound all perfect and sanitized. It takes you through emotions. You know what I'm saying? And I feel like, cause I'm on both sides of it. I completely use it every day cause I develop. So I have products out, I created my own DAW, I got seven plug-ins. Like I'm way about that life, but musically I get the divide. You know what I'm saying? Early on, like maybe almost three years ago, I did a full AI album just to mark the time. [1:02:29] Cause I knew this is where we were going, you know? And it wasn't for any, you know, I wasn't trying to make it a, you know, tour. And it was just to mark the time. And then I did one in January to kind of show where we've advanced in that short amount of time, quality wise, you know? But I'll say this, Jeff, you know, the way you play and the way you write, and that stuff's never gonna be able to be, even what y'all did back in the 80s, it's just impossible to get that type of rapport and that type of energy from a computer, even if it's surveying everything and training on everything, because even if y'all wouldn't have played it back now, it's not gonna be the way it was then, because everything in the world and in our lives was different, you know what I'm saying? [1:03:16] So, but I hear you though. And you know, listen, I want to, every guest I've asked this question on my show, so I have a very big piece of all these different opinions about it and I'm glad that you shared yours with us because your pedigree, you know, however you view it, listen, we gotta respect it, cause it's you. You know what I'm saying? So I'm a, I love that, I love having this conversation too, man, because it's like, you know, it's early, bro. I mean, we both lived through sampling. we both lived through drum machines, you know, and it kind of had the similar feeling at the beginning. [1:03:51] And then they figured out the money and then it became normalized. You know what I'm saying? So, you know, maybe we'll see where this is a year from now. [1:03:59] The Tonight Show [1:03:59] Briefly before we get out, man, just your time on the Tonight Show, that was coming out of being, you know, such a heavy jazz guy. And I used to come see y'all, you know, when y'all was at the hotel, what was it, the Bel Age? Bel Age, the Bel Age, yeah. That was when I was playing in Purecussion with the little collapsible joints and killing. Oh man, those days. To be able to just go see y'all at a club in LA is bananas bro. [1:04:30] People that don't know, when you were here for the Tonight Show, they had a jam session so you could go literally see Tain play every week in LA. Just mind blowing to think of now. But that transition, how was that? From swinging and doing all that, but then going to a lot of all the genres, having it cover all these different things. Like what was that transition like for you? You know, it's like, you know, it took me a minute, even though when I was in college, my palate was broader, I was prepared, my stomach played with anyone, you know? [1:05:11] But I got into it. I got into it. I got into trying to find the sound that was on the original recording. And, you know, yeah, it was fun for me. I'm like, you know, if I'm going to be out doing this type of thing, you know, just from doing that, I mean, I got to play with Little Richard and Elton John and Chuck Berry, R. Kelly and, you know, just like the Village people, you know, it was fun. It was fun for me. [1:05:42] It's fun for me. I like, you know, a lot of people, I'm not gonna say a lot of people, but some musicians, they want everything to be like, like right in their wheelhouse or a convenience for them or they don't wanna play with a singer cause the singer is gonna make them do something that they don't usually do, you know. But that's another thing that I got, I got kind of got from Kenny Kirkland. It's kind of like when somebody asks you to do something and you have to think about it and prepare yourself, You know, that's when you, that's actually when you're being a musician. [1:06:13] Yeah. You know? Yeah. You know, you're trying to like, you know, dress something up. But I got into doing that and, you know, messing with some electronics and trying to find a sound that [name unclear] would use and blah blah blah. Yeah, you know, I loved it. Yeah, that's dope. That's super dope, bro. [1:06:35] After Mask [1:06:35] Well, listen, man, anything, you know, I know you, anything, I'm sorry, my gardeners didn't get the memo if you can hear that, I'm sorry. Anything that, I know you're working on something, but anything coming up you want a shout out or anything? Yeah, yeah, right now I'm mixing this recording. I did a recording that was sponsored by Chamber Music America. They asked me what I wanted to do. And so I did a lot of stuff that's related to the pandemic, the after effects of the pandemic, people that died during the pandemic. [1:07:14] And this recording should come out at the end of October and it's called After Mask. And yeah, on the recording is Ravi Coltrane, James Genus, Paul Bollenback, Grégoire Maret on harmonica, James Francies, he's on piano and keyboard. And then I wrote a suite of music about George Floyd. And that's being narrated by Wendell Pierce, who was my roommate in Brooklyn. [1:07:47] Oh, wow. And then, yeah, and then I wrote a piece, I wrote a piece just like really, once in a while, I'll write something that has vocals. So I've done the vocals myself a few times. I've used Frank McComb and I've used Cy Smith and I've used Kurt Elling to sing my songs. This one, this one is like a nice uplifting song. And I've been doing some work for, for Darryl Jones lately, when he does a band, I've kind of been in his band. [1:08:18] So this will feature Bernard Fowler. Oh wow. But just, yeah, yeah. So I got a record, you work with Bernard. No, I work with Bernard, but I work with Munch though. Yeah. You work with, yeah, we're doing. Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, always cool. But what else is on there? Yeah, I wrote a tune in [year unclear] for the virus. I wrote something about, I wrote a salute to Ellis Marsalis, who died from the virus, to Charnett Moffett who died during the pandemic, to Wayne Shorter who died during the pandemic. [1:08:53] Yeah, the thing for George Floyd. And then there's also, I did something about the insurrection. Yeah. Beautiful, man. That's beautiful, man. Amazing. Yeah, I love that. Yes. That's awesome, bro. [1:09:06] The 1875 church [1:09:06] Hey, Tain, so I know you converted your crib from a church. Why don't you show me a little bit about what that's looking like, man? Okay. I don't know how to put this thing up. How do I put this? I don't know, but I'll just do it from here. But this was kind of like the original parsonage behind me. So this is a church that was built in 1875. I just kind of use this as my family room, but I'll take you into the main church. [1:09:39] Wow. What's the name? This is my own. How long did it take to do the conversion? You know what? The previous owner had a production company here. So he used to shoot commercials for the Discovery Channel and Animal Planet and stuff like that. but I'll just show you the, this is like a 300-seat church in here. Like that, you can see that. [1:10:10] Wow, that's crazy. Yeah, so behind me that's a, Oh man, yeah. New TesTainnt. Get out here, it's kind of like a stage. I don't know how much you can see. Yeah. Wow, man. Yeah. Yeah, look at it, he took out the altar and he built a stage. There's a pipe organ in here. Wow. And there's a bell tower too. Oh, wow. [1:10:40] So you like rehearsing there or do you just use that for recording or both? Or what do you use that space for mostly? I've made like about like eight or nine records in here. And you know, like some of mine, my wife is also a composer. So she's done some, I'm gonna ring this bell for y'all. Wow. The bell tolls. [1:11:10] Yeah, that's cold, man. That's cold right there. Wow, amazing. Yeah, it's coming in. Yeah, man. Yeah, I have fun in here though. Yeah. There's a pipe organ that you can't see behind the thing. It's very messy, otherwise I'll spend more time in here. Nah, that's beautiful, bro. That's a great space. Wow, the roof looks amazing and all the arches and eyes. Amazing, man. It's really cool. It was the previous owner. He made it very easy for me to get it. All right. [1:11:41] Yeah, thanks for the tour, brother. Appreciate that, man. Wow. [1:11:45] Advice for young jazz drummers [1:11:45] Well, and then for the cat that's now faced with, he's gonna get out of high school, he's gotta make that life decision, he thinks he wants to play jazz and he's a drummer, what is Tain telling him right now? Oh, yeah. I would say just be inclusive, study the jazz tradition, But I encourage everybody to try to chase everything back as far as they can, especially even to Africa or to folklore types of things. [1:12:25] But be open, and jazz means a lot more things now. So swinging jazz and hip hop-related jazz. I'm just saying, most music now is a fusion. And most of the most successful fusions are whenever you have as much information as you can about the two things that you're trying to combine. So I think that's a healthy thing. But just trust your ears and think about your motivation for what you want to create. [1:13:01] If you just want to be a music kind of business person or if you're really trying to... But this era means enlightening things and inspiration and just solid stuff. I'm just saying, if you want to be, I guess, a drummer or whatever instrument you are, just try to get into the history of your instrument. Because specifically talking about jazz and American music, we're talking about basically like a hundred years of music, you know, maybe. And it's kind of like if you were more of a classical person, then you'd be responsible for hundreds of years of music. So I mean, it's a lot, but then it's not a lot, you know. But just be sincere. Try to get some kind of mentorship. And, you know, just, I feel like so many things with music are taken care of by loving music. So, really, really love music that makes you really appreciate you have the opportunity to sit down with other people and work stuff [1:14:21] Out. It's a privilege to sit down with great musicians and work on music. So that makes you prepare as much as you can so you don't waste that time when you're able to interface with people or play for people actually spending money to come see you and stuff like that. It's crazy sometimes when you think about it. It's such a good thing. But it makes you be on time. It makes you practice your instrument so that you can get to whatever you're going to get to on the piece at hand. Especially with original music. A lot of original music, somebody creates something and they trust you with it. You don't have that much time. It's like you want to be able to get to something and bring it to life. So I just encourage people to have a balance between like kind of what we we talked about earlier, have a balance between being able to understand and calculate things and definite things about harmony and rhythm and read the music. And then try to be able to try to realize that the written music is only an approximation and that you have to [1:15:38] Take that and lift it off and put it up in the air and make it the magic stuff that we're talking about, you know, it's like, it's just a love it. Yeah. Yeah, that's the bar right there. That's the bar, man. Because like, it's on the paper. That's the starting point. But you got to turn that music into music. You know what I'm saying? Yep. Yeah, man. Yep. Well, Tain, man, listen, bro. I really enjoyed this conversation. My guy appreciate you man so much. We you know, last time I saw you we were up at a not this year, but last or maybe, yeah, last year at a, what's the festival up there in Rhode Island that just passed? [1:16:19] Oh, Newport. Yeah, we were at Newport. That's the last time I saw you, yeah. But, you know, but man, you know, you have no idea how many things I can hum note for note that you played on, man. Like, I mean, I think I could probably sing Branford entire 10, 15 minute pieces of his solo solo on [title unclear]. So you've been a huge influence to me, man, and to so many other people. So once again, thanks for coming on the show. [1:16:51] And ladies and gentlemen, none other than the incredible Mr. Jeff “Tain” Watts. Wow, I like that. I got to get in the middle of that, man. I'm a good man. So man, you know what we will definitely you know see each other soon man and man. Thanks again my bro Okay, so if you got value from this episode, do me a favor. Hit subscribe, drop a like, and share this with somebody who needs to hear it. [1:17:22] New episodes drop every week. I'm Trevor Lawrence Jr., this is The TrevBeats Show, and we out. It's The TrevBeats Show and we out. We out, we out, we out, we out. It's The TrevBeats Show and we out. It's the TrevBeats. It's The TrevBeats Show and we out.