Grumpy Artists

[ds1984]

The ear problem was in 2001. Matt stayed from 2005 until 2010 included. Must have been other reasons!

Then explain me why Jim is featured on both US recorded  albums The Ragpicker's Dream and Shangri-La plus the multi years sessions All the Roadrunning.

And strangely he whipped from the recording gang only once Mark started using his own London based recording studio.

If I am correct Jim had ear problems that prevented him to travel by plane making him almost impossible to be part of Mark touring band.

[herlock]

The ear problem was in 2001. Matt stayed from 2005 until 2010 included. Must have been other reasons!

Then explain me why Jim is featured on both US recorded  albums The Ragpicker's Dream and Shangri-La plus the multi years sessions All the Roadrunning.

And strangely he whipped from the recording gang only once Mark started using his own London based recording studio.

If I am correct Jim had ear problems that prevented him to travel by plane making him almost impossible to be part of Mark touring band.

Well, then why is Matt credited on 2010's Get Lucky? And Jim is not credited on 2007's Kill to Get Crimson. Studio and touring seem to be two independent things. All in all Matt was kicked out after 5 long years of touring. Ok, Jim is an outstanding player, but a bit more convoluted to my taste. Matt was fine to be. So was Danny whom I prefer to Ianto. Mark has strange and abrupt decisions sometimes...

[ds1984]

The ear problem was in 2001. Matt stayed from 2005 until 2010 included. Must have been other reasons!

Then explain me why Jim is featured on both US recorded  albums The Ragpicker's Dream and Shangri-La plus the multi years sessions All the Roadrunning.

And strangely he whipped from the recording gang only once Mark started using his own London based recording studio.

If I am correct Jim had ear problems that prevented him to travel by plane making him almost impossible to be part of Mark touring band.

Well, then why is Matt credited on 2010's Get Lucky? And Jim is not credited on 2007's Kill to Get Crimson. Studio and touring seem to be two independent things.

Answer a question by another question ?

You should enter into politic 

[herlock]

The ear problem was in 2001. Matt stayed from 2005 until 2010 included. Must have been other reasons!

Then explain me why Jim is featured on both US recorded  albums The Ragpicker's Dream and Shangri-La plus the multi years sessions All the Roadrunning.

And strangely he whipped from the recording gang only once Mark started using his own London based recording studio.

If I am correct Jim had ear problems that prevented him to travel by plane making him almost impossible to be part of Mark touring band.

Well, then why is Matt credited on 2010's Get Lucky? And Jim is not credited on 2007's Kill to Get Crimson. Studio and touring seem to be two independent things.

Answer a question by another question ?

You should enter into politic 

Well, I'm already in politics 😂
But, in all honesty, I didn't intend to reply your question with another question. Since you were saying that Jim played on 2002, 2004 and 2006 albums and drew the conclusion that Mark must have favored Jim over Matt, and was only waiting for Jim's ear problem to be fixed to call him back, I merely remarked that Mark favored Jim for the 2010 album, so that studio choices and touring choices seemed unrelated. Besides, Matt toured with Mark for 5 years, that's pretty long for a replacement! So he must have been fired for other reasons, which I have no clue about.
Btw, this used to be also your reasoning. I remember once you and I were talking IRL, and you told me, regarding Matt: "I wonder why he fired this one" 😉

[superval99]

The ear problem was in 2001. Matt stayed from 2005 until 2010 included. Must have been other reasons!

Then explain me why Jim is featured on both US recorded  albums The Ragpicker's Dream and Shangri-La plus the multi years sessions All the Roadrunning.

And strangely he whipped from the recording gang only once Mark started using his own London based recording studio.

If I am correct Jim had ear problems that prevented him to travel by plane making him almost impossible to be part of Mark touring band.

Well, then why is Matt credited on 2010's Get Lucky? And Jim is not credited on 2007's Kill to Get Crimson. Studio and touring seem to be two independent things.

Answer a question by another question ?

You should enter into politic 

Well, I'm already in politics 😂
But, in all honesty, I didn't intend to reply your question with another question. Since you were saying that Jim played on 2002, 2004 and 2006 albums and drew the conclusion that Mark must have favored Jim over Matt, and was only waiting for Jim's ear problem to be fixed to call him back, I merely remarked that Mark favored Jim for the 2010 album, so that studio choices and touring choices seemed unrelated. Besides, Matt toured with Mark for 5 years, that's pretty long for a replacement! So he must have been fired for other reasons, which I have no clue about.
Btw, this used to be also your reasoning. I remember once you and I were talking IRL, and you told me, regarding Matt: "I wonder why he fired this one" 😉

Matt toured for three tours - 2005, 2008 and 2010 not five.  I don't believe that Matt was fired.   He was working with Mary Chapin Carpenter at that time, so perhaps that is the reason he left.

[herlock]

That's why I said 5 years, not 5 tours 😜

[superval99]

That's why I said 5 years, not 5 tours 😜

Three tours wouldn't have taken five years!   You actually said Matt was touring with Mark for five years.

[herlock]

I mean calendar years. A good measure of continuous relationship.
And it's 4 tours, not 3. Matt is also on the 2006 short one. I really enjoy my Real live roadrunning DVD! 😊

[superval99]

I mean calendar years. A good measure of continuous relationship.
And it's 4 tours, not 3. Matt is also on the 2006 short one. I really enjoy my Real live roadrunning DVD! 😊

I also enjoy the RLRR DVD, but Jim is also there in the pre-concert part of the DVD with Mark and they both look pretty friendly together.   

[dustyvalentino]

Matt wasn’t fired, he was always only there because Jim couldn’t travel, Guy covered all this stuff in his diaries at the time.

Danny is also easy to explain, rightly or wrongly he wasn’t considered to be a “real” drummer like Ian.

Chad is the only one where there may be some controversy, even then Chad played it down in that podcast a few years back.

[ds1984]

Since you were saying that Jim played on 2002, 2004 and 2006 albums and drew the conclusion that Mark must have favored Jim over Matt, and was only waiting for Jim's ear problem to be fixed to call him back, I merely remarked that Mark favored Jim for the 2010 album, so that studio choices and touring choices seemed unrelated.

Err Jim isn't playing on the Get Lucky album but Matt is .

None of the UK recorded album did feature Jim during his break from the 96'rs.

Besides, Matt toured with Mark for 5 years, that's pretty long for a replacement! So he must have been fired for other reasons, which I have no clue about.

So in my opinion Jim was the n°1 on Mark's list and used Matt as long as Jim was unable.
But that is opinion I was not there whith Mark switched back.
And I ignore if Matt was available in 2011.

I remember once you and I were talking IRL, and you told me, regarding Matt: "I wonder why he fired this one" 😉

I don't remember I expressed that opinion with that exact sentence .
But is it correct that I did say I prefered Matt over Jim.
 
 

[herlock]

Argh sorry I indeed meant Matt, not Jim, for the 2010 Get Lucky album.

Anyway, whatever the reason for Matt leaving the band may be, my point is, there was also some turnover during the solo years. Nothing as dramatic as David leaving DS in 1980, but I think Chad is comparable to Pick. Both great drumers who seemed to have been fed up at some point... And Danny is comparable to Terry: Both powerful Drumers, both great human beings, but somehow not fully up to Mark's expectations, but called back at some point (the BIA tout for Terry, the last 2019 tour for Danny).

[rmarques821]

Matt wasn’t fired, he was always only there because Jim couldn’t travel, Guy covered all this stuff in his diaries at the time.

Danny is also easy to explain, rightly or wrongly he wasn’t considered to be a “real” drummer like Ian.

Chad is the only one where there may be some controversy, even then Chad played it down in that podcast a few years back.

I wonder who formulated that judgement about Danny. It's always been my "needle in the ass" issue with his touring band, the letting go of Danny to bring in Ian. I'm not in a position to judge Danny's technical abilities on the drums, but he matched Mark's sound like no other. He had the energy, his fills always complemented the song very well and he was just a nice guy to watch perform, always with a smile on his face. When Ian was brought in to replace Danny, Mark's shows lost a bit of soul.

Anyway, it's all water under the bridge now

[dustyvalentino]

My understanding (and as ever I could be completely wrong), is that Danny was a percussionist to trade, one of the very best. Then in the late 90s/early 00s he worked to get to a high level on drums, to the extent that MK used him on the charity shows and then he admirably stepped in when Chad left at short notice.

As to the earlier comment about Chad being comparable to Pick, the big difference is that Chad left, seemingly at short notice, in the middle of the tour.

Chris would be able to educate us on the consequences of that, but again we don’t know the circumstances, for example if he had to leave to deal with some sort of family emergency then you would think there would be a degree of sympathy. From memory he was touring with Neil Young shortly after.

And he had already completed two tours with MK by this point so you would think he would know what to expect.

All very unusual.

[Rolleyway Man]

My understanding (and as ever I could be completely wrong), is that Danny was a percussionist to trade, one of the very best. Then in the late 90s/early 00s he worked to get to a high level on drums, to the extent that MK used him on the charity shows and then he admirably stepped in when Chad left at short notice.

As to the earlier comment about Chad being comparable to Pick, the big difference is that Chad left, seemingly at short notice, in the middle of the tour.

Chris would be able to educate us on the consequences of that, but again we don’t know the circumstances, for example if he had to leave to deal with some sort of family emergency then you would think there would be a degree of sympathy. From memory he was touring with Neil Young shortly after.

And he had already completed two tours with MK by this point so you would think he would know what to expect.

All very unusual.

I remember an article from a few years ago where Chad was very complimentary of Mark and he made it clear that the issue wasn’t with him. He didn’t say what the issue was specifically, but I got the impression that there was some sort of issue with someone or something outside of the band environment. I would assume Danny was contacted to advise that Chad was imminently leaving the band and that Chad hung on until Danny was parachuted in. But there must have been some prior warning so that Danny could perhaps listen to some recordings of the shows and get some level of understanding of how to play his drum parts. But it was certainly an unusual situation.

And I have to say I was hugely impressed with Danny. He really brought energy to the mix. I recall Danny chatting with fans on Facebook a while ago and he mentioned that he and Mark had actually discussed Ianto during the Get Lucky tour, so it wasn’t like he was cast aside out of the blue. And later he returned on percussion, so it all came full circle for him.

To be fair, I like all of the drummers Mark has worked with down the years. They all have their merits. I think, broadly, they all had the right style and tone at the right time.