Jojo Mayer: It’s A Human Thing

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“Technique is just legwork. It’s not a paradigm shift for the most part.”

This interview with Jojo was the last one that I recorded during the Drumeo Festival in 2020. The night prior to this interview was when Nerve closed the festival with a tremendous performance that blew the minds of those in attendance. I have been listening to Nerve since early on – in fact, it was the Prohibited Beats album where I discovered them with the incredible tune “Far”.

Prohibited Beats was the first Nerve album release, but there were also major parties that Jojo hosted in NYC that he called “Prohibited Beatz”. At the Drumeo VIP dinner, he shared the entire story of how he was no longer allowed to host these parties, as people well into the thousands would attend. Look up the “Cabaret Law” for some nice casual reading. It was that among other contributing factors that forced Jojo to stop the Prohibited Beatz parties.

Jojo Mayer is a very creative and ingenuitive musician. It has been commented on many times before that Jojo possesses very high technical abilities both in his hands and feet. He broke down this technique in his two highly acclaimed instructional Hudson Music DVDs, “Secret Weapons for the Modern Drummer”. The first release was dedicated to hand technique and the second release was for feet. Combined, these DVDs covered everything you’d ever need to know about technique.

There is no question that Jojo Mayer is among the greatest drummers of all time and has been incredibly influential in music and the arts.

In this episode:

You will hear about…

• The message, “you can’t do that” and how Jojo basically ignored it
• How New York isn’t matching the creative output it used to produce
• Whether a musician who hasn’t struggled as much is missing something musically
• Jojo’s thoughts on “Rock n’ Roll”
• Jojo thoughts on technique
• How Jojo is concerned about the safety and prosperity of mankind

Why you should listen:

Jojo is obviously an expert musician and I love his music, but his interviews are always interesting, too. His thoughts about society, art, culture and beyond always have an enlightening edge to them. Speaking for myself, I find his words to be almost as enjoyable as the music he performs. Much like Frank Zappa in that regard. I am very happy to have had the opportunity to have some one-on-one time with a hero of mine and to have captured something of value for listeners.

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Photo: Ronn Dunnett

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