Yeah.. Fair enough.. Just wondered...

Cheers

Ditto...............The guy gave his best and gave Buddy ample notice. Buddy was a DDick for treating him this way!!!

Buddy was certainly one of a kind.

The simple fact remains that as a small business owner, replacing employees that are moving on or firing employees for whatever reason and dealing with the consequences is simply part of the deal. Being a band leader is just another form of small business. You hire employees (musicians, technicians, drivers, merchandisers, etc.) you make sales (bookings) or hire someone as a salesman (booking agent) hire business managers and personal managers, and deal with the cost of doing business (hotels, flights, busses, per diem, rehearsal space, personnel pay, etc.). No difference. Quite often, great musicians don't make good managers.

Debating what to say here. Buckie, clearly you idolize Buddy and defend his actions. I get that. But you really don't know the guy I'm talking about. And you're making assumptions and calling him mediocre, which is incorrect.

Either way I didn't tell the story to disparage Buddy. I think he's one of the best drummers to walk the face of the earth. I was inspired by him at an early age. One of the most influential moments in my drumming was the first time I heard Buddy.

I didn't think when I heard the story that Buddy was a Dck. I just thought that was the way he was. So what . It doesn't change what a great drummer he was. I heard Frank Sinatra was like that too. I heard Sinatra threw a pitcher at Buddy's head. So not every body is nice and friendly and has good interpersonal skills.

I do know this though. Joining a band is not a marriage. Anyone can leave at any time for any reason. I had plenty of people quit my bands and I quit many bands for a variety of reasons. Maybe he quit Buddy because he got tired of hearing Buddy rant on the bus. I had plenty of people quit my small business too, I never expected them to work for me forever. I only told one guy to F himself and that was the sax player. I felt bad about it almost immediately and I'm glad I made up with him.

Regarding if anybody ever took Buddy to the mat, the answer is...YES!

According to one of Buddy's former bass players: At one point, Buddy had hired a brass player who was a pretty good-size boy.

Buddy used to just mess with him out of the blue. For example, one day this kid came on the bus wearing a captain's hat. Buddy got in his face and told him to take it off because HE'S the captain on THIS bus, nobody else. I guess Buddy just rode this kid's @$$ any chance he got.

One day, they'd stopped at a truckstop and as they were all getting back on the bus, this kid came on eating a Snicker's. As he walks past Buddy, Buddy slapped the half-eaten Snicker's out of the kid's hand onto the floor of the bus. Finally, the fella'd had enough.

Whereas before, he'd stay silent while Buddy abused him, this time he said, "What the **** is WRONG with you, you (F-in)' ***hole?" Buddy went into the ol' Brooklyn, "Oh yeah, you wanna start some **** with me?"-thing and went into a karate stance.

This big ol' kid just punched right through it and blasted Buddy on the button. Buddy was out for about 5 minutes, though he later denied it.

After that, Buddy was the kid's best pal.

There are other stories that were told to me by guys I know that witnessed them firsthand (a couple that are rather disgusting, honestly) and these guys are convinced that along with his superhuman abilities, Buddy was a, and I quote, "an evil force in the world". If you read Torme's book, you'll get a bit of an idea why. Partially his own fault, but not completely.

Buddy prohibited drug use on his band, even though Buddy himself was quite a pot-smoker, but alcoholism was rampant in his band, supposedly because of the conditions they had to live with on a day-to-day basis. Just sayin'...

Buddy was a genius constantly. Intermittently, he was also either a great guy, or a total bastard.

Nah mate. Buddy was running a sweat shop and you know it. Thats why he was employing young'uns. He had been through the highest paid bit and was running his own show for his own reasons. It's a challenging life, but unless sacked for being c.r.a.p., a handshake and a thank you is cool.

Still love Buddy though.

Yeah, well I wasn't going to say but he said the pay was average, the bus wasn't luxury, and the rooms were shared, more like motel, not high end hotel, and most of the players were relatively inexperienced. But the trade off was getting the experience and Buddy Rich name on your resume. In return Buddy got relatively cheap labor who would put up with quite a lot.

As tough as he was on his band, Buddy had moments of kindness too.

After one of his performances, I went out to the parking lot and waited to see if I could get an autograph. His driver said he had already gotten on his bus, and since he had just finished a long show, I thought I was out of luck.

The driver must have taken pity on this 15 year old kid, because he went in and said somthing to Buddy, and next thing I knew, I was told to come on board!

The only people on the bus were Buddy, and an attractive blonde.

Even though he looked tired (this was only a couple of years before his death), he signed an autograph, let me have my picture taken with him, and even took the time to ask if I played. We chatted for a minute about drums, and off I went, with an everlasting positive impression of Buddy Rich.