Named ninth-best on Rolling Stone magazine’s drummers poll, and part of the magazine’s 100 Greatest Artists list as a member Cream too boot, Ginger Baker curtly dismisses the idea.
“I am not a rock drummer,” Baker barks at Michael Hann of the Guardian, in an interview that can only be described as contentious. “I’ve never been a rock drummer. Cream wasn’t rock ‘n’ roll. No way in a million years was Cream rock ‘n’ roll. Nor was Blind Faith,” he adds before rattling off a number of other collaborations over the years.
“Where did they get the rock drummer bit from?” Ginger Baker asks, both dismissively and rhetorically. “I’m not a rock drummer. I’m a musician who plays music.”
While Baker’s five-minute turn on Cream’s 1966 debut Fresh Cream is credited with establishing the rock-drummer solo, he counts as his most important musical moments those alongside jazz legends like Art Blakey, Elvin Jones and Max Roach.
An acclaimed documentary into Ginger Baker’s complex personality and often troubled life, called Beware of Mr. Baker and directed by Jay Bulger, saw theatrical release last month. Hann’s talk followed a recent screening.
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