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Interview with Ray Luzier - Korn
Ray Luzier Ever wondered where your passion, determination and self belief can take you? Ray Luzier is a shining example of a drummer who has lived through his love for music and drumming. Not losing his focus, he has toiled throughout his drumming career to now taking residency as a permanent band member in ‘Korn’ one of the most respected and creative bands in metal and a prestigious seat in rock/metal circles. His previous 8 year residence with David Lee Roth has given him a respected touring experience and the Army of Anyone has developed his creativity not only as a drummer but a musician. Graduating from the Musicians Institute in Hollywood in 1989 and taking on the role as one of the tutors for PIT from 1992 – 2001, he’s managed to stamp his own brand of drumming to the admiration of his peers and audience. His distinctive drumming flair, especially his hand and foot techniques, are staggering and have reached signature levels - to have a greater insight to his drumming technique, his very own instructional DVD “Double Bass Drum Techniques, Hand & Foot Coordination, Drum Fills and Warm-Up Exercises” is highly recommended. Drummer Live in 2008 saw him perform his first drumming festival in the U.K. to the acclaim of the drumming media. Ray took time out in his heavy press schedule at Download 09 to chat and catch up. |
It’s your first Download, what are you’re first impressions? It’s huge!!! Pulling in hear I was like ‘Wow’ that’s a lot of people, tents set up everywhere, buses everywhere and a great line-up with some great music going on – it’s awesome!!! So tell me about your involvement with Korn I got the gig with Korn in October 07. As you know they had several fill-in drummers. Terry Bozzio played on most of the last record, Joey Jordinson from Slipknot was filling in on the tour. I knew Joey was leaving and my last band, Army Of Anyone, with Robert and Dean DeLeo from Stone Temple Pilots and Richard Patrick from Filter, were disbanding at that time. Our management for Army Of Anyone was Korn’s management so I said I was interested. I found out later that Jonathan Davis heard the Army Of Anyone record and asked who was the drummer. Coincidently, they said “Why don’t we have Ray come up to Joey’s last gig in Seattle and see what happens?”. So I went up played 6 songs with them at soundcheck in a big giant empty arena at 12:00 noon in Seattle and after that he said ‘Welcome to Korn and we’ll see you in Dublin’. So January 08 we started our 35 country tour. How challenging were the drum parts and how much freedom does Jonathan Davis give you in the writing and creating process of Korn? I’m very respectful and been so fortunate like all the bands I’ve been with from David Lee Roth to Army Of Anyone, they’ve given me the rhythmic freedom to inject my own contribution – I play a lot of those Van Halen songs and of course, there are signature drum parts that are there and you have to play them as a drummer but I’ve been fortunate enough that a lot of artists let me be Ray Luzier, they let me be me. With Army, they like something that I do and they don’t just want me to copy what’s on the record. So with Korn, there’s no new songs yet; like next year’s tour I’ll be playing songs that I recorded with but right now, I respect David Silvera’s drum parts – I think he’s really creative as a drummer. We’re quite different drummers, we’re nothing alike but I wanted to play a lot of his signature fills, but the band wants me to be me and that gives me the freedom to inject energy and express emotion. |
Funnily enough it’s something I was going to ask you, how much of it is emulated and how much of it is Ray Luzier? I don’t the percentage but all I can say that it became my own thing and after several months of touring you kinda evolve into it. I’ve watched video tapes from the early shows and the later shows and wow, I really change that up or this up. But for it to work you have to really feel the band and get inside it. With Korn it’s such a unique different band, their tunings are really different, the way Jonathan sings, no one plays like that; they’re not a hard rock heavy metal band and it really is so powerful and I try to bring as much power as I can but fused with creative playing. I try not to overdo it and draw attention to myself, I just strive to put it up a couple or more notches and take it to another level and that’s hopefully what I’m doing and they let me do that and give me the freedom to energise the songs in my own way. Your drumming with David Lee Roth and Korn stylistically are poles apart. I would imagine with Korn you would have introduced more tonal structure and of course, visually your drum set-up has completely changed so that must make a difference, let’s talk a little bit about that. |
Absolutely. The cool thing about it is we’re writing with Ross [Robinson, producer] and he is such a unique producer and he’s bringing different drumming ideas out of me for the new record – it’s really pushing me. Certain things like I would do a double kick pattern and he would say now play that with one foot. I would go “Whoa! but it’s more comfortable” and he says “I know it’s more comfortable, that’s why I don’t want you to play it and play it with one foot”. I’m like “Wow”, different wacky things like that and I walk away hurting some days, I’m not use to doing that!!! I love it when people push me and challenge me and that brings the best out of me – I have no ego attitude but I love when people say, I want you to try this, I’ll try anything; I may not like it but I will try it especially coming from someone I really respect. |
Now as for my kit, it’s totally different as you pointed out. My current stage kit is completely different to my European kit and this kit I’m using at Download is kinda what I’m all about but the United States kit we couldn’t bring over here, it’s way too monstrous with the rack and the cage and all. It’s pretty crazy with all kinds of electronics, gong bass drums and stuff. I have a good amount of that here but I have an acrylic kit tonight. There’s no triggers, the only this I trigger is the kick drum ‘cause the guys like to hear that triggered sound on stage but coming through front of house nothing is triggered, nothing is artificial. I have two Roland pads on the side that I use for different side sticks and various things like but everything else is purely organic. When and what are the Korn fans to expect from the next Korn album? Date wise we don’t exactly know when it’s coming out but we’re heavily working on it. We’re in the studio now with Ross Robinson, he did the first two Korn records and he’s done some amazing work from Slipknot to The Cure, etc – he’s done so many great records. I’m very excited about getting in the studio with him. Right now we are half way through writing it, so far all I have to say is that it’s brutal - it’s very old school. Now I heard we are going to try and record with no click track and I love that which is really weird in this day and age. Everyone uses click tracks and they fix drums up and stuff but Ross is completely the opposite. He wants to record drums with 2” tape (old school), whereas you don’t punch in anything and if you mess up in a song you go back and start from the beginning. For me, I really love that and I really miss a little glitch here, a little mistake there because we’re humans we’re not machines. I love it when the song bends and the timing slows down and pushes here. I’ll fix a mistake don’t get me wrong but I can’t wait in the studio and do this and I hope there’s glitches on it ‘cause we’re human, our hearts beat and we breathe at different rates, we’re really not machines. |
I do sessions a lot in L.A. and when I get a record back I can tell whether they’ve fixed it in 3 bars, I can listen to it and hear whether they’ve fixed the drums or they would lock this out. I do movie soundtracks and they like to lock it up, they really want it that perfect and don’t get me wrong I understand that. But when you’re doing a record that’s in your face which such great writers from Korn, I want that to be as raw as possible. I can tell this record for the fans is going to be old school – if you’re a fan of the first couple of Korn records, you’re gonna love this. It’s very rare to see this in metal music ‘cause everything is so precise purely because in some cases, the speed element that takes place needs that precision but a lot of it arguably may end up being over produced that it leans towards it sounding too clinical and less organic, would you agree? That’s completely my point. It kinda bums me out, like in my last band Army of Anyone the producer Bob Ezrin, he was adamant; now if there was a little glitch on there he would around and say “hey, that’s the way it’s supposed to be”. You know, there is a beauty about that, it may not be a mistake, it might be sticks clicking or something. Now if you break a stick or if you flat out mess up a fill then sure you punch it in. I’m really proud of that last record, it’s probably my favourite record that I played on ‘cause the band come from old style playing and they love that old school Led Zeppelin stuff and so do I. That stuff allows you to play through your heart and I’m a schooled musician, I taught at PIT and at the Musicians Institute in Hollywood but I play ‘street’ you know what I’m saying. I know how to read music but that doesn’t mean I’m a robot player – play from the heart!!! Equipment: Hardware and Pedals: DW Electronics: Roland For more information: Interview Jerome Marcus Photography: Jerome Marcus |
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