Video: Drummer Thomas Pridgen (The Mars Volta, Suicidal Tendencies, Trash Talk) Critiques Drumming in Famous Movies

GQ has this neat video series, The Breakdown, in which they get real-life professionals to look actors pretending to do their job in movies and then critique the work. So, y’know, they’ll show a therapist scenes from The Prince of Tides and Good Will Hunting or a military veteran scenes from war movies or whatever (GQ, if you ever wanna do one on bloggers, I can make room in my schedule for you).

For the latest installment in this series, drummer Thomas Pridgen — known for his work with such bands as The Mars Volta, Suicidal Tendencies, Trash Talk, Pinnick Gales Pridgen, and Thundercat — takes a look at scenes from films such as This is Spinal Tap, Wayne’s World, Bohemian Rhapsody, Whiplash, Step Brothers, That Thing You Do!, Drumline, The Mambo Kings, and, most excitingly, the 1988 Judge Reinhold/Fred Savage father/son body switcheroo classic, Vice Versa.

Along the way, Pridgen touches on a number of subjects you may find interesting, ranging from the drum solos of Motörhead’s Mikkey Dee and Mötley Crüe’s Tommy Lee (hey, those band names both have umlauts AND the names of the drummers rhyme!) to the massive kit used by Whitesnake’s Tommy Aldridge to the use of click tracks when playing live to how drummers are “usually just the most lit person” in any given band.

You can check out the video below.

Pridgen has had two releases this year, both of which are excellent — Trash Talk’s Squalor and SpiritWorld’s Pagan Rhythms, the latter of which is one of my favorite metal albums of 2020. Stream it at the bottom of this post.