via Brandon Wenerd
Audio By Carbonatix
My dad was a high school band director for 30 years. And let me tell you, the man loved a good drummer joke. He had a million of them, each one more groan-inducing than the last.
“How can you tell a drummer is at your door? The knocking speeds up.”
Classic. It was his way of paying respect to the dudes and dudettes in the back who pound things like cavemen for a living.
It’s a sacred tradition in music, right up there with guitarists having unnecessarily large pedalboards and singers asking “How you doin’ out there?!” to a half-empty bar. The drummer joke is a rite of passage. It’s the great equalizer. You could be the most technically proficient prog-rock god on the planet, but unlike a savings bond, there’s no guarantee you’ll ever mature and make money.
So when I got the chance to sit down with John Hoffman, the guy who won the rock and roll lottery to become the new drummer for Primus, I knew what I had to do. After hearing about his absolutely insane journey from hustling local gigs to playing sold-out shows with his heroes, I couldn’t let him leave without a proper welcome to the big leagues.
I hit him with a laundry list of the dumbest, most classic drummer jokes I could find.
Check out the clip below to see a good sport in action above, and then be sure to watch our full conversation about his ride to joining one of the most legendary bands of all time.