This year will mark the 50th anniversary of Carmine Appice’s influential book Realistic Rock. Modern Drummer has been featuring some excerpts from the updated version of this book (The Ultimate Realistic Rock) throughout the year and this will continue with some of the more complex sections. But we wanted to ask Carmine about the origins of this classic book, what went into writing it, and what makes it such a great book. MD: In 1972 why did a guy who helped invent rock drumming, was touring with Cactus, playing with Jeff Beck, and had huge success with Vanilla Fudge, decide to write a drum book? CA: I was playing with Cactus at the time, and I was home between tours. I walked into the Sam Ash store in Hempstead NY, I always looked at the book section when I went into stores. This was in 1971 when we all looked […]

August 2022 Issue