Charlie Watts

Sad news about the loss of Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts.

Like many people I saw the Stones live a couple of times, once at St James Park in Newcastle and once at the old Wembley Stadium.  They were great, of course, but in those big stadium set-ups the band is so far away from you that without the video screens you can’t see much.  Much more enjoyable was seeing Charlie a few years ago doing what he really liked; playing Jazz in a small and intimate venue with an audience of a couple of hundred people at most.  He was playing drums with the Ben Waters Big Band and whilst he got top billing as the biggest ‘name’, on the night he was just the drummer with the band playing some great Jazz.  I got this CD a few years ago; recorded in 2004 at Ronnie Scotts where he played with his ten piece band.  If you like good modern Jazz I’d heartily recommend it; if you’re looking for Stones music played differently, don’t bother.