Simon Phillips Exclusive Interview (2018) Protocol, Toto and more...

[@funklover24]

I heard Protocol last november and the sound was horrible. They didn't have a balanced sound because drums were too loud and the guitar coudn't be heard well. There was no real exchange between the band members because everything was focused on the drumming. But a never ending drum-solo is boring, although there is no doubt Simon has outstanding technical abilities. But his attitude seemed to be quite selfish. And there are some drummers, whose drum-sets are less than half as big as Simon's, but they get more coulors out of it. When I heard Simon with Mike Oldfield in 1985 I liked him very much because his role was more kind of supporting the other band-members. But this was not the case with his own project.

[@Fred_P]

I heard them last november too and I disagree on everything except Simon's technical abilities. Now what?

[@funklover24]

Different opinions for sure, may be different concerts.

[@Fred_P]

Damn, that was a quick reply... I want to add though, the band was miles ahead when Andy Timmons and Steve Weingart played. Greg Howe is terrible live (although judging by videos on youtube I wen't to one of the better shows) and Otmaro Ruiz really struggled on all of the songs, he wasn't even on the studio record. The only thing Otmaro played great was an interlude by Chopin, something he clearly has played many times in his life. Maybe these things made you form your opinion, but based on the wrong assumptions.

[@funklover24]

Well, what you say about Greg and Otmaro is what happens, if the drummer doesn't let the band breathe. There is a wonderful live-recording with jing-chi (Vinnie Colaiuta on drums) and Otmaro on keys and he plays awesome solos there. I saw Otmaro's face in the gig with Protocol and I noticed, that he did not enjoy the gig. Simon never managed to let go or calm down. His pressure was to high and he did not take care, what his partners wanted to do. Simon always wants to show HIS technical abilities, but there are very important things beyond that. This is an ego-theme. Also Toto sounds better with Shannon Forrest and I did not like them at all with Simon. I tried three times (1992, 1995, 1998, also twice with Luke's Candyman-tour) and then stopped going to Toto-concerts with Simon. Simon also did not leave space for the percussionist Chris Trujillo and his playing did not support the band as a whole. I did like Simon VERY much in a live concert with Mike Oldfield. This was really amazing.

[@Fred_P]

Oh I see. So what Greg is doing (screwing up) here is Simon's fault, completely logical... kzbin.info/www/bejne/r3W3oqpvm9qFgJo Maybe I wasn't clear enough about Otmaro. I didn't know him beforehand, but I could hear that he's a good musician. It was very clear however that the reason he struggled was because he didn't bother to learn the songs properly. He seemed to struggle more with the odd time signature stuff, maybe he doesn't have a lot of experience with that, I don't know. Ernest Tibbs, as a long time member of the band, had a good vibe with Simon and played perfectly all the time. So given that there was one player (Greg) who clearly needs 5 takes to play good on a song and another player (Otmaro) who hasn't done his homework, I wasn't surprised at all that Simon needed to take command of the ship so to speak. Lastly, I'm a drummer also and trust me, if there are band members that don't know what they're doing you can't let them take control of the song, you need to keep everyone on the right course, or the whole song will fall apart.