Some time in the early to mid 70’s, we started seeing rock drummers with huge kits - I’m thinking of guys like Carl Palmer, Bill Bruford, Neil Peart, Phil Collins, Alex Van Halen, the drummers for Styx and Kansas… They would often have two bass drums, be surrounded with eleventy-seven toms and cymbals of various sizes, have a gong and chimes and other percussion-y stuff behind.
But who was the first rock drummer to have an oversized drum kit instead of a standard “Ringo” kit? Did it coincide with drummers evolving into “percussionists”?
Bonham had an extended drum set, I believe, but nothing comparing to the percussion section that people like Peart have. Even Peart started out small; I remember seeing an early video where he ran a standard drum set. Of course, that video was before they hit it big. They were playing in a bowling alley.
All I remember is that when Plant recommend John Bonham to Jimmy Page, Bonzo was known for being kinda like Eddie Van Halen with his Marshall amp: he went for his tone regardless of the size of the club he played. And given his kit and approach, he was known for being fucking loud (just like EVH would crank his Marshall to get the “brown sound” he was after, regardless of club size.) I read that Bonzo was known for lining his kick with foil in the hopes that it woudl increase the reflectiveness of the shells. No clue if that actually works.
My point being that Bonzo was certainly at the forefront of the escalation of drum bombastics.
Before anything else, I am going to acknowledge this. Well played
Anyhoo, size of drum kit may be a factor of economics. The story for Peart, and the rest of the band, is that after he was added to replace the original drummer on the eve of their first tour. They were given an bundle of cash and pointed at a music store. The instruments they had early were a reflection of how much they could afford. With more success, came better and for Peart more instruments.
Funny thing with Peart, he accepted at some point the ability of digital instruments to replace some things. His kit shrunk, to a certain degree. But for their last tour, the old stuff was back in, as well as a replica of the first kit he used on tour.
Hey!! Don’t forget: they needed money for those white silk kimono tops they wore!!
Yep, Alex famously used his money to buy a gorgeous white Gibson ES-355, which I think is the first guitar really associated with Alex before he moved on to the various other guitars he is known for playing.
Realizing I didn’t actually address the OP, the answer has to be Moon or Bonham. Even if they weren’t the first to have huge drum kits, they would have been the ones that set the standard and were followed by others.
Regardless of kit size, Bonham was a pretty high energy drummer. IIRC, during the Led Zep set of Live Aid, two drummers were used. Tony Thompson of Power Station, and Phil Collins.
Seeing Santana on stage, I was impressed by the wide array of percussion instruments. Of course, there was more than one percussionist involved.
Bonzo had the strongest whip action I have ever seen. He could be on a Charlie Watts kit and sound huge.
I have shared this story on the SDMB before: A physican buddy of mine in town had his own mid-life crisis rock band. He did charity events to raise money for patients needing work they couldn’t pay for. One was for plastic surgery for a Haitian family caught in a tenement fire and addressing their burns.
Celebrities came out including Anton Fig the brilliant studio drummer and longstanding member of Paul Shaffer’s band on David Letterman.
My friend’s band kicked off, with his drummer. Nice guy, good groove - sounded just fine. After 6-7 songs, he got up and Anton came out to applause. He sits down, grabs his sticks, re-orients a couple of things, and then does a quick fill to check out the rig.
BUPPEDA BUPPEDA BUPPEDA BAM!!!
I have NEVER heard anything jump like that. They sounded like gunshots, not drums. Everything stopped and Fig looked around with a smile and said “let’s go!”
I immediately flashed on Bruce Lee and his infamous “one inch punch” where he could go from 0 to Damage within the distance of 1 inch. It was SO clear that Fig’s technique was SO good that he could one-inch punch the drums, cracking the whip with his sticks.
I have heard many drummers, but very few get even close - to me, Bonzo is ground zero for that approach.
Bonzo played five piece kits, one up two down. Not a big kit at all. Buddy Rich, for example, played the same.
Ginger Baker was playing a pretty big kit in the 60s. Two bass drums, two rack toms, two floor toms, and snare. I believe Moon got the idea for a bigger kit from him.
I can’t think of anyone with a big(ger) kit than Ginger Baker before that, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t someone.
I think the Dead were perhaps the first prominent rock band to have both a drummer (Bill Kreutzmann) and a percussionist (Mickey Hart). Hart joined in 1967 and I imagine he probably had an interesting kit from the start.
If Keith Moon and Ginger Baker’s kits in the '60s aren’t considered big enough to settle this question, I would say that Carl Palmer in '72 is probably the earliest one I think we could all agree qualifies as “huge”.
