As the longtime drummer in Red Bank, New Jersey’s Monster Magnet, Jon Kleiman is all about devoting himself to the song and playing exactly what’s right for bandleader Dave Wyndorff’s hard-hitting but ultra-melodic tunes.



“I’m self-taught, no formal education—I never learned how to do a paradiddle or whatever, and my left hand is basically like having a dead herring strapped to my shoulder,” Kleiman says, laughing. “I’m not as good, of course, but I consider myself to be in the Ringo school of things, where your style is your main selling point. In the beginning, I knew that I wasn’t great, and I couldn’t do the things that I heard. I was listening to a lot of Mitch Mitchell at that point, and I was like, ‘God damn! I can’t do any of this, so I’m just gonna make up for it by doing a fill every other measure!’”



Jon Kleiman started playing the drums as a teenager in punk bands gigging around South Jersey. He joined Monster Magnet after its first single and has played with the group ever since, progressing with it from the Hawkwind-inspired psychedelic sludge of early albums like Spine of God and Dopes to Infinity, through the more tuneful and focused efforts of Powertrip (a gold-selling hit for A&M Records) and the new album, God Says No. The latter is a veritable tour of different stoner-rock styles, from the straightforward stomp of “Melt” to the organ-driven garage-band rave-up of “Heads Explode,” and from the twisted Robert Johnson-on-mushrooms blues of “Gravity Well” to the Middle Eastern drone of “Cry.”



“I was never too into the stoner-rock thing,” Kleiman says.” I just thought it was an excuse to rip off Black Sabbath and not be able to write songs. It’s fun to jam on stuff some times, and certainly we’ve done it—that song ‘Tab’ was like 30 minutes long—but I didn’t ever really consider us stoner rock. We’re more creative than that. Dave’s songs—he tends to arrange in pretty odd ways sometimes. It isn’t like, ‘This song is really easy; it’s verse/chorus/verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/out.’ It’s like, ‘This song starts on a bridge, then there’s a pre-chorus, then there’s a verse into a bridge….’ That’s the only thing that’s a major obstacle or me; I just have to make really detailed notes if I don’t know the song absolutely by heart.”



Unlike many stoner-rock bands which emphasize the importance of group dynamics in the studio, Monster Magnet does all of its jamming in intense rehearsals long before entering the studio. When it came time to record God Says No, Kleiman played alone. “I think I played better that way,” he says. “There were no distractions, and by then I knew how the song went in my head so well that I could hear other people’s parts.”



Like many of his stoner-rock peers, Kleiman also has a side project, rockabilly/garage band the Ribeye Brothers. Original Monster Magnet vocalist Tim Cronin sings and plays banjo, while Kleiman does everything else; he says the group serves as a healthy outlet for doing all of the things that he can’t do in Monster Magnet.



Proudest recorded moments:

“I think I overplayed a lot in the beginning, especially on Superjudge. Spine of God was more psych, so I didn’t have to do that so much. As I’ve progressed, I think my style has gotten a lot simpler; my drumming has gotten simpler as I’ve gotten to be a better player. God Says No is all about the grooves.”



His gear:

“I used to have two of those piece of shit Vistalite sets—mine sounded like crap because the bearing edges were all fucked-up. Now I play out on the road on this really nice Slingerland set. I have a deal with them, and I love the sound and really like the look. I love that wide-open ’60s sound, but the drum sound that I like unfortunately doesn’t always fit into Monster Magnet. When I play at home in my home studio, there’s some changes I have to make for when I go out on the road. I’m using Aquarian heads now, and they’ve been really accommodating. I’ll use their American Vintage heads in the studio, and they’re really great for that ’60s sound.”



(main source: jim dero.com)