“I think I see Denmark from here.”
Recently, former Saturday Night Live star Will Ferrell and current Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith engaged in a drum-off on The Tonight Show. It was memorable for several reasons, among them the two men’s remarkable resemblance to each other when decked out in the same clothing, Ferrell’s ability to lip-synch comically effectively, and the strategic placement of a cowbell.
Even more recently, the two decided to issue the collective challenge a second time. For reasons passing understanding, though, they chose as their target Metallica’s business manager drummer, Lars Ulrich:
Will: Lars gets pissed because he gets mistaken for both me and Chad Smith. He can settle that score now, too.
Chad: There it is. The gauntlet is down.
“No, Chad; that’s an island made of Danish krone. I made the same mistake myself.”
Ulrich, who, despite reports to the contrary, is a good-natured guy, has of course picked the gauntlet right back up. From SPIN:
It was a little lonely on the sidelines during the first drum-off, given the somewhat forced nature of the lookalike element between Chad Smith and Will Ferrell, when I’m TRULY the one carrying that dead-ringer gene around! As for any further drum-offs, I’m sure that with a bit of practice, I could give Chad a run for his money. But Will? That’s a whole different story. He rules the “bad-ass drummer universe.” I mean, you’re talking about a guy who’s so next level, actually, so beyond next level, that he may just be completely unreachable! That said, I’m definitely up for the challenge…Bring it on!!!
Which, in a low- to mid-level talent sort of way, actually makes perfect sense. There’s no logic in challenging, say, Brann Dailor of Mastodon, or Danny Carey of Tool, or some demi-god figure like Morgan Ågren. Those people aren’t well-known (even as drummers go), and the results of a pro-am charity demonstration would be…let’s call it “embarrassing,” to say the least.
It’s just a shame that Ulrich doesn’t have the chops of a Smith, or a Ferrell–or, for that matter, an offstage Questlove. Or, while we’re on the subject, of the Lars Ulrich of yore. He was never a fantastic drummer, but people forget that, for a long while there, he was competent enough to hold down the back end of whatever wonderful riffs Hetfield and Hammett came up with.
Still: it should be an amusing enough performance. And there are always memories:
