Steve Jordan | The Rolling Stones' drummer

When Charlie Watts died in August 2021, the Rolling Stones needed a drummer. There was only ever going to be one name, because Charlie had already picked him.

Steve Jordan had been Keith Richards’ drummer for thirty-five years by that point, and had spent the previous four decades quietly being one of the most important musicians in American popular music — as a player, and increasingly as a producer.

Here is a career that most people only noticed at the very end of it.

Who is Steve Jordan?

Steve Jordan was born on 14 January 1957 in New York City.

He came up through the New York scene in the seventies and was in the house band on Saturday Night Live by his early twenties, then on Late Night with David Letterman in the World’s Most Dangerous Band with Paul Shaffer.

That is the classic New York apprenticeship: five nights a week, a different genre every guest, no rehearsal.

The playing

The sideman list is enormous — Keith Richards’ X-Pensive Winos (from 1986), John Mayer (a decade-long partnership), Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Stevie Wonder, Sonny Rollins, Aretha Franklin, Bruce Springsteen and the Blues Brothers.

He also has a long career as a producer: John Mayer, Buddy Guy, Robert Cray, Solomon Burke, Keith Richards, and a great deal more. Producing is what he did whenever he was not playing.

The Rolling Stones

He stepped into the drum chair in 2021 and played on Hackney Diamonds (2023) — the band’s first album of new material in eighteen years — and has toured with them since.

He also played Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival in the same period. Drumeo’s voters gave him Soul/Funk Drummer Of The Year in 2023.

What Steve Jordan actually does

His feel is enormous and unhurried. Jordan’s backbeat sits back, and it is heavy. The band leans on it rather than being pushed by it — which is exactly what the Rolling Stones need, and exactly what Charlie Watts did.

He plays like a producer. Because he is one. Every choice is a mix decision: what to leave out, what to let ring, where the hi-hat should sit relative to the vocal.

He is a groove specialist, not a technician. There are no chops to speak of. There is an enormous amount of sound, and impeccable judgement.

He plays the hi-hat like a rhythm guitarist. Open-and-closed accents, sixteenth-note detail, and a lot of the funk in his playing lives there rather than in the kick.

He does not imitate Charlie Watts. He plays the Stones catalogue his own way — which, given that he and Watts were friends and Watts effectively recommended him, is the only respectful option available.

Steve Jordan’s drum kit

He is a Yamaha artist and has been for a long time.

• Drums — Yamaha Club Custom, often in a swirl orange finish. Club Custom is a kapur-shell kit — warm, mid-focused, and deliberately not a modern bright rock sound.
• Gretsch, on the Stones tours. He has also used Gretsch kits with the Rolling Stones, for a vintage aesthetic that suits the material.
• Snares. He plays his own Yamaha signature bamboo snare, has used the Yamaha John “JR” Robinson signature model on tour with John Mayer, and keeps vintage drums including a Ludwig Black Beauty to hand.
• Cymbals — Paiste.
• Heads — Remo.
• Sticks — Vic Firth Steve Jordan signature. Light and long, built for touch rather than power — which, for a man with that big a backbeat, tells you the weight is coming from technique rather than from the stick.

Every era, with buy links, is on Steve Jordan’s Rig Vault page.

Want the sound without the rig?

The Jordan sound is a placement problem, not a purchase.

Play the hi-hat with your whole hand. Open it fractionally on the offbeats and close it on the downbeats. That single habit puts more funk into a plain rock groove than any gear change.

Then lighten the stick. A longer, thinner stick forces you to generate volume from the stroke rather than the mass, which is where a big, relaxed backbeat comes from. Our drumstick size guide covers what changes.

And tune warm. A kapur or mahogany-voiced kit, medium tuning, coated heads. Our drum head buying guide covers the coated options, and the Gear Guru will spec the rest.

Where to start listening

• Keith Richards — “Take It So Hard” (1988). The X-Pensive Winos, and the definitive Jordan groove.
• John Mayer — Continuum (2006). Which he co-produced, and which sounds the way it does largely because of him.
• The Rolling Stones — “Angry” (2023). Taking over the biggest drum chair in rock, without fuss.
• Late Night with David Letterman, any 1980s clip. Him playing four genres in ten minutes.
• Neil Young — Are You Passionate? (2002). Him in a completely different register.

Final thoughts

Jordan’s career is a reminder that the most important musicians are frequently the least visible. Four decades of records that sound good partly because he was in the room, and almost nobody outside the industry could have named him until 2021.

Following Charlie Watts is an impossible job. He has done it by not trying to be Charlie Watts, which was the only right answer.

See Steve Jordan’s full rig in the Rig Vault, or read about Questlove — another drummer whose whole reputation is built on where the notes land.