Sex, Drums, Rock ‘n’ Roll: The Hardest Hitting Man in Show Business
by Kenny Aronoff
(Backbeat Books)

If you don’t know the name, Kenny Aronoff, you are sure to know this drummer extraordinaire from seeing him sit behind John Mellencamp’s band for years (he created and played the iconic drum break in “Jack & Diane” as just one example of his work with J.M), as well as from seeing him on tour with The Smashing Pumpkins, Melissa Etheridge, and John Fogerty. Aronoff is that kinetic bald-headed dude with the big wild glasses pushing along most every modern popular artist you have heard in the past three decades.

From country stars to pop divas to hard rock heroes, to teaching drum clinics around the world, to now owning his own studio in L.A., Aronoff tells his incredible story of hitting hard, making friends and working harder each day to create a brand that everyone wants on their music. His memoir Sex, Drums, Rock ‘n’ Roll: The Hardest Hitting Man in Show Business is fast, brash, complex and at all times entertaining…just like the man who wrote it.

From middle class beginnings in suburban Massachusetts, to practicing over and over, attending college in Indiana as a orchestral drum major, to meeting John Mellencamp (who was John Cougar then) to touring the world, then the second act of his life as a sought-after studio musician playing on countless multi-million selling releases, teacher, live player, we get it all here, with even some first person asides by people like Mellencamp, Billy Corgan and others.

You’re gonna eat this book up, be you a drum fan or casual music listener. Sex, Drums, Rock ‘n’ Roll: The Hardest Hitting Man in Show Business is great stuff indeed.