The drummer Phil Collins and David Gilmour said is one of the best

Besides being an incredible singer and songwriter, Phil Collins is also one of the most influential drummers in Rock history, inspiring countless musicians, including the late Neil Peart. Throughout his career, he had the chance to watch many of his peers perform and was impressed by several of them, including one drummer whom Pink Floyd‘s legendary guitarist and singer David Gilmour also praised, even calling him the best drummer in the world.

The drummer Phil Collins and David Gilmour said is one of the best

The musician mentioned by Phil and David was the highly respected session drummer Steve Gadd, with whom Gilmour recently fulfilled a longtime dream by inviting him to play on his album “Luck & Strange”, even calling him the best drummer in the world. “We booked a week, five days with Steve Gadd, who’s the best, you know. The absolute best drummer in the world and I’d never worked with him before.”

“I met him a few times but always wanted to (work with him). (So) I managed to get five days of his time and he flew over to London. I had booked Mark Knopfler’s studio and I got the other guys in there. We had some songs we wanted to try and we spent a very intense week working on putting down those songs. (I was with) Steve, Rob Gentry on keys, Guy Pratt playing the bass,” he told Broken Record Podcast in 2025 (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).

Phil Collins is also a big admirer of the American musician, having mentioned him, in his autobiography “Not Dead Yet”, in a joke, saying he is a reference to every drummer, who often says he would have played it better in what they were working on. “It’s not easy being a drummer. I’ve heard all the jokes.”

He continued:

“I know that it takes five of us to change a lightbulb. One to screw it in, four to talk about how much better Steve Gadd would have done it. I’ve yucked along to the one about the drummer who died, went to heaven, was surprised to hear some phenomenal drumming coming from behind the Pearly Gates. (He) rushed to St Peter to ask if that was really Buddy Rich playing. ‘No, that’s God. He just thinks he’s Buddy Rich.’ I should have told that one to Tony Bennett,” Phil Collins said.

In a conversation with David Sheff he had previously mentioned Gadd as one of the drummers who influenced him. “Everyone from Charlie Watts to Ringo to Keith Moon to Buddy Rich, Tony Williams, Steve Gadd. All those are influences. Especially Ringo,” he told David Sheff.

Steve Gadd is one year older than David Gilmour and six years older than Phil Collins. However, he actually began his professional career later than both of them, only in 1968. Over the following decades, he became one of the world’s most sought-after and respected session drummers. He has played on albums by artists such as Paul Simon, Simon & Garfunkel, Steely Dan, James Taylor, Eric Clapton and Paul McCartney.

David Gilmour was impressed by how incredible Steve Gadd’s playing is

David Gilmour was really impressed by working with Steve Gadd, especially because when he watched him play, it seemed as if he was barely touching the drums. Yet on the final recording, it sounded as though he had played much more heavily.

“I think I just emailed his website (to get in touch with him). Polly said to me: ‘Who you want to play with?’ I said: ‘Well, I love Steve Gadd’. But I’m frightened.’ She said: ‘Oh, man up! Call him now!’ What’s extraordinary about him is that he is very light touch all the time. He’s hardly touching these things. When you hear him back in the control room they sound like someone (is smashing the drums). It sounds like someone like Ged Lynch (British drummer) is whacking the shit out of them or something. How he achieves that sound just by the feel, the touch, still baffles me,” he said in an interview with Gary Kemp and Guy Pratt (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).

Phil Collins already praised Steve Gadd back in the 1970s

Already in 1974, when Steve Gadd was still a young session musician, Phil Collins had already become a fan of his. In an interview with Ken CK at the time, he said: “There a lot of good players, you know. Like every now and again I hear of people like Steve Gadd, he does Atlantic (records) sessions and things. He’s a young guy, Joe Farrell, his band Joe Farrell Quartet, Steve Gadd played with that.”

“They’ve also got a guy called Robert Mason who’s a synthesizer player. He did an album with Steve Gadd on drums, He played very good stuff. People like that you know, you just hear them and think ‘f*ck, who’s that drummer?’ And you’ve never heard the guy before, and there he is, playing his head off.” At the time, Phil Collins was still only Genesis‘ drummer. A year later, Peter Gabriel left the band, and Collins began the process of becoming its lead vocalist as well. Curiously, Steve Gadd was part of “The Fugitive” (1983), the second solo album that Phil’s bandmate, Genesis keyboardist Tony Banks released.