Personally, as a drummer my entire life, and having known many drummers in various bands in my local area, I can tell you categorically that Travis Barker is not exceptional in terms of technique or general skill. I do notice that he's very good at keeping time, and is a veritable metronome (from live vids obviously), but his patterns are nothing to write home about. However, he is drums in a niche, which calls for hard, non-dynamic, nail-on-the-head rhythms specifically there to drive the point home. He excels at that. But that doesn't mean to say he would excel at anything else. Put him in a jazz band and I think he would fail miserably, for instance.
While no one is claiming that a "good" drummer needs to be ace on every level and genre, I think it's important to realize whether the goal is being met appropriate, as a drummer. TB meets it in his genre and style, but on the same token, it doesn't make him a "great drummer" unless your scope of what you consider great drumming is simply being able to play your own genre effectively and above the bar set by it, in which case I would agree.
So really, there's a kind of subjectivity when it comes to this. It can be argued that TB might be the top of the chain in robotic, hard-hitting simple rhythms, but it might also be argued that complexity is a hallmark of good drumming, or that Purdie is the hallmark of good pocket drumming, when both are worlds apart.
To finish, I just want to put it out there that I don't believe the faster you play, the better you are. There are a myriad of factors involved, and every last one of them hinge on a style as it is suited to what's being played.
Really, it's like comparing who is the best guitarist in the world from the perspective of either solo electric in terms of Rock or finger picking greats in Folk. They're both guitars.
But to agree with those that say TB isn't that great of a drummer, we have to make the assumption that a particular style is inherently more skillful than the other.
If that's the case, I vote free jazz.
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