Beat of a different drum
The drum rhythm baits the hook of "We Will Rock You." In sports stadiums, it begs for a game-saving touchdown.
But pounded out as a communal pulse from a sacred drum circle led by a one-armed rocker whose fall and rise is heavy metal legend, it becomes prayer.
Rick Allen, Def Leppard's drummer, is sitting under an oak tree in shorts and a T-shirt with one sleeve tucked inside. He is shaking an instrument called a cabassa and, with a bare foot, tattooing a bass drum set on soil that was once part of an Indian village and is now the Chumash Interpretive Center in Thousand Oaks.