Meet the Rhythm team

The Rhythm team

You've read the magazine - ever wondered how it happens every month? By magic, obviously. This lot are too busy listening to drum-heavy music or watching clips of the Alan Partridge movie...

Chris Barnes

Head honcho Chris cut his journalistic teeth at Portsmouth University where he spent three happy years writing for the student newspaper, interviewing bands and reviewing gigs (while studying Geography…). Soon after University he began working for Rhythm as Staff Writer. During his nine years so far on Rhythm Chris has put his hand to every aspect of the magazine from gear, to news and tuition, and interviewed many of his heroes including Vinnie Paul, Questlove, Dave Lombardo and Stewart Copeland. His fondest memories stem from various overseas trips to check out the drum manufacturers around the world, all for the benefit of Rhythm readers. Nice work if you can get it…



Drumming Experience:

Chris admits to having been a bass player but was thankfully taught a mean 4/4 by the drummer in his band back in ’97. He has since drummed in a variety of bands from covers outfits to lo-fi punk trios and gigs regularly around the south-west.



Top 3 Drummers: 


Stewart Copeland 


JP Gaster


Vinnie Paul

Chris Burke

Starting out on the NME, Chris moved onto Loaded in its mid-’90s heyday and then spent 10 years writing Pornalikes, captions and rising to Associate Editor before relocating to the West Country and hooking up with Rhythm. Aside from checking everything’s spelled right, Chris also writes features and interviews for the mag and looks after Rhythm’s website and social networking stuff.


Drumming Experience:

Chris is a bass player, though he enjoys bashing out beats on his Roland e-kit. Inspired by dad’s job and Rhythm magazine, Chris’s daughter Betty is becoming a pretty mean drummer at just 10!

Top 3 Drummers:

Brendan Canty


Bill Ward

The Rev

Rich Broughton

Art Ed Rich has done beautiful things with the magazine since joining the team in 2012 – just check out some of his lovely interview opening spreads and great covers. Rich learned his crayoning at Norwich School of Art & Design before working in Future’s art studio, and then on the PlayStation 3 magazine PSM3 for seven years prior to joining Rhythm.

Drumming Experience:

None whatsoever, but it’s quite hard to find an art editor of Rich’s quality who plays drums. But to be fair, he’s come along way since his inauspicious start on Rhythm, photographing cajons the wrong way round and referring to toms as ‘ground toms’ and ‘air toms’. Musically, Rich used to play trumpet. Grade 3 apparently.

Top 3 Drummers:

Animal from The Muppets

Chicken drumsticks

Dizzy Gillespie

Rich Chamberlain

Staff writer Rich does everything from editing the Gear reviews section to finding great new drummers for the magazine’s new bands section to interviewing the big name players and rounding up news stories. Oh, and he does loads for the website. And reviews all the hair-rock albums that nobody else wants to.

Drumming experience:

Rich was taught his first beat by his dad and brother (it depends which one you ask) around 15 years ago. Since then he’s played in several bands with differing (from none at all to very little) levels of success gigging regularly around the hotbed of music that is the East Midlands.

Top 3 Drummers:

Phil Rudd


Chad Smith


Tommy Lee

The Rhythm team

So that's the four staffers manning Rhythm HQ, but luckily they've got a little help from a handful of freelancers that make the magic happen every month... in no particular order, Rhythm's extended family includes...

Geoff Nicholls

Gear Guru

Geoff is as much a part of Rhythm as the bricks and mortar of Rhythm HQ. Got a gear conundrum? Ask Geoff! Aside from interviewing drummers and the aforementioned advice column, Geoff is one of Rhythm’s team of expert reviewers (alongside regulars Adam Jones and Dave Holmes), and each year trawls the National Drum Fair for great vintage kits with great stories behind them.

Pete Riley

CD Editor

Pete compiles and edits the Rhythm Lessons section of the magazine and produces the tuition CD every month. Aside from being a regular gigging drummer, Pete has a number of instructional books and a DVD entitled Technical Difficulties under his tutorial belt. Pete is regularly joined in the Lessons section of the mag by highly-qualified and expert drum tutors Mike Sturgis, Colin Woolway, Jason Bowld, Adam Bushell, Justin Scott and Erik Stams.

Chuck Parker

Our man in LA

Chuck is an LA-based freelance drummer and writer. His long-held passion for drums and music extends to playing, teaching and writing about drums. His geographical location has helped Rhythm secure a number of top-name interviews with US drummers.

David West

Our man in London

A drummer for nearly 30 years, David is one of Rhythm’s top freelance writers. He regularly tracks down big name drummers for Rhythm’s cover features and inside interviews.