Jim Gordon, a drummer who played with dozens of rock stars and shared songwriting credits with Eric Clapton for the hit “Layla” but faced deepening mental health crises and spent the last four decades in prison for his mother’s murder, died at the 13 Medical Facility of the Prison in Vacaville, California. He was 77 years old.
The death was announced in a statement from his publicist, Bob Merlis. No reason was given.
Mr. Gordon’s collaborations have included tracks on George Harrison’s first post-Beatles album All Things Must Pass (1970); the landmark Beach Boys album Pet Sounds (1966); and Steely Dan’s 1974 song Rikki Don’t Lose That Number.
Demand for Mr. Gordon’s versatility – from bluesy backbeats to whicrack licks – was once so high that he charged three times the studio rate for drummers. It has spanned genres as diverse as Glen Campbell’s country-influenced odes (“Wichita Lineman,” 1968), Gordon Lightfoot’s folksy ballads (“Sundown,” 1974), and Frank Zappa’s rock-jazz fusion. Zappa nicknamed Mr. Gordon “Skippy” as a playful reference to his sunny suburban California upbringing.
Sitting behind his drum kit, Mr. Gordon delighted musicians and enthusiasts as part of the Los Angeles-based Wrecking Crew, a group of largely anonymous studio musicians who backed top stars. With his athletic 6-foot-3 frame — and his curly mop of hair that wags — he could put the skin-and-pelvis punch on rockers like Joe Crocker and Tom Petty. Or he could set hard-edged rhythms that defined a song.
His work on the Incredible Bongo Band’s 1973 song “Apache” (a remake of a 1960s hit by the Shadows) was discovered by hip-hop artists and went on to become one of the most sampled drum breaks in history. The 2012 documentary Sample This called the Bongo Band’s version “the national anthem of hip-hop”.
Mr. Gordon, who also played keyboards, has been credited with the piano-led second coda of “Layla,” which appeared on the 1970 album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs by Clapton’s band Derek and the Dominos. (Rita Coolidge, a singer-songwriter, claims that she helped write the song, but was denied credit.)
Even as Mr. Gordon’s reputation grew, his increasingly erratic behavior made other musicians suspicious. While touring with Cocker in 1970, he was accused by Coolidge of assaulting her. “It came out of nowhere,” she was quoted as saying in Bill Janovitz’s 2023 biography of musician Leon Russell.
Mr Gordon sought outpatient treatment for schizophrenic episodes – he said he heard voices telling him when to eat, what to wear and when to work. Sometimes he also disappeared because of drug and alcohol excesses.
The offers and gigs dwindled. In 1979 Mr. Gordon was in Las Vegas with Paul Anka’s band. After a few bars of the opening song, Mr. Gordon left the stage.
Just before midnight on June 3, 1983, Mr. Gordon arrived at the home of his 71-year-old mother, Osa Marie Gordon, in North Hollywood. According to police files, he struck her four times in the head with a hammer. She somehow survived that. He then repeatedly stabbed her in the chest with a butcher knife, police said.
At his trial in 1984, psychiatrists testified that Mr Gordon believed his mother was controlling him through a voice in his head. According to the statement, the voices sometimes made it impossible for him to play the drums.
“This is not a murder case,” said defense attorney Scott Furstman. “This case is a tragedy.”
Mr Gordon was convicted of second degree murder and sentenced to 16 years in prison. A then-new California law prohibited the use of insanity as a defense. But the judge, James Albracht, noted Mr Gordon’s apparent “serious mental illness”.
Mr Gordon was sent to inmate medical facilities for treatment for schizophrenia. Parole has been denied over the decades.
“When I remember the crime, it’s like a dream,” he told the Washington Post in 1994. “I can remember what happened in that space and time and it seems kind of distant, like I went through it on another plane. It didn’t seem real.”
James Beck Gordon was born in Los Angeles on July 14, 1945 and grew up in the Sherman Oaks neighborhood of the San Fernando Valley as post-war suburbs swelled. His father was an accountant and his mother a teacher.
He started drumming as a kid and built his first kit out of garbage cans. As a teenager he was in a local band making $10 a gig while also playing drums in the Burbank Symphony. He was offered a music scholarship to the University of California, Los Angeles. Instead, shortly after graduating from high school in 1963, he joined the Everly Brothers for a UK tour.
His fussy habits caught the eye. Even at a one-night gig, he would carefully unpack and fold his clothes in hotels. His money was carefully saved and tabulated – right down to spending on toothpaste – influenced by his father’s meticulous bookkeeping. “He partied like a rock star but managed his money like a CPA,” wrote Martin Booe in a profile in The Post.
In the mid-1960s, Los Angeles’ top studio drummer Hal Blaine announced that there was a rising new talent in town. Mr. Gordon soon had his choice of artists. He collaborated with Carly Simon on You’re So Vain (1972) and John Lennon on Power to the People, a track on the 1971 album Plastic Ono Band. The list grew: Harry Nilsson, Nancy Sinatra, the Byrds.
Later, behind bars, Mr. Gordon dutifully managed his ongoing royalties from “Layla” and other work that brought in recurring payments, such as the “Apple Jam” session with Harrison.
Mr. Gordon’s marriages to Jill Gordon, a dancer, and Reneé Armand, a singer, ended in divorce. Survivors include a daughter, Amy, from his first marriage.
In 1993, Mr. Gordon watched on television as Clapton accepted the Grammy for Best Rock Song for an acoustic version of “Layla” on his album Unplugged (1992). Mr. Gordon was credited as a songwriter in the Grammy program, but Clapton did not mention him in his acceptance speech.
Mr Gordon appeared to bear no grudges in an interview with The Post a year later.
“I would still love to play with Eric,” he said.