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What a sad story, a once gifted, in demand, and promising drummer, eventually convicted of murder, ended up passing away, alone, while in jail.
Jim played on some of the biggest hits of the 1960s and 1970s, he was a protégé drummer to Hal Blaine and at the height of his career Gordon was reportedly so busy as a studio musician that he flew back to Los Angeles from Las Vegas every day to do two or three recording sessions and then returned in time to play the evening show at Caesars Palace.
He has played with the Everly Brothers, Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys (1966); Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers by Gene Clark (1967); The Notorious Byrd Brothers by the Byrds (1968); and the hit “Classical Gas” by Mason Williams (1968), Joe Cocker, and he also played drums on three tracks on Alice Cooper’s 1976 album, Alice Cooper Goes to Hell.. He was a member of the touring band for Delaney & Bonnie featuring guitarist Eric Clapton. The instrumentalists later formed Derek and the Dominos, their first studio work being George Harrison’s “All Things Must Pass”. Frankly, it’s unbelievable the number of known artists he has supported. There is an extensive list HERE, a Wikipedia page we leaned heavily on for this article.
His story takes an extremely tragic turn when on June 3rd, 1983 he attacked and killed his mother. After his arrest he was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Leading up to the tragic event there were out of character violent events, and later it was found out that he began to hear voices (including his mother’s) which compelled him to starve himself and prevented him from sleeping, relaxing or playing drums. His physicians misdiagnosed the problems and instead treated him for alcohol abuse.
He was sentenced to 16 years to life. Periodically he would come up for parole but it was never granted due to him not showing up to the parole hearings. Gordon died on March 13th, 2023 at the age of 77.
