Carl Palmer has earned his place in rock history as one of the greatest drummers of all time. But as the 76 year-old tells MusicRadar: “Time waits for no man, as we know.”
Palmer is currently on tour in the US with his An Evening with ELP show, with dates in the UK and Canada to follow in 2027.
“I don’t want to stop,” he says. “I don’t want to retire. I want to just carry on.”
But at his age he has made various lifestyle choices to keep him fit and healthy and able to continue performing at a high standard.
He explains: “You have to sleep more, you have to exercise in different ways, you have to have a certain diet. I mean, I’m a pescatarian now. I was a vegan for 13 years. I’ve had a few heart conditions, but we’ve managed to resolve those. Gone around all of that.
“I do a lot of yoga classes for the stretching. And I’m very careful about alcohol. I might have a drink once every couple of weeks. I’ve never drunk a pint of beer in all my life, by the way, or a lager, or even had a cigarette. I mean, I’ve smoked a bit of Bob Hope over the years, but not for the last 40!”
Palmer has one key routine to prepare for a concert.
“Contrary to some rumours, I don’t go to sleep,” he says. “What I do is I like to get my legs off the floor. I like to take the weight off my legs. If I can get my legs off the floor and lie on a sofa or whatever, that really helps me for about 15 to 20 minutes because I’m then really that much stronger when I go out on stage.”
He adds: “I do need to watch the diet. I don’t eat three to four hours before I play. I don't drink alcohol on tour. I sleep as much as possible, and I try to eat as well as I possibly can. And you know I have fish every other day. Apart from that, it’s like lentils, beans and vegetables and stuff. It’s not boring because I’m so used to it now.”
Palmer vows to continue performing for as long as possible.
“I don’t want to give up because I love what I do,” he says. “I’ve been doing it professionally since I was 16. So I’ve been doing this now 60 years professionally, and I started playing drums when I was 11, so I’ve been playing 65 years.”
He does, however, has one nagging fear about being out on the road.
He admits: “I don’t want to die in some cheap hotel, you know? And sometimes I don’t always stay in the best hotels. That’s all I’m worried about.
“It’s fine as long as it’s a Hilton or a Four Seasons, but if it’s one of those dodgy hotels, don’t tell anyone. That’s all I’m saying. Because it will be on the the obituary, won’t it? ‘He was found in a cheap hotel that was about to close down, and he had a cheap rate on the room.’ You don’t need that.
“My wife says to me now, ‘I might have to come out on tour with you more to make sure everything’s okay.’ You know, when you’re 76 you never know when something bad might happen.”
And when he says all of this, Palmer isn’t being morbid. He’s just being practical.
As he says in conclusion: “I even know where I’m going to be buried. It’s not a graveyard. It’s a kind of nature reserve.”
