_Tim Alexander_

Tool drummer Danny Carey will fill in for Tim “Herb” Alexander during a few Primus shows this September. As previously reported, Alexander is currently recovering from open heart surgery following a heart attack last month. Speak with Rolling Stone, Primus frontman Les Claypool said:

The mighty Tim ‘Herb’ Alexander is a polyrhythmic Viking of extreme and unique talent so the one person that we thought could step into his shoes and do it justice is the one and only Mr. Danny Carey… Whereas Herb is the stocky, Easter Island-faced, boulder of a drumming human, at nearer to seven feet, Danny Carey is the mighty redwood tree of percussion; towering over his kit like a golden-haired noble spruce.

I can’t wait to see that menacing grin of Danny’s shine out as we pound our way through ‘Here Come the Bastards’ and ‘Those Damned Blue-Collar Tweekers.’ He’s a dear old friend and we are extremely excited to have him aboard, and I would wager we are equally if not more intrigued than most by what kind of sounds are going to come out of the three of us once we actually get in a room together and do more than just consume fancy booze.

Carey will perform with Primus during their upcoming shows at Riot Fest in Chicago and Denver, as well their late night gig at Chicago’s Concord Music Hall. Claypool told Rolling Stone that the band decided to go on with the gigs as a way to help out Alexander financially. He also noted that Carey was their first choice to replace Alexander because, “we figured it would be heard to get Stewart ‘Stew-daddy’ Copeland ouyt of his ivory tower.” Claypool also added that:

When Tim ‘Herb the Ginseng Drummer’ Alexander had a minor heart attack a few weeks back we were all startled,” Claypool says. “When he went in for an angioplasty the next morning and they said he needed a triple bypass we were all shocked. Tim is the ‘Ginseng drummer’ for a reason: He was always the non-meat eating, teetotaling, mastodon of a man who could throw a football over a mountain, chuck a curve ball at 89 miles per hour and could play his drums for hours on end without breaking a sweat, but unfortunately genetics and a taste for dessert have a way of catching up and kicking one’s balls. The great Herbinator has undergone his surgery and has come out with flying colors, but alas, it will be weeks before he can man the Primus percussion helm.

Primus are set to release their next album, Primus & The Chocolate Factory with the Fungi Ensemble on October 21. The record will be Alexander’s first with the band in almost twenty years.