The Trap Set will always be available for free, but we rely on donations from our listeners.

Please visit our website at thetrapset.net and click Donate.

Subscribe to our show on iTunes, and if you enjoy what you hear, give us a review. This is Joe Wong.

Welcome to the Trapset, where each week we explore the lives of drummers.

I want to play something for you. Tonight we ride, right or wrong, Tonight we sail On radio song

You're hearing You Reck Me by Tom Petty, featuring my guest Steve Ferroni on drums.

As a child, Steve trained as a tap dancer, but by the time he was 12 years old, he was playing gigs behind the drums.

Steve's first big break came

when he joined the average white band, which eventually led to sessions with Shaka Khan,

El Jaro, Duran Duran, Eric Clapton, Michael Jackson, and more. Steve's sense of song is

second to none, and his groove is so strong that he can propel classic songs without playing

fills or even touching the crash symbol.

For the past 25 years, Steve has been the drummer for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

As a member of one of the all-time great rock bands, he successfully honored the legacy left

by his predecessor Stan Lynch, while also helping the

Heartbreakers explore new creative terrain.

I spoke to Steve in his backyard in Southern California.

I'm not a smoker, but I couldn't turn down his offer to try a Cuban cigar.

And now our conversation with Steve Ferroni.

My father wasn't around, but he was a dancer for the Sierra Leone National Dance Company.

And my mother,

my mother was a factory worker.

...