I'm thrilled to have found Bill Bruford's blog, because stuff like this is just wonderfully inspiring. So many great passages to choose from, but I'll tease it with this:

Ideally the music is dictating what it is that should be played on the kit, not the other way round. In other words, what the drummer is playing is (should be) a direct function of the music's requirements; no more, no less. You exist to serve the music, not the reverse. So, super-imposing your latest lick at every possible moment only serves to attract attention, usually unwisely, to yourself, and away from the music.

Ooh, ooh, and another one:

Personally, I believe the art is to conceal the art, so I try to move in the opposite direction - maximum economy of movement, minimum of fuss. Understatement, elegance, economy. You know, that British thing!

A few weeks ago, a local radio station played an edited version of "Little Sister" from Queens of the Stone Age that interspersed Christopher Walken's whole "more cowbell" routine into the intro, which happens to have a really wimpy-sounding cowbell in it.

Now I'm listening to the first track from Audioslave's Out Of Exile album, "Your Time Has Come," and there's that same wimpy-sounding cowbell. What's the deal? Is this literally just a producer or two who thinks it's funny to throw that in there? It's so muted that it has no tone, and that just doesn't seem to serve any sonic purpose whatsoever.

This is a really odd thing for me to rant on, I realize, but if you're going to have cowbell, make it sound like a freakin' cowbell.