Parkway Drive's Ben Gordon On Teaching Chris Hemsworth To Play Drums: 'I Have So Much Respect For Him'

Chris Hemsworth—yes, the mega-famous Australian actor who portrays Thor in Marvel’s superhero universe—enlisted Parkway Drive drummer Ben Gordon to teach him how to play the drums for pop superstar Ed Sheeran. And this mad venture was captured on camera for the new season of Hemsworth’s documentary series, Limitless: Live Better Now.

The first of the three-part documentary series, all of which arrive on Disney+ on Friday, 15 August, is titled Brain Power.

Having decided to grasp a new skill, and a pretty challenging one at that, Hemsworth learns how to play the drums in Gordon’s home studio.

But, it wasn’t just learning how to play the drums for one song and in private: Hemsworth was challenged by Ed Sheeran to learn how to play the drums for his hit single, Thinking Out Loud, in front of 70,000 fans in a stadium. And he had just two months to do it.

While Hemsworth is “very talented, very good looking,” and “one of the most famous people in the world,” Gordon reminds The Music that no one can be good at everything, and Hemsworth “wasn’t very comfortable or confident at the drums at all.”

Gordon admits that he never imagined the possibility of teaching Hemsworth how to play the drums to perform with Ed Sheeran, describing the experience as “one of those random things that came together that you really couldn’t have planned.”

He adds, “But yeah, it is quite surreal, looking back thinking how it came to be, and the fact that it’s one of the biggest pop stars in the world, one of the biggest actors in the world, and me and my band, like other characters in the episode, it’s pretty weird, but I’m really happy to be a part of it.”

When quizzed about just how much help Hemsworth needed when Gordon was approached to be his teacher, he frankly answers, “So, Chris is good at many, many things. He’s very talented. He’s very good-looking. He’s one of the most famous people in the world, but no one’s good at everything, and he wasn’t very comfortable or confident at the drums at all, which is what the episode was about. Essentially, it’s finding what you’re not comfortable with.”

Throughout the remainder of the series, Gordon notes that the challenges suited Hemsworth more, as he could use his strength and bravery to swim through ice, climb a rope, and perform other impressive physical feats. But putting him behind a drum kit was an entirely different hurdle.

Gordon muses, “Something like learning the drums, you can’t fake it; you can’t muscle your way through it. You have to put the time in. So, yeah, he was very [much a] novice at the start, and he had to put a lot of time into actually getting to the point where he could play a song with one of the biggest pop stars in the world in front of 70,000 people. So, there was a lot of work to be done.”

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One of Hemsworth’s biggest struggles to overcome throughout the episode was keeping time—and nowhere was that clearer than when he played way too fast as Gordon’s Parkway Drive bandmates tried to play Vice Grip.

“That was so fun in the episode,” Gordon laughs. “The idea was to get him to have some experience with a live band, and, admittedly, Parkway Drive’s drum parts are much more complex than Ed Sheeran’s, typically speaking, so he was kind of thrown in the deep end.

“But that was the idea, because before that point, he wasn’t really taking it seriously. You just have a lesson here and there. It wasn’t top priority for him. But then, after that point, he was like, ‘Well, I’m still incapable, I need to put [the effort] in.’ And it worked, but it’s really fun watching the guys trying to play with him as the drummer and the anchor point, playing really fast… we got told by the director not to hold back. So, the guys in Parkway were kind of giving it to him [laughs].”

Highlighting the importance of a drummer keeping time, Gordon explains, “Essentially, a drummer’s primary role is the timekeeper. A lot of people wouldn’t know it, but all the other instruments and the vocals follow the drums, and if the drums speed up, everything has to move with the drums. When the drums slow down, they have to move with the drums.

“So, the drummer is super important—especially in a live environment—the drums kind of anchor all the other musicians,” he continues. “And, so, most people, if they just start playing the drums, their tendency is to speed up, especially [if they’re] nervous or anxious. You gradually speed up. I think every drummer can relate, myself included.

“[Sometimes] you play a show and you think it was really good, and then you look back at the footage, or you listen back and you’re playing, like, 15-20 BPM faster than the song actually is because your adrenaline so high [that] you think you’re playing in time, but you’re playing way ahead, which is why we and most other bands these days play to a metronome, so you can’t speed up.

“But Chris wasn’t playing to a metronome; he was just playing naturally. So, we had to instil timing. He practised with a metronome, and he practised with the song. But yeah, timing was probably his biggest challenge, and coordination as well.”

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As genuine, real-life friends for “six or seven years,” the lessons from Gordon to Hemsworth flowed quite well. “When he got challenged to learn the drums, I guess I was his only friend who’s a professional drummer,” Gordon shares, but he didn’t originally plan to feature on camera for the Limitless documentary.

“Initially, I was just going to help off-camera,” he admits. “I was just going to give him some lessons and tips. But as it turned out and it evolved, they wanted to film the lessons, and then I became a bigger character in the episode.”

Gordon continued, “I think the fact that I could just be natural—if they got some famous drum educator who, admittedly, there’s probably way better drum teachers out there than me, because being an educator and being a professional is a very different thing—I think the production team liked the fact that Chris was super comfortable around me, and I was comfortable around him.

“We could just talk like mates, rather than this potentially uneasy dynamic. So, they just liked that it was kind of a natural process, rather than forced.”

Fast forward to the night of the show, and months of effort and lessons came to a head in front of tens of thousands of Ed Sheeran fans.

“That moment was incredible,” Gordon recalls. “It was so much pressure from months and months of build-up for this show, to the 70,000 people. What I was reiterating to Chris, and what he mentions in the episode, is that you only get one shot. What he’s used to in the world of film, you know, very high-pressure situations, but if you mess up, you just go again until you get it right.

“But this was one shot, and it was a really intense moment of build-up. I knew that if he came in on time, he was going to nail it… I was really nervous. But when he came in on time, playing at the right tempo and the right feel, it was such a relief and such a good moment.

“You can see footage of me in the bottom right corner when he’s doing the performance. I couldn’t get the smile off my face; I was just so happy to see him perform. I felt like a proud dad watching, [thinking], ‘He’s done it; he’s won the Grand Final [laughs] or something like that.’ It was really fun.”

From having “no innate drumming rhythm,” as Gordon described Hemsworth’s initial drumming ability, to performing in front of 70,000 people, is a remarkable achievement. One that’s instilled the Parkway Drive drummer with plenty of respect and admiration for the famous actor.

“I have so much admiration for Chris for doing that,” Gordon smiles. “You know, he’s one of the most famous people in the world. He doesn’t need to do this series, but he’s putting himself out there to potentially embarrass himself in front of the whole world. And he’s doing it for learning, for growth, and to set an example for himself, for his kids, for his family and for the wider community, to show that you can achieve anything if you put your mind to it. It’s really inspiring.”

Gordon continues, “I have so much respect for Chris for doing that because to choose something you’re really not comfortable at and say, ‘I want to do this in front of the whole world,’ it takes a lot of guts.

“You know, I’m so comfortable at playing drums; I don’t get nervous. I can play drums in front of millions of people and feel comfortable. But if I had to go in front of thousands of people and say, play piano or something, I would be terrified, because I can’t do it. I’m not comfortable with it. So, it’s very admirable.”

Limitless: Live Better Now airs on Disney+ on Friday, 15 August.