How the Eventide Instant Phaser Turned Charlie Watts’ Drum Kit into a Swirling Rhythm Machine on 'Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)'

The most surprising thing about the drum sound on Goats Head Soup’s “Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)” isn’t that Charlie Watts played it straight—he always did—but that the band decided to run his entire kit through an Eventide Instant Phaser. Phasers were usually vocal or guitar toys in 1973 (think “Riders on the Storm”), but here the Stones and engineer Andy Johns patched one directly onto Watts’ overheads and room mics. The result was a drum track that feels like it’s breathing underwater, each rimshot and snare hit sliding through the stereo field in a slow, hypnotic pulse.

That phasing fundamentally changed how the rhythm locks with the track. Because the effect cycles in and out, the backbeat loses its usual crisp, anchor-point feel. Instead, the drums sound like they’re pushing and pulling against the tambourine and handclaps, creating a slightly disorienting lurch that matches the song’s paranoid, street-corner energy. It’s a rare moment where production trickery becomes the groove: without the phaser, the song would just be a funky rocker; with it, the kit becomes a restless, living thing that never sits still.