EVEN MORE ANTHRAX DRAMA
Thursday, July 23rd, 2009 at 12:00pm by Axl RosenbergSome of you may already be sick of all this Anthrax nonsense, but I am not. In fact, it is entirely possible that I am enjoying even more than I am enjoying the Fear Factory drama. Probably because I actually care about Anthrax.
So. Reader Aleksander Sobecki sent us a link to this inteview with Scott Ian from Metal Hammer. I’m going to do very little editing to the actual text because it’s all pretty fun to read. I will, however, include my analysis after each chunk of text.
And away we go…
SCOTT IAN ON THE DEPARTURE OF DAN NELSON
“We stand by every word in our official statement. Because all we’ve done is make public exactly what Dan told us. He certainly was not fired – he quit the band, and we accepted his resignation. As for those comments about being fit to go on the road, and that we pulled the tour for other reasons…since Charlie (Benante, drums) join us in 1983, we’ve only ever cancelled one gig. That was in Düsseldorf in 1987, when Charlie was running a really high fever, and we had to send him to London for treatment. When we didn’t make it onto the plane to go to Sweden recently, to start our European run of dates, it went against every molecule in my body, and the same goes for the rest of the band.
“As a band, we learnt a long time ago that in these situations, it’s always best to tell the truth, If you lie, then it comes back to bite you in the ass. That’s why we were careful at every step to put things exactly the way Dan had told them to us. Why has he changed his story now? I can only assume it’s to save his own skin, and to avoid being seen as the bad guy. I can’t say that I blame him. But we have absolutely been completely truthful…
“…things were weird between Dan and us from December. I’d love to say a lot more, and I will as soon as I’m able, but right now, I just cannot go into any further detail.”
ANALYSIS: Well, someone is lying here. They can’t both be telling the truth. And, clearly, neither side is going to admit to being “the bad guy,” as Ian puts it. Not really knowing either party, I don’t feel like I can make a snap judgement. It’s easy to say that Ian is a dick – hell, I said it yesterday – but for all I know, Nelson is at fault. I’ll be curious to see if anyone gets the actual down-low on what happened.
SCOTT IAN ON THE RETURN OF JOHN BUSH
“[John] was the first guy we called when the whole thing went down with Dan. And all of us are delighted that he can do this gig – it’ll be great fun. Obviously, our set will be different to the one we’d worked out with Dan. It’ll be more oriented towards the Bush era, although still concentrating on our most popular songs. That’s what a festival crowd expects.
“[Getting John Bush back in the band full-time is] not in the back of my mind – it’s right at the front of it. When our reunion tour with Joe Belladonna and Dan Spitz finished in 2007, we (Ian, Benante and bassist Frank Bello) wanted both John and (guitarist) Rob Caggiano to come back. Well, Rob returned but not John. Now, though, we’ve Sonisphere to look forward to with him.
“I love working with John, and I know I speak for everyone involved with Anthrax – the band and the fans – when I say that the best thing for us would for this to turn into a long-term relationship. But I don’t want to jump the gun. Let’s see how things go at Sonisphere, and take it from there.”
ANALYSIS: It’s no secret that Anthrax wanted Bush to re-join the fold after the Belladonna/Spitz reunion ended, but no one in their right mind can blame Bush for passing after the way he was treated. That being said, I think I can speak for both Vince and myself when I say I hope enough time has passed that Bush is willing to let bygones be bygones and come back full-time.
Honestly, I’m still not clear why the fuck the reunion even happened. We’ve Come for You All was, from an artistic standpoint at least, one of the best, if not the best, ‘Thrax records of all time. When I saw Bushthrax tour in support of it, the show was sold out. When I saw the Belladonna-reunion ‘Thrax tour a couple of years later, they played a bigger venue, but drew roughly the same sized crowd. Go figure.
SCOTT IAN ON WORSHIP MUSIC
“Until we have a new singer, I can’t tell you what will happen to the record. We’ll probably change a few things on it, including the vocals. However, nothing’s been decided, expect that the release date will go back, possibly to next year.”
ANALYSIS: Honestly, I’m incredibly curious to hear the Nelson (not Nelson) version of this album, and I hope it either gets released in some capacity or leaks or something. If the songs are really that good that all it would take is having Bush or whomever re-record the vocals to have it be an awesome release, then fine… but in my “wishful thinking” world, they’d at least release the Nelson recordings as a bonus disc or something.
-AR
While Scott does have a reputation for fucking things up here, he’s being way too “No.. no.. see, we fucked up before, there’s no reason for us to do it again” for it to seem like he’s the lying one. Not that it’s completely impossible, but if Dan’s the one being a dick, then no shit he’d try to blame it on them (and could get away with it, considering his reputation..). If he didn’t know that he was done with Anthrax until they started cancelling shit, then why was the DanNAnthrax twitter deleted so quickly..
Something smells like shit, and unfortunately, it’s more likely Nelson’s ass right now, because Ian just showered.
Man, I fucking hate Anthrax. My least favorite thrash band of all time. Can’t stand Scott Ian especially.
Fuck Bush! bring back Belladona! AXL suck my cock dude! The reunion was great! I’m tired of Bush!
Hasn’t it been proven they just can’t work with Belladona? Also, a Bush tour would do just as well, plus, they can play more from their catalog. Belladona isn’t going to sing “Only.”
“AXL suck my cock dude! I’m tired of Bush!”
Ha Ha
Well, unlike Biff T, I’ve liked Anthrax for a long time and am also interested to see how this all pans out. I agree with Axl about wanting to hear the WM album as it exists to see how Dan did other than trying to watch crappy YouTube videos. As far as them releasing it as a bonus disc, if Dan did quit, why would the rest of the band want to release the album with him and allow him to get paid from the release or any residuals? I think the only way it will be heard is from a leak, and since I don’t actively search that stuff out, guess I’ll never hear it. The saga continues…
why can’t they stick with belladonna…? someone explain, is he just an ‘ollable cunt?
mostly because he’s lame and can’t pull it off live….
That’s not true. I saw the Anthrax reunion show in Houston, TX and Belladonna was great. He voice isnt as clear as it was in the 80s but it was still very good. Most of the other thrash vocalists from that era have declined alot more, except for maybe Chuck Billy of Testament who still sounds awesome even after cancer.
I saw his “solo” stuff awhile ago and he was awesome! id rather see belladonna with out anthrax than anthrax without belladonna
I never liked Nelson’s voice. I saw them open for Maiden last year and he came off like Bush-Lite or something. By the way, Bush’s wife has a lucrative commercial casting business and I don’t think he has a full time gig so I could see him taking this.
Wasn’t he the voice of Burger King for awhile, too?
Yes he was!
Nelson’s website is amazing.
Anthrax died when Joey left the band in ‘92. Period.
Testament’s better, and they don’t have all this band drama bullshit going on. You’ll have to wait another ten years for a record, but you know it’ll kick ass.
Anthrax is one of my favorite bands of all time, but I cant argue with you on that one. Testament is the most consistent out of all the old school thrash bands as far as quaility releases go.
It would make my year if Bush came back for good.
Does anyone know if Worship Music is anywhere out there on the ol’ interweb?
I don’t care what any of you say, the most solid Anthrax era was the Bush era, and no….they were not Thrash when Bush was fronting the band and that’s ok since most thrash sucks cock.
I think it’s kind of dicked on the part of Anthrax to give Bush the boot in favor of a reunion tour with Belladonna, if that is really how it went down.
This Nelson guy has really botched the whole situation up even if it isn’t his fault.
Maybe if Anthrax can’t get Bush back they should try a doing albums with several” guest vocalist” per album, since they can’t seem to keep it together.
Why can’t we find a way to clone Bush so we can have Anthrax AND Armored Saint concurrently?
BRING JOEY BACK! WAAAAYY COOLER!
I thought Bush was sticking with Armore Saint? And they were going to release a new album . Armored Saint last album got screwed because Anthrax decided to do Vol. 8 and that shot any chance for the Saint to get something going on. But since Bush was under a contract with Anthrax he had to go with them. Let Bush concertrate on Armored Saint and Anthrax go back to the drawing board. The stuff i head with Dan singing almost sounded nu-metal to me, i don’t like to think that because Anthrax has alway released quality metal and i would think this would be no different.,but i wasn’t sure. I just think what ever Anthrax does it will be worth the wait.
duefnikufesin!
Sorry about that.
Difficult of a nelson version release because he could ask for royalties and i don’t think that the trax camp will let slip a yearly check under his door given the circumstances of the split.
One weel for bush to re record the record and they will be ready to go :D
Bush should stick to Armored Saint. Bring back Belladonna for Anthrax. All will be well. The end.