DAN NELSON IS SUING ANTHRAX

If you thought that release of Worship Music meant that Anthrax could finally put all the Dan Nelson drama behind them, well, you thought wrong. The New York Post reports that the former ‘Thrax vocalist is suing the band for a whopping $2.65 million:

Dan Nelson says drummer Charlie Benante, bassist Frank Bello and guitarist Scott Ian falsely stated in “numerous interviews” that he had “abruptly resigned” after getting sick, forcing a cancelation of a tour.

The $2.65 million suit also alleges that Benante last month told the rock-news site Blabbermouth.net that Nelson “was a bully.”

The Long Island native says his ex-bandmates’ “intentional defamation” has caused him a loss of income and damaged his reputation.

The Manhattan federal court filing further charges that Nelson co-wrote the tunes on the band’s latest album, “Worship Music,” but hasn’t gotten his fair share of the profits.

Insofar as the whole “Nelson quit/Nelson was fired” thing goes, I obviously have no idea what really happened — no one save for Nelson, the members of Anthrax, and probably a few members of their inner circle (e.g., their management, etc.) knows what really happened.

And I’m looking at the liner notes for Worship Music right now, and the only writing credit given reads “All songs written by Anthrax.” In other words, I also have no idea if Nelson wrote any of the album, or if he was just a hired hand. As I understand it, John Bush used to write his own lyrics and melodies, whereas Belladonna did not. So it could go either way with Nelson.

But the defamation part… well, the guys in Anthrax certainly have not been shy about smack talking Nelson in the press. Does that mean he’s owed money? I would assume they have a much larger platform from which to speak than Nelson does, since they’re Anthrax and he’s basically an unknown vocalist from Long Island, but… yeah, I need a lawyer to weigh in on this. If the things they’ve said in the press really are doing damage to Nelson’s career, I suspect he really should be compensated.

I’ll be curious to see how this pans out, and if it brings any new revelations about the whole Nelson/’Thrax split to light. But I wouldn’t be shocked if the whole thing was settled out of court, in which case we will probably never get to hear the full story.

-AR

[via Metal Underground]