METALSUCKS Interviews ANTHRAX's JOEY BELLADONNA
[Press Release]
MetalSucks writer Anso DF recently interviewed ANTHRAX singer Joey Belladonna about his return to the band. Belladonna spoke about what it's been like to replace ex-singer John Bush and the band's plans for "Worship Music," the shelved album they recorded with ex-singer Dan Nelson. An excerpt follows:
It’s been reported that some material from theWorship Music album will feature new vocals from you, and other songs will be totally new. Is that accurate?
Yeah, there’s going to be some new songs for sure. I’m banking on all that happening. And some tweaking, re-doing, and re-structuring – anything that needs to be done. There are some songs that really are quite well done. I’ll do one [in concert on this tour]. I did my part on it. It had the outer boundaries intact, so it was just a matter of getting in there, refreshing it, and putting the stamp on it. But there are a bunch of songs like that – four, five, six – that’s alright too.
One point that gets lost in the discussion is that the changes in Anthrax aren’t limited to singers; there’s also a move back to pre-Bush Anthrax sound.
Right now, I haven’t heard a whole lot of the songs. I’ve had some stuff in the past that I’ve checked out. I wasn’t certain about what style was coming down, but yeah the approach is little older school, but definitely with some of the newer twists. You know, all of the above. I don’t know if one’s more than the other. I haven’t heard enough of it yet. We haven’t gone into too much pre-production for me to verify that.
So you haven’t heard all of what they’d finished?
No.
That’s kinda interesting. I’m surprised by that. It seems like it will be a tough record to release because it’s going to be so totally scrutinized.
Oh yeah. It’s gonna be one of those things. About your question earlier, about reservations about things – that’s the third thing. Maybe not in that order. It sucks that you’re in this line of fire where it’s like ‘He did this, he was that’ … who cares. He did that, now I’m back. I do what I do, and he did what he did. He’s different, I’m different, and that’s it. It stinks when you gotta be held to a certain standard. John might’ve had the same [experience]. I don’t know. It’s something that I really didn’t have to do early on. You are who you are. If you like the band, you like the way we do things, then cool. But now you got ‘Well, I liked it when he…’ and all that [groans]. I have to disregard a lot of it, because you know what? I can only do what I do and hopefully they dig it.
See, I’m positive John Bush went through that too, because I was among those who put him through it. It was upsetting that overnight Anthrax lost so much color. And I stood there, looking at John and thinking ‘This really isn’t the same thing.’
It wasn’t. There was no way around it. And then I come back in, and I don’t want to be that guy who has to take that spot of what you’re doing. I want to do what I did before where you let me do my thing and you dig what I do. I have a different route that I can take, a style. A different approach. The word ‘heavy’ sometimes is a little weird. What’s heavy, you know? Look how I sing – it’s melody, it’s quality, it’s range. It’s tone. There are certain things that go with vocals versus just yelling hard and screaming.
MetalSucks writer Anso DF recently interviewed ANTHRAX singer Joey Belladonna about his return to the band. Belladonna spoke about what it's been like to replace ex-singer John Bush and the band's plans for "Worship Music," the shelved album they recorded with ex-singer Dan Nelson. An excerpt follows:It’s been reported that some material from theWorship Music album will feature new vocals from you, and other songs will be totally new. Is that accurate?
Yeah, there’s going to be some new songs for sure. I’m banking on all that happening. And some tweaking, re-doing, and re-structuring – anything that needs to be done. There are some songs that really are quite well done. I’ll do one [in concert on this tour]. I did my part on it. It had the outer boundaries intact, so it was just a matter of getting in there, refreshing it, and putting the stamp on it. But there are a bunch of songs like that – four, five, six – that’s alright too.
One point that gets lost in the discussion is that the changes in Anthrax aren’t limited to singers; there’s also a move back to pre-Bush Anthrax sound.
Right now, I haven’t heard a whole lot of the songs. I’ve had some stuff in the past that I’ve checked out. I wasn’t certain about what style was coming down, but yeah the approach is little older school, but definitely with some of the newer twists. You know, all of the above. I don’t know if one’s more than the other. I haven’t heard enough of it yet. We haven’t gone into too much pre-production for me to verify that.
So you haven’t heard all of what they’d finished?
No.
That’s kinda interesting. I’m surprised by that. It seems like it will be a tough record to release because it’s going to be so totally scrutinized.
Oh yeah. It’s gonna be one of those things. About your question earlier, about reservations about things – that’s the third thing. Maybe not in that order. It sucks that you’re in this line of fire where it’s like ‘He did this, he was that’ … who cares. He did that, now I’m back. I do what I do, and he did what he did. He’s different, I’m different, and that’s it. It stinks when you gotta be held to a certain standard. John might’ve had the same [experience]. I don’t know. It’s something that I really didn’t have to do early on. You are who you are. If you like the band, you like the way we do things, then cool. But now you got ‘Well, I liked it when he…’ and all that [groans]. I have to disregard a lot of it, because you know what? I can only do what I do and hopefully they dig it.
See, I’m positive John Bush went through that too, because I was among those who put him through it. It was upsetting that overnight Anthrax lost so much color. And I stood there, looking at John and thinking ‘This really isn’t the same thing.’
It wasn’t. There was no way around it. And then I come back in, and I don’t want to be that guy who has to take that spot of what you’re doing. I want to do what I did before where you let me do my thing and you dig what I do. I have a different route that I can take, a style. A different approach. The word ‘heavy’ sometimes is a little weird. What’s heavy, you know? Look how I sing – it’s melody, it’s quality, it’s range. It’s tone. There are certain things that go with vocals versus just yelling hard and screaming.
Leave a comment