December 5, 2024 • 18 mins
We are excited to catch up with Legendary guitarist and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave. Tom chats and very proudly brags about his young 13 year old son Roman who has turned into a virtuoso guitarist in his own right. He speaks about Battle of LA album turning 25 years old and other projects during his career. He talks about an upcoming benefit concert at the Roxy and a future solo project coming up. We enjoyed his company and laughs!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Booker, striker Tom Morella of many bands and himself.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Nice to see you. It's nice to see you guys.
Isn't that good to be here?
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (00:07):
Man, wait, so you're playing a show tomorrow at the Roxy.
I just want to ask straight away, does Roman join
you for one song, two songs or no songs?
Speaker 4 (00:14):
Roman will be there and I think we're going to
leave it to surprise. How many songs? Okay, he's been
my Roman of course with my thirteen year old guitar
shredding guitar prodigy son who's writing big hits for big
hit movies. And yeah, he'll be there, and he'll be
he's ready to blow the roof off.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
So you know, as a pretty accomplished guitarist yourself, having
a kid do things, I assume there's a lot of
different things that he does as well. Do you sit
back sometimes?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
In add deal person.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
Him been relegated to being the rhythm guitar player in
my family, like instructed what chord progression to play? Well,
he shreds until he's done. That's yeah. It was basically
was during First of all, my two kids had no
interest in the family business, none whatsoever. They never they
never really had heard rage against the machine. Like ever
then pandemic times came in. While everybody else was baking
(01:02):
sour dough bread, my youngster was learning Stairway to Have It,
you know. Like I started out like, just you know,
in the middle of a Fortnite marathon or something. I
was like, could you spare five minutes to learn the
first three notes of Stairway to Have It? And he's like,
I'll give you four, you know, And so the next
day I gave him the next three notes, and the
third day he came back and asked me if we
could keep going with it, and that was the traction
(01:23):
we needed.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
And does Roman not only play well but you just
said that he does, but does he create his own
sounds for you and himself on the time? Oh?
Speaker 4 (01:31):
I mean, I just I just steal the best of
his stuff, right yeah? Yeah? Yeah, I mean the couple
of songs we've done, Soldier in the Army of Love
and One Last Dance. But basically me just walking by
his room and going like, what's that? He says, something
I'm working on? I said, can I.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Borrow that for a big hit Hollywood movie? Yeah? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (01:50):
And how did it work with grandson? And your son
and you because you've worked with Grandson before, but now
you got your son.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
That's right, That's that's right, that's right.
Speaker 4 (01:56):
So the Venom sony reached out about the Venom movie
because they loved the song that I had done with
Grandson hold the line that was already going to be
in the film. They said, can you guys come up
with an end TI like a theme for the movie,
and said, well, give it a shot.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
It was a very narrow wind.
Speaker 4 (02:11):
It was like seventy two hours to get this thing together.
So I sent Grandson. I got a bunch of riffs
on my phone. I sent him like twenty five riffs
and the one he picked was Romans.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Whoa you playing Romans?
Speaker 5 (02:22):
Was that?
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Wait?
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Were you playing Romans? Or he actually was playing that?
He was, Wow, that is insane.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
So it was like a blind coke Pepsi taste test.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Is it weird losing the taste test?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Well, this point, like, I mean, I just think it's
awesome to be able to have like another There's a
lot of low hanging great rift fruit and the Morello
tree right now, So.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
It's pretty awesome when you see somebody like Jacob Nole
who's the son of the late Great Bradley Knowle, who's
been stepping in for his dad doing an un job.
Speaker 5 (02:54):
Like, do you have thoughts or you see that happening
and you feel something there?
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (02:56):
Yeah, well, I mean last summer, Roman came on tour
with me, you know, when we were playing festival in
front of sixty thousand people, you know, opening the show
with him and our song, and and I remember like
the first big fest was like somewhere in Spain, there's
like sixty thousand people. And he said he normally doesn't
get nervous because it's like it's really kind of just
like we jam like we do in his bedroom. It's
not that big a deal when you're playing a club
show or whatever. And he was like, Dad, I feel
a little bit nervous. I'm like, well, do you know
(03:18):
the song? He's like, yeah, I know the songs? Like,
are you confident that I know the songs? Like, I'm
pretty confident you know the songs that it's gonna be okay.
But we'll say the funniest thing when we're getting ready
for the tour. I was on tour for about a
month before he joined me, and I called him up,
and I said, I'm like, dude, you gotta there's a
couple of tunes you have you learned them? He's like, Dad,
I know him. He said, right now, I'm practicing my
stage moves. Oh like your practice in your stage moves? Like,
(03:41):
what might that be the world found out?
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Do you get nervous for your son or is that
the most exciting thing for you?
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Now?
Speaker 4 (03:51):
I'm pretty confident that he's he's got the goods. Yeah,
I'm not nervous anymore. I'm excited to unveil him on
an unsuspecting world.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Yet we've got any more questions about Roan, I'm very
cloud yet.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Firstly, at first I say, it's not nepotism when your
kid's that fucking good. That's the way.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Booker and I like when we've seen video of your
son and the song and know the song from Venom
and seen you and him and Nandy playing.
Speaker 5 (04:17):
It gets us excited music fan.
Speaker 4 (04:19):
It's awesome, especially in a day and age where maybe
like shreading rock guitar playing is not choking the top
of the charts right to be able to have a generation,
you know, like that young who's really sort of embraced
that and is going for it in a way that's meaningful.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Are you anticipating kicking him out the door and sending
him out onto the road like you did as a
young man.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
He can do whatever he wants.
Speaker 4 (04:40):
You know, I got the one thing that I that
I had was this kind of unconditional support from my
mom Mary Morello and and three years old. Don't age well,
she looks ninety one hundred and threes.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
I'm one hundred and one years old. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Yeah, she's a very powerful radio personnelity as you may
have heard her I've heard. But no, I mean like
it was kind of whatever he wants to do right now.
I mean, he takes it serious.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Like he he's you.
Speaker 4 (05:06):
Don't need to tell him to go practice every day,
is in there writing songs. And you know this day
kids can produce too, so on his iPad he's able
to You know, you could make the White Album on
an iPad these days.
Speaker 5 (05:14):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
There's a lot of possibilities, speaking of charts and being
at the top of them and music that has great
guitar in it. The Battle of Los Angeles recently turned twenty.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
Five years old.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
If I just say the song title, excuse me, the
album title to you, what do you think, Well, I.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Mean, it was a crazy situation because it was the
Rage had that Battle of Los Angeles, was Time magazines,
Rolling Stone magazines, and Spin magazines Album of the Year, Wow,
and then we stopped playing. So it's like it was
a bittersweet in some ways. But I'm so proud of
that record.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Now. That record was a it.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
Was a not the easiest birth, but the fact that
it exists in the world. And you know, one of
the things that I've been doing over the course of
the last couple of years with my show, you know,
I've had a lot of different iterations. There's you know,
there's audiously, there's profits of Rage, Street Sweeper, Social Club,
the Atlas Underground stuff, the night Watchman Acoustic. In the
last couple of years, I've really embraced the whole catalog.
I have twenty two records that I've made, twenty two
(06:12):
records if you include the Springsteen one, you know, And
so when we go out and play, whether it's with Roman, whatever,
is like we embrace all, We honor the Rage fans,
Like everywhere I go. The one thing about like Rage
against the Machine music, it is while the band has
only played nineteen shows in the last fourteen years. That
is music that is near and dear to people's hearts,
and it really matters, and it's in twenty twenty four
(06:34):
and beyond it's still gonna matter. And so we play
that music, we honor that music, and also really I
have such love and respect for the fans of that
music that have allowed you know, a career of thirty
plus years to continue and meet spending some time with you.
Now you've had nice people today.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Thank band after band after band. Do you ache to
be in another thing? Is there another logict?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
No?
Speaker 4 (06:56):
I'm very content, like I've never been happily. Last tour
was the biggest solo tour I did. Couldn't be more content,
just me. The thing is like when you when you're
in a band, the upside is that you get chemistry.
You create something together that you never could create alone.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
And it's this magical thing that the four of you
or whatever do.
Speaker 4 (07:15):
When you do solo stuff, you have purity, and it's
purity of vision and intent and the art is pure
and the it's you know, you sort of hand select
like the day you know, in a way that is
very satisfying.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
For me. Now, I'd love to do that.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
I just saw a clip recently, you Mikey Fromikubus and
Perry Sure and a couple acoustic guitars and just singing outside. Sure,
can you just tell Booker and I not just about
that exactly, sure, but Perry Ferrell.
Speaker 5 (07:41):
First on your radar and you and his was war
and when.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Sure, oh my gosh.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
Well, and I moved to la in eighty six as
Jane's was bubbling an ascendant and they you know, I
got a hold of a bootleg cassettes of them playing
live and they became my favorite band without ever having
seen them or anything like that. And the first time
that I I know, if I met Perry, the first
time I was in a room with him. There was
a rumor that Jane's Addiction they were rehearsing for the
Nothing Shocking tour somewhere in this little grungey studio east
(08:08):
side on Melrose, and somebody had an address. I just
went into the room and sat down on the floor
like this grimy carpet, and some of their girlfriends and
drug dealers and whatnot, and I was.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Just like trip out. Oh, I love that.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
When you arrived in Los Angeles. Did you ever feel
intimidated by anything you saw out on the streets or
in clubs, by the talent of people who were your
age or younger.
Speaker 4 (08:30):
Yeah, I was intimidate by intimidated by the fact that
when I arrived in Los Angeles, I was expecting it
to be a virtuoso kingdom of Steve Viiz and instead
it was a bunch of faster pussycats.
Speaker 5 (08:42):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Really.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
I got the free papers that said, you know, like,
here's the hot local bands, and I'm like, I didn't
have much money, but I saved up my twelve bucks
to go to the troubad Order. See like at the time,
the band that was the front pay and it was
a band called Faster Pussy Gut And I was like,
place was packed. It was you know, people we're going
and I was like, I was like, I can't do anything,
Like there's nothing in me that's anything on the stage.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
I may not be able to ever have a career
in Wow. Wow man, Yeah yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
Yah, yeah, I'm just blown away by that.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
So where do we go next? I'm trying to think
where we're going next.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
I watch a lot of I got something for tom
I watch a lot of these reaction videos on YouTube
or they watched.
Speaker 5 (09:23):
Those were people I've.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
Seen in twenty twenty four their first time they ever
hear those.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Some of those are pretty precious.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
They are because it takes me back to when I
heard Rage for the first time. We're played audiously for
the first time on the radio, and you get those
goosebumps and so excited. But there's one thing in particularly
when to ask about, and it's Brad Wilk. When I
see him drumming in the like of Stone video, not
going crazy, can.
Speaker 5 (09:42):
You just how how good is that?
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Dude? He's the greatest? Let me okay.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
So I was in a band called lock Up before
Rage Against and in the final days of that band,
drum we were recycling drummers. Brad auditioned for lock Up
and I remember he was like he and I from
the first second wa room together played great.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Now.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
He had this ramshackle drum set, like at the end
of the first song, like he had his drum set
like I'd be like out of the Sears catalog, and
like he hit the symbol and the symbol of the
tiny tiny symbol just fell over, and I said, you
may not be ready for Madison Square Garden yet or
your gear. Your gear may not be ready. But I
kept his number and when the literally the moment that
lock up broke up, I got a call from the
(10:21):
sing of it finally boiled down. There's two of us
in the band.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
He quit.
Speaker 4 (10:24):
I was the last one laugh. So he, the singer,
called me up and said, lock up is over. I
hung up the phone and I called up Brad and
I said, you want a jam? And that was the
beginning of like the way that we played together, that
thing I was talking about chemistry. I had some of
those riffs for the first Rage record. I dragged them
all over time. I played with many many drummers, some
in very famous bands, later in fate, very famous bands,
(10:44):
and it never sounded like Rage against the Machine until
Brad Wilke was playing the drums.
Speaker 5 (10:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
I mean, when you look at music today and you
look back at when you started or even prior to that,
how did this magic always find one another? Because now
there's an internet, there's a highway, there's a place where
people couldn't meet up, and there should almost be no
excuse and music should actually be better because they should.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
How did it happen then? And was it just magic.
Speaker 5 (11:13):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
I mean I think that it's there were, you know,
a lot of bands and the thing one of the
things that was different, the landscape was very, very different,
where like there was no bands when my band came up.
It was Nirvana and Pearl Jam that commercially broke through.
That allowed record companies to say, maybe for the first time,
we don't know what's best, right, and so they began
like sort of signing tool and you know, in Rage
(11:35):
and bands that were clear There was nothing on the
radio like those kind of bands, but there was sort
of this trust that a thing is there's something in
the zeitgeist of the world that is happening. And there
were bands who were fearlessly and ferociously making music that
was not commercially oriented but connected. I'd say, for me,
like the best thing that ever happened in my career
(11:56):
was a total failure. I was in this band Lock
and I was sort of like junior. I joined a band,
I joined the older dudes, and I joined their band.
We got a record deal, and we did everything everybody asked,
you know, like they the experts. It was Geffen Records.
They had guns and Roses and the Eagles and whatnot.
And you know, when the music got smoother, like I
had some some of some of the guitar playing weirdness
(12:19):
that would later make up a significan part of my sound.
They said, don't there's guitar doesn't sound like that on
the radio.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Don't do that.
Speaker 4 (12:26):
I'm like, oh, you must know, you must know, right,
And so we made a record that was a bland
version of the band and were summarily dropped.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
I was twenty seven years old. I had failed.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
I came, I moved to Hollywood from libertyvill, Illinois to
get a record deal. I got it, and I was
dropped and I was done. So but I was still
a musician, and so I made a solemn vow. I'm like,
I'm never going to play another note of music that
I don't believe in, since I'm not going to ever
be famous or make records. And that was when I
began writing the riffs that would be my contribution to
the first Rage against the Wow.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
How do you find each other? Though? That's how do
you know? That's a better question, you will. Here's the
thing is, like, you don't like I knew?
Speaker 4 (13:03):
I mean the first time I played with Brad like
I like, I was like, that's a great, Like we
play great together and we're playing like in front of
the it's already even described like zero minus zero. We
would rent a space he and I would rehearse, just
the two of us. We would rent a space in
front of the drum set of a heavy metal band
that rehearsed in another place. Right, yeah, and we're playing
(13:24):
bomb Track and Know Your Enemy and Freedom and Township
rebling or the riffs that would later, you know, manifest
in those songs.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Did you friendship up first or is it the musicianship
with the instrument in front of you where you said
I need to be with this person that It was.
Speaker 4 (13:38):
Really like that more that like there was a Now
it's different because there is the Internet, but you would
there was a thing called the music connection, you know,
and and there'd be an ad in there that was
appealing or sixty percent appealing, and you'd call that person
up and they'd be flaky and they'd never get back.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
To you, et cetera.
Speaker 4 (13:53):
And finally get in a room with someone and they're
off their mind on drugs, onless. You know, I moved
here in the eighties. I moved to in eighty six,
and you know, Rage formed in ninety one, so there
was a lot of a lot of not finding the right.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
This is the worst Craigslist story.
Speaker 4 (14:07):
Yeah, seventy roses, I'll join ye, you have no idea.
I mean I would borey like the the horror stories
of like how of me trying to figure out especially
someone like I was a metal guitar player like I
my I came to Hollywood because in Circus and Hit
Parader magazine, I saw that the sunset strip was awesome
and there was no there was a you know, no
(14:28):
room at the end sign out for me there Like
my hair wasn't right, my skin wasn't right.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
My idea is my politics weren't right. There was nothing
that like fit in the same story.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Yeah, did you ever cross paths with Rivers who started
off in a much heavier band on the sunsets?
Speaker 4 (14:46):
No?
Speaker 2 (14:46):
I mean in later in life, later I.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
Have two more quickness book speaking of Rage against the Machine.
At least once a month, I watched forty seconds of
what they say is your first show ever, which is
Saday north Ridge. Was that really the first show? And
how did that was the first. That was the first
public show. It was the first public show.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
The first I'll tell you the real show was was
Timmy had a friend in Huntington Beach whose parents were
out of town, and we knew five songs at the time,
and uh, and so you.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
Know, we've set up there. We'd never played in front.
Speaker 4 (15:15):
We played in front of one dude before at the
industrial park, which almost merrits its own story. We played
four songs for this guy who used to walk, this
worker walk back and forth in front of our place.
He said, what do you guys do? He said, we're
a band. He said, can I hear you? We're like,
I guess so he heard rage against him, saying, one dude,
he's sitting there. One dude, he's sitting there. We play
him a couple of songs and he's standing and we're like,
so what do you think? And he stands up and
sort of assumes a poster and says, your music makes
(15:36):
me want to fight.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
That was the first review. We didn't know.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
Cut to cut to the living room, where the first
song we played was Take the Power Back, and we
were so amped up that we played it at like
three times the speed that it would one day Manifest
on a record and when the beat drop there was
a huge circle pit in the living room like the
omoir was immediately overturn.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
It was. It was a instant.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
It was an instant, immediate, like spiritually electric connection with
the world. We played the five songs. People were going
so ban as we played the same five songs again.
Speaker 5 (16:10):
Wow, awesome. My last thing is more of a pitch
than a question.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Yeah, yeah, be real.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Send dog Cypress Hill one day on the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame ballots. I think they observed such
a huge those two voices coming together, the longevity, their back,
all of it.
Speaker 5 (16:26):
I love Cypress hil Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
There are a lot of bands deserving of being the
rock I'm in.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
I'm on the nominating committee, which is a you know,
it's a dog fight every year just to make the ballot.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
We don't I don't don't put anybody in.
Speaker 4 (16:37):
We make the ballot and then gets decided by a
wider That's why it Yeah, but around in your head,
all right, should we wrap it up?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
One last thing to hype for your people.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
There I'm in the midst of the songs, soldier in
the army of love and One Last Dance are sort
of the first forays. My next record is going to
be my first ever solo rock album, and it's.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Going to be the more like on the one.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
The two goalposts are like the biggest Morellian Rifts of
Rage and Audio Slave and then Springsteen's Darkness on the
Edge of Town.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
That's what I'm working on now.
Speaker 5 (17:08):
Guest singers mostly not some guest singers.
Speaker 4 (17:11):
I'm singing a lot of it, but uh but they
working some with Shooter Jennings on it, working with some
other producers on it. But we're stealing my Son's rifts
wherever and whenever I can, and got that please got
the plutonium grade right now? Oh you think they're free?
He has Ah. Yes, It's like how much money we
make on Venom? I'm like, how much money do we make?
Speaker 2 (17:29):
I had? I had dinner one night. I showed up.
It was at the Rainbow.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
You were with Eddie Trunk and the internet has just
sort of they started not paying people, and I remember
your frustration.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
Has any money.
Speaker 4 (17:41):
Come in yet? We were like, Roman got a check,
That's all I know. He's a strong negotiator.
Speaker 5 (17:54):
But when is the full length going to drop?
Speaker 2 (17:55):
I'm still working on in twenty twenty five, twenty.
Speaker 5 (17:57):
Twenty five, we cannot wait.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Yeah, all the songs. Man, thanks man, well.
Speaker 5 (18:00):
Thank you so much for joining Lovely.
Speaker 4 (18:02):
Seeing Lovely seeing some old friends and you got chopping
it up. A real pleasure there you go. Thank you, buddy,
Thank you,
Booker, striker Tom Morella of many bands and himself.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Nice to see you. It's nice to see you guys.
Isn't that good to be here?
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (00:07):
Man, wait, so you're playing a show tomorrow at the Roxy.
I just want to ask straight away, does Roman join
you for one song, two songs or no songs?
Speaker 4 (00:14):
Roman will be there and I think we're going to
leave it to surprise. How many songs? Okay, he's been
my Roman of course with my thirteen year old guitar
shredding guitar prodigy son who's writing big hits for big
hit movies. And yeah, he'll be there, and he'll be
he's ready to blow the roof off.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
So you know, as a pretty accomplished guitarist yourself, having
a kid do things, I assume there's a lot of
different things that he does as well. Do you sit
back sometimes?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
In add deal person.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
Him been relegated to being the rhythm guitar player in
my family, like instructed what chord progression to play? Well,
he shreds until he's done. That's yeah. It was basically
was during First of all, my two kids had no
interest in the family business, none whatsoever. They never they
never really had heard rage against the machine. Like ever
then pandemic times came in. While everybody else was baking
(01:02):
sour dough bread, my youngster was learning Stairway to Have It,
you know. Like I started out like, just you know,
in the middle of a Fortnite marathon or something. I
was like, could you spare five minutes to learn the
first three notes of Stairway to Have It? And he's like,
I'll give you four, you know, And so the next
day I gave him the next three notes, and the
third day he came back and asked me if we
could keep going with it, and that was the traction
(01:23):
we needed.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
And does Roman not only play well but you just
said that he does, but does he create his own
sounds for you and himself on the time? Oh?
Speaker 4 (01:31):
I mean, I just I just steal the best of
his stuff, right yeah? Yeah? Yeah, I mean the couple
of songs we've done, Soldier in the Army of Love
and One Last Dance. But basically me just walking by
his room and going like, what's that? He says, something
I'm working on? I said, can I.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Borrow that for a big hit Hollywood movie? Yeah? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (01:50):
And how did it work with grandson? And your son
and you because you've worked with Grandson before, but now
you got your son.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
That's right, That's that's right, that's right.
Speaker 4 (01:56):
So the Venom sony reached out about the Venom movie
because they loved the song that I had done with
Grandson hold the line that was already going to be
in the film. They said, can you guys come up
with an end TI like a theme for the movie,
and said, well, give it a shot.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
It was a very narrow wind.
Speaker 4 (02:11):
It was like seventy two hours to get this thing together.
So I sent Grandson. I got a bunch of riffs
on my phone. I sent him like twenty five riffs
and the one he picked was Romans.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Whoa you playing Romans?
Speaker 5 (02:22):
Was that?
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Wait?
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Were you playing Romans? Or he actually was playing that?
He was, Wow, that is insane.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
So it was like a blind coke Pepsi taste test.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Is it weird losing the taste test?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Well, this point, like, I mean, I just think it's
awesome to be able to have like another There's a
lot of low hanging great rift fruit and the Morello
tree right now, So.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
It's pretty awesome when you see somebody like Jacob Nole
who's the son of the late Great Bradley Knowle, who's
been stepping in for his dad doing an un job.
Speaker 5 (02:54):
Like, do you have thoughts or you see that happening
and you feel something there?
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (02:56):
Yeah, well, I mean last summer, Roman came on tour
with me, you know, when we were playing festival in
front of sixty thousand people, you know, opening the show
with him and our song, and and I remember like
the first big fest was like somewhere in Spain, there's
like sixty thousand people. And he said he normally doesn't
get nervous because it's like it's really kind of just
like we jam like we do in his bedroom. It's
not that big a deal when you're playing a club
show or whatever. And he was like, Dad, I feel
a little bit nervous. I'm like, well, do you know
(03:18):
the song? He's like, yeah, I know the songs? Like,
are you confident that I know the songs? Like, I'm
pretty confident you know the songs that it's gonna be okay.
But we'll say the funniest thing when we're getting ready
for the tour. I was on tour for about a
month before he joined me, and I called him up,
and I said, I'm like, dude, you gotta there's a
couple of tunes you have you learned them? He's like, Dad,
I know him. He said, right now, I'm practicing my
stage moves. Oh like your practice in your stage moves? Like,
(03:41):
what might that be the world found out?
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Do you get nervous for your son or is that
the most exciting thing for you?
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Now?
Speaker 4 (03:51):
I'm pretty confident that he's he's got the goods. Yeah,
I'm not nervous anymore. I'm excited to unveil him on
an unsuspecting world.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Yet we've got any more questions about Roan, I'm very
cloud yet.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Firstly, at first I say, it's not nepotism when your
kid's that fucking good. That's the way.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Booker and I like when we've seen video of your
son and the song and know the song from Venom
and seen you and him and Nandy playing.
Speaker 5 (04:17):
It gets us excited music fan.
Speaker 4 (04:19):
It's awesome, especially in a day and age where maybe
like shreading rock guitar playing is not choking the top
of the charts right to be able to have a generation,
you know, like that young who's really sort of embraced
that and is going for it in a way that's meaningful.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Are you anticipating kicking him out the door and sending
him out onto the road like you did as a
young man.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
He can do whatever he wants.
Speaker 4 (04:40):
You know, I got the one thing that I that
I had was this kind of unconditional support from my
mom Mary Morello and and three years old. Don't age well,
she looks ninety one hundred and threes.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
I'm one hundred and one years old. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Yeah, she's a very powerful radio personnelity as you may
have heard her I've heard. But no, I mean like
it was kind of whatever he wants to do right now.
I mean, he takes it serious.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Like he he's you.
Speaker 4 (05:06):
Don't need to tell him to go practice every day,
is in there writing songs. And you know this day
kids can produce too, so on his iPad he's able
to You know, you could make the White Album on
an iPad these days.
Speaker 5 (05:14):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
There's a lot of possibilities, speaking of charts and being
at the top of them and music that has great
guitar in it. The Battle of Los Angeles recently turned twenty.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
Five years old.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
If I just say the song title, excuse me, the
album title to you, what do you think, Well, I.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Mean, it was a crazy situation because it was the
Rage had that Battle of Los Angeles, was Time magazines,
Rolling Stone magazines, and Spin magazines Album of the Year, Wow,
and then we stopped playing. So it's like it was
a bittersweet in some ways. But I'm so proud of
that record.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Now. That record was a it.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
Was a not the easiest birth, but the fact that
it exists in the world. And you know, one of
the things that I've been doing over the course of
the last couple of years with my show, you know,
I've had a lot of different iterations. There's you know,
there's audiously, there's profits of Rage, Street Sweeper, Social Club,
the Atlas Underground stuff, the night Watchman Acoustic. In the
last couple of years, I've really embraced the whole catalog.
I have twenty two records that I've made, twenty two
(06:12):
records if you include the Springsteen one, you know, And
so when we go out and play, whether it's with Roman, whatever,
is like we embrace all, We honor the Rage fans,
Like everywhere I go. The one thing about like Rage
against the Machine music, it is while the band has
only played nineteen shows in the last fourteen years. That
is music that is near and dear to people's hearts,
and it really matters, and it's in twenty twenty four
(06:34):
and beyond it's still gonna matter. And so we play
that music, we honor that music, and also really I
have such love and respect for the fans of that
music that have allowed you know, a career of thirty
plus years to continue and meet spending some time with you.
Now you've had nice people today.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Thank band after band after band. Do you ache to
be in another thing? Is there another logict?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
No?
Speaker 4 (06:56):
I'm very content, like I've never been happily. Last tour
was the biggest solo tour I did. Couldn't be more content,
just me. The thing is like when you when you're
in a band, the upside is that you get chemistry.
You create something together that you never could create alone.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
And it's this magical thing that the four of you
or whatever do.
Speaker 4 (07:15):
When you do solo stuff, you have purity, and it's
purity of vision and intent and the art is pure
and the it's you know, you sort of hand select
like the day you know, in a way that is
very satisfying.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
For me. Now, I'd love to do that.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
I just saw a clip recently, you Mikey Fromikubus and
Perry Sure and a couple acoustic guitars and just singing outside. Sure,
can you just tell Booker and I not just about
that exactly, sure, but Perry Ferrell.
Speaker 5 (07:41):
First on your radar and you and his was war
and when.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Sure, oh my gosh.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
Well, and I moved to la in eighty six as
Jane's was bubbling an ascendant and they you know, I
got a hold of a bootleg cassettes of them playing
live and they became my favorite band without ever having
seen them or anything like that. And the first time
that I I know, if I met Perry, the first
time I was in a room with him. There was
a rumor that Jane's Addiction they were rehearsing for the
Nothing Shocking tour somewhere in this little grungey studio east
(08:08):
side on Melrose, and somebody had an address. I just
went into the room and sat down on the floor
like this grimy carpet, and some of their girlfriends and
drug dealers and whatnot, and I was.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Just like trip out. Oh, I love that.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
When you arrived in Los Angeles. Did you ever feel
intimidated by anything you saw out on the streets or
in clubs, by the talent of people who were your
age or younger.
Speaker 4 (08:30):
Yeah, I was intimidate by intimidated by the fact that
when I arrived in Los Angeles, I was expecting it
to be a virtuoso kingdom of Steve Viiz and instead
it was a bunch of faster pussycats.
Speaker 5 (08:42):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Really.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
I got the free papers that said, you know, like,
here's the hot local bands, and I'm like, I didn't
have much money, but I saved up my twelve bucks
to go to the troubad Order. See like at the time,
the band that was the front pay and it was
a band called Faster Pussy Gut And I was like,
place was packed. It was you know, people we're going
and I was like, I was like, I can't do anything,
Like there's nothing in me that's anything on the stage.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
I may not be able to ever have a career
in Wow. Wow man, Yeah yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
Yah, yeah, I'm just blown away by that.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
So where do we go next? I'm trying to think
where we're going next.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
I watch a lot of I got something for tom
I watch a lot of these reaction videos on YouTube
or they watched.
Speaker 5 (09:23):
Those were people I've.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
Seen in twenty twenty four their first time they ever
hear those.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Some of those are pretty precious.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
They are because it takes me back to when I
heard Rage for the first time. We're played audiously for
the first time on the radio, and you get those
goosebumps and so excited. But there's one thing in particularly
when to ask about, and it's Brad Wilk. When I
see him drumming in the like of Stone video, not
going crazy, can.
Speaker 5 (09:42):
You just how how good is that?
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Dude? He's the greatest? Let me okay.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
So I was in a band called lock Up before
Rage Against and in the final days of that band,
drum we were recycling drummers. Brad auditioned for lock Up
and I remember he was like he and I from
the first second wa room together played great.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Now.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
He had this ramshackle drum set, like at the end
of the first song, like he had his drum set
like I'd be like out of the Sears catalog, and
like he hit the symbol and the symbol of the
tiny tiny symbol just fell over, and I said, you
may not be ready for Madison Square Garden yet or
your gear. Your gear may not be ready. But I
kept his number and when the literally the moment that
lock up broke up, I got a call from the
(10:21):
sing of it finally boiled down. There's two of us
in the band.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
He quit.
Speaker 4 (10:24):
I was the last one laugh. So he, the singer,
called me up and said, lock up is over. I
hung up the phone and I called up Brad and
I said, you want a jam? And that was the
beginning of like the way that we played together, that
thing I was talking about chemistry. I had some of
those riffs for the first Rage record. I dragged them
all over time. I played with many many drummers, some
in very famous bands, later in fate, very famous bands,
(10:44):
and it never sounded like Rage against the Machine until
Brad Wilke was playing the drums.
Speaker 5 (10:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
I mean, when you look at music today and you
look back at when you started or even prior to that,
how did this magic always find one another? Because now
there's an internet, there's a highway, there's a place where
people couldn't meet up, and there should almost be no
excuse and music should actually be better because they should.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
How did it happen then? And was it just magic.
Speaker 5 (11:13):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
I mean I think that it's there were, you know,
a lot of bands and the thing one of the
things that was different, the landscape was very, very different,
where like there was no bands when my band came up.
It was Nirvana and Pearl Jam that commercially broke through.
That allowed record companies to say, maybe for the first time,
we don't know what's best, right, and so they began
like sort of signing tool and you know, in Rage
(11:35):
and bands that were clear There was nothing on the
radio like those kind of bands, but there was sort
of this trust that a thing is there's something in
the zeitgeist of the world that is happening. And there
were bands who were fearlessly and ferociously making music that
was not commercially oriented but connected. I'd say, for me,
like the best thing that ever happened in my career
(11:56):
was a total failure. I was in this band Lock
and I was sort of like junior. I joined a band,
I joined the older dudes, and I joined their band.
We got a record deal, and we did everything everybody asked,
you know, like they the experts. It was Geffen Records.
They had guns and Roses and the Eagles and whatnot.
And you know, when the music got smoother, like I
had some some of some of the guitar playing weirdness
(12:19):
that would later make up a significan part of my sound.
They said, don't there's guitar doesn't sound like that on
the radio.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Don't do that.
Speaker 4 (12:26):
I'm like, oh, you must know, you must know, right,
And so we made a record that was a bland
version of the band and were summarily dropped.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
I was twenty seven years old. I had failed.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
I came, I moved to Hollywood from libertyvill, Illinois to
get a record deal. I got it, and I was
dropped and I was done. So but I was still
a musician, and so I made a solemn vow. I'm like,
I'm never going to play another note of music that
I don't believe in, since I'm not going to ever
be famous or make records. And that was when I
began writing the riffs that would be my contribution to
the first Rage against the Wow.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
How do you find each other? Though? That's how do
you know? That's a better question, you will. Here's the
thing is, like, you don't like I knew?
Speaker 4 (13:03):
I mean the first time I played with Brad like
I like, I was like, that's a great, Like we
play great together and we're playing like in front of
the it's already even described like zero minus zero. We
would rent a space he and I would rehearse, just
the two of us. We would rent a space in
front of the drum set of a heavy metal band
that rehearsed in another place. Right, yeah, and we're playing
(13:24):
bomb Track and Know Your Enemy and Freedom and Township
rebling or the riffs that would later, you know, manifest
in those songs.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Did you friendship up first or is it the musicianship
with the instrument in front of you where you said
I need to be with this person that It was.
Speaker 4 (13:38):
Really like that more that like there was a Now
it's different because there is the Internet, but you would
there was a thing called the music connection, you know,
and and there'd be an ad in there that was
appealing or sixty percent appealing, and you'd call that person
up and they'd be flaky and they'd never get back.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
To you, et cetera.
Speaker 4 (13:53):
And finally get in a room with someone and they're
off their mind on drugs, onless. You know, I moved
here in the eighties. I moved to in eighty six,
and you know, Rage formed in ninety one, so there
was a lot of a lot of not finding the right.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
This is the worst Craigslist story.
Speaker 4 (14:07):
Yeah, seventy roses, I'll join ye, you have no idea.
I mean I would borey like the the horror stories
of like how of me trying to figure out especially
someone like I was a metal guitar player like I
my I came to Hollywood because in Circus and Hit
Parader magazine, I saw that the sunset strip was awesome
and there was no there was a you know, no
(14:28):
room at the end sign out for me there Like
my hair wasn't right, my skin wasn't right.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
My idea is my politics weren't right. There was nothing
that like fit in the same story.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Yeah, did you ever cross paths with Rivers who started
off in a much heavier band on the sunsets?
Speaker 4 (14:46):
No?
Speaker 2 (14:46):
I mean in later in life, later I.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
Have two more quickness book speaking of Rage against the Machine.
At least once a month, I watched forty seconds of
what they say is your first show ever, which is
Saday north Ridge. Was that really the first show? And
how did that was the first. That was the first
public show. It was the first public show.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
The first I'll tell you the real show was was
Timmy had a friend in Huntington Beach whose parents were
out of town, and we knew five songs at the time,
and uh, and so you.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
Know, we've set up there. We'd never played in front.
Speaker 4 (15:15):
We played in front of one dude before at the
industrial park, which almost merrits its own story. We played
four songs for this guy who used to walk, this
worker walk back and forth in front of our place.
He said, what do you guys do? He said, we're
a band. He said, can I hear you? We're like,
I guess so he heard rage against him, saying, one dude,
he's sitting there. One dude, he's sitting there. We play
him a couple of songs and he's standing and we're like,
so what do you think? And he stands up and
sort of assumes a poster and says, your music makes
(15:36):
me want to fight.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
That was the first review. We didn't know.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
Cut to cut to the living room, where the first
song we played was Take the Power Back, and we
were so amped up that we played it at like
three times the speed that it would one day Manifest
on a record and when the beat drop there was
a huge circle pit in the living room like the
omoir was immediately overturn.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
It was. It was a instant.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
It was an instant, immediate, like spiritually electric connection with
the world. We played the five songs. People were going
so ban as we played the same five songs again.
Speaker 5 (16:10):
Wow, awesome. My last thing is more of a pitch
than a question.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Yeah, yeah, be real.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Send dog Cypress Hill one day on the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame ballots. I think they observed such
a huge those two voices coming together, the longevity, their back,
all of it.
Speaker 5 (16:26):
I love Cypress hil Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
There are a lot of bands deserving of being the
rock I'm in.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
I'm on the nominating committee, which is a you know,
it's a dog fight every year just to make the ballot.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
We don't I don't don't put anybody in.
Speaker 4 (16:37):
We make the ballot and then gets decided by a
wider That's why it Yeah, but around in your head,
all right, should we wrap it up?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
One last thing to hype for your people.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
There I'm in the midst of the songs, soldier in
the army of love and One Last Dance are sort
of the first forays. My next record is going to
be my first ever solo rock album, and it's.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Going to be the more like on the one.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
The two goalposts are like the biggest Morellian Rifts of
Rage and Audio Slave and then Springsteen's Darkness on the
Edge of Town.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
That's what I'm working on now.
Speaker 5 (17:08):
Guest singers mostly not some guest singers.
Speaker 4 (17:11):
I'm singing a lot of it, but uh but they
working some with Shooter Jennings on it, working with some
other producers on it. But we're stealing my Son's rifts
wherever and whenever I can, and got that please got
the plutonium grade right now? Oh you think they're free?
He has Ah. Yes, It's like how much money we
make on Venom? I'm like, how much money do we make?
Speaker 2 (17:29):
I had? I had dinner one night. I showed up.
It was at the Rainbow.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
You were with Eddie Trunk and the internet has just
sort of they started not paying people, and I remember
your frustration.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
Has any money.
Speaker 4 (17:41):
Come in yet? We were like, Roman got a check,
That's all I know. He's a strong negotiator.
Speaker 5 (17:54):
But when is the full length going to drop?
Speaker 2 (17:55):
I'm still working on in twenty twenty five, twenty.
Speaker 5 (17:57):
Twenty five, we cannot wait.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Yeah, all the songs. Man, thanks man, well.
Speaker 5 (18:00):
Thank you so much for joining Lovely.
Speaker 4 (18:02):
Seeing Lovely seeing some old friends and you got chopping
it up. A real pleasure there you go. Thank you, buddy,
Thank you,
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