ANTHRAX Guitarist: 'We Can't Base Our Decisions On What Our Audience Is Gonna Think'

David Priest of On Track Magazine recently conducted an interview with ANTHRAX guitarist Scott Ian. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow:

On Track Magazine: When "The Greater of Two Evils" came out, I thought for sure that John [Bush] was on board 'till the bitter end. Then before anyone had a chance to know what happened, the classic line-up had returned. There are a lot of people on both sides of the fence that are having trouble with this: people that are happy about it, people that are not happy about it. When it was first decided to bring back the old line-up did you give any thought as to the impact — both for and against — this reunion?

Scott Ian: "No, no. We've never given thought to what anyone is gonna think or say. Outside of the people in this band, really no one else's opinion matters. And it's been like that since day one because if it wasn't that way we never would have gotten past our first album. When we were first writing songs to make 'Fistful of Metal', people were like, 'You're out of your minds, you're never gonna be able to do this, you might as well just play VAN HALEN covers. Then you can go get gigs and make some money.' If we would have listened to people we never would have done anything, we've never done this to please anybody but ourselves. And I think that's true for any band, but especially in this music, when we started playin' it, nobody gave a f*ck, nobody cared about thrash metal or speed metal or any of that crap. So, in a sense, we've been on our own forever and people have come along for the ride, but we can't base our decisions on what our audience is gonna think — we could never do that."

On Track Magazine: Right, right. No I totally hear what you're saying — stick to your guns and people will respect you more anyhow.

Scott Ian: "And I mean, that's not as if to say we're telling our audience to go f*ck themselves; far from it. We understand anytime you make a decision like that, of course, you're gonna piss people off. When we fired Joey [Belladonna] in 1992 we knew we were gonna piss off a huge portion of our audience, but if we didn't do that then maybe the band doesn't continue. And we get John Bush and we have this f*cking amazing dude in the band for thirteen years. And it just so happens we decided to make a call and try and put the reunion together and it happened and now we just find ourselves in a really weird place because instead of one singer we have two great singers; we don't know what the f*ck we're doin'."

On Track Magazine: Now you've obviously heard what's been reported about where John Bush currently stands in regard to his place with ANTHRAX saying that it's over with. What are your thoughts on his reaction to the reunion and what his outlook for the future is?

Scott Ian: "Well, I know what his reaction to the reunion is and I know what his outlook for the future is. And what you read in the press and what is actually talked about between friends are two different stories and some things will remain personal and some decisions will be revealed when we decide to reveal them. Not every conversation that this band has is for public knowledge; it's just the way it is. I'm sorry, people on the Internet, but you just can't know everything."

On Track Magazine: No doubt things do tend to get out of hand when it comes to the Internet gossip that goes down. There's always the twisted version of the story and of course the truth…. It's like the old telephone game, rumor gets spread around and it doesn't take long for the story to stray way off course. I just wanted to get your input and what you thought. And if you wanta keep it personal, that's cool. I mean, I'm down with that.

Scott Ian: "Yeah, I really, truthfully, have nothing to say about it. Whatever decisions happen and however we move forward in this band will be made known when were ready, but we made a statement and the fact of the matter is we committed to do a reunion tour and that's it. And nobody was fired and nobody's quit. And people can speculate all they want, but until we say something then there's really no reason for them to waste time speculating. Either enjoy it or don't enjoy it."

Read the entire interview at OnTrackMagazine.com.