LAMB OF GOD's MARK MORTON Celebrates Six Years Of Sobriety

LAMB OF GOD guitarist Mark Morton is celebrating six years of sobriety.

Earlier today (Friday, December 27),the 52-year-old musician took to his social media to write: "I woke up this morning with 6 years clean & sober. This comes after decades of drinking nearly every day & with the final 10 years of that compounded by an aggressively progressive opiate addiction that almost killed me.

"I'm writing this just in case someone out there who feels as hopeless, helpless & crippled by addiction as I once did might read it & start to believe that recovery IS possible.

"You can get clean & live a life beyond anything you've ever dreamed of. Find an alcoholic or addict living in recovery. Ask them what they did. You're worth it."

In his recently released memoir "Desolation: A Heavy Metal Memoir", Morton credits Slash for making "sobriety look cool" and helping him along his recovery journey. Speaking to the GUNS N' ROSES-centric podcast "Appetite For Distortion" about how the GN'R guitarist was instrumental in getting Morton to stay sober, Mark said: "I didn't actually check with Slash before I wrote that part of the book, so I hope he doesn't mind me sharing that story. Maybe I should have reached out, but I don't think it's anything…

"Slash has been pretty open about his experience with some of these things," Morton continued. "And so when I was trying to get sober and well before I was able to accomplish any kind of sustained sobriety or recovery, Slash was very helpful. He was very compassionate, very kind and made himself available to me with some insight and perspective that he shared.

"Let me add to that, that I think Slash and some other people who have been open about their experience with addiction… I'm the kind of person that has to think something's cool to wanna pursue it, because, see, I have a low self-esteem, so I want you to think I'm cool," Mark explained. "'Cause I'm not sure that I am. So when something's cool, I'm gonna chase it 'cause I wanna be that. And people like Slash, who's cool and people that put themselves out there and shared their story and shared their experience made it look cool, made sobriety look cool to me. And I'm grateful for that. 'Cause that's part of what it took. I'm just being genuine.

"It's not an intellectual decision," Morton added. "Addiction's not an intellectual issue. Some of the smartest people I know are addicts and alcoholics. People that aren't addicts and alcoholics tend to overlook that. It's not a matter of reason or, in my experience, rational thinking or intellect. It's something deeper than that. And so, for me, having an example of people that I admired that I said, 'Hey, there's something on the other side of this that can still be cool.' Because, see, I thought being a drug addict and an alcoholic was what rock and roll was [and was] part of what it was supposed to be. And it turns out it's not."

"Desolation: A Heavy Metal Memoir" was released in June via Hachette Books. Co-written with Ben Opipari, the book explores both Mark's life in music and his tumultuous path through addiction and into recovery.

Morton addressed his sobriety in the lyrics to the song "All I Had To Lose", which appeared on his "Ether" solo EP, released in 2020.

"When I was in that kind of mindset of drinking and drugs and all that, I tended to have this sort of negative filter," Morton told ABC Audio about the track, which he described as among the "most personal" songs he's ever written. "I could make anything 'woe is me,' or 'it should be this way,' just entitled, very addict sort of viewpoint on things."

He continued: "You get a little bit of clarity and you get a little bit of gratitude, and you start seeing, like, 'Wow, I still have so much going on. It's amazing that I didn't mess this up.'"

"Desolation" was described by the publisher as "the story of Morton's lifelong quest for clarity and self-acceptance, and shows how the pressures of career success and personal battles eventually came into conflict with Morton's dedication to the creative process."

Morton co-founded LAMB OF GOD, which was initially called BURN THE PRIEST, in 1994.

In 2019, Morton released his debut solo album, "Anesthetic".

LAMB OF GOD's latest LP, "Omens", came out in 2022.

Morton and the rest of LAMB OF GOD completed the "Ashes Of Leviathan" tour with MASTODON this past summer.