IRON STEEL EXCLUSIVE BLOG ENTRY #5: MORGAN ROSE ON BEING THE TOUR MANAGER
[Welcome to the fifth installment of our exclusive blog series from the new thrash supergroup Iron Steel, featuring Morgan Rose (Sevendust) on drums; Jim LaMarca (Chimaira), Dave Ellefson (ex-Megadeth) and Rachel Bolan (Skid Row) all on bass; along with vocalist and guitarist Fran Strine and guitarist Tommy Redd. Each week a different member will be posting a blog entry at MetalSucks. This week Sevendust skinsman Morgan Rose talks about the trials and tribulations of being the band’s de-facto tour manager. (Check out Fran Strine’s, Jim LaMarca’s, Tommy Redd’s and Dave Ellefson’s previous entries.]
If you asked me a year ago if I would be the only island of sanity in an otherwise raucous, insane metal super-group, I would tell you that you were NUTS. The fact is, they need SOMEONE around here who is realistic, grounded and sensible, so here I am!
At NAMM Ellefson and Fran were having flashbacks, LaMarca got out of control at our release party and Tommy… well, Tommy is just a dangerous dude on the whole. Rachel Bolan only speaks to us via morse code transmissions and I recently heard that we were bringing even more people into this psychotic mess of a band – scary!
I’ve become the de-facto tour manager for the band lately because all our tour managers wind up either quitting, getting killed in one of Tommy’s ill-planned maneuvers or disappearing on their way to take the groupies home. The last one went to bring Tommy one of his bags and brought the wrong one up from under the bus – it was his stash of grenades – and it exploded as the tour manager swung it over his shoulder. We found the poor guy, headless, hanging from a tree on the outskirts of the parking lot we were in.
The most interesting part of the tour manager duties is maintaining the list of what we spend money on here. You learn a lot about a person from what they spend their per diem on, for sure. From Fran’s purchase last week of 6 bottles of Jack Daniels, 2 boxes of Hello Kitty Band-Aids, 30 black bandannas a box of Grits and a bucket of KFC to Ellefson’s stockpile of Red Bull and Pixie Sticks (how did you THINK he got all those side projects done? 12 hours awake just isn’t enough!), it is telling for sure. LaMarca bought a tazer gun, a case of chocolate milk, 20 copies of the DRAGONFORCE record and some whoopee cushions yesterday and Tommy bought an electron microscope, night vision goggles and fireworks from a state that wasn’t supposed to sell them with what he saved up of his per diem over the last few months.
I, of course, bought Ramen Noodles, Mac & Cheese Mix, a few bottles of water and a bottle of multi-vitamins. Boring, I know, but I might actually make it through this promo tour with my health intact. That is, if I continue to avoid Tommy and if we can find another new tour manager soon.
-Morgan Rose, IRON STEEL
