Saliva’s Bobby Amaru On Why They’ll Continue After Wayne Swinny’s Death
Saliva very sadly lost their founding guitarist Wayne Swinny to a brain hemorrage while on the road back in March of 2023. Since then, the band has gone through some ups and downs in their process of healing, understandably. Saliva frontman and vocalist Bobby Amaru spoke on the band’s future in a recent interview with Meltdown of Detroit’s WRIF radio station. As transcribed by Blabbermouth.net:
“I tossed it up, man, and when he passed away, I kind of questioned whether I even wanted to do it or not. And I had tough decisions [to make], man. But I thought about what he would have wanted. I thought about a lot of our conversations and kind of went back to a lot of that. And he was at my house literally five days before he passed, cutting a solo on one of the last songs for the ‘Revelation’ record. And that was a very fun and interesting day, doing that and just hanging with him. And I remember we went and got Thai food. And he got a number two, and, dude, his mouth was literally like numb on fire. He could not handle it, dude. He was drinking milk and water and all kinds of stuff. But we had so many great times, and I know how he felt about what we were doing with Saliva. I knew how he felt about the new record.
“I think sometimes people don’t give me credit either for being here 13 years, and they just kind of wanna assume the early days — forget all the other stuff; it’s just all about the early days,” Bobby continued. “And I get the legacy of Saliva and the brand, and I’ve never disrespected that one bit and I’ve always just tried to take the high road. But sometimes, man, when things are going on behind your back and stuff, too, and sometimes people just play the victim in all of this and you’re the problem, like I’m the issue or something as to why Saliva is continuing to go on. And it’s, like, I’m just doing what I’ve been doing the last 13 years, which is keeping the train on the track. I felt like we did a lot of really cool things last year. We played a bunch of DWP [Danny Wimmer Presents] shows and a bunch of really cool festivals… That was fun. And we had a really successful tour with Drowning Pool. And it felt like the right thing to do was to just keep going forward, keep moving into the direction that we feel is positive and keeps things on track. It’s no disrespect to the old stuff and the old band — I never would take any credit away from any of those guys — but I think brands, fans, especially, sometimes they forget it is a business, and businesses do still go on after members leave. It’s always touchy. You’re never gonna please everybody. You’re always gonna have people who just hate it regardless, but you can’t please everybody. And I’ve always lived by that from day one. Like when I came in the band, it was, like, ‘Well, what are you gonna say to people that don’t like it?’ People are gonna like it or they’re not gonna like it. You can’t please everyone.”
Now after Swinny’s passing, there are no original members left of Saliva, who initially formed in 1996. As it stands now, Saliva is made up of Sammi Jo Bishop on drums, guitarists Josh Kulack and Sebastian LaBar, and Amaru on vocals.
