10 page interview with Ross The Boss about MANOWAR's history from the beginnings to the split, conducted by Manuel Trummer (of Atlantean Kodex fame) in 2016 and originally published in German in DEAF FOREVER Magazine. The pictures down below in the article is not from the actual magazine. Courtesy of ”Zex” who translated this.
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The Story of Manowar in the Words of Ross “The Boss” Friedman
With the parting of Ross the Boss and Joey DeMaio in November 1988 ended one of the greatest creative runs in the history of heavy metal. As if in trance, MANOWAR had recorded four immortal classics in only two and a half years: “Battle Hymns”, “Into Glory Ride, “Hail to England” and “Sign of the Hammer”. After the ambiguous transition album “Fighting the World”, the epochal “Kings of Metal” ended the creative triumphal march that founded the renown of MANOWAR as the loudest, grandest, most excessive, ostentatious, controversial and - for many fans - simply the best heavy metal band of all time. The attempt of a story.
>>Baby I was born to play music, I’m the man with the screaming guitar!<<
In the Beginning, There Was Innocence
Ross sits in front of me, wearing glasses and a black shirt. The legendary guitarist has just celebrated his 62th birthday. He loves to talk, and his likable “Noo Yawker” accent immediately wins me over. Only once during our three long talks, Ross seems upset. Angrily he tells the story of how AFM records shipped out his solo debut “New Metal Leader” (2008) with a sticker saying “Best Heavy Metal Album since Kings of Metal!”. His artistic integrity and independence are important to Ross, and rightly so. For his involvement with the punk pioneers The Dictators, he is held in high esteem by the rock community – beyond his role in MANOWAR. Countless co-operations, from Anthrax to the punks of The Nomads to rock ‘n’ roll bands like The Spinatras shaped his life. His most recent “baby” are the power metal heroes of Death Dealer. Furthermore, the Ross-The-Boss-Band is preparing to tour again, this time with American musicians. Ross cannot accept a standstill. “My motto is: songs, songs, songs. And when you have written all these songs, you continue: with songs, songs, and more songs.” It is precisely this manic energy and the need for rock that catapulted MANOWAR in only six years from a backwater rehearsal room to the rock ’n’ roll Olympus
.>>We met on English ground …<<
A Fateful Encounter
At heart, it is Ronnie James Dio who has to be named the father of MANOWAR. On May 18th 1980 in the City Hall of Newcastle, during the Black Sabbath UK-Tour, he established contact between Ross and his pyrotechnician Joey DeMaio. Ross had recently taken over the guitars for the French tour support Shakin’ Street: “At that time, Joey was part of the Black Sabbath crew. Ronnie told me to talk to Joey, that he’d be great bass player and that music-wise, he’d be on the same wavelength as me. Since I always did what Ronnie told me, I approached Joey, and we immediately connected.” It wasn’t only their common New Yorker origins that brought together Ross and Joey so quickly. In 1980, after a rash of failed projects, both were looking for new musical challenges. In each other, they found the perfect partner with the definite will to make it big. Aside from Shakin’ Street’s major label debut that Ross had recorded in 1980, his main accomplishments at that time were the first three albums of the legendary Dictators. However, Ross’ musical biography didn’t start with Punk, but with the first violin in the orchestra of his North Bronx school. Beatlemania, the Rolling Stones and B.B. King brought him to rock music and revealed to him the magic of the electric guitar.
Ross cracks up laughing when he remembers the name of his first high school band: Total Crud. Equally obscure: his involvement with the hard rockers Lyre, who only released three rare 7”s; “It Could Be You”, “Hungarian Rocksody” and “Mirror, Mirror”. Joey could look back at a quite similar career. 400 kilometers north of New York, in the provincial town of Auburn, Joey had initially also started to play guitar at the height of the Beatlemania, before John Entwistle and Jack Bruce brought him to play bass instead. His first major gig took place on Broadway, when he played bass in an early production of the musical “Godspell”. Together with the hard rock band Feinstein’s Thunder he released the powerful single “Midnight Lady” and the Buddy Holly cover “Slippin’ and Slidin’”. Thunder nearly meant the end of Joey’s career, when during a bass solo the pyrotechnics set his costume on fire. Joey was hospitalized for two months due to his severe burns, and only through extensive therapy for his hands could he retain his playing skills.
Another rather unusual musical episode was when Joey and his former schoolmate Eric Adams joined the salon band Looks and toured the hotel bars of the state of New York. 1984, Joey remembers that time in Sounds magazine: “That was the reason we wrote‘All Men play on Ten’! Eric and I had been playing in a Holiday Inn-Band. After three weeks I said: ‘That’s it! I’ll never brush my hair again, I’ll never turn it down again, or use smaller equipment!’ We were fired anyway. For some reason the guests didn’t want bass solos for dinner.” Loud amps, no compromises and the absolute will to hit it big – no wonder that Joey and Ross immediately connected: “After the Dictators, I wanted to do something bigger, with more power and energy. A band like The Who, or Cream, or a classic power trio. Joey wanted the same. He was a great fan of Mountain and Grand Funk Railroad. At one point, we started jamming in Black Sabbath’s dressing room. Even back then we loved to play it loud. As soon as Sabbath were on stage, we let rip. When they had finished their set, Ronnie burst in, roaring ‘What the hell?? Have you guys lost it?!’ (laughs) We then started doing it every other night. That’s how MANOWAR got started."
>>And we all knew what we had to do …<<
World’s Loudest Flatmates
The musical energy between Ross and Joey in 1980 must have been breathtaking. Without any financial security through other jobs or bands, they quit Sabbath and Shakin’ Street to fully devote themselves to their new, big project. “Joey lived in my flat in New York, and we immediately started to write songs. Our first tracks were ‘Shell Shock’ and ‘Battle Hymn’. A good friend of mine was Bob Currie, back then a big shot at EMI. I invited him to my flat and we played our songs to him. He couldn’t believe how the two of us managed to sound like that. It was so loud and heavy we sounded like an entire band with drums and everything. We played ‘Death Tone’, ‘Fast Taker’, ‘Battle Hymn’ and some other songs we had written. That was just Joey and me. We didn’t have a singer, we didn’t have a drummer, and we had never played live. We didn’t even have a name – but we had the support of Bob Currie, one of the most important people with EMI.” With a little front money from EMI, Joey and Ross went to Auburn in 1981 to record a two-track tape with “Shell Shock” and “Battle Hymn” on it for the negotiations with the label. EMI immediately signed them. Meanwhile, the dynamic duo had grown to be a full-sized band. On drums, Carl Canedy of The Rods helped out. Vocals were taken over by another old friend of Joey’s from the Auburn scene: Eric Adams. If you measure musical success with chart positions, Eric was number one in theMANOWAR camp. As the singer of the Teenie band The Kids, the eleven year-old Adams had entered the Spanish hit parade with the single “Lovin’ Everyday” in 1965. But when Joey brought the Ian Gillian-Fan and former bandmate from Looks to join MANOWAR, Eric was working as a butcher at a major meat market – and was commonly known as Louis Marullo. “He had two sons named Eric and Adam. He took these two names on as a stage name. Back then, pseudonyms were not uncommon with musicians in New York. I also didn’t act as Ross Friedman, but as ‘Ross the Boss’. Family names that can be associated with a certain ethnic group don’t sound very mysterious. Take for example Gene Simmons. He didn’t go on stage as Chaim Witz, because it would have broken the theatrical rock star image. It was similar with us. Marullo, Friedman – that didn’t fit the Barbarian image we had chosen. In fact, it didn’t fit anything. (laughs)”
With the Liberty/EMI major deal in their pockets, Ross, Joey and Eric – still without a drummer or a name – had a quick start. What wonderful times for musicians: the label sent the band for six months to Florida, where they were to rehearse, write songs and record the first album – apartment, pool, rehearsal room, equipment and all expenses covered. Producer Joe Foglia (later sound guy for the TV shows “Miami Vice” and “Scrubs”) established contact with drummer Donnie Hamzik, and also the band name dates back to the Liberty-financed Florida era: “Originally, our favorite name was Pax Romana. ICBM – Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles – was also up for discussion. (laughs) One day, our technician Dawk blurted out: ‘Manowar! How about Manowar?’ Joey and I looked at each other and just said: ‘That’s it!’ Because it reflected our attitude. With the tons of equipment that Dawk had set us up with, we felt like being at war anyway. The name also embodied our fighting spirit: Manowar was the name of a famous racing horse that is today regarded as America’s most successful show horse of all time. Then, it also means battleship – a very strong image that translates well into the language of heavy metal. We were in Florida, we had a band, we had a name, and we had a major deal. Ready to start at last.” Meanwhile, Bill Aucoin, famously known as the “Father of Kiss”, had taken over the management of MANOWAR and, through sappy interviews and a razor sharp profile, tried to establish the band as the new Kiss. One June 7th 1982, “Battle Hymns”, with its mighty cover art and immortal title track, was released. Every second of it made clear that these were no amateurs at work. Being 28 years old, Ross, Joey and Eric brought a massive amount of stage experience to the band. Because of their original sound, Joey’s innovative bass play, Ross’earthy riffs and the one-in-a-100 year voice of Eric Adams, the press immediately celebrated MANOWAR as a new hope for American metal and as a substantial answer to “the new British bands”. Shortly thereafter, MANOWAR played their first live show at Club Summers on the Beach in Fort Lauderdale – naturally with full equipment. It should remain their last gig at the location. The place had to be renovated afterwards.
But Liberty had anyway booked a complete US-Tour as opening act for Ted Nugent. What started out as a triumphal march – MANOWAR outacted the Headliner night after night and pulverized U$ 20,000 worth of pyrotechnics at every show – ended suddenly. After only three dates, “The Nuge” kicked the young New Yorkers off the tour: “When we were unpacking our equipment, the other two acts started looking like a children’s birthday party” laughs Ross. With their support slot, also the deal with Liberty was gone. There had been a change in the upper management, and the sales of “Battle Hymns” fell short of the expectations. Their rapid ascent was followed by an equally sudden downfall. The fall from major label-heaven traumatized the band. From that time on, MANOWAR staged themselves as outcasts, fighters against the industry and false metal, and the only real metal band (alongside Black Sabbath). In countless excessively immoderate interviews, the band spoiled their chances with labels, magazines and other musicians rather early. With their fans however, MANOWAR allied to form a sworn, quasi-religious community – until this very day.
>>Four sworn to vengeance, see the hate in our eyes<<
An Extra Helping of Attitude
Without the cash flow from Liberty, not only manager Bill Aucoin made off; Donnie Hamzik, who didn’t share MANOWARs no-holds-barred approach, also had to leave the band. With their U$ 12,000 payoff, Ross, Joey and Eric entrenched themselves in their Auburn rehearsal room and swore to strike back. Their campaign of vengeance found powerful support: “Scott Columbus sat down at the drumkit, and after three seconds we knew he was going to be our new drummer. He had a tougher punch than every other drummer I ever played with. Scott didn’t know fear. I love that. I am a punk rocker from New York, and I like guys with attitude. He got behind the drums and just blew us away.”The wheels started turning again when MANOWAR got the attention of Jon Zazula. In 1983, the epicenter of American metal formed around his shop Rock’n’Roll Heaven in New Jersey and his label Megaforce. With Metallica, Anthrax and Overkill, the former stock broker had some of the hottest bands of the time on his hands. When he heard the demos of “Into Glory Ride” – among them an early version of “Brothers of Metal” – he took charge of the release and organized a series of live shows as well as an appearance on Nickelodeon, a children’s TV channel. In gratitude, they signed the recording contract with their own blood. “Into Glory Ride” was released on July 1st 1983 and poses until today the central monument of epic metal. The songs are mightier and more dramatic. The rock ’n’ roll edge of “Battle Hymns” only shows itself on the opener “Warlord” (the intro was “performed” by Joey, Eric and Eric’s girlfriend …). Scott’s iron punch lends hymns like “Gloves of Metal” a hammering drive. The power of MANOWAR – and “Into Glory Ride” proved that once again – lay in their originality. No other band, neither back then nor today, had that unique sound. Out of the “Battle Hymns”-sessions, also “Gates of Valhalla” made it onto the new record: “Our advantage was that whenever we were in the studio, we recorded many songs that ultimately didn’t end up on the album. From the phase between ‘Battle Hymns’ and ‘Hail to England’, there are dozens of unreleased songs. One of the first pieces we wrote around the time of ‘Battle Hymn’ and ‘Shell Shock’ was called ‘Golden Ride’. It was never used. On another demo from that time was a track called ‘The Meeting’ and another one with the title ‘The Will to Kill’. That was in New York, before Carl Canedy. My friend Rich Fazio helped us out on drums. Joey should still have all these tapes.”
With the legendary cover of “Into Glory Ride”, also MANOWAR’s image came more to the point: “When we were living in Florida, “Conan the Barbarian” was released. We were blown away: ‘Hey, that could be us!’ (Ross imitates Arnold Schwarzenegger). We wanted to be exactly like that! The sheer power … The women should look up to us, and our foes should tremble before us. That was the image we wanted.” Despite receiving spectacular critiques, “Into Glory Ride” ultimately failed to facilitate the leap over the Atlantic. On the eve of the planned European tour, the tourbooker’s sister was killed in an accident. The tour was cancelled. Frustrated, MANOWAR left Megaforce and signed with Music For Nations in London, who had already licensed “Into Glory Ride” for the European market
.>>The quest for the grail, to England we sail …<<
On the Zenith
No phase in the band’s history documented the creative power of MANOWAR as insistently as the time following “Into Glory Ride”. The secret of steel: absolute professionalism and unconditional devotion to the music. In only six days, the band recorded the two (!) classics “Hail to England” and “Sign of the Hammer” (with the exception of the title track) in November 1983. At Toronto’s expensive Phase One Studios, star producer Jack Richardson flawlessly succeeded in casting MANOWAR’s pounding live sound on vinyl. “Blood of My Enemies” and the satanic epic of the century, “Bridge of Death” (later imitated by Quorthon) are absolutely singular until this day. No other band ever succeeded in combining melody, pathos and heaviness in such perfection. A big part was played by Eric Adams, who in 1984 coruscated at his artistic peak. With the support of Music for Nations, MANOWAR finally broke into Europe. The “Spectacle of Might” tour in 1984 made for many anecdotes. Already after the first show ensued the legendary fallout with supporting act Mercyful Fate, whereupon – as legend has it – King Diamond bestowed a curse upon MANOWAR. It didn’t hurt. For MANOWAR again managed to switch to a major label with worldwide distribution. 10 Records, a subdivision of Virgin, took over the band business and released “Sign of the Hammer” on October 15th 1984. Before, Virgin had sent the band to the horribly expensive Manor Studios in Oxford to add one more song to the seven already completed in the sessions with Jack Richardson. Under the aegis of Oliver Platt came thus the title track into being. It is remarkable how Platt managed to imitate Jack Richardson’s sound, so that on the album, no rift between the material from the two sessions can be heard. Tracks like “Thor (The Powerhead”), “Mountains” and the apocalyptic “Guyana (Cult of the Damned)” finally established MANOWAR firmly on international stages. No less than two extensive tours through Europe followed; the “Sign of the Hammer”-Tour in 1984/85 and the “Hail To Europe”-Tour. “We played many venues we’d never been to before, the Hammersmith Odeon among them. We also got the offer to open for Whitesnake. But they said we could only perform if we wouldn’t wear our leather outfits. We said: no, we don’t think so.” Still: in Europe, MANOWAR had found their second home.
Drums of Doom
The Curse of Technology
After a – for the band’s standards – unusually long hiatus of approximately three years, “Fighting the World” was released in 1987 – and met mixed reception. The commercially arranged album marks a departure from its barbarian predecessors. It is not only a transitional musical work, but was also marked by the tensions that were beginning to take hold of the band. The extensive touring for “Hail to England” and “Sign of the Hammer” was followed by the old game. 10 Records dropped the band. Via an acquaintance, Ross established contact with the major Atlantic Records. But Atlantic had no interest in buying a pig in a poke. With a small budget, MANOWAR entered the studio to record a demo. Together with producer legend Eddie Kramer (Woodstock, Jimi Hendrix, Humble Pie), a whole range of new songs were developed: “Courage”, “Number 1”, “Brothers of Metal” and “Blow Your Speakers”. The last two tracks were sent to Atlantic as a two-track tape, who subsequently signed MANOWAR. The 1986 version of “Brothers of Metal” is circulated on the internet today and clearly outshines the official “Louder Than Hell” (1996) version. “Courage” and “Number 1” were later also used by Joey on “Louder Than Hell”.
Apart from the simple songwriting, for instance in “Carry On”, it was the polished sound of “Fighting the World” that alienated many fans of the band. The working practices of MANOWAR had started to change considerably: “A problem had arisen while touring. We couldn’t hear the drums on stage anymore, mainly because our amps were so damn loud. Through Dawk, we found Vince Gutman, who had worked for Prince and Bruce Springsteen. He had developed a trigger system for drums that he used to produce those big artists. So around that time, we started to work with triggered drums when playing live shows. At the studio, Vince then brought along a device called Synclavier. He explained that we could use it to develop drum tracks and edit them on the computer afterwards. In the studio, I like to work conventionally, but Joey insisted that we also use the digital drums for recording. On ‘Fighting the World’, Scott already didn’t play the drums anymore.”
The disagreement surrounding the legendary “Drums of Doom” also reveals that the mood in the band increasingly deteriorated. Especially Scott, who was now not heard on the finished albums anymore, suffered from the changed recording conditions: “Scott wentthrough with all of that because he was a good guy, but I know how unhappy it made him. He also hated playing live with a triggered system. Scott wrote some of the drum beats, and he also recorded some cymbals. But the drum tracks were created with the Synclavier, on the computer. That started a pretty negative psychological development with him. He felt depreciated and said he was probably good enough for the stage, but not for the studio anymore. It really preyed on his mind.” A weakness of the album also lies in that you could hear in many songs how MANOWAR struggled with the still unfamiliar digital technology. Particularly striking is the awkward programming of the absolutely identical sounding hi-hats on “Holy War”. Despite all its deficits, “Fighting the World” was MANOWAR’s final breakthrough in Europe. Until today, the album that is regarded as one of the first metal albums with a fully digital production, sold 300,000 units in Germany alone. The impressive sales and an unrelenting tour schedule notwithstanding, the band earned little money with it: “Joey and me held fifty percent of MANOWAR, respectively. Of the money we earned with the band we paid Scott and Eric. The rest we put in new equipment. Joey never needed much himself, because he lived with his parents in Auburn. But I had to pay for my apartment and my car. So from the beginning of MANOWAR on, I worked in parallel in construction. We controlled the works at the highways. I can imagine many people find that hard to believe, but if you live in New York City, you need a lot of money. What I earned with the band was never enough to survive.”
>>They were the Metal Kings!<<
Divorce Amongst the Gods
After some successful touring (i. a. with Motörhead), MANOWAR retreated again to record their magnum opus “Kings of Metal”. Even though Scott Columbus again can’t be heard on the album, the result sounds more confident than the unsteady “Fighting the World”. Exceptionally aggressive hymns like “Hail and Kill” or “Blood of the Kings” reclaimed lost ground. Furthermore, no other band at that time would have dared an overwhelming, megalomaniac bombast track like “The Crown and the Ring”. In sum, “Kings of Metal” is a masterful work and one of the most lavish metal productions of the 80s. Again, Universal Studios in Chicago and the digital skills of Vince Gutman assumed responsibility for the complex sound. But as the band had come to terms with the altered circumstances ofproduction, their disagreements concerning the songs were on the rise: “I never liked “Grandfather, tell me a story …” (imitating the voice). Another song that really upset me was “Pleasure Slave”. I told Joey that we definitely shouldn’t release this song. He just said: “Yes we do.” My opinion didn’t count anymore. Right up to the point where I realized how things were going to turn out.” But disputes between the two heads of the band also flared up on another front. Just like “Fighting the World”, “Kings of Metal” flopped in the USA. Ross thinks he knows the reasons: “Our albums flopped because we never toured the US. That finally broke our back. Joey just didn’t want to tour without full equipment. I suggested to him that we just take two full stacks and play every damn club in the USA. Anthrax did it, Metallica did it, Slayer did it. Joey refused. Then the whole bullshit with ‘Death to False Metal’ started. The fans had already begun making fun of us. You can’t go and tell a fan ‘If you like Manowar, you can’t listen to Slayer, Metallica or Anthrax anymore’. All that hurt us immensely, and it estranged us from the scene.” The end came shortly after the completion of “Kings of Metal”, still before the planned European tour: “’Kings of Metal’ came out in autumn 1988. I was really enthusiastic about how great the album sounded. Then one day my phone rang. It was Joey, he said he was in New York and wanted to talk to me. I suggested he’d come over so we could share a beer, have some fun. He then said it was time for me and the band to part ways. I asked him: ‘What’s now with the four kings of metal? You couldn’t have picked a worse timing, Joey, could you?’ That really hurt. But it is probably like a marriage. We started the band as partners, and then we drifted apart. I am proud of my time with Manowar. Joey and me were like Yin and Yang. But the Yin can’t ying without the Yang. (laughs) A prize fighter can’t win with only one fist. But fortunately I have all my other bands. I couldn’t be happier.”
Translated from German by ”Zex"
Written by Manuel Trummer for DEAF FOREVER Magazine #10 (02/2016).
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