All he wanted was a new Walkman…

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Scott Ian

September 27th marked the 25th anniversary of Cliff Burton’s death.

I knew Cliff for three years and in those three years became good friends with him and Kirk, bonds that have lasted and stood the test of time. We were the three musketeers when we were together and we got to spend a lot of time together back in those days. We were all coming up at the same time and reveling in our bands, the music, the scene and the lifestyle. We fucking loved Metal!

This is one of the many fine memories I have of Cliff. Add your favorite beverage and enjoy.

I was in London in March of 1984 doing promo for our first album Fistful Of Metal. Metallica was also in London because they were supposed to do a tour with The Rods and Exciter in the UK but the tour was cancelled. They were in the middle of making Ride The Lightning in Denmark but they couldn’t go back to the studio because it had been booked during the time they were supposed to be on tour. Music For Nations got an apartment for them to stay in and I ended up staying there with them.

As you can imagine things were very crazy. Too much alcohol. Too much everything. We were partying non-stop and having the time of our lives. A bunch of 20 year old kids in London living the dream.

Scott and Cliff in London, UK. March, 1984.

At the Marquee, March 1984. I think this is a few days after our arrest.

One day Cliff and I were going to a store so Cliff could buy a Walkman. We were in the tube station and two policemen approached us and asked us if we had drugs. We said no, big surprise. Truth is, we didn’t. They kept telling us that we should just tell them what we have and things would be easier for us. We kept telling them that we didn’t have anything. I guess they didn’t believe us being the long haired freaks that we were because they arrested us and took us to the police station. They took all of our clothes and put us in separate cells. These weren’t cells with bars, they had solid doors with a little window that they could slide open from the outside. I was sitting in a six by six concrete room with no windows in my underwear for five hours with no communication with anyone. At some point I heard Cliff’s voice and I started banging on the door screaming at them to tell me what was going on. A cop opened the window in the door and told me “they were taking my mate back to the flat so they could search it.” Apparently they had found Cliff’s cold medicine pills in his coat and they assumed it was illegal drugs. I guess they hadn’t heard of Sudafed yet in England. They sent the pills to a lab to be tested because they didn’t believe Cliff when he told them that it was just cold medicine. So now they were taking him back to the apartment and I got really nervous because I knew he had weed back there. If they found the weed we were fucked. All I could think of was that movie Midnight Express where the guy gets busted in Turkey for smuggling and sent to Turkish prison and nobody ever sees him for years and he bites the guys tongue out and kisses boobies through glass. Randy Quaid is in it. He gets stabbed in the ass.

Anyway, I imagined we would get sent away without a word and I’d never be heard from again. It’s easy to get irrational when you’ve never been arrested for anything and you’re sitting in a cold concrete cell in a foreign country in your underwear for five hours with no clue as to what is going on.

Another two hours or so passed and the cell door opened and a cop was handing me my clothes and telling me I was to go to the Captain’s office. Were we on a one way train to ass stabbing?

I got dressed and followed this cop to the Captain’s office. To my surprise, Cliff was already there lounging in a chair with a huge Cheshire cat grin. I figured we were OK but I still had no idea what happened and how they didn’t find the weed back at the flat.

The Captain started to apologize to us and tell us how “sorry he was for the mistake and us being falsely accused and that the cold medicine really was cold medicine etc etc.” I freaked.

I started screaming at him, gesturing wildly I’m sure with my hands (things got a bit hazy at this point as I was so agitated). I remember telling the Captain that “I could give a fuck for his apology” and “how dare they do what they did to us” and “just because we have long hair doesn’t mean we’re fucking criminals” and a whole bunch of other rhetoric. The Captain said “I would think the police in NYC would have done the same thing” and I screamed at him that “the police in NYC have better things to do than arrest two innocent people just because they have long hair and suspect that they have drugs.” I was livid. I was too angry to realize that I was screaming at a British police Captain who could very easily throw me back in a cell. Cliff was looking at me like I was insane and he hit me in the leg a couple of times trying to get me to shut the fuck up. Finally I stopped and they let us leave. The Captains final words “I’m sorry you feel that way ringing in my angry ears.”

As soon as we were outside I asked Cliff what the hell happened back at the flat. He told me that they (Cliff and six cops) walked into the flat and Kirk was in the living room playing guitar. The cops proceeded to search the flat for an hour to no avail. They couldn’t find anything. I asked Cliff where the weed was hidden, like he had some super secret hidey hole to stash his shit. He started laughing and asked me where would be the first place I would look if I was a cop searching a flat looking for drugs. I told him I would look under the mattress of his bed.

Exactly.

The weed was under his mattress and the cops never looked there!! I couldn’t believe it. The Metal Gods were looking down on Cliff and I that day.

Needless to say we were very happy about our freedom. We boozed it up all night and I think Cliff, Kirk and I ended up wrestling in the hedges on some unsuspecting Brits lawn in the wee hours of the morning.

Cliff never got his Walkman.

RIP my brother.

Cheers,
Scott

I still can’t believe it happened

Posted on September 22, 2011 by Scott Ian

Off to Australia for the last Damned Things shows for the foreseeable future and a ton of Anthrax promo. Thank you all for making our first week with Worship Music such a success. We’ve only just begun to fight!

Next up, first leg of the US tour with Testament and Death Angel. It’s going to be SICK!

See you from down under.

Cheers,
Scott

Thank You

Posted on September 16, 2011 by Scott Ian

Thank you Andy Buchanan for taking the best picture of my career. I’ll have a lot to say about the show in the next week or so, still reeling over the immenseness of it all.

Thank you Metallica, Slayer & Megadeth. Thank you NY Yankees. Thank you to everyone who came out to make this show so amazing for us.

Please checkout our new record Worship Music wherever you get your music. It’s out everywhere. It’s the record of our lives and it deserves to be heard!!!

Cheers,
Scott

In The End

Posted on September 2, 2011 by Scott Ian

Is a song on our record. I think it’s the best song on the record. I think it’s the most important song on the record and it’s the centerpiece of Worship Music.

This song started out as something completely different back in 2007 and over the last four years it went through revision after revision. We were never satisfied with it, always just missing the mark. Even the “finished” version (it had a different title at the time) in 2009 was not as good as it could’ve been and actually may not have even made the record.

It was this song that we wanted to write as a tribute to Darrell and Ronnie. This being our first chance to say how we felt about these guys in the context of what we do and what they influenced. Musically this was the one, epic in scope, the right balance of melancholy and aggression, a proper tribute to two guys that meant so much to us except, it wasn’t perfect. And it had to be. It had to be perfect to honor them.

Scott & Dime

Darrell was our friend first and foremost. We’d been on this crazy path together since we met in 1986. His impact on our lives will never be forgotten and will always be missed. He played on three Anthrax records. He was truly the sixth member of the band. Getcha’ pull! Ronnie, what can I say? I started out as a fan from Rainbow and then of course followed him to Sabbath. I saw Ronnie for the first time on the Heaven & Hell tour in 1980. He was incredible. On the Mob Rules tour my friend Jimmy (who knew Ronnie) was able to score us some passes and we literally got them from under Ronnie’s hotel room door! We met him after the show, I had a brief chance to stammer a hello, or at least tried to as I was so sweaty and nervous. Cut to years later and I’m meeting Ronnie again and he remembered me from that short meeting years before. That’s who he was. He always put you at ease. He always had a kind word and a smile. He was a mentor to us in so many ways, mainly how to be so fucking cool. On tour in 2004 I remember standing on the side of the stage night after night blown away by the power he possessed and also giving him Yankee’s scores between songs! Yes, Ronnie was as fanatical about the Yankees as I am. To have had the privilege to become friends with one of my hero’s was an incredible experience and I will never forget my moments with either of them.

Scott, Dio & Vinnie Paul

We were still fighting with this song, the arrangement just not right and then Charlie found the bells. He sent this melody idea to Rob and I with a new arrangement that had these bells playing this really dark melody and it was soooo close. Rob suggested Charlie tweak the chorus combining his new idea with some of the previous idea and that was it. It was one of those moments of clarity when you just know something is right. The song was finally the song it was supposed to be. So now, words to match the power of the music.

I wasn’t sure how to even try and express what I felt. Everything I came up with lyrically just sounded cheesy to me. I finally had the music that lived up to the task of honoring our friends, now I needed the words to convey the emotions. I kept hitting a wall and then Charlie sent me a line… “Lone star was dark tonight.” That line opened the door for me and the words came naturally. The feelings translating into lyrics that I felt did Darrell and Ronnie justice.

I’ll leave the rest to you my friends, you’ll be able to hear it in 11 days. Enjoy it and I hope it fucks your world the same way Darrell and Ronnie fucked mine!

Have a great weekend.

Cheers,
Scott