Thrash metal icons Anthrax may be standing firm with their frontman Joey Belladonna behind the mic, but there’s still a contingent of fans around the world that still yearn for the John Bush years. That’s not a knock against Belladonna, per se, but for many the high octane, groove metal stylings of Anthrax in the 90s and 2000s really resonated.
To his credit, John Bush himself has been thinking about his time in Anthrax. Sure, he’s happily fronting Armored Saint and Category 7 these days, but that doesn’t mean the dude is ignorant to the legacy he built in one of the most influential metal bands of all time. To that end, he’s been vocal in the past about maybe putting together a tour to commemorate his work on kick ass albums like Sound of White Noise, Stomp 442, Volume 8, and We’ve Come For You All.
During a recent interview with Eonmusic, he was once again asked about a potential tour where he’d perform those tunes one day. And while he acknowledges he’s crazy busy lately, he admits he still wants to get that rolling.
“I have some ideas about it, some more recent ideas about it, and in conjunction with, for players, we could even maybe do something in conjunction with [my new project] Category 7, although I don’t know about that yet, which means we could play some of these songs, but then we could also play some of the songs from everybody’s other projects, right? I don’t know yet. Now I have this other thing with Category 7 and Saint and like, how do I make it work? I do want to do that one day, I really do. I certainly believe that from ‘[Sound Of] White Noise’, ‘Stomp [442]’, ‘Volume 8’, ‘We’ve Come For You All’, there’s great songs that certainly could do a really cool support slot or even a headlining show. I don’t necessarily want to go out and do sixty dates, quite honestly, but I do want to go out and play maybe some specific shows, maybe some festivals. I have some ideas, newer ideas in conjunction with it. It’s just about making it work.”
Though he said he’s willing to get it done, he later admitted in the interview that he knows time isn’t necessarily on his side.
“Time is not on my side with a lot of things. I’m 60 years old, but I’m still doing pretty good — I did Pilates yesterday and held my own. I still try to be physically active, and I feel great, the voice is good, as long as I stay healthy. I want to make this work. I don’t know; next thing I know, it’s going to Blabbermouth tomorrow, because they’re gonna be, like, ‘He said that before, but he hasn’t done it, so, like, shut up already!’ So I want to. I just don’t know when.”
In the past, there’d been talk to have guitarist Paul Cook, who was also involved in Anthrax during part of Bush’s time there, potentially involved in such a tour.
As a fan of “Bushthrax”, I gotta say it would be sick to see John back performing some of these songs. It would be pretty fucking killer.