Scott Ian Spoken Word
Anthrax guitarist Scott Ian will release Swearing Words in Glasgow, a spoken word DVD, on 11.11.14
“I’ve always loved musicians like Jello Biafra and Henry Rollins, who have the balls to do spoken word performances. It’s just them and the mike. There’s no band to make them look good or cover up their mistakes. They’re alone, naked. It’s seemed like a really cool thing to do, but I’m not especially political and while I’m interested in a lot of different subjects from good food to great comic books, I’m not enough of an expert in any one area to get onstage and talk about it like I know any more than anyone else.
Then over the past five years or so I’ve been lucky enough to become really good friends with some great comedians, like Brian Posehn and Patton Oswalt. We’d sit around and swap stories, and I realized they were as interested in the stories I have about my bands Anthrax and S.O.D., the people I’ve been lucky enough to cross paths with — like Lemmy Kilmister from Motorhead, Gene Simmons from KISS, the late Dimebag Darrell from Pantera and cutting my teeth alongside the guys in Metallica, Slayer and Megadeth – as I was in their jokes.
The thought of doing spoken word still terrified me, but they helped convince me that I’ve had a bunch of really stupid, funny, tragic and triumphant experiences over the last 10 years or so and that if I could write them all down or at least put them into some sort of order, I’d have at least a couple hours’ worth of material that Anthrax fans, and anyone who likes nerdy (nerdy meaning cool) shit like Star Wars, Stephen King, drinking and sports might want to hear.
Still, being able to sit with my friends in a bar and tell entertaining stories was a long way from standing in front of a paying crowd telling stories that would hopefully entertain them. And, I had no idea how to go about actually booking a show. I just had this big idea that I could do speaking shows and eventually it’d happen.
And it did. Anthrax fans have always been loyal and supportive and that has allowed me to act like a rock star for more than 30 years. So, I wanted to reach out first to my fans to help finance this one-of-a-kind DVD that reveals more about me, my sense of humor and my bizarre career than anything you’ve ever read or seen.”
— Scott
