Tom Morello

Before Rage Against The Machine were rock veterans, before Prophets Of Rage even existed, there was a young Kiss fan building his star from the ground up. Now, as he prepares to publish a career-spanning new book, Whatever It Takes, Tom Morello takes us

Before Rage Against The Machine were rock veterans, there was a young Kiss fan dreaming of stardom. Now, as he prepares to publish a new book, Whatever It Takes, he takes us back to his early years, with personal photos and recollections.

My first ever gig – a euphoric moment.

My first concert was seeing my favorite band in the world at the time, Kiss. The show was at the Chicago Stadium in a suspect part of Chicago. My mom, who was a high-school teacher, bought a ticket for a student of hers to drive my friend and I to the show. This was a time where the great bands really maintained a mystique. There were only these fabulous rumours about the band spitting blood and breathing fire and guitars smoking, so my anticipation was at a fever pitch to see all this in person. The opening band was Uriah Heap, and the experience felt so much louder than ten jet plane engines surrounding my head. Our seats were behind a pole at the side of the stage but that did not diminish the rock euphoria I felt that night. As you can see here, I am glowing in my rain boots and bootleg T-shirt.

My teenage bedroom in Libertyville.

Here I am playing my Gibson Explorer 2 practising some hot licks in front of my wall-sized Kiss poster, my extensive collection of stuff and ceramic hippopotamuses. My lifeline to the world is the record player you can see in the background there. I would sit for hours in my room practising Michael Schenker riffs, Randy Rhoads leads, and dreaming of one day being able to make albums and play on stage.

This is a period where I was practising countless hours a day, every day, without fail.

The first time I performed live.

Here I am [left] posing before my first ever public performance, which would be in my mom’s basement in Libertyville, IL. My band, the Electric Sheep, was dressed for the occasion. I’m wearing a garbage bag held together with electrical tape, the prerequisite headband, jeans that have exactly a hundred safety pins running down the legs, and moccasins. A photo of Stonehenge looms in the background. While I was nervous as hell, at the same time I was ready to begin the lifetime adventure of live performance.

The show was a gathering of the high school’s Concert Choir, where we inflicted our cacophonous original punk rock tunes on our unsuspecting classmates. The concert began with us hiding our punk outfits by all wearing concert robes until the big reveal. I remember at one moment during the show, balancing my guitar on my head and pulling on it, bowing the neck until it almost snapped off, to get some horrific feedback result.

“I was pursuing an Honours Degree in Political Science, and an Honours Degree in Spandex-Wearing

Jheri-Curl Hair-Metal.”

High-school jams, Alice Cooper make-up and, erm… Renaissance Faire work.

Adam Jones and I played in my high-school band together. We were called the Electric Sheep. Adam was a talented musician and I was a beginner, so he helped me find my way around the fretboard. I dressed as Alice Cooper pretty much every Halloween for a number of years. I identified with Alice embracing his outsider-ness, as I felt like an outsider. The twisted glam rock mixed with horror themes and awesome riffs were an intoxicating blend for my teenage self.

I worked five summers at the Renaissance Faire in Bristol, Wisconsin, strumming pirate shanties and frolicking about in tights. It was a way to pay off college loans while pretending I was living in the Lord Of The Rings.

Hair-metal at Harvard.

I was the first person from my home town to ever attend Harvard University. I was also the first person to ever apply to Harvard University. I basically had a dual major that I was pursuing: an Honours degree in Political Science, and an Honours Degree in Spandex-Wearing Jheri-Curl Hair-Metal.

New bands in Hollywood.

I arrived in Hollywood in 1986 [joining pop rockers Them Generation, above] with a college degree and a Marshall stack. I was utterly unemployable, as my Renaissance Faire-based work history left me with few marketable skills other than juggling and playing Yo, Ho, Ho And A Bottle Of Rum.

Lock Up’s first record deal – and a questionable album title.

I endeavored to put together a political band with heavy riffs and funky rhythms, but no one was having it, so I joined the only band that would have me, a pop-rock outfit called Them Generation. Fortunately that not-so-good-band was rehearsing at the same complex as my favorite local band, Lock Up. Lock Up was in a vein of funk rock – like early Chili Peppersmeets-Living Colour. When Lock Up parted ways with their guitarist, the fellow who ran the rehearsal space recommended they give me a look, as he had heard me shredding up a storm through the walls for months. And so I joined my favorite local band and embarked on the hard-scrabble clubplaying experience of a struggling Hollywood musician. We eventually scored a record deal with Geffen, and I began my recording career with an album awkwardly titled Something Bitchin’ This Way Comes.

“Killing In The Name was played on BBC Radio complete with all sixteen ‘f**k you’s and one ‘motherf**ker’.”

Rage Against The Machine begins…

When Lock Up broke up, the first call I made was to Brad Wilk [pictured above], who had auditioned for an earlier version of Lock Up and I remembered him being an outstanding drummer and nice guy. Rage Against The Machine formed in late summer 1991, and our first real public performance was at a lunchtime event at Cal State Northridge, where we slowly but surely won over the skeptical students.

My friends in Tool.

We had a long-standing friendship with the guys in Tool. In addition to Adam [Jones] and I [left, as youngsters] coming from the same small town, Maynard [Keenan] was my roommate for a short time in Hollywood. Tool was a great band from their first gig and everybody knew it. They had us open for them at early club shows. When they signed their record deal, they had a celebratory show and we opened up. There were about 25 people in the room for this Rage/Tool throw-down.

On tour with Public Enemy.

Rage Against The Machine’s first tour was a West Coast swing with our heroes Public Enemy. We admired the great poet rapper Chuck D and the inspiring music and sonics of the group. It was an honour to share the stage with these all-time greats. The photo on the back of the first RATM record was taken at The Palace in Hollywood. It was our tenth show and we were opening up for Body Count, whose debut album was causing a stir.

BBC radio makes Killing In The Name a hit in the UK.

Early on in the UK, RATM had a Sex Pistols moment where an unedited version of Killing In The Name was played on BBC radio complete with all sixteen ‘fuck you’s and one ‘motherfucker’. Soon thereafter we began gracing the cover of NME and Melody Maker weekly and, much to our surprise, became pop stars in the UK, with teenybopper fans sleeping in the lobbies of our hotels trying to catch a glimpse. Meanwhile, back home I was still living hand-tomouth in a cramped apartment with many roommates.

Heading to Pinkpop festival in the Netherlands, as the shows keep getting bigger.

The first festival show I ever played was Pinkpop in Holland in 1993 [with Rage Against The Machine among a line-up topped by the Black Crowes, Lenny Kravitz and Living Colour]. I had never seen an audience that big. We were late arriving at the gig so didn’t even have time to be nervous. Looking out at a sea of 60,000 fans and seeing the music connect really made me think that we were on to something.

That protest at Lollapalooza.

The Parents Music Resource Center was a pro-censorship music organisation in the United States founded by Senators’ wives with the aim of censoring heavy metal and rap music. That year, Rage was the opening band on the Lollapalooza tour, and in Philadelphia we staged a naked anti-censorship protest in a football stadium. We stood stone-faced with duct tape across our mouths and the letters ‘PMRC’ emblazoned across our chests. We stood there for fifteen minutes as the guitars howled with feedback. We didn’t play a single note of music that day, challenging the stadium audience to recognise that you can’t take controversial music for granted, and that bands like RATM could be silenced permanently unless you act. It was also crazy to be standing there for so long. At first there was rapturous applause which, as it became obvious that we weren’t going to play, became angry boos and quarters being chucked at our dicks.

Whatever It Takes, the new book by Tom Morello, is available to order from TomMorelloBook.com