The name John 5 is akin to God in the world of guitars.
Over his career, John has played not only as part of bands, but also as a guest musician and gun for hire, to the extent that it would probably be easier to list the musicians he HASN'T played with before rather than the ones he has. But try this on for size. Rob Zombie, Marilyn Manson, Rob Halford, Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, David Lee Roth, Alice Cooper and Jim Root…
Need I go on?
But it is John 5's most recent role as guitarist for Motley Crue that saw him in Australia only a short time ago, but from next week Aussie fans get a chance to see John 5 in a different light altogether. Playing with and for his own band, John 5 And The Creatures.
John will be special guest for Steel Panther on their upcoming On The Prowl Australian Tour, performing a set of instrumental tunes from The Creatures, as well as a Motley Crue medley and more.
It will be a chance to see one of the world's leading guitarists perform in a project of his own creation, rather than playing someone else's music. Understandably, John is a difficult man to track down, but HEAVY lucked out earlier in the week and managed to get 15 minutes with the legendary axeman to chat about the upcoming tour.
With the tour less than two weeks from kicking off, we ask John if he is packed and ready to go yet?
"I'm not packed, but I am ready to go," he smiled. "I love Australia so much. I was just there with the guys and I got this wonderful opportunity to come over with Steel Panther, and I'm super psyched about it."
We double check that he will be playing as John 5 And The Creatures.
"Yes," he confirmed, "and we're gonna be doing a lot of crazy music, so it's gonna be something else. I've never been there solo with the instrumental. I know a lot of people are really excited for it, and I am too. We're gonna do a bunch of cool songs, and we're gonna actually record the shows for a live record."
We push John to define what he means by 'crazy' music.
"We're gonna do…" he laughed. "I'm actually gonna play a song that is not released, and we're gonna film a video for the live record too. So that will be very special. We're gonna film it in each city in Australia."
In the full interview, we talked more about how much John loves Australia and how much he is looking forward to getting back to Perth especially. He expressed the importance of staying healthy on tours, getting enough sleep, eating well, and having a great time. He also mentioned that Australia felt very comfortable to him, likely due to his familiarity with the place and the presence of friends. He told us what to expect from his live shows and the honour of being asked to support Steel Panther.
We spoke about the length of his set as a support band and if it was more difficult for him to adjust to shorter stage times after being used to playing full headline sets. We delved into his career, starting when he drove to LA as an 18-year-old determined to become a session guitarist. He ran us through his expectations versus reality back then and how his career has panned out since then, including at what point he knew his dream had become reality.
John talked about the new Motley Crue EP Cancelled and how he enjoyed the recording process, as well as future plans for more new music from Motley Crue and more.
https://teglive.com.au/live_tour/steelpanther/