JACK RUSSELL'S GREAT WHITE Schedule California Shows
April 28, 2012, 12 years ago
JACK RUSSELL'S GREAT WHITE - featuring former GREAT WHITE singer Jack Russell, guitarists Robby Lochner (ex-ROB HALFORD) and Matthew Johnson (ex-GREAT WHITE), bassist Dario Seixas (ex-FIREHOUSE, STEPHEN PEARCY) and drummer Derrick Pontier (ex-Great White) - have scheduled three California shows as follows.
May
3 - Agoura, Hills, CA - Canyon Club4 - San Juan Capistrano, CA - Coach House
12 - Redondo Beach, CA - The Brixton
Jack Russell recently spoke with Full In Bloom Music about the controversy surrounding his departure from Great White and starting up another band under the same moniker. An excerpt is available below:
FIB: What's the latest with the Great White lawsuit? Initially it came out that you were ok with them using the name Great White and that you wanted to tour as Jack Russell's Great White. Then the band announced they would be doing a new record with XYZ vocalist Terry Illous, which resulted with you filing to prevent them from using the name.
Jack: "Well yeah, putting an album out as Great White....that's not Great White. Now they're having a 30th Anniversary, who are they kidding.....30th Anniversary of what? I fired them all. How can they have an anniversary if they're all fired. I fired them on December 10th. But they obviously don't want to be fired. Prior to that, they tried to file for the trademark without me. I could not believe it, my gut was so upset. I had tears in my eyes... I couldn't believe these guys were my friends. Ok, I cost them some money but then again, I allowed them to go out with other singers. I called Jani (Lane) and said, 'do me a favor and go out and fill in for me while I get well, so these guys don't lose money.' Then Terry (Illous) came in and I was cool with that too. In retrospect I should have said no....'you wait for me until I come back' but that's not who I am. I don't want to stop them from earning a living but they sure wanted to stop me. I'm getting emails from these guys, 'You can only go out there as Jack Russell - formerly of Great White' from a manager who has only been with the band for the last few years. Screw you buddy. Honest to God, these moves that I am making are not out of animosity. I mean it, they are just business decisions. Those guys cannot be Great White. There already are too many people going, 'Which version of the band are you in?' It's ridiculous. They need to call it something else. It's a different singer.....and the singer is the one element of the band you cannot change, without completely changing the sound of the band. I don't care how great the singer is, or how bad. I don't care if you put Steven Tyler in RATT, it ain't gonna be Ratt."
FIB: There was a recent interview with guitarist Mark Kendall where he was saying that you joined his band which later became Great White.
Jack: "I joined his band (laughs). No way. He was in a cover band and he kept bugging me to sing for him and I didn't want to do it because he was in a crosstown rival band. I had never heard them but of course they sucked because they were our rivals. That was when I was in a band with Audie. I finally went and checked out Mark's band and the band kind of sucked but he played me some of his own stuff and I said, 'You quit these guys, I'll quit my band and we'll start our own band', that's exactly as it happened, may God strike me dead. Then Don Dokken was the one that initiated us getting started here, he brought Alan Niven down to see us. The Dokken connection came from Gary Holland, who had played in DOKKEN over in Europe. I've heard Mark try to take credit for that. No. I just talked to Don the other day and asked him to refresh my memory. He said, 'I met you guys through Gary Holland and I came down to the studio, heard you sing, loved the voice and said I wanted to work with these guys'. Then he introduced us to Alan Niven and he wanted to sign us to Greenworld. They didn't want us, so he quit. He said, 'I don't know what I'm going to do now, I don't have a job' and I said, 'Why don't you be our manager'. He said, 'I don't know anything about managing' and I said, 'Well, you're going to learn'.....and learn he did, he became one of the best managers in rock n roll."
Read the entire interview at Fullinbloom.com.