Mudvayne and Hellyeah lead vocalist Chad Gray is gearing up for his first-ever solo tour, dubbed the “30 Years Of Madness” run. During a recent appearance on “The David Ellefson Show“, the frontman opened up about the emotional toll of rehearsing inactive Hellyeah tracks and his relentless drive to stay on the road while Mudvayne takes a break from touring in 2026.
Since reuniting in 2021 after a 12-year hiatus, Mudvayne has completed several tours and released two new tracks, “Hurt People Hurt People” and “Sticks And Stones“. Meanwhile, Hellyeah has remained on pause since their 2020 U.S. tour was canceled amid the pandemic. For Chad Gray, diving back into that catalog means confronting the heavy emotions surrounding the passing of legendary drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott.
Reflecting on the complicated feelings attached to the music and the band’s initial tribute shows, the singer offered the following (as transcribed by Blabbermouth):
“It’s been really weird. I’m obviously rehearsing all that stuff now. And I haven’t played, I haven’t touched those songs in seven f**king years, or eight years, whatever it’s been since Vinnie [Paul Abbott, Hellyeah drummer] passed. And [Hellyeah] did the ‘Celebration Of Life’ tours after he passed, which, honestly, we did those way too early. We were still f**king all mourning, and we did it ’cause we wanted to pay tribute to him. And those tours really kind of f**ked us up as a band, ’cause we were all just still mourning and grieving. Needless to say, when we were on stage, they were fun. And we had Roy Mayorga f**king playing drums for us, which he absolutely crushed it and did just such a great job.”
He continued, highlighting how the solo tour serves as both a tribute to his late bandmate and a celebration of his own massive 30-year career milestones across multiple successful bands:
“But coming back, there’s a little bit of that in revisiting these songs, there’s a little bit of, like… There’s some remembering penning them, there’s some remembering recording them and stuff, but there’s a lot of remembering playing them with Vince,” Gray continued. “There’s some memory of me playing without Vince. It’s kind of a big f**king ball of emotions when I [revisit] those [songs]. And that’s part of the reason I’m doing it, man. This is an exercise in autonomy. I’m taking ownership of my own independence, my own career, celebrating 30 f**king years… 1996 is when I started this s**t, and celebrating 30 years of me doing this with 12 albums, six with each band. And it’s been cool, but it’s been difficult. But I’m excited about it, man. I wanna pay homage to Vin. I want to keep his legacy alive. You put those songs away and you put that part of his life away and you’re putting him away. Bringing these songs back out and playing them and servicing such a large number of fans that have just been — Hellyeah‘s been removed from their life — it’s really cool too. But a big part of this is to celebrate my own independence and doing what I’ve done in 30 years. Part of it is paying it forward to Vinnie, paying homage to Vinnie, keeping his legacy alive. Part of it is servicing the Hellyeah fans. I mean, we ground that motherf**ker for 12 years. We built Hellyeah from nothing. Just f**king five dudes that jumped in a garage — Dime‘s [late Pantera guitarist ‘Dimebag’ Darrell Abbott] garage, where they did [The Great Southern] Trendkill, they did Reinventing The Steel in that, they did the Damageplan record in there. It was their own personal studio that was on Dime‘s property in his garage. So, that’s what it was. It was just us showing up and walking in the room with no relationship. I didn’t have any kind of relationship with Vinnie. I’d met him one time.”
Beyond honoring the past, the vocalist explained that the core motivation for launching his solo endeavor simply came down to his inability to sit still. When his team suggested taking a year off, he quickly rejected the idea.
“Since we brought [Mudvayne] back in ’21, we’ve done it once a year for the last four years. And it’s just, like, management, everybody’s just, like, ‘We should probably give it a break. We should probably just take 2026 off.’ And I’m just, like, I’m 54 f**king years old. I’m not taking a year off. That’s like me putting my happiness in a cage for a year. That’s where I shine. I love to service my fans. I love to f**king help however I can and give back. And just sitting around my f**king house with my thumb in my a**, doing f**king projects and s**t, it’s not the way I’m wired, man. I wanna work. I’m a worker bee.”
“I was writing, recording or touring nonstop in one band or another for 20 f**king years. And Vinnie passed. It took a little bit [of time to get back into it]. I came back to the Mudvayne table, put that back together. And then we did it. And then we were off 46 weeks. And then we did it, and then we were off 46 weeks. And the old days of like writing, recording, touring, writing, recording, touring, which is what I loved, that was out the f**king window. So even though I’m going out once a year for six weeks or seven weeks or whatever, I’m just sitting around the f**king house all the time. So the whole idea of this, honestly, was when we said we were gonna take the year off, and it’s just, like, I don’t wanna do that,” he concluded.
To bring the music to life on stage, Chad Gray has recruited a backing band that includes Hellyeah guitarist Christian Brady and Mudvayne touring guitarist Marcus Raffety. The “30 Years Of Madness” trek is officially set to kick off on April 24 at the Fremont Country Club in Las Vegas, Nevada.
“30 Years Of Madness” tour dates:
April 24 — Las Vegas, NV — Fremont Country Club
May 26 — Flint, MI — The Machine Shop
May 29 — East Moline, IL — The Rust Belt
May 30 — Green Bay, WI — Epic Event Center
