Sevendust is currently gearing up to release their highly anticipated fifteenth studio album, One. However, drummer Morgan Rose recently shocked fans by revealing that the veteran metal band was dangerously close to calling it quits less than two years ago.
During a recent interview with host Stan Bicknell, the founding member detailed how the group had seriously discussed winding down their career and even outlined plans for a massive farewell tour before ultimately changing their minds.
“We went through this period of time where we just weren’t touring as much. We were kind of thinking that we were gonna land the plane a little bit, like, ‘Let’s slow it down to a farewell thing,’ which we had discussed, for sure. And then some other things happened, and we decided, ‘You know what? Instead of parking the car here, why don’t we just put it all the way into drive, like all the way in, and let’s tour like harder than we’ve ever toured and just burn the car out. Like, ‘Let’s tackle things that we haven’t done.’ So that happened. Just overnight, it was a decision that went from ‘We’re gonna retire’ to ‘No, no, no. We’re gonna actually put the afterburner on now instead.'”
When asked to clarify the exact timeline of these conversations, the drummer confirmed that the prospect of retirement was a very recent reality.
“It was recently. It was, like, a year and a half ago. This was gonna be our last record. We had a blueprint for it and everything. We actually had like a whole layout. It was that thick, of going through everything that we were gonna do and how we were gonna do it. And, I mean, I cried a few times thinking about it.”
He went on to explain the heavy emotional toll that the idea of stepping away took on him. Because Sevendust built their massive following through relentless touring rather than major label backing, the group formed an incredibly tight-knit bond with their fanbase. For the drummer, walking away meant losing a vast extended family.
“We’ve had so many people that we’ve met. The Sevendust community is a very close thing. We did not have the luxury of a major label or the major label money, so we grinded it from the beginning and then got really mistreated in the middle of our career, like horribly mistreated. And the people stood there long enough for us to get our legs back, and then when we finally found somebody that really knew that we could trust that knew the game and knew how to make it work, we were so beat up. And the people started coming back a little more and more and more, and it just became this thing where it’s, like, ‘Oh, man. I’ve known these people from being out there so much.’ And when you overtour yourself, you see these people a lot. And they become people you’re going to dinner with or going to lunch with, or having coffee with, or whatever it might be. And you’re doing it consistently. And then one day you’re just, like, ‘We’re gonna wrap it all up.’ And I’m, like, ‘That means they died.’ Because I never see them outside of this. So that means it’ll be like every gig will be another death in the family. It’ll be another group of people that I know from that, and I also know from being around them, and it’s, like, there’s thousands of them. So that’s like a thousand people that you care about dying in a year and a half. So I got really emotional about it, and then when it was decided we’re not gonna do that, I got just rejuvenated. [I didn’t have to] face that now. It got really exciting. I hadn’t felt that kind of, like, ‘I’m ready to break some s**t now. I wanna tear something up.’ And we just got back from a two-month run in Europe, and I felt like it was ’97 again.”
One officially arrives on May 1 via Napalm Records. To capture their signature sound, Sevendust once again teamed up with producer Michael “Elvis” Baskette at Studio Barbarosa in Gotha, Florida. The renowned producer is well known for his previous work with rock heavyweights like Alter Bridge and Slash.
One Tracklist:
- “One“
- “Unbreakable“
- “Is This The Real You“
- “Threshold“
- “We Won“
- “Construct“
- “Bright Side“
- “The Drop“
- “Blood Price“
- “Misdirection“
