Blabbermouth — SKID ROW bassist Rachel Bolan says that he was never friends with the band’s former lead singer, Sebastian Bach.

Bach fronted SKID ROW until 1996, when he was fired. Instead of throwing in the towel, the remaining members took a hiatus and went on to play briefly in a band called OZONE MONDAY.

In 1999, SKID ROW reformed and, after a bit of shuffling over the years, featured a lineup consisting of Bolan, Dave “Snake” Sabo and Scotti Hill, alongside drummer Rob Hammersmith and singer Johnny Solinger.

SKID ROW fired Solinger over the phone in April 2015, a few hours before announcing ex-TNT vocalist Tony Harnell as his replacement. Eight months later, Harnell exited the band and was replaced by South African-born, British-based singer ZP Theart, who previously fronted DRAGONFORCE, TANK and I AM I.

Asked in a new interview with “The Chuck Shute Podcast” if SKID ROW‘s original 1996 split came as a relief to him, Bolan said: “Things were pretty bad within the band — with all of us, actually. [We] never heard from each other when we were home, and most of us lived 15 minutes from each other’s house. And it started to get not fun at one point, because it was just all bullshit that went along with preparing to do stuff, and and whatever it was. It was a relief in a way. It was melancholy. It was a relief, and good, I get to go home and just chill and and recharge my batteries, but where are we going from here? So it was kind of waiting out a storm, so to speak, and just seeing what’s what’s gonna be there when it goes by. And it was years — it was years — and then we decided to get the band back together in 2000, and here we are, 20 years later, still having fun and doing a lot of shows. Well, not now, but we were doing a lot of shows [before the pandemic] — 100 shows a year. And that’s a lot for a bunch of old guys. [Laughs]”

Bolan went on to confirm that he and his bandmates “were entertaining the idea” of reuniting with Bach following Harnell‘s departure. Rachel also shot down the possibility of a rekindling of his friendship with Sebastian, explaining: “Well… Here’s the soundbite for Blabbermouth. I wouldn’t say we were friends [when we were in a band together]. We were bandmates. You know what I mean? We’re two very different people.” Bolan added that he hasn’t seen Bach “in years.”

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