The last 18 months have been an emotional rollercoaster. The four corners of the world have suffered the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, and many issues have come to the forefront, especially those highlighting the importance of mental health and open dialogue between differing minds. This is nothing new, and rock and heavy metal fans have seen these themes reinforced in the music of their favorite artists, and Tom Morello was no exception.
Just before embarking on a tour with Rage Against The Machine , a return eagerly awaited by fans worldwide, Morello and his bandmates had to cancel the highly anticipated dates. At home with his family, unable to go out – like all of us – the guitarist, vocalist, songwriter, and activist resumed his solo project, which debuted in 2018 with The Atlas Underground . This Friday, the 15th, Tom Morello continues the project with the album The Atlas Underground Fire .
In an exclusive press conference for Brazilian journalists, Morello, with his typical friendliness and good humor, spoke with Wikimetal and other media outlets about the release. He explained that the album was created entirely during the quarantine period he spent at his home in Los Angeles, California. "From the age of 17 until 2020 I was constantly writing, recording, and performing, and all of that suddenly stopped, so it was very difficult for me."
Morello explains that despite having a studio in his house, he doesn't know how to use it, as he's always been accompanied by a sound engineer when recording. "They only let me touch the sound knob. I don't know how to use anything." The guitarist, like all of us, didn't know when he'd be able to return to work, so he decided to play alone and experiment with different things, until he had the idea to record everything on his cell phone. "It was a lifeboat. I wasn't planning on recording an album or anything like that. You know, during those days anxiety, depression, and fear were creeping in. I needed to keep Grandma alive, keep the kids sane. So this was my way of escaping for 45 minutes, creating a little, being the creative person I am, and then coming back." Technology is a challenge for Morello, something he made very clear from the beginning of the press conference, when he entered the Zoom room and had difficulty opening his camera for the journalists to see him. But everything was resolved quickly, just like with the album. He says he listed the names of musicians he'd like to collaborate with someday and sent them recordings from his iPhone, without expecting it to become what it did.
The Atlas Underground Fire has 12 tracks, all featuring special guests. Among them are Bruce Springsteen and Eddie Vedder on a cover of AC/DC , Bring Me The Horizon on "Let's Get The Party Started," Chris Stapleton on "The War Inside," Grandson on "Hold The Line," and Sama' Abdulhadi on "On The Shore Of Eternity." During the press conference, Morello explained how some of these collaborations came about.
The AC/DC cover started long before the pandemic, when he toured with Bruce Springsteen as part of the E Street Band in 2014. During a show in Australia, Eddie Vedder, who was also there, joined Springsteen and Morello for a jam session. In it, the trio played the AC/DC hit just for fun, but of course, later, when thinking about possible collaborations, he immediately thought of Springsteen and Vedder and the song.
The song with country singer Chris Stapleton came from a desire to work with him after meeting him at the Chris Cornell tribute event in 2019. “I wanted to collaborate with him to see what could happen, and it ended up that he was the first person I worked with specifically for this album,” he said. “We started talking and venting (…) and two hours later we had a lot of good material.” Morello also said that Stapleton reminded him of Cornell because of the way he works and composes. Speaking about Chris Cornell, Morello smiles sadly and says how much he misses his colleague. “I’m still devastated by his death. I haven’t gotten over it yet. It’s horrible, every day. And I’m very grateful that I got to work with him.”
Besides collaborations, something important for Tom Morello during the creation of the work was the theme. In The Atlas Underground Fire , he doesn't even consider leaving the political tone aside. “I have an artistic existence, and not just as a guitarist, but as an artist in general. I seek diverse ways to express myself, not only to entertain the public, but also to confront the public about a point of view that they have been forced to have.”
Morello has always been a political being. Born in 1964 in Harlem, a neighborhood in New York City, the guitarist is the only child of Mary Morello , an Italian-American teacher, and Ngethe Njoroge , a Nigerian diplomat. The couple, who ended their relationship shortly after Tom's birth, met during a pro-democracy protest in Nigeria. Both have always taken political stances in their work and personal lives, teaching Tom Morello to do the same. Currently, the guitarist is one of the most politically engaged artists in rock.
We hear Morello's political and militant side in "Hold The Line" and "The Achilles List," for example. In "The War Inside" and "Driving to Texas," for instance, he addresses another important theme: mental health. In the midst of the pandemic, the musician had to learn to work differently than he had throughout his life with Rage Against the Machine , Audioslave , and Prophets of Rage . "These are more introspective, reflecting the anxiety I felt during this quarantine period." The third part, as Morello described it, is the instrumental line that couldn't be missing from a guitarist's album. "The album begins with an instrumental piece called 'Harlem Hellfighter' and ends with Sama' Abdulhadi's song." This last one, despite only having instruments, is as political as any other by Morello. He recounts that the DJ co-created the song with him during the Israeli attack on Palestine.
The Atlas Underground Fire arrives with this triad of concepts, all equally important to Morello. The album, moving from political activism to the fight for mental health, summarizes the rollercoaster that the last 18 months have been. Morello acknowledges that this was only possible due to his passion for curation. “One of my talents that I really love is curation. I love curating. You know, anything from managing the kids' soccer team to creating an album. Throwing ideas back and forth is something that makes the creative process happen. All the collaborators had the freedom to create what they wanted, but I always kept an eye on things to make sure the result sounded like a Tom Morello album.”