Tom Morello

BIOGRAPHY

Thomas Baptist Morello was born on May 30, 1964 in Harlem, New York. His mother, Mary Morello, who is part Irish and part Italian, is a founder of Parents For Rock And Rap, an anti-censorship group. She was also a teacher at Libertyville High School. His father, Ngethe Njoroge, was a Mau Mau guerrilla and revolutionary. Morello's great-uncle, Jomo Kenyatta, was the first elected president in Kenya.

Morello grew up in Libertyville, Illinois, at the time a virtually all-white suburb of Chicago. There he attended Libertyville High School. He played French horn in the school band, sang in the chorus, and was active in speech and drama club. In the 1980 mock elections at LHS, he campaigned for a fictitious anarchist "candidate" named Hubie Maxwell, who came in fourth place after Jimmy Carter at the overwhelmingly Republican school. Ronald Reagan won the mock election. He also wrote a piece headlined "South Africa: Racist Fascism That We Support" for the school's alternative paper, The Student Pulse. At age 13, Morello purchased his first guitar at Rigoni Music in Libertyville. He wanted a solid-body Ovation guitar, but he didn't have the money to buy one. Instead, he purchased a Kay guitar. Wanting to learn how to play "Black Dog" by Led Zeppelin, he took two guitar lessons, but instead was taught the C-major scale. He decided that playing the guitar was a waste of his time, so he placed it in his closet for the next four years.

Around 1980, Morello first started studying the guitar seriously. He had formed a band in the same year called the Electric Sheep which featured future Tool guitarist Adam Jones on bass.[4] Jones wasn't originally in the band; he was a replacement for a member who quit because he felt his musical skills were far superior to those of the other Sheep. Few if any of the Sheep could really play an instrument at first (Most of their songs consisted of a single chord), but the band was an impetus for Morello to start honing his skills. Instead of performing cover songs, the Sheep wrote original material that included politically charged lyrics. None of the songs composed by the Sheep contained solos. Soloing was a skill that Morello began learning in college.

At the time Morello's musical tastes lay in the direction of heavy metal, particularly Kiss, Alice Cooper, Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath. Morello developed his own unique sound through the electric guitar. Later his music and musical politics were greatly influenced by punk rock bands like The Clash, the Sex Pistols and Devo. Morello graduated in 1982 and began attending Harvard University. There he made a point of practicing every day for up to eight hours without fail, no matter how much studying he had to do. He graduated in 1986 with an honors degree in political science. He moved to L.A., where he briefly worked as an aide to Senator Alan Cranston as he set about trying to join or start a band. (Adam Jones moved to L.A. as well; Morello introduced Jones to some of his future bandmates.)

In 1988 Morello joined Lock Up,a glam rock band that released one album through Geffen Records before splitting up. This record was called Something Bitchin' This Way Comes, which enjoyed only slight success at the time. Morello had been crushed by the lack of success he experienced in Lock Up. He visited a club in Los Angeles where Zack de la Rocha was rapping. After viewing de la Rocha's lyric books, Tom asked him to front a band. Morello drafted Brad Wilk, a drummer who had unsuccessfully auditioned for Lock Up, and de la Rocha introduced the two to his friend Tim Commerford. The four formed a new band, Rage Against the Machine. Rage had great success, especially in North America and Europe. Their first, self-titled album, was recognized by fans for Morello's innovative guitar as well as its originality (being one of the first records to combine rock and hip-hop). Morello expressed his attitude toward songwriting during this period as overtly political.

After four years of silence and rumors of break-ups, the band released its second album, Evil Empire. The album moved away from the traditional metal guitar work of the first album; it was experimental in nature and demonstrated Morello's ability to use the guitar in strange ways, showcasing his abilities with the kill switch. In 1999, the band released The Battle of Los Angeles, their most commercially successful record. In late 2000, they released another album entitled Renegades. Shortly before the release, de la Rocha left Rage, and the band's instrumentalists said they wanted to continue making music together.

After de la Rocha left Rage Against the Machine, the remaining bandmates started jamming with former Soundgarden vocalist Chris Cornell at the suggestion of producer Rick Rubin. The new group was first called Civilian, but changed their name to Audioslave before their first album was released. The band released their eponymous debut album on November 19, 2002. It was a massive critical and commercial success, attaining triple-platinum status.

The band released their second album, Out of Exile, on May 24, 2005. It debuted at number 1 on the Billboard charts and attained platinum status. In the same year, they released a DVD documenting their trip as the first American rock band to play a free show in Cuba. Morello recently stated he has made a commitment to Audioslave and is "in it for the long haul." The band's third album, Revelations, was released in the fall of 2006. As of February 15th 2007, Audioslave are on hiatus as a result of frontman Cornell's departure due to "irresolvable personality conflicts". The band reunited with Zack de la Rocha and resumed their previous band, Rage Against The Machine.

Morello is less known for his folk music, which he plays under the alias The Nightwatchman. It is his political folk alter ego. One of his many songs, "No One Left," which compares the aftermath of September 11 to that of a U.S. attack on Iraq, appears on the album Songs and Artists that Inspired Fahrenheit 9/11.

Morello, as "The Nightwatchman," released his debut solo album, One Man Revolution, on April 24th, 2007. Morello "The Nightwatchman" joined the Dave Matthews Band for its short European tour in May 2007. As well as opening for the Dave Matthews Band, he was invited to guest on a couple of songs each night. The last night of this Morello/DMB arrangement was May 30 at Wembley Arena in London, on Tom's birthday. The Nightwatchman is currently supporting Ben Harper on tour. During this tour, Morello has been joining Harper onstage for a cover of Bob Dylan's "Masters of War" on which he plays the electric guitar in the style for which he's best known. Morello has presided over a Hotel Cafe residency in LA since November, which has featured many of his musical cohorts including Serj Tankian, Perry Farrell, Jon Foreman from Switchfoot, Shooter Jennings, Nuno Bettencourt, Queen V, Sen-Dog from Cypress Hill, Jill Sobule, Boots Riley of The Coup, Alexi Murdoch, Wayne Kramer from MC5 and others.