Undisputed_ How to Become the World Champion in 1,372 Easy Steps - Chris Jericho [112]
What kind of a name is Zbyszko anyway?
CHAPTER 31
Tonight Fozzy Gay
When the Happenstance tour ended on The Howard Stern Show in 2003, it was the official end of the Fozzy gimmick. Rich and I felt that it was time to stand on our own and Happenstance was a great indication of what we could do as an original band. So we dropped the covers, the storyline, the pseudonyms, and the wigs. We debated changing our name to Walls of Jericho, Jericho Siren, Kajagoogootwo, something more “serious,” then we started thinking about some of the biggest bands on the planet and how awful their names sound initially. Limp Bizkit, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Korn, Toad the Wet Sprocket, Hoobastank, the Queens of the Stone Age, Pink Floyd, Kiss, Helloween— and the worst of them all, Def Leppard (just think about that one for a second). All of them are silly if taken literally, but when you hear them over and over again the silliness wears off and they become iconic over time. Rich and I decided that with all of the work and touring we’d done that it would be one step forward and two steps back to start from scratch with a different name. For better or worse, Fozzy was our name and that was that.
We knew we’d have our work cut out for us recording an all-original album. We were under the microscope more than ever, and the only way to combat that was to record the absolute best record possible. Every song had to be good—we couldn’t afford to have any filler material whatsoever. With that edict in mind, the Duke put his cock to the grindstone and wrote some of the best songs of his life. He came up with all of the music and the melodies, while I wrote the lyrics with Ed Aborn, our friend and the visual timekeeper of Fozzy. Once we were ready, we set up shop at Treesound Studios in Atlanta, using the same soundboard that was used on the Police’s Synchronicity and Rush’s Moving Pictures albums. The studio was huge with a killer ambience and reinforced the idea that we were playing with the big boys now.
We thought it would put Fozzy in a different light if we invited a few of our famous friends to contribute to the record. The first guy I called was Zakk, and not only was he my brother, but a big Rich Ward fan as well. Zakk credits Rich and Stuck Mojo with helping him get back into heavy music after he went through his Book of Shadows acoustic period and was happy to help us out by playing an amazing solo on the song “Wanderlust.”
Our producer was a friend of Megadeth’s guitarist Marty Friedman, who agreed to lay down a solo for “Born of Anger.” I’d met Alter Bridge guitarist Mark Tremonti a few years earlier in Tampa when he was touring with Creed and found out he was a Fozzy fan. He’d offered to do a guest solo when we did our next album, but in typical Jericho fashion, I lost his number and never followed up with him. So when I found out that Alter Bridge was also recording their new album at Treesound, I simply walked downstairs to their studio door and knocked. I handed him a tape of our song “The Way I Am” and said, “Will you play on this? Here’s your chance!”
Myles Kennedy, Alter Bridge’s singer (now with Slash), laid down some backing vocals, and suddenly Fozzy’s new record had a whole new slant. Any band that had an album featuring the talents of Wylde, Friedman, Tremonti, and Kennedy had to have some credibility—and we did.
It was froot to know that we were in the same studio with the Alter boys, but Rich and I really flipped when we found out that someone else of status was working there as well. Somebody who was only one of the top ten biggest rock stars in the world—Rico Suave himself, Gerardo.
Actually it was Sir Elton John. He was recording his Peachtree Road album in the biggest studio in the complex and we took a quick look around when Elton had a day off. There were fresh-cut flowers everywhere and