Ross The Boss Reflects on Fifteen Years of Blood, Fire & Steel (Interview)

For the past five decades, guitarist Ross “The Boss” Friedman is a name that has been well respected within the heavy music industry. First becoming a force to be reckoned with by co-founding New York City’s punk icons The Dictators in 1972, Friedman then followed it by achieving massive notoriety with US power metal giants Manowar in the 1980s.

Since 2006, Ross and his Ross The Boss band have been creating fiery traditional metal across four full-length albums. The band’s latest release, A Legacy Of Blood, Fire & Steel, is a comprehensive “best of” compilation celebrating 15 years as a band. Consisting of three songs from each of his four full-length albums, they appear in chronological order.

Featuring songs performed by original vocalist Patrick Fuchs, as well as current belter Marc Lopes—who recently snagged the vocalist role in Metal Church—they both offer dominant vocal qualities to each Ross the Boss era. New members—bassist Dirk Schlächter (Gamma Ray) and drummer Sean Elg (Cage, KK’s Priest)—recently replaced Mike LePond and Steve Bolognese, respectively.

AFM Records honored Friedman by initiating the idea for releasing the record, while Friedman got to choose what he thinks are the best tracks. During a recent phone interview, Friedman spoke about the process of culling the tracks together for the new compilation, the reformation of The Dictators, and what’s in store for Ross the Boss.

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How did this compilation/best of record come about?

This was AFM’s idea, and they wanted to do something to help with the upcoming tour. I was completely blown away by their offer; the best of. I mean, it’s an honor. They’re honoring me by saying, “We really appreciate you.” So, I’m going to continue my relationship with AFM and I’m looking forward to doing so.

How difficult was it picking all of the tracks? How did you come to these conclusions?

I don’t know. Let’s say for Hailstorm, “Great Gods Glorious” the instrumental, I think just never got the credit it deserved. I think that song… that’s my idea of an instrumental, and people are really listening to it and saying, “You’re right!” People are liking the choices on the songs, I’ve heard it already. I think a lot of them are obvious choices, like from the last record, “Maiden Of Shadows,” “Denied By The Cross,” “Born Of Fire.” The songs that were singles. Looking back on it, I don’t think there was a bad song on any of those records. I’m not a repeater. There’s a lot of bands out there that are repeater bands. I call them repeater metal!

Since Marc Lopes joined the band in 2016, he’s really turned into a dynamic frontman for the band.

He’s really developed; he’s come along. And now he sings in Metal Church. He said he wanted to do this (being a musician) full time. I told him, “This is what you wanted. This is what you got!” But I also play in another band; I play in The Dictators. And we’re doing really well. We just signed two deals with Deco and Valley Entertainment. And we have shows coming up with The Damned out on the west coast after my European tour with Ross the Boss. And we have 10 shows in Spain in September, we have a new record. It’s working, it’s good. So, I got it from both bands. We just finished a single for AFM with the Ross the Boss band to be released in July. It’s a really fantastic song, it’s called “One and All.” So, we’re working!

I often crank The Dictators’ third album Bloodbrothers. How did The Dictators reunion come about?

Well, it was never a reunion. What really went down was, The Dictators NYC was me, (Dick) Manitoba Daniel Rey, Dean Rispler, JP (Paterson). So, we were The Dictators NYC without Andy (Shernoff), and we would play and play and play, and then finally it came to an end. I will never put The Dictators down, ever, because that’s my first band. And Dean suggested I go to Andy and say let’s get the band back together. And that would take me out of it because I play bass, and Andy plays bass. But we did it and it’s been great. For the past few years it was singles. We got Albert Bouchard, the original drummer of Blue Oyster Cult in the band now, and Keith Roth from Sirius XM on guitar and singing. We’ve tested ourselves by doing a Canadian run, so we’re good. We know what we’re doing. So, everything’s 100 percent now.

How did your participation with the parody band Nanowar of Steel on the track “Armpits of Immortals” happen?

They contacted me through a friend of mine. Gatto (Panceri 666) called me up and asked me if I wanted to do a track on their record. And I said, “Of course I do.” I found them really, really funny, but really serious musicians. I did a festival in Spain and I was setting up on one stage and they were playing on another stage to my left, and they were playing some Manowar song and all the Spanish fans were looking at me like, “You wrote that song!” So, I’m listening to a song that I wrote, and they’re playing it. And it was amazing. So, when Gatto contacted me, I was more than happy to do it.

Speaking of festivals, the Bloodstock 2019 when you got KK Downing to come back on stage was a fantastic moment. Were you trying to mend the disagreements between him and Priest? What was that experience like playing with him that day?

A lot of people ask me about that. And the way it went down was, we had the spot at Bloodstock, and a friend of ours says that he knew KK. I told him to see if he’d like to come down and have a beer with us and hang out and get him out of the house. And I thought nothing of it. Then a couple of days later, he said yes. Then I asked if he’d like to jam with us. And I thought nothing of it, I was just asking the question. And then a couple of days later, he said yes. I thought that would be perfect for him. So, we started doing plans in earnest and he said come one or two days in advance and we’ll practice at my Steel Mill, because he has a club. So we went there and we came in early; it was an extra expense, but it was worth it. We practiced four Judas Priest songs, and we had it perfectly down. I played Glenn’s parts. I had my Gibson SG with the mirror pickguard, just like Glenn Tipton. I said that he could count on us and as soon as he heard us play, he thought it was going to be great. He came out and it was amazing at Bloodstock; people just loved it. He was so energized at the end of the set, and he said he wanted to play more, that he didn’t want to stop! So, I would have to say that we got him back into the music business. It was a total success.

I think the Ross the Boss band is just on fire at the moment, what great musicians you’ve assembled. And of course you yourself have really shined. How has the musical chemistry and the band camaraderie been between all of you?

It’s really great now, we have a new rhythm section from the records. We have Dirk Schlächter from Gamma Ray on bass. And he’s just shot out of the canon, he’s just an amazing bass player. We have Sean Elg on drums, from Cage, and now he’s KK’s Priest’s drummer. Because Ripper (Owens) got him the gig. So, I guess I’m responsible for a lot of things!

What happened with Mike and Steve?

The problem was, last year Mike had to do a Symphony X tour and he couldn’t come with us. I always knew that that was going to happen sometime. And Steve had a problem with customs, and they couldn’t come. So, the two others came in, and we played Barcelona Rock Fest and we just totally blew it apart. I hate to say it, but I found a better rhythm section. It’s just a matter of timing. What can I say? Things happen. It’s not that I don’t love those guys, I love them to death. But between Sean and Dirk, it’s volatile. It’s on fire!

Is there brand new material in the works for a soon to be released Ross the Boss album?

Yes! As I said, we turned in one song for AFM. They gave me a schedule… I just have to come up with more stuff. But that’s alright, that’s what we have to do. (The new members) are very involved with the writing; the whole band is involved. Other than the other band that calls itself Manowar, there’s one guy that just does everything in that band. Unlike my band, I count on them to do things. One song is totally done. This will be for a release maybe before fall or something. There’s a lot of work to be done, but that’s no problem.

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A Legacy Of Blood, Fire & Steel was released on April 28th, 2023 through AFM Records.