Russell bites back at ‘Fake’ White

Biteback: Jack Russell

Sacked singer Jack is determined never to return… he’s furious they never called him as he fought for life… and insists they’ve all behaved as badly as him in their time

Sacked singer Jack Russell is determined never to return to Great White – and he says the band bearing the name is fake anyway.

He’s incensed that none of his bandmates called while he was near death in hospital.

And he insists the offences that got him thrown out, which cost them money and caused them embarrassment, are no worse than things they did themselves at other times.

Russell parted ways with Great White after a series of attempts at reconnecting, during which he found himself unable to clean up his act with regard to drugs and alcohol. He recently took legal action against them for using the band name. Last week they retaliated with a countersuit listing a series of Russell’s actions which led them to sack him – including forcing the band to mime on a European tour.

Now he tells 95.5 KLOS there’s no chance they’ll ever reunite: “I would never do that,” he states. “Not after what they’ve done to me. They’re not my friends. They haven’t been for a long time apparently.

“There’s my group, then there’s the fake. Jack Russell is great white. Any band in the world, you change the singer, you change the sound of the band. You can’t call what they’re doing now Great White. It’s not.

“We changed guitar players every year, we changed drummers, we changed bass players. Nobody cared, man. Most people don’t know their names.”

Russell has been hospitalised several times over the past two years, and in once instance he came close to death after suffering a perforated bowel. He says: “I was gone at one point. I was in a coma for five days. The frustrating thing was not one guy in my band called to say, ‘Hey, is he dead?’ That was the worst part.”

He’s prepared to accept he’s not completely blameless in the fallout – but insists his behaviour has been no worse than that of his bandmates over the years.

“I cost them some money, thousands of dollars, I made them a little embarrassed,” he admits. “It was nothing that anybody else hadn’t done at some point, to a degree. I’m not going to get into particulars – suffice to say we’ve all had our issues.

“I was sober for eight years, some of the guys weren’t, and now some of the guys got sober before I did, I guess I’m ostracised for that.”