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Tom Morello on the band’s halted tour: “Rage Against the Machine is like the ring in Lord of the Rings”

“It drives men mad.”

Tom Morello of Rage Against The Machine

Image: ZUMA Press, Inc. / Alamy

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Tom Morello has opened up about Rage Against the Machine’s cancelled shows following frontman Zack de la Rocha’s leg injury last year.

Asked to describe RATM’s current status in a new interview with Rolling Stone, Morello replied, “There is no term. Rage Against the Machine is like the ring in Lord of the Rings. It drives men mad. It drives journalists mad. It drives record industry people mad. They want it. They want the thing, and they’re driven mad.”

“If there are Rage shows, if there are not Rage shows, you’ll hear from the band,” the guitarist added. “I do not know. When there is news, it will come from a collective statement from the band. There is no news.”

“The conversations I’ve had with band members since the tour have been about life,” Morello explained. “I understand that in this interview, it’s at the top of your list, your Lord of the Rings check list. It’s hard to explain, but when you’re in it, it’s never been like that. It’s a band that made three albums of new material, that tours very intermittently. It’s a unicorn in a way. Much of the time, there’s not a position the band is in. You know what I’m saying?”

When pressed for details as to whether or not RATM will hit the road again after de la Rocha recovers, Morello admits once again that even he himself did not know.

“We’ll see… I don’t know,” he said. “I know as much as you do, honestly. Right now we’re in time of healing. I’m in a time of making music and doing a bunch of stuff.”

The band was just two shows into their 2022 Public Service Announcement Tour when singer de la Rocha tore his Achilles tendon on stage, forcing the group to cancel the remainder of their 2022 tour dates in UK and Europe as well as their 2023 North American shows.

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