Those of you who attended SXSW last week may have had the opportunity to see Rage guitar shredder-turned-folksman Tom Morello milling around Austin at times with a veritable who’s-who list of renowned rock icons. Sightings caught Tom alongside legends like Wayne Kramer, Slash, Perry Farell, Les Claypool, Patrick Shillenn and Nuno Bettencourt.

I know that right now you’re looking at that list of icons and thinking, “hey hey hey, there’s something fishy about your list of so-called rock legends”, but rest assured, “More Than Words” was a huge hit and Nuno’s music has had more of an impact than you think on not only Boston-based funk-rock, but also American rock music as a whole.

But I digress. Truth be told I was able to not only see Tom play a couple times during the convention, but also to hang out, have a few drinks, and discuss topics ranging from “how awesome is Pan’s Labyrinth?” to “Is Michael the most powerful of all archangels”. You know, light conversation.

To me, this was one of the biggest and best highlights of my trip. Tom Morello is one of my musical idols and someone whose work I’ve looked up to for years. It was almost like one of those Hero Worship columns from the magazines where some young buck gets to interview David Bowie, or Robert Smith or someone. Getting to spend even a small amount of time talking and drinking a whiskey on the rocks, (or even god forbid, one of those disgusting mint-leaf garnished mojito-contraptions that everyone was pounding), was a surreal moment indeed. It’s also pretty amazing how many random people introduce them self to you when you’re sitting at a bar with Tom Morello. He creates somewhat of a gravitational pull on any surrounding music industry types. It was fun to watch everyone reel in, then just kind of circle and orbit him.like moons.

In summation, what did I learn from my happy hour with Tom Morello? Several things including,

1) he likes hot rods, and used to attend car shows in the midwest,
2) Roughly 78% of passers-by claim Rage Against The Machine “used to be my favorite band”
3) The next Michael Moore movie is going to be good,
4) He is not the right person to bug about a new Rage record,
and
5) Michael may in fact be the most powerful of all archangels.

The end.

Related Posts

• The Nightwatchman Will Return This Fall
• The Nightwatchman Shows His Union Support
• VIDEO: The Nightwatchman | “Alone Without You”