Tom Morello: Standing Up for the Working Manby David Malitz - Sept. 1, 2011 12:03 PM
The Washington Post
Tom Morello will always be best known as one of rock-and-roll's great electric guitar wizards.
It was his spiky, sinewy playing that lit the fuse in the dynamite that was Rage Against the Machine, one of the most ferocious bands of the '90s, whose punk-funk-rap-rock assault was often imitated but rarely matched. And Morello's ability to combine otherworldly effects with efficient and explosive playing earned him the No. 26 spot on Rolling Stone's 2003 list of 100 Greatest Guitar Players of All-Time.
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But in the decade that Rage has been more or less on hiatus, Morello has taken on a new identity. He has traded in his electric guitar and array of pedals for a simple acoustic and been reborn as the Nightwatchman, an old-fashioned folk singer who stands up for the working man.
"The idea of the lone troubadour standing there with three chords and the truth on a flatbed truck at the barricades is appealing," says Morello, 47. "With Rage, the idea is to create mosh pits in an arena or stadium. With the Nightwatchman, the idea is to create mosh pits in your mind."
The new album "World Wide Rebel Songs" is Morello's fourth effort as the Nightwatchman and changes the blueprint just a bit. It's the first electric Nightwatchman album, and Morello is backed by a full band that adds extra punch to his protest songs. "The idea with this record was to be part Johnny Cash, part Che Guevera, part Marshall stack 1/8amplifier3/8," he says.
The best way to see the true Morello is his solo act.
"I've now made as many Nightwatchman records as Rage Against the Machine records," he says. "There are great benefits to playing with a band and the chemistry you have with other musicians. But there's a real purity to doing the solo work. The Nightwatchman stuff is definitely the most full-world view of my take on music and myself."
Morello is a proud far-left activist who has adopted many human-rights issues as his own, including recent high-profile battles over immigration law in Arizona and union struggles in Wisconsin.
"I love the fact that I can pick up an acoustic guitar and be on the front lines of any struggle tomorrow," says Morello, whose February performance at the Wisconsin state house brought extra attention to the cause.
But the genesis of "World Wide Rebel Songs" came from a much smaller place -- a low-end guitar factory in South Korea. After workers there unionized a couple of years ago, they were fired and the plant was moved to China. Morello agreed to play a benefit show for them. The day before the show, a devastating earthquake struck Haiti, and the South Korean workers decided to donate all the money raised to Haiti relief efforts. Morello was so moved that he wrote the track "World Wide Rebel Songs" that night and used it as a jumping-off point for the record.
"The idea in that song, in my music and in the concert, is to try to create a little bit of the world that you'd like to see," he says. "That one selfless act of people from halfway around the globe pitching in and having each other's backs, it happens a lot.
"When I was in Wisconsin in February in the midst of the union demonstrations there, I got this moving e-mail from one of the organizers of the demonstrations in Cairo. He said, 'We've got your back, we're all in this together.' "
