Fozzy: Chris Jericho
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 Although having been around since 1999, it’s only now that U.S. nu-metal band Fozzy can official begin to really prove themselves as a real contenders in the metal world as an original act.
Following the break up of Stuck Mojo in 2000 (After the release of their critically acclaimed ‘Declaration Of A Headhunter’ from the same year) guitarist Rich ‘The Duke’ Ward started up a loose local covers band under the moniker of Fozzy Osbourne, which boasted a revolving line up of musicians who happened to turn up on the night.
In a chance meeting a year beforehand, professional wrestler (W.W.E.) and metal fan Chris Jericho (He chose the Jericho over his real name Irvine from Helloween’s ‘Walls Of Jericho’ no less) met with Ward. The meeting proved to be a turning point for the pair, and within twelve months, the pair would turn Fozzy (After dropping the Osbourne part) into a fully-fledged recording and touring band.
The band’s self titled debut album was quickly released in 2000, and while it was an album predominately devoted to cover songs (Only two originals), it received an overwhelming response from the press in regards to the band’s performance (Who at the time consisted of vocalist Jericho as Moongoose McQueen, guitarist Ward as Duke LaRüe, Ward’s guitar student Ryan Mallam as The Kidd, ex-Stuck Mojo bassist Dan Dryden as Shaun Popp and drummer Frank ‘Bud’ Fontseré as KK LaFlame).
Within the ensuing two years that passed, Fozzy had gone through more member shuffles (Dryden was replaced by ex-Stuck Mojo bassist Keith ‘Watty’ Watson, while producer Andy Sneap joined on as an additional guitarist), with the bands sophomore effort ‘Happenstance’ seeing a release in 2002. Although still featuring mostly covers, the album did have a couple more originals this time around (Five in fact). The joking persona of the band too was toned down in a sense, but was still evident for the most part.As if to cap off their past, Fozzy decided to release the D.V.D. ‘Unleashed, Uncensored, Unknown’ in 2003, along with making a couple of compilation appearances.
Two years have since passed, and Fozzy have returned once again. But what has made their return all the more interesting this time around (Apart from another line up change, which has seem Mallam’s position taken over by Mike Martin and Watson replaced by Sean B. Delson) is the fact that Fozzy have finally dropped all the gimmicks, unleashed their new album ‘All That Remains’ on their own Ash Records and made it their first to comprise of all original numbers.
I caught up with vocalist Chris Jericho to find out what went into the decision to record all original material, the change of record labels, guest contributions (Of which there are a few), constant member changes, touring and what he considers all that remains in Fozzy.
“We’re very happy with ‘All That Remains’. We’re excited by how it turned out, and equally as excited by the reaction it’s been getting all around the world, especially in Australia where things have been going really good. So it’s an exciting time for us right now.”
And Jericho also has another reason to be excited about the reaction to ‘All That Remains’, as the album is the first to released through his own newly established Ash Records, rather than their old label Megaforce Records.
“We actually had a deal with Megaforce Records where we did one record at a time. When the first record was done, we signed another deal for ‘Happenstance’, and then that was it. It was a two record deal basically, but only one at a time. It was cool to be with them for the first two albums, but when it came time to do ‘All That Remains’, we had a lot of ideas creatively, financially and promotion wise, and we knew that we would be better off doing it by ourselves. We just took a page out of The Eagles, John Cougar Mellencamp and Ozzy Osbourne’s books, and do the album for ourselves. They all started their own labels to be free of the restrictions of record companies, and that’s kind of the idea we had. That’s how I came up with Ash Records. We eliminated the middleman so to speak, and decided to do things a little more hands on.”
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