KROKUS’ CHRIS VON ROHR – “Even The METALLICA Logo Was Slightly Inspired By The KROKUS Logo”

Yiannis Dolas from Greece’s Rockpages did a recent interview we did with Krokus' co-founding member, bassist Chris Von Rohr. He talks about the band's farewell tour, the reasons they are not releasing a new album, about Lars Ulrich listening to early Krokus albums, Lemmy, Bruce Dickinson, Rob Halford checking out the Swiss band when they played in England and being kicked out of their tour with Def Leppard.

"Recently I spoke to Lars Ulrich from Metallica…he came to me holding To You All, the album that I sing on,” said Rohr about Metallica. “That’s a more bluesy and experimental album. Definitely, the style before Metal Rendez-vous was totally different. Lars told me that when he was still in Denmark we would listen to that early Krokus stuff and let’s face it even the Metallica logo was slightly inspired by the Krokus logo." 

"[In the early '80s] we found out that there’s a big interest for Krokus in England. That was a big surprise for us, too, because we had only started to get bigger in Switzerland. England seemed like a really scary place for us because all our heroes were from England and the truth is that we weren’t really prepared for such a jump…from a club level band to all those legendary places in England like Hammersmith, Apollo or Liverpool’s Empire etc. These were places where all the famous bands played. That was a challenge for us and a test to prove that we weren’t simply another regional band. It was a learning process for us but also a great time period for us. Everybody was coming to see us…Lemmy, Bruce Dickinson, Rob Halford. It was a perfect timing for us…the beginning of the ‘80s."  

Getting kicked off the Def Leppard tour: “The problem was that our singer was breaking some rules…things you don’t do when you are a special guest on a tour. The guys in Def Leppard were great…they came to us and told us that we shouldn’t copy Joe Elliott’s raps or we shouldn’t go to some areas on stage which are reserved for the headliner. But Marc [Storace, Krokus singer] didn’t listen and he did it again. Next thing we know, our manager had a fist fight with Def Leppard’s drummer who had, of course back then, both his arms.”

(Photo - Tim Tronckoe)