Kyuss pioneered the stoner rock genre in the late '80s and early '90s, made a massive splash in the rock and metal world, and then sadly called it quits in 1997. Founding drummer Brant Bjork recently spoke to Metal Hammer about how they were told they could've been the next Metallica by their label, to which Bjork basically responded "pass."
"Our guy at the label would always say, 'You guys will be the next Metallica', and that bummed me out," said Bjork. "I wanted to be this Kyuss! I felt like we fucking rocked and had hit the peak of our chemistry at the time, and Metallica were super-cool guys and really supportive, but seeing it all on that scale, it was just like, 'This isn't for me.' If that's the epitome of success in a rock band, it just seemed unrewarding. They got up and played the same things every night, said the same things… I could tell it'd become a travelling circus, a machine. I was still 20 years old, more attracted to what we were doing in terms of improvising onstage and being loose. I wanted Kyuss to go more in that direction."
Kyuss' lineup included guitarist Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age), bassists Nick Oliveri (Mondo Generator, ex-Queens of the Stone Age) and Scott Reeder (ex-Goatsnake, ex-The Obsessed), vocalist John Garcia, and Bjork. The band has never reunited, which Oliveri was publicly pissed off about in 2022.
"It's one of those things," said Oliveri in an interview with Goetia Media. "I feel personally that it's a fans' band. When the band existed [until] '95, with a record company push and all behind it, as a band, it got [big]]. And the band broke up, and then years later, fans traded MP3s, CDs, cassettes, whatever, and it grew [much bigger] without any label push, without the band existing. So it's a fans' band; they took it further than we ever did."
"[The fans] wanted us to play. I wish we were able to play. But I don't have any ownership or stake in the name. [Drummer Brant Bjork] came up with the name; he didn't have ownership in it. He left the band at one point. The existing members registered the name. So it's just as simple as that. I kind of feel a lot of different ways about it. I feel like why do you wanna own the name if you wanna kill the band? Let us run with it and have a good time. We're playing [the songs] with all respect to the music that we can, as close to it as we can. And the fans, we owe it to 'em."
