Black Star Riders at The NAMM Show

Left To Right Tim Rossi, Robbie Crane, and Chad Szeliga

I roll up on the Sawtooth Booth (Sawtooth Musical Instruments) to catch The Black Star Riders in action. It’s a quarter to 5 PM, Saturday night and there’s a crowd lined up to get autographs and meet Sawtooth artists: Vinny Appice (Black Sabbath, DIO) Michael Angelo Batio (MAB, Nitro) and Robert “Vudu Man” Sarzo (Hurricane, Queensryche). Sawtooth’s Tanya Fuoco herds the people around the booth out of the isles and into straight lines. It was quite funny the reactions of the crowd to her cajoling.

Chad Szeliga Rocks the Cajon at NAMM

I push through the crowd to get a front row seat. Camera in hand and mic on, I overhear Drummer, Chad Szeliga, talking to Sawtooth’s Co-owner, Kevin “Oz” Osbourne. Oz explains that NAMM has strict rules about noise levels, informing Chad he’ll have to forgo the drums and play the “Spirit Cajon”. (A cajón is a box-shaped percussion instrument originally from Peru, played by slapping the front or rear faces with the hands, fingers, or sometimes implements such as brushes, mallets, or sticks).

Robbie Crane Introduces the Trio

Chad takes his seat atop the cajon and begins warming up. Soon Chad is joined by Bassist and fellow Black Star Rider, Robbie Crane, along with Blackfoot vocalist Tim Rossi. Robbie explains to Backstage360, “Traditionally, we would have had our singer Ricky Warwick. Cuz he’s sick we’re gonna just jam with our buddy from Blackfoot.” I remark, “ just jam, huh,” and Robbie smiles and says, “just jam like we did in the old days. No structure, no clue, I’ve never played with him before.”

The three musicians exchange a little banter and discuss what to play. Robbie introduces the ensemble and off they go.

It wasn’t long before the three Journeyman musicians were jamming in perfect harmony entertaining the crowd. They never said, and I couldn’t tell, whether they were “jamming” something specific. Whatever they were playing, it was very cool and quite rocking!

The guys went on for about 30 minutes then stood up and walked out to greet some of the fans. It was a great jam enjoyed by all who dropped by.

The Black Star Rider’s latest album “Another State of Grace” dropped late last year on Nuclear Blast Records. The band just finished a run through Europe.