HOW TO BE A 'G' AND RAISE 7 KIDS ON THE ROAD...

When Max and I got married in 1993, we made a deal to stay a family.....to not split up....to not begin to live separate lives. In Sepultura and Sacred Reich, we always said that we lived two parallel lives...both real, but both very different. We both agreed our lives would be one Tribe, music and family as one road. We had seen too many people split up and what happened to the children. It wouldn't be a part of our plan.

From birth, Zyon and Igor both grew up on the road. Zyon didn't like it so much. He loved the music and the backstage, but the people overwhelmed him. He was one of the most famous metal babies of all time, and the fans mobbed him. He was their little dragon..he was the the future. He was at the Chaos Ad recording and every Sepultura tour after, until his Pops left. At the age of 3 he started writing his name and reading and asked to go to school and not tour. Igor, on the other hand, went to school late as he could and walked out the minute he turned 16. He never wanted to leave the road.

Me and Zyon in Israel at the making of the Territory video 

Thirsty on the beach in Tel Aviv

School comes along and most parents get happy but I can't say I was. It was rough finding good nannies and solving childhood issues from the road. But guess what? Don't whine and do it, because you can. You can do anything you can. I argued over the phone with police trying to RICO Zyon because his classmates wrote CRELS FOR PRESIDENT all over the school. I thought he should have run for class president, but whatever... The point is you can still be MOM and work all day in another country. I probably knew more about my kids lives than stay at home parents really know.

With all the kids in school, for some years there were no cell phones or even fax machines. Now with SKYPE and wifi it's much easier to check shizzle out at home. Every holiday or break we would fly everyone to where we were at the time. It was the best feeling to see everyone arrive! It was a routine to fly in and out, go in and out of school and blend it all together. When we went home, Max would go into the music class at the elementary school and I would go into the classroom and talk about different countries and their customs. When the kids were in high school, we even rode in a convertible in the Homecoming Day Parade!!!

Richie playing the Nailbomb club show in Holland at the age of 8

Alex, Richie, and Max at the Chaos AD recording

Many years we did dodge the school system and kept them out on tour longer than we should have and more often than we were allowed. The police would be called and we would get the lowdown drilled to us. but we were truant still, I admit. On the road, the kids went to many museums, castles, concentration camps, slums, boat rides, walked through Ann Frank's alcove and Nelson Mandela's cell at Robben Island. I wanted them to know history. To know poverty. I took them to Mao Hauser concentration camp where my mother was imprisoned. I wanted them to know their roots. I wanted them to make decisions with thought and to learn about the world, and not to hang out in malls, or waste their time in a friends back room, day after idle day. And no, it wasn't easy and it wasn't all glamourous. It was years of no sleep, working through the birthday parties, spending hours on planes, never sitting down to eat a meal, always with the wheels turning in your head. But I wouldn't change a day! My 2 daughters helped us to keep our bond strong. If it weren't for them, we probably would have stumbled more often. The thread we spun twines through us no matter where we are on this planet. From us it threads through each territory, it spreads like lava and connects our Tribe to us. Once you are in the Tribe, Max says you are never out. It is the law...

On a canoe in the Amazon

Roxanne and Zyon in Hawaii.

Now the boys are out of school. No more nannies...well, the dogs need one now, but thats another blog... Igor, our 7th and last domino, was never one for school. Reading his whole life, being a deep thinker and a diversified musician, school was a ball and chain, a giant anchor. One day he said he was never going again. I protested and he disappeared with Max. The principal, who was super cool, answered the phone when I called the school to discuss it. A bit later, I got a call back, from the principal, regarding our family's move to Portugal....apparently what Max told them...


Class was really dismissed....

1989 HOW TO ROCK THE F#@& OUT AND STILL MANAGE...

The 80's were magic..Metal was rock solid, growing under the highways, strolling down the sidewalks across the cities, peering out at night through the smoky doorways of discreet clubs. Fans waited in line overnight, outside record stores, to be the first to rush in and grab the latest assaults. The bins were filling with new band's product from the evolution as more bands were being birthed in every garage and bedroom.

I finished my elementary education at the Bootleggers and began my university studies on the road beginning in 1988. Sacred Reich was my baby and times were good! One of the friendships I made during that time was with Debbie Abono, one of the few other woman managers at the time.

Sacred Reich

Possesed

I think Debbie was like 50 years old or something when she saw her first Metal concert. It was a Motörhead show that she got baptized at. We met in a funny way. I was such a newbie when I started with Sacred! I found an old Metal Maniacs Magazine article about people important to bands..a lawyer, a manager, etc. There was Debbie, manager of The Possessed. I wrote her a pretty naive letter asking if Sacred could tour with her band. Yes, I was a dork and didn't even know about booking agents. She called me and we met when The Possessed played Celebrity Theater in Phoenix. Ahhh, the good ole days of Metal..the birth of thrash taking hold...

Forbidden

Debbie, and Christina (my daughter/merch seller)

We bonded by laughter and a zillion espressos and soon we were traveling on a bus with Sacred and Forbidden, crossing Europe and eventually the US. Damn, it was wild, I admit. And yes,..the stories are true...believe even the ones you don't want to...We shopped till we dropped in the daytime and moshed the nights away in one exotic location to the next. We drank a bit, smoked a bit and even touched our toes in the Reeperbahn...

Bookwork was a big job with no computers, wifi, fax machines or even the thought of a cell phone! I always cracked up when Debbie threw all her receipts in a cardboard box and shipped them home! What a web to untangle later! Through the years of our friendship, I saw Debbie successfully do something most managers can't and won't do...take garage bands and develop them. This is much harder than doing what most managers do..... wait and prey on bands that someone else put their sweat into. She took the helm of The Possessed, Forbidden, Vio-lence and many others. She fearlessly crafted them and fought their way into the history books, And we laughed our asses off the whole way through...it may have been the wine...

Myself, and Debbie

Class dismissed...

WORLD CUP 1994....GOOD TIMES

In 1994, Sepultura was on tour with Pantera in the US. The tour was selling out and the shows were rocking with Chaos Ad. The soccer World Cup games were running parallel to the tour and the guys were clamoring to see them whenever they got a chance.

Pantera

As we neared the west coast, one of the guys in the band was able to hook us all up with tickets to the match in LA!!! We could barely restrain ourselves from jumping up and down and shrieking!! The timing was perfect and we calculated that we could go to the game and still make the show on time.

Me and Max walking to the game

 
Walking to the entrance was as much fun as the game! People celebrating and partying all the way up the path! Luscious aromas of food floating around our noses and drumbeats hammering through our ears!! We had all the kids with us...no Igor since he wasn't even a thought at the time! I even scheduled plastic surgery appointments for the next week to remove the grins from our faces!

Richie, Rox, Jason, and Zyon in the stroller.

Whitney Houston sang the Star Spangled Banner at the opening! What a treat to be gifted with her amazing vocal chords! We all had Brazilian yellow jerseys on; unity everywhere!

Italy was creamed in the end and it bolstered our moods even more!! What a perfect day! We all returned to the stage with the everlasting Winner's Grin on our mugs! A raging show; yellow jerseys all around and a packed stadium..who could ask for more? I hate to think what would have happened if Brazil had lost...

Dana, Me, and Max

Class dismissed...

TRIBAL 'S' TATTIN' WITH MAXXX

Everyone who knows the story of Max, knows the Sepultura 'S' logo......the spikey, tribal design that was created in Brasil in 1990, and represents the band's mark. What you didn't know was that I am the first female to ever have that tatted on my flesh! I was almost the first person in the world, but Andreas beat me by a couple minutes.

Max decided to get a giant back tattoo and get the tribal 'S' also. He asked Mike Roper to do the honors and brand his baby's name on him for life. We all knew Mike and had already gotten quite a bit of work done by him. I had my dragon wrapping my forearm, and a lotus blossom rising above it. One day, Mike would also do the Max heart on my chest, which was a Valentine gift to Max from me. In fact, recently, I heard Mike is the number 1 tattoo artist in the world for Japanese artwork done outside of Japan! He certainly deserves that honor!!

Mike came to my home at 3015 E. Corrine Rd. in Phoenix, and aided by his assistant, Mike, laid out his instruments for chiseling. They set up on the wicker table that one day Max would write Nailbomb lyrics at! Keep in mind, in 1990 there were no babies crawling at our feet named Zyon or Igor; there was no record called Chaos Ad, there were no Roots. There was Beneath the Remains beginning to Arise and the Primitive Phoenix rising wasn't even a dream!

Hours later, after many cassettes had ripped the covering off our eardrums, the masterpiece was done! The brand complete...the son with the Father. All was normal...

Class dismissed early for the explosive weekend...