Great White Artistfacts

1982-
Mark KendallGuitar
Jack RussellLead vocals1982-2010
Lorne BlackBass1982-1987
Audie DesbrowDrums1985-
Michael LardieGuitar1986-
Tony MontanaBass1987-1992
Scott SnyderBass2008-
Terry IlousLead vocals2010-2018
Mitch MalloyLead vocals2018-2022
Brett CarlisleLead vocals2022-
No band has been more defined by a concert tragedy than Great White. On February 20, 2003, 100 people were killed when their stage pyrotechnics set off an inferno at The Station Nightclub in West Warwick, Rhode Island. Among those killed was their guitarist, Ty Longley, who was 31 and had been with the band just a short time.

Great White started doing benefit concerts a few months later, but this didn't go over well with families of the victims. The Station Fire Memorial Foundation asked the band not to speak about tragedy so as not to cause further distress to those affected.

None of the band members were criminally charged, but their tour manager was sent to jail for involuntary manslaughter.
Great White emerged from Los Angeles in the '80s when it was hotbed of rock and roll debauchery - Guns N' Roses and Mötley Crüe both were part of the scene. Their heyday was in the late '80s when they had two Platinum albums and got some airtime on MTV. They had a precipitous decline in the '90s grunge era, and by the time of the Station fire, were performing sporadically and restricted to small venues.
Original lead singer Jack Russell dealt with alcoholism and drug abuse, which got so bad in 2010 that he had trouble standing. A fall nearly killed him, perforating his bowel and putting him into a coma. The band moved on without him, replacing him with Terry Ilous. When Russell was well enough to perform a few years later, he formed a new band called Jack Russell's Great White, which often toured concurrently with the original Great White, led by original guitarist Mark Kendall.

The two competing versions of Great White were both active from 2012 until 2024, when Russell died from lewy body dementia at 63. His last show was in El Paso, Texas on April 5, 2024 - by this time he was singing while seated. His death came on August 15, 2024.
Kendall and Russell first got together to form a band in the late '70s but Russell ended up going to jail after he blacked out on PCP and was part of a drug-related shooting. He was sentenced to eight years but ended up serving less than a year. After he got out, he again teamed with Kendall and they formed Great White.
Along with White Lion and Whitesnake, they were one of the big "white" rock bands of the '80s. Their shark theme supplied a visual motif, with their album covers often using a fin. The cover of their 1991 album Hooked shows a woman wearing only seaweed being hoisted up on a giant fish hook. An alternate cover shows her mostly submerged.
Most of their songs were written by some combination of Russell, Kendall, and whoever was producing the album, but their biggest hit was a cover: "Once Bitten, Twice Shy," written and originally released by the English rocker Ian Hunter in 1975. Hunter's version was a hit in the UK but was little known in America. Great White come across it when Guns N' Roses guitarist Izzy Stradlin suggested they cover it.

Comments

Be the first to comment...

More Songfacts:

Take Me to ChurchHozier

Hozier's "Take Me to Church" drew inspiration from the atheist writer Christopher Hitchens. He called it "a bit of a losing your religion song."

Scooby SnacksFun Lovin' Criminals

The Scooby Snacks in the Fun Lovin' Criminals song aren't dog treats, they're Valium pills.

Do You Believe In Love?Huey Lewis & the News

The first Huey Lewis & the News hit, "Do You Believe In Love?," is a cover of a song Mutt Lange wrote three years earlier called "We Both Believe In Love."