Reality Bath Follow-up

Music fed this weird ice-climbing route which fed a song title for my band

Randy Blythe and I met via Instagram in 2018. I first linked to his page from Nikki Sixx’s feed, and I was stunned by the depth of his work. I had seen Lamb of God at Saltair in 2010 and couldn’t imagine the vocalist capturing such emotional, insightful images, nor did I ever imagine he would be into much that was physical beyond skateboarding so I was utterly intrigued when I read some of his posts about surfing.

I bought two issues of the Unbuilt Zine that Randy contributed to in that period as research when we began producing the RAZE zine because I thought they were onto something cool. Randy and I finally connected directly when I posted something about The Young Gods — or maybe he did and I commented but at this point neither of us can remember nor does that matter. Actually, it does because knowing about that band and anything done by Franz Treichler puts us in a pretty small club.

Randy is likely best known as the vocalist for American metal icons Lamb of God however, he makes amazing photographs and has been honing the craft of writing for over a decade. His first book, Dark Days (2015) is a harrowing journey describing his arrest, incarceration, trial, and acquittal for manslaughter in the Czech Republic after a fan tragically died after a stage-dive during a 2010 concert. His command of language and pacing in the book was a total surprise to me, and shattered the stereotype of a metal band frontman. After I read the book, and he read Kiss or Kill we met in person when his band opened for Slayer in August 2018. Shortly thereafter he interviewed me for his radio show, “The Power Remains” that used to air on the now-defunct, metal-focused streaming platform, Gimme Radio. Following that quick hit, focused mainly on the influence of music, we recorded and published a podcast on the old NonProphet show which may or may not be accessible at this time of writing.

Randy’s passion for surfing and for protecting the environment, for social compassion and fighting for what’s right, and his own sense of place within the context of music and the world is compelling and humbling. As an example, following hurricane Florence, and freshly off the road after having finished the tour with Slayer, Randy loaded his truck with supplies and drove to areas devastated by the storm to help out, visiting towns that were too small to pop on the FEMA or Red Cross radar.

Randy describes his new book, Just Beyond the Light: Making Peace with the Wars Inside Our Head as a "tight, concise roadmap of how I have attempted to maintain what I believe to be a proper perspective in life, even during difficult times." Starting on 2/19/25 Randy embarks on a spoken word tour to promote the book. More info here.

The real reason to post this has to do with a song from the eponymously named Lamb of God album from 2020. When asked during an interview with Vulture which was the best song on the record Randy replied,

"Overall, that would be “Reality Bath.” I took the name from my friend Mark Twight, who is a world-renowned Alpine-style ice climber and has on record many first ascents. Not expedition-style with all the Sherpas and everything where you can pay someone to carry oxygen — he’s one of these dudes who goes up with nothing but what he can carry in his backpack. He did a first ascent, him and another dude up in Canada, and since he did it first, he got to name it. “Reality Bath” is what he called it, and it has not been repeated to this day.

Twight’s a writer, as well. He wrote a book called Kiss or Kill. I’m not a climber, but his writing about climbing is fascinating, and he’s a fascinating person in general. He took the name “Reality Bath” from the title of some obscure Canadian (ed. note actually they hail from Texas) punk rock band, I think. Music fed this weird ice-climbing route, which fed a song title for my band. It’s a neat cyclical thing.

Mark Morton, my guitar player, gave me a really good compliment the other day. He goes, “You know, we’ve been working 20-something years together, and I think your writing and performance on ‘Reality Bath’ may be my favorite thing you’ve done with me in these decades.”"

Randy Blythe interview at Vulture in 2020

Pre-order Randy's new book here

Randy doing his thing, 2018 in Salt Lake City

p.s. during the Gimme Radio discussion Randy asked me to give him five songs and the reason why they are important. These were my songs, which he played on the show and we discussed the influence of those songs, those bands, and his own experiences with many of the artists:

1. “The Fall of Because”, Killing Joke

2. “Smothered Hope”, Skinny Puppy

3. “Guns on there Roof”, The Clash

4. “Pushing The Extreme” – live version – The Wipers

5. “We Destroy the Family”, FEAR

Finally, after the 2018 show in SLC Randy and I drove out to Antelope Island to make some photographs. It was a cool afternoon, and an incredible sunset.

Check out Randy’s Substack page:

D. Randall Blythe