Each time Acid Bath vocalist Dax Riggs has stepped onstage this year, the cult sludge vocalist feels like he and the rest of the band are getting drenched in the blood of an excitable, adoring fan base. And according to him, that’s a beautiful thing.
Indeed, one of the heavy-music world’s most surprising stories this year has been the return of the cult Louisiana outfit, nearly 30 years on from winding down their first act after the tragic 1997 car-accident death of bassist Audie Pitre.
While the furiously gnarled-up blues-sludging of the band’s two albums — 1994’s When the Kite String Pops and 1996 follow-up Paegan Terrorism Tactics — made them underground legends for generations, the fervor for the Southern outfit is at an all-time fever pitch in 2025, leading to a series of sell-out club dates and high-profile slots on some of the world’s most prestigious festival stages. Quite frankly, the reaction to Acid Bath’s reunion is tripping Riggs out, but he’s also enjoying the ride alongside founding guitarists Sammy Duet (Goatwhore) and Mike Sanchez, and new onstage collaborators Shane Wesley (Crowbar) and Zack Simmons (Goatwhore).
Speaking with Revolver a few days after a gig at the Paramount in Brooklyn, New York, Riggs reports on all things Acid Bath — from playing to decidedly un-tranquilized crowd and re-connecting to the songs they made with late friends Pitre and Tommy Viator (keyboards), to the possibility of making new music, to the interdimensional journey Riggs goes on every time he shuts his eyes.
How’s your day been so far, Dax?
DAX RIGGS Oh, pretty good — just kind of like an astronaut, coming back to Earth.
In which ways? Have you got your…earth legs back? That’s not the way you say that, but…
Yeah, yeah, that’s kind of how it is. Going to sleep is kind of like going to another world and then coming back. I’m acclimating to this atmosphere, I guess. But slowly.
Oh…So this has nothing to do with the shows?
Maybe? We fly to all these shows, so there’s part of that. I guess I kind of feel like an astronaut, in some way.
The Tinfoil Biter
How was the New York show?
It was amazing. It was just another bucket of blood gushing everywhere, but in a lovely way. And kind of in a loving way. It’s kind of like the elevators opening up at the Overlook Hotel, you know?
Is that like a reciprocal thing? Are you guys facing the elevator of blood?
Yeah, we are. We are awash in the blood. It’s really energizing, spiritually. It’s like so much love. It’s like a cannon of love directed at you, just blasting you and recharging your mojo.
That sounds good and healthy! Had you been approached about doing an Acid Bath reunion prior to this?
I guess it was always a conversation amongst the band. [But] we’d all moved far away, and it just seemed like such an undertaking at any given point in the past, where we were busy with other projects — especially me and Sammy. It seemed like it would be very difficult. But time has taken [away] some of the pain.
What convinced you all to bring this back together, then?
I guess [it was] the offer of a show. We’d never had a legitimate offer [from a promoter] to do something [until recently]. So, when it happened, we considered where all the members were at, and who would be participating.
It just seemed like something wonderful…like, the possibility of doing it well and in a mature fashion. It works well in that there’s some evolution to what we’re doing, and artistry in finding out how to do these songs now.
What it was like to actually be back on stage in New Orleans last April — 28 years to the day from your last show — and get into these songs with Acid Bath for the first time in three decades?
I’ve never played a show where I had such a weight on me. I’d always been pretty freewheeling, and never had much baggage that I brought with me on stage. [But] there was a tremendous weight on me [as I was] thinking of my friend who’s no longer with us — and just wanting him, in my mind, to be happy and proud of what we were doing.
That was my main concern. I just wanted to do the best job that I could do. So, there was a heavy weight that I’d never experienced. I mean…for sound check, I was literally shaking.
The Tinfoil Biter
Were you reflecting on Audie and Tommy as you were performing these songs?
Oh, definitely. Tommy was always a friend of the band — he was in a version of the band before I was in it, but with Sammy and Audie. So it’s a blow that he’s gone
And Audie…he wrote a lot of the songs that we’re performing. It’s been a battle to come to terms with it like that.
Artistically, it’s kind of going back, but it felt like the right timing [to reunite]. I was just about to put out my own record [7 Songs for Spiders] — [the reunion] dovetailed with my own interest in hairy guitars again. It’s something that started to bubble up in me over the last 10 years.
You’ve been starting all these shows with “Tranquilized.” Why is this the Acid Bath song to jump into the set with?
We always felt like it was a fun, jammy song, and we don’t have a lot of those. And it was always a popular one with the audience. So, it was an easy starting point for us. We get a little dirge in there, but it’s also got some weird elements.
There’s footage from your recent Redmond, Washington, show where people are out in the crowd screaming their heads off like it’s like a Taylor Swift concert. Has the reaction to this reunion surprised you?
Oh, God, yes. That’s what I mean when I say [it’s] like a bloodbath of love.
Was that something you felt from the crowd during the initial run of the band?
We always had good fortune, along with our troubles. And we always had lots of friends. Like, we didn’t have a place to practice, so some bikers just adopted us. [This was] after a hurricane had destroyed a trailer park. They just pulled a few trailers together and wired up some electricity for us, and that’s where we started to play. We always had a dark angel kind of helping us along.
There was a nice poetry to having Eyehategod playing your first show back, since they’d also played your last show of the Nineties…
Even though we never actually played a show with Eyehategod back in the day, we were always friends with them, and we would go to their shows. When Audie died, they were the biggest band that came and played our little fundraiser for him and his funeral. It meant a lot to us.
We feel the same way about Crowbar — they were always so supportive of us, and that meant a lot to everybody in our band. And Kyle [Thomas from] Exhorder was the first one to ever say, “Hey, you guys jam! I dig it!” We were good friends with them. There was a lot of support that we got from the core bands of New Orleans.
There was a moment at your New York Show where Sammy thanked everyone for remembering Acid Bath. Did you have any concerns about coming back after so long?
I had this feeling that it was gonna be big, somehow, but I actually had no idea what the fuck was really about to happen. So now I’ve seen this phenomenon in several cities, where it’s like a religious orgasm happening. And it feels really, really good — you know, as an orgasm should. [laughs]
Maybe it [has to do with] the length of time [Acid Bath was away] … things have gotten so strange and different in the metal world that a band like us now makes more sense.
You’re coming back to lyrics that you wrote 30 years ago. On the idea of things making more sense: do you have a better, or at least a different understanding of these songs than you had when they were originally written?
Oh, dear God, yes. It’s quite often like that with me. I find that I’m directed to say these things, lyrically, by some inside [force] that I don’t fully understand. It’s just what feels right, and what sounds right [at the time]. It may not make perfect sense to me, but as time goes on, I see all these things in it that reveal deeper meanings to my own personal life.
One thing that strikes me as I re-emerged myself in these songs was the foretelling of a death scene at the stoplight. It’s in several songs [ed. including “Dr. Seuss is Dead” and “Paegan Love Song”]. Or there’s this Graveflower.
Sometimes it freaks me out, but whenever I write lyrics I go inside a secret internal language that’s not even clear to myself. But it reveals itself over time.
You’ve mentioned in earlier interviews that Stormy Daniels has Acid Bath lyrics tattooed on her. First off, how did you find out about that? And do you know which lyrics they are?
I know it’s from “Bleed Me an Ocean.” Sammy had met her at a Crowbar show in New Orleans, and she’s recently come to another show. She’s just the nicest person you could ever meet, and we’re her favorite band.
Did it take a while for you to get your screaming voice back into shape for these shows?
Oh yeah, I really didn’t know what was going to happen. I had a feeling that I could [still] do it, and the reason is because oftentimes I’ll be frustrated [about] things and I’ll kind of go into a screaming rage. [laughs] Just in normal life. Usually I’m by myself, I don’t do it around anybody. But it was always there.
I wasn’t sure how I could switch back and forth [between singing and screaming] — because that’s really the trick, building up your endurance to be able to sing and then go to this other thing. It’s been getting better and stronger, but it is a challenge.
This is maybe an obtuse segue, but maybe on the idea of challenges onstage — You’ve spoken in the past about being electrocuted at an old Acid Bath gig; what’s the wildest thing that’s happened to you during this of run of reunion shows?
It’s been pretty chill, but it was probably when Sammy threw a guitar out of nowhere. My eyes were closed. The song was over [and] he was pissed off because [his guitar] wasn’t tuning properly, and he just threw it across the stage. I was like, “What the fuck just happened,” but it’s just silly stuff like that.
It’s been a joy playing this stuff live, because we have such a good crew of people helping us. The bass player [Shane Wesley] is in Crowbar, he’s played with them for a lot of years. And then the drummer [Zack Simmons] was in Goatwhore. So, there’s some road dogs.
As you mentioned, you’ve been playing or will be playing to huge festival crowds — Sonic Temple, INKcarceration, Aftershock. What was Acid Bath’s biggest show in the Nineties like, and how does it compare to these newer festival performances?
They don’t compare at all. This is like another world. And sometimes I think, like, 40 per cent or more of the crowd probably wasn’t born when we were a thing. But it’s a lot of people having fun. I like to see the kids having fun.
Our shows then…we were all smashed-in; there was a lot of acid. I guess there was no thought to transmitting some horrific idea to the masses, you know what I mean? Like, it just wasn’t a possibility. It was our world. And now we’re kind of in your world.
It’s amazing. I cannot find the words to describe how unreal it really is for the members of Acid Bath to see this. We are tripping constantly on the amount of attention and fan mania that we have.
Having these shows under your belt, and seeing the reception to them, does it make you think about the future of Acid Bath, in terms of new music?
We’re definitely gonna do more music, but the idea of calling it “Acid Bath” is probably not something that we’re going to do. But I think this [reunion] is inspiring to us to do other projects. There’ll be aspects of this [in them], I’m sure. We’re really working in the graveyard, you know?
Are you going to continue supporting your 7 Songs for Spiders solo album?
There will be one-off shows coming up, but [Acid Bath] has taken over the driver’s seat.
Basically, I’m cool with letting my record get out there… [and letting it] sink in a little bit. And then [I’ll] play. So that’s my plan. And I’m kind of interested in recording more music.
When we spoke with you earlier in the year, you told us that you were making music at your home studio with friends, but also that some raccoons stopped by the joint — and that a rat chewed on one of your synths. How’s the wildlife situation in your studio at the moment?
It’s died down. We finally have an agreement with the raccoons, so it’s all good. The studio is where we rehearse with Acid Bath, and we’ll be recording music there in the future.