Being part of a successful rock band does not necessarily make you rich. Just ask former Anthrax member John Bush. During a recent episode of “The Ex-Man” podcast hosted by Doc Coyle, Bush said, “The bottom line is I've never really made enough money, even when I was in Anthrax, to justify not having to work again or not having another job.”
Bush offered some sage advice to today's musicians saying, “If I was giving advice to somebody right now, I'd say take your merchandise advance, go on the road and then when you come back still do your job, so you're not just depleting the money that you got as advances. That's the conversation I would have with myself now. But I don't regret any of those things. It's not like something I look back on and go, 'Man, I really screwed up.' I just think that was the way life went . . .”
Bush has been working alongside his wife for the past several years at her casting studio which she had when they married 20 years ago. He said, “It's our mom-and-pop business. It's not this enormous cash cow, but it certainly helps pay the bills. And so I'm kind of ingrained in that when I'm home. I kind of juggle that with my music career. And that's another way of earning money.”
Bush was Anthrax's frontman from 1992 to 2005.