Venom Inc. singer and bassist Tony “Demolition Man” Dolan has weighed in on yesterday’s news that Jeff “Mantas” Dunn won’t be returning to Venom Inc.
Yesterday, Sunday, December 1, Mantas shared a message via social media, which reads in part:
“Greetings my friends, The last few months have been incredibly difficult on every level and to cap it all only a few days ago one of my most beloved cats, Spooky, passed away in front of me after a short but very aggressive illness. I was with him every step of the way.
“After I suffered the second heart attack the outpouring of love and concern from you guys via a multitude of messages and calls has been overwhelming and a simple thank you seems so insignificant. So my friends it is now time to address the situation.
“I wish to inform you all that I will not be returning to Venom Inc. Obviously my health and wellbeing are of paramount importance to myself and my family, however, there are also more personal issues which have influenced my decision. To be absolutely clear, I will not be appearing at any advertised shows.”
Speaking in an interview with Laughingmonkeymusic (see below), Tony “Demolition Man” Dolan commented on the news, sharing: “I know that yesterday was quite shocking with his statement, and everybody’s picked up on that, but you know, it may not be forever – he may feel in a years time that he feels great and wants to do it again. He will produce music in his studio, because that’s what he does, and that’s his therapy, and that’s great, you know. And his social media he was doing, that was his therapy, so that was all good. When he stopped doing that, I thought maybe that’s not the best thing to do. And as much as in my heart I would like him to still be doing the tour, and the shows… even through the whole season, we did Indonesia, we did all of South America, Columbia, Chile, Peru, Brazil, Mexico, Romania, Poland – I mean we did these huge shows, half a million people at Pol’and’Rock, 80,000 in Indonesia, I mean huge shows. Every night in South America I think it was 3 – 6,000 people. So we did these incredible things and I wanted him to be there, but you have to feel good about it, and he didn’t feel good about it, so he had to sit out and I had to accept that. In a ideal world we wouldn’t age. In an ideal world we’d be great and 18 forever.”
Later Tony adds: “My whole premise of this is to keep that spirit, keep that feeling, keep that fire. And if I can make a 60 year old guy come to a show and cry because he feels like he’s 17 again listening to that song for the first time, then that’s the whole point.”
Hear what else Dolan had to say in the video below:
See Mantas’ full statement below: