Background and career
Scott Ian (born Scott Ian Rosenfeld, December 31, 1963) is an American musician, best known as the rhythm guitarist, lyricist and co-founder of the thrash metal band Anthrax, of which he is the sole continuous member. Ian is also the guitarist, lyricist, and a founding member of the crossover thrash band Stormtroopers of Death, and is the rhythm guitarist for the metal bands the Damned Things and Mr. Bungle. He has hosted The Rock Show on VH1 and has appeared on VH1's I Love the... series, Heavy: The Story of Metal, and SuperGroup.
Scott Ian Rosenfeld (his name has since been legally changed to drop his birth surname) was born to a Jewish family in the Bayside section of the New York City borough of Queens; he has a younger brother named Jason (who was the lead vocalist of Anthrax for a brief period in the early 1980s) and a half-brother named Sean. Ian attended Bayside High School, with classmates (and future Anthrax bandmates) Dan Lilker and Neil Turbin, graduating in 1981. Witnessing Kiss live at Madison Square Garden in 1977 made a huge impact on Ian, who has been vocal about his love for the band (Ian appeared on an episode of Gene Simmons Family Jewels, in which he visited Simmons' home and spoke about the impact Kiss has had on his life). Ian went on to be influenced by British heavy metal bands such as Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Motörhead and Judas Priest, as well as the punk rock band Ramones. The musical style of his playing and songwriting including fast alternate picking was also largely influenced by the German metal band Accept. Ian states that Malcolm Young, Rudolf Schenker, and Johnny Ramone were his biggest influences to pursue rhythm guitar. He learned how to play guitar by listening to AC/DC records such as Powerage and Highway to Hell, he would sit in his room and learn how to play every song on the albums.
As a founding member of Anthrax, Ian helped to create thrash metal in the mid-1980s alongside Megadeth, Slayer, and Metallica. He came up with the idea to collaborate with the rap group Public Enemy, covering their song "Bring the Noise" in 1991. This has been considered a foundational recording of the rap/rock genre. In 2005, Ian was invited by Chuck D of Public Enemy to perform "Bring the Noise" with them as part of their induction into VH1's Hip Hop Honors Hall of Fame. He also joined Public Enemy on the Rock the Bells tour in 2007. During his tenure Anthrax has sold over 10 million albums worldwide and have been nominated for six Grammy Awards.
In 1985, Scott Ian co-founded the crossover thrash band Stormtroopers of Death as a satirical take on hardcore punk, recruiting Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante, former Anthrax bassist Dan Lilker, and vocalist Billy Milano. After releasing one album Speak English or Die that same year the band went on a hiatus before briefly coming back from 1997 till 2002. A Stormtroopers of Death tribute set headlined the Milwaukee Metal Fest on May 16, 2025, with Ian on guitar, Dan Lilker on bass, Ian's son Revel Ian on drums and Hatebreed's Jamey Jasta on vocals.
Ian began working with music television channel VH1 in 2001, when he was asked to host the program Rock Show. During his 48 episodes as host, he interviewed guests including Ozzy Osbourne, Rob Halford, Ted Nugent, Stone Temple Pilots, Megadeth, 3 Doors Down, Sevendust, Tenacious D, and the Cult. Ian was a regular commentator on various VH1 shows including the I Love the... series, 100 Most Metal Moments, Awesomely Bad Number One Songs, When Metallica Ruled the World, and episodes of VH1's Behind the Music featuring Metallica, Pantera and Anthrax. Ian was prominently featured in VH1's History of Heavy Metal. In June 2006, he starred in the VH1 reality series SuperGroup with Ted Nugent, Sebastian Bach, Jason Bonham and Evan Seinfeld. Ian plays guitar in the group Pearl (with his wife, Pearl Aday), who toured with Velvet Revolver and Meat Loaf. Pearl's debut album was released on January 19, 2010, through Megaforce Records. Ian performed with Pearl on Jimmy Kimmel Live! on January 20, 2010. In 2006, Ian joined the supergroup Damnocracy, however the band did not release any albums and disbanded in 2010. In 2008, DC Comics asked Ian to write a two-issue prestige-format comics series for the character Lobo. Books one and two of Lobo: Highway to Hell were released in November and December 2009. From 2007 to 2013, Ian hosted / cohosted the annual Kerrang! Awards. In 2008, Ian signed with UltimateBet, the third largest internet gaming site in the world, as one of their online professional players. He joined professional poker players Phil Hellmuth and Annie Duke as one of Ultimate Bet's star pros. He won Ultimate Bet's premier Sunday 200K tournament and cashed in in 2010's WSOP main event by finishing 634th out of 6494 players. In 2010, Ian joined the metal supergroup the Damned Things, which released their first album on December 14, 2010. On June 21, 2011, his wife gave birth to the couple's first child, thus forcing Ian to briefly depart from Anthrax's tour. Andreas Kisser of Sepultura filled in for Scott on guitar during Scott's absence. Ian provided voice work for the Adult Swim show Metalocalypse, as the character "Some Guy Who Snuck Into Dethklok's Trunk Last Night When They Were Pretty Hammered" in the "Season III: The Dead Man" opening episode "Renovationklok", as well as providing guest voices in the episode "Tributeklok". Ian did a spoken word tour entitled Speaking Words, starting in May 2013, in the UK. In 2014, he and his wife joined former members of Mother Superior to form Motor Sister. They released their debut album, Ride, on March 9, 2015. He also toured Europe and North American with a solo spoken word storytelling act called "Speaking Words" that year. In 2015, Da Capo Press published Ian's memoir titled I'm the Man: The Story of That Guy from Anthrax. On December 12, 2017, Ian released his book Access All Areas: Stories from a Hard Rock Life, which is a follow-up to his first autobiographical book I'm the Man, published November 24, 2015. The book features stories about his life including not only his adventures with Anthrax, but also with other musical celebrities such as Madonna and David Lee Roth. In 2018, he toured Australia on another spoken word act called "'Spoken Word Stories by Scottie'" also known as "One Man Riot". In 2019, he contributed the foreword to the book King's X: The Oral History by Greg Prato, published by Jawbone Press. In 2020, Ian joined Mr. Bungle for their series of reunion shows where they performed their 1986 demo album The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny. He then played on the re-recording of the album which was released later that year.
Ian has appeared as himself in the 2003 comedy Calendar Girls and representing the character Kevin's conscience, in the 2022 American teen comedy-drama Metal Lords. Ian played a zombie in the Walking Dead appearing in the 2015 episode "Remember." In 2023, he voiced an Elite Tribunal Soldier animated musical fantasy film Metalocalypse: Army of the Doomstar.
