Robert Bartleh Cummings (born January 12, 1965), better known by his stage name, Rob Zombie, is an American musician, film director, screenwriter, film producer and writer.
He founded the heavy metal band White Zombie, and as a solo musician sold a further 15 million albums. Five of his albums have been certified platinum and another two have been certified gold, making him the artist with the most gold and platinum discs on the Geffen Records label.
Zombie has also established a successful career as a film director, creating the movies House of 1000 Corpses, The Devil's Rejects, as well as the 2007 remake of Halloween.
Zombie's younger brother is Spider One from alternative metal band Powerman 5000. Their parents were traveling carnival workers, and this exposed both of the brothers to much of the strange imagery they incorporate into their music. Rob was a sickly child who was not allowed to participate in sports, and was considered the 'weird kid' at his high school.
Zombie has been a longtime fan of The Ramones, The Misfits, shock-rocker Alice Cooper, British heavy-metal pioneers Black Sabbath and Judas Priest, Metallica and many more. The styles of these musicians continue to be a strong influence on him to this day. Both brothers went to college, but Rob dropped out to pursue other interests. Rob attended Parsons The New School for Design in New York and Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. Rob got his start by working as a technician for Pee Wee's Playhouse. It was also during this time that he met future White Zombie band-mate Sean Yseult.
On October 31, 2002 he married long-time girlfriend Sheri Moon (now known as Sheri Moon Zombie) after almost 13 years of dating. The two had met at Toad's Place, a concert venue, in New Haven, Connecticut through mutual friends. Ten days before their planned wedding date, the couple decided to elope and get married on Halloween. She has appeared or starred in all of his films.
Rob Zombie is also a longtime vegetarian after being affected by slaughterhouse footage he saw in high school. For Thanksgiving of 2007, Zombie used his notoriety and joined forces with PETA to record a message with PETA's 2007 holiday hotline. The message itself gave details about the lives and gruesome slaughtering of turkeys and a plea to choose an alternative for the holiday..
Zombie has various tattoos forming sleeves on both arms, most of them featuring horror/science fiction imagery. These include the Creature From the Black Lagoon, sinister clowns, demons, and skulls. He designed almost all of the tattoos himself.
White Zombie was an American band named after the 1932 film White Zombie, which starred Bela Lugosi. Based in New York, White Zombie was originally a noise rock band in the vein of fellow New York band Sonic Youth and Texas Experimental Punk band Butthole Surfers. White Zombie was known for combining heavy-metal music with driving guitar riffs (as on "Super-Charger Heaven"), overlayed with lyrics heavily influenced by horror films and pseudo-Satanic imagery. Unlike other metal bands of the 1990s, White Zombie was almost exclusively a "fantasy" band, writing songs not about real life, but about surreal horror fantasies.
Following their signing to Geffen Records, White Zombie achieved commercial success, with two 2x platinum albums and a large number of their songs featured in movies and TV shows (notably Beavis and Butthead). The group officially disbanded in 1998 shortly after the release of singer Rob Zombie's solo album Hellbilly Deluxe.
In 1996, Rob Zombie collaborated with Alice Cooper on the song "Hands of Death (Burn Baby Burn)" for the X-Files tie-in CD Songs in the Key of X. It was Zombie's first work outside of his band White Zombie. The song was nominated for a Grammy for Best Metal Performance the same year, but lost to Nine Inch Nails for their song "Happiness in Slavery".
Rob Zombie formed his own solo band in 1998. John Tempesta (drums) came directly from White Zombie, and was joined by Mike Riggs on guitar and Blasko (Rob Nicholson) on bass. They recorded and released Rob's debut solo album, Hellbilly Deluxe, in 1998, produced by Scott Humphrey. The album was a success, selling three million copies domestically. This album contained the hit singles "Dragula", "Living Dead Girl" and "Superbeast". White Zombie dissolved after the release of Hellbilly Deluxe. Rob Zombie toured extensively to promote the debut album, releasing American Made Music to Strip By in 1999, an album of remixes from Hellbilly Deluxe.
Rob Zombie next released The Sinister Urge in 2001 (the title taken from a 1961 film by Edward D. Wood), again produced by Scott Humphrey. This release contained the singles "Never Gonna Stop (The Red Red Kroovy)", "Feel So Numb" and "Demon Speeding". While the album still featured Rob's signature heavy metal sound, it was also more experimental than Hellbilly Deluxe, such as including brass instruments on "Go To California." The album has been certified platinum.
Rob released his first greatest-hits album Past, Present & Future, in 2003, containing hit songs both from his solo band and White Zombie. It also featured covers (The Commodores' "Brick House" and The Ramones' "Blitzkrieg Bop") and unreleased songs ("Two-Lane Blacktop" and "Girl on Fire").
After a 2002-2003 world tour, Mike Riggs and John Tempesta left Rob Zombie to form a similar band, Scum of the Earth. This put plans for another tour or new album on hold. However, between 2003 and 2005, Rob Zombie released two self-directed horror films, House of 1000 Corpses and The Devil's Rejects.
In 2005, Zombie returned to the music world by recruiting former Marilyn Manson guitarist, John 5, and former Alice Cooper drummer, Tommy Clufetos. Blasko and Humphrey remained, and the five began recording Educated Horses, which was released in 2006. Stylistically, Educated Horses is Rob's most experimental release. In contrast to the heavy metal sound of his first 2 albums, this one has a more alternative metal sound to it. The single "Foxy Foxy" can be described as his most "party-going" song. The other 2 singles, "Let It All Bleed Out" and "American Witch", featured his signature heavy sound. It was also his 1st album to not contain heavy amounts of horror—either in the artwork, songs, or even his physical appearance (Rob Zombie is dressed in regular clothes on the album cover, and his dreadlocks are gone). However, the songs "Seventeen Year Locust" and "The Scorpion Sleeps" featured song topics of creepy-crawlies. Following the release of the album they toured the U.S. with Lacuna Coil.
20th Century Masters: Millennium Collection: The Best of Rob Zombie was also released in 2006 by his label, Geffen Records. It contains songs similar to his 1st greatest-hits album, but there are also songs on this release from Educated Horses. In 2007 Rob Zombie released his first Live CD, This was supposed to be accompanied by a live dvd & picture booklet, but so far only the cd has surfaced. Blasko, Rob's bass player, left the band after the Educated Horses Tour, right before the American Witch Tour (The 2nd leg of the tour), to play bass with Ozzy Osbourne (he's done this before: in 2005, during Rob's musical hiatus). To fill in, Rob hired Piggy D. of Amen (band) and Wednesday 13 fame as a permanent replacement.
On May 31, 2006, Zombie was joined by guitarist Slash (Guns N' Roses, Velvet Revolver), Gilby Clarke (formerly of Guns N' Roses) on rhythm guitar, Scott Ian of Anthrax on bass, Tommy Lee of Mötley Crüe on drums and special guest Ace Frehley of Kiss also on lead guitar. The occasion was a one-time supergroup tribute to Kiss for the first annual VH1 Rock Honors Award Show. They played one song, "God of Thunder," before handing it off to the honoree. Rob Zombie then went on tour with Ozzy Osbourne.
Rob has also started work on a currently untitled follow-up to 2006's Educated Horses. In may of 2008 he posted an update on his website stating:
"Well, we have for the first time ever written more songs than we need for an album. Everything isn't 100% finished, but everything is moving along great. No release date yet." In August of 2008, a new (instrumental) song entitled "Tyrannosaurus Rex" , featuring John 5 on guitar, was uploaded onto Rob's MySpace music page.
Rob Zombie attending the 2007 Comic Con to promote Halloween.
House of 1000 Corpses was Rob Zombie's directorial debut and his first horror film. Zombie wrote the screenplay as well as directing the film. It took four years to make (1999–2003), and was finally released by Lion's Gate Films in 2003, after Stacy Snider, then-head of Universal Pictures, sold the film to them, as she did not wish for Universal to release the film. It was later revealed that Snider is not a fan of horror films. It featured a shocking amount of violence and gore. It told the tale of a group of unlucky teenagers who stumble upon the Firefly Family, a family of sadistic and vicious murderers. The film was shot in a surreal and over-the-top style that alternated between dark and campy humor. While hailed by many horror fans as a masterpiece, the film has also come under scrutiny for being very similar in look, feel, and plot to the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre film from 1974.
The House of 1000 Corpses' sequel, The Devil's Rejects, which Zombie also wrote and directed, showcased a much different style. Whereas House was at times comedic and bizarre, Rejects was more dark, serious and gritty. Released in 2005, Rejects had the Firefly Family on the run from the law and a particularly vengeful sheriff whose brother was murdered by them in the first film.
Rob Zombie contributed to the 2007 exploitation film Grindhouse, by Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino by directing a faux trailer, called Werewolf Women of the S.S., starring his wife, exploitation veterans Udo Kier and Sybil Danning, and Nicolas Cage, who appeared free as a favor.
Zombie next wrote and directed Halloween, a reimagining of the 1978 classic that was released August 31, 2007. Although it was a success and opened at number #1 at the box office with $26 million, it registered only 27% at Rotten Tomatoes. It would go on to gross over $78 million, his biggest hit yet and the highest grossing "Halloween" film of all time (not counting for inflation).
He is also the executive producer of the forthcoming animated film The Haunted World of El Superbeasto, based upon his comic book series, The Adventures of El Superbeasto (which appeared in his Spookshow International comic book). The film is due for a 2008 release.
Zombie will next be directing a new movie for Dimension Films known as Rob Zombie's Tyrannosaurus Rex, based loosely on the comic book he co-wrote entitled THE NAIL. The film is due for a 2009 release.
Zombie has been rumored to be remaking both Bonnie and Clyde and C.H.U.D. but has declined to both.
On Friday, October 13, 2006, Zombie became the host of TCM Underground on the Turner Classic Movies channel with the screening of a double feature of Ed Wood's Plan 9 From Outer Space and Bride of the Monster. Until January 2007, Zombie hosted a different double bill every Friday night at two in the morning.
Further information: Rob Zombie discography
