A lot is going on with Bad Wolves. The Los Angeles metal band lost its vocalist last year when D.L. Laskiewicz departed to play in Falling In Reverse. Sara "Killboy" Skinner was announced as the new singer two months ago, and now Bad Wolves have been removed from an upcoming tour with Christian rock group Skillet, allegedly due to Skillet fans’ complaints about Skinner’s involvement.
In a video, she explained, "I have gathered you all here today to inform you that Bad Wolves will no longer be joining Skillet on their upcoming tour. Now, Skillet's camp did not want me to say anything, but apparently a statement has to be made. And I'm not someone who's ever hidden who the fuck I am, so let's not leave you to speculate, okay?"
"Here's the the truth," she continued. "Skillet announced us on their tour and their fans had a field day doing very extensive research that their booking agents and management did not do. Upon their findings, I am a trans OnlyFans bitch. Now unfortunately, only one of those things is true. Have fun finding out and we will see you on the next tour."
Unfortunately that's not the only drama for Bad Wolves; guitarist AJ Rebollo has announced that he's leaving. The band recorded a cover of Dolly Parton's "Jolene" months ago, and the country icon was reportedly going to add her vocals to it. Rebollo says their label, Better Noise Music, is pressuring them to release it even though the members decided it would be in bad taste to do so shortly after her death.
"We, as an entity, told the label we had no interest in releasing the cover after learning of Dolly's unfortunate passing as her collaboration on the song was no longer a possibility, and we felt it would (understandably) be interpreted as somewhat of a capitalization on her passing from an outside perspective," he wrote in the statement. "They went ahead and posted that we were releasing it anyway, despite efforts from more than one member, myself included, to oppose it."
"With the label completely disregarding numerous decisions we make out of passion, and ultimately just unknowingly exhausting the band's attempts to fully enjoy being here, I am no longer happy here," he added. "The amount of hate, negativity, and harassment we receive on a daily basis due to decisions made outside of our control has taken a massive toll on our sanity."
Bad Wolves, incidentally, are best known for "Zombie," the Cranberries cover released three days after Dolores O'Riordan tragically died in 2018. (Like Parton, the Cranberries vocalist was planning to record vocals for Bad Wolves’ cover.) AJ Rebollo was not in the band then — he joined as a touring guitarist in 2023 and became a full-time member the following year.
The "Jolene" cover comes out Monday (Aug. 31). Here's a quote by Bad Wolves founder John Boecklin from the press release:
Our singer is a big fan of Dolly and had posted a bunch of videos of her covering "Jolene." So, we decided to make a Heavy Metal cover version for our next album. On hearing our version, our label CEO Dan Waite sent the finished demo to Dolly's Manager Danny Nozell with a request for Dolly to guest feature on our version. We heard back that Danny had played the track to Dolly, and that Dolly loved our version, and that Dolly was going to go into the studio and add her vocals very soon. We then sent over the stems for Dolly's studio engineers to work with. Like everyone, we were devastated of this week's news of Dolly's passing. We will honor Dolly’s incredible legacy by donating proceeds from "Jolene" to the Dolly Parton's Imagination Library.
