INTERVIEW: How Throat Cancer + Blackberry Smoke Led to Jason Newsted's Chophouse Band Tour

On Tuesday (May 5), Jason Newsted joined Loudwire Nights to dive into the Chophouse Band, a group he formed in the early-'90s and a group he is getting ready to hit the road with for its first-ever official tour.

Listen to the full conversation in the player near the end of this article.

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"It's been percolating for a while," Newsted told Loudwire Nights' Chuck Armstrong about the tour that kicks off on July 1 in Northampton, Mass., with several headlining gigs as well as dates supporting Blackberry Smoke.

"I've averaged six shows a year and I choose them very carefully and they're always in philanthropic nature ... Six a year is enough for me to be able to do it on my terms."

There were two significant factors, though, that pushed Newsted to take the Chophouse Band out on the road this summer.

"I became friends with Blackberry [Smoke] over the last few years," he explained.

"I was just so, I don't know man, enlightened, given hope by their demeanor, by their welcoming, embracing Southern gentleman nature, you know? Everybody — not just Charlie [Starr], not just Benji [Shanks], everybody. The merch guy, camera guy, monitor guy, everybody was cool the same way. And not just to me, but the people that are with me, my uncle, my aunt, my wife, everybody calling by their name and being totally cool. That is beautiful."

In some ways, Newsted materialized this tour with Blackberry Smoke and the Chophouse Band. On Nov. 13, 2025 when joined Blackberry Smoke onstage at a show in Ithaca, N.Y., for a cover of Black Sabbath's "Children of the Grave."

Following the show, Newsted caught up with Starr and after listening to some music, asked him about the opening band that night. After some back and forth, he brought up an idea.

"I go, 'You know, you need to let Chophouse Band open for you,' and he goes, 'That's not a thing,' and I go, 'No, I really would like to do that,'" Newsted recalled.

"And so a couple of weeks later, we're in. It was that thing. It was [a] face-to-face, brother-to-brother proposition as it were. I manifested it, bro."

Facing Throat Cancer + How It Changed Everything For Jason Newsted

Beyond the proposition made to Starr to tour with Blackberry Smoke, the other major factor that led to the Chophouse Band hitting the road this summer was a deeply personal and frightening one for Newsted.

"About one year ago, I had a procedure for throat cancer," he shared.

"They cut a bunch of shit out of here and then went inside with this new laser procedure that cuts a bunch of shit out, too. The cavern inside my head is different than it was before. I could still get it, I could still get some of that, but my singing voice is different for the stuff I'm singing now. It leans more toward that Tom Petty vibe and I'm kind of really digging it."

Newsted was very open about the experience — not just how it changed the way it sings, but how it's altered his outlook on everything.

"I was the closest to death that I've been," he admitted.

"Me and the boys [in Metallica] had some pretty close calls collectively ... The way I feel the most alive is to be making music as loudly as possible, screaming my head off. I don't care who's watching, could be zero, could be 10,000, could be however many in Moscow. It doesn't matter, man. I still do it the same. The way I feel the most alive is by doing this. I need to feel the most alive that I can."

He said he wasn't planning on doing a tour again but with the support of Blackberry Smoke and this experience, it all came together. As he put it, "The planets aligned."

Once Blackberry Smoke put their hand out, he put his band together — guitarist Jesse Farnsworth, bassist Jimbo Hart, guitarist Humberto Perez and drummer Robert John-Tucker — and Newsted was ready.

"When you're up against it like this, you really look at it in a different way," Newsted said about his experience with cancer and getting ready for this tour.

"[There are] reflective things, you know, we have a birthday, you reflect on that year, a new year comes around, reflect ... My arrogant spoiled ass, it would take a lot to get my attention or a lot to impress me...the 'great spirit' got my attention. 'Look bro, you're getting put in check.' I expected this maybe 20 or 25 years from now, but not right now, but it did happen."

He said that he'll look around at some of his colleagues and peers in music and watch them living life a lot harder than he ever did, but not face this kind of scare — and he could easily ask himself, "How is that fair?"

But he doesn't seem to be too concerned with that kind of questioning of life.

"I learned a lot from it," Newsted said.

"I don't plan on anything taking me down ever again. If it does, it does, but I'm not taking that chance. There are a handful of us, Bruce [Dickinson] from Iron Maiden, [Dave]
Mustaine, Mike [Ness], myself, a handful of others that have very similar afflictions ... It really does wake you up in a way that nothing else could wake you up."

What Else Did Jason Newsted Discuss on Loudwire Nights?

The bass that Jimbo Hart played on Jason Isbell's cover of Metallica's "Sad But True": "I give away a lot of instruments. When I played Alembics, I gave away Alembics. Now that I've played Sadowsky for 30 years, I've given away some Sadowskys. And it's to somebody that I feel deserves it, that wants it, that earned it, that needs to know the fucking difference ... I met Jimbo 10 or 11 years ago and I think the second or third time I went to see him, I took a Sadowsky down to him. I said, 'Dude, just try this out.' He's said it many, many times, it changed his game. It changed his outlook. It changed everything for him, his approach to the bass and all that, realizing what's possible with such a fine instrument. Not that he didn't kill it before, whatever he puts in his hands, but it is a step up. So that happened."
Joining Metallica after the death of Cliff Burton: "I was the happiest person, happiest camper, most elated individual, reaching the pinnacle of the world that I found myself in, the world I wanted to be in, the microcosm we live in, the metal world. I had earned the opportunity to have played a role, the ultimate role, for what I dedicated my life to. So very, very, very stoked, right? I joined this thing of three of the saddest, collectively depressed, filled with anger and anguish people. And their crew — but the kings? It was so sad. They couldn't comprehend what had happened. Nobody could, but especially they couldn't. And they were never given any time to feel it or process it. One month after the event, maybe 20 days after the ashes spread, I was playing on Cliff's amp. I mean, 20 days. We're 23 years old. The consequence hadn't even formed yet. I'm just happy, happy, happy coming into that thing. That's the playing field we started on."
How his various worlds are colliding with the Chophouse Band's tour, from Jimbo Hart's connection to Metallica to the first Metallica show Charlie Starr saw being a concert on the Damaged Justice tour: "I feel that. It's really more planets gelling, you know, than colliding. If you talk about the metal band, the symphony, that might be colliding. But if you talk about this thing happening, I really think it was meant to be. I've been trying to get Jimbo in the Chophouse for almost 11 years and we finally got him in there for the first time in March this year. It was a long time coming, but it was destiny, if you believe in that kind of stuff."