EXODUS’s ROB DUKES Opens Up About Touring Life-style: ‘You Miss Household Time’ And ‘You Sacrifice Alone Time’

In a brand new interview with Rocking With Jam Man, EXODUS frontman Rob Dukes talked concerning the “sacrifices” he and different musicians must make whereas they’re on tour away from their household, together with lacking milestones, feeling remoted and struggling to stability the highway with residence life. He mentioned (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “I watched my [EXODUS] guitar player Lee Altus raise small children while he was in the band, and miss out on huge swaths of their life. I didn’t see my dog for three months. And I miss my dog, man. My dog’s a huge part of my life. It’s not a child, but to me it is. I mean, I don’t have kids, so it’s the closest I’ve gotten [to having kids]. You miss family time. I think every human being, or most human beings, require a time to be alone and read a book or listen to music or whatever. And when you’re on a tour bus for months at a time, you’re in a very small, confined space with 10 or 11 people, including the crew and the band, and you get very limited amount of alone time. And then somebody’s always where you wanna be. And then if you leave the bus, then there’s fans and other bands, and those things are a sacrifice. You sacrifice that alone time, the time you need for yourself to do the things you wanna do. And then you miss family occasions, events, birthdays. Luckily, the upside to technology is that Zoom is an option and FaceTime, and you can stay in touch with family a lot easier than it was even 15 years ago.”

Reflecting on how a lot tougher it was to remain in contact together with his household whereas on tour a few a long time in the past, Rob continued: “I remember going to… You’d have to find a phone store to get Wi-Fi, ’cause there was no Wi-Fi anywhere in Europe. So I would be in Europe for two months and not talk to anybody back home, very rarely, ’cause it was just difficult. But that’s all gotten a lot better. But my dog doesn’t understand a phone. When she hears my voice through the phone, she thinks I’m out the door and freaks out, so I had to stop letting her hear my voice, ’cause it would make me feel bad that she thought I was home and I wasn’t. I didn’t wanna disappoint her. But luckily she’s not human, she’s a dog, so the moment I did walk in the door off tour, she forgot about all the time I was gone. And the only one who really missed it was me. But being a musician, getting out there, just do what makes you happy and be honest about it.”

EXODUS‘s twelfth studio album, “Goliath”, got here out on March 20 through Napalm Records.

The follow-up to 2021’s “Persona Non Grata” marks the primary EXODUS LP since Dukes‘s return to the band a 12 months and a half in the past.

In December 2025, EXODUS filmed music movies for 3 songs from “Goliath”, together with “3111”. The clips had been helmed by Jim Louvau, a musical and visible inventive artist primarily based in Phoenix, Arizona, who beforehand labored on EXODUS‘s music video for the track “The Fires Of Division” from “Persona Non Grata”.

“Goliath” marks the primary time in practically three a long time that an EXODUS album hasn’t been combined by Andy Sneap, who has acted as JUDAS PRIEST‘s producer and touring guitarist for eight years.

EXODUS‘s longtime singer Steve “Zetro” Souza joined the pioneering thrash steel act in 1986 after beforehand fronting the band LEGACY (which later turned TESTAMENT). He remained within the band till their hiatus in 1993, however rejoined them for 2 years from 2002 to 2004. Dukes had joined EXODUS in 2005 (following Souza‘s departure) and remained till 2014, when Souza rejoined.

Dukes beforehand joined EXODUS in January 2005 and appeared on 4 of the band’s studio albums — “Shovel Headed Kill Machine” (2005),“The Atrocity Exhibition… Exhibit A” (2007),“Let There Be Blood” (2008, a re-recording of EXODUS‘s basic 1985 LP, “Bonded By Blood”) and “Exhibit B: The Human Condition” (2010).

EXODUS performed its first live performance with Dukes in practically 11 years on April 5, 2025 on the Decibel Magazine Metal & Beer Fest: Philly on the Fillmore in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Although EXODUS hardly ever will get talked about alongside the so-called “Big Four” of Eighties thrash steel — METALLICA, MEGADETH, SLAYER and ANTHRAX — the aforementioned “Bonded By Blood” LP impressed the likes of TESTAMENT, DEATH ANGEL, VIO-LENCE and plenty of others to launch their careers and is taken into account probably the most influential thrash steel albums of all time.