Before the chimes of his doorbell stop echoing, Sebastian Bach throws open the front door of his Las Vegas home. His 6’4” frame fills the doorway, his iconic voice as recognizable when he speaks as when he sings. “You want some coffee??” he bellows, then runs in socked feet to the open-plan kitchen to make a fresh pot.
Sebastian is a force of nature. He takes up a lot of space. He is loud, enthusiastic, and immediately magnetic. I realize quickly that when he gets excited, his already booming voice somehow gets even louder. “My single was the most added on radio last year,” he says as he fills the coffee pot. “But my label tells me I need to get my Spotify numbers up. I COULD GIVE A SHIT ABOUT SPOTIFY NUMBERS. I make more money off Cameo for saying, ‘Hey so-and-so in Idaho. This is Sebastian Bach. I heard your dog died.’”
His home reflects his larger-than-life nature. Gold and platinum discs cover the walls — so many I lose count. Just as striking are the large-scale paintings by his late father, David Bierk, each brimming with raw emotion. One graces the cover of Sebastian’s 2024 album, Child Within the Man, but standing before the original, the intensity is overwhelming.
Pieces of Sebastian’s well-documented rock memorabilia collection are everywhere: enough Kiss artifacts to start a museum, plus rare Beatles treasures like a 1964 commemorative coin from their first U.S. trip, gifted to him by the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
Framed posters from Sebastian’s three major theater roles also line the walls: as Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, Riff Raff in The Rocky Horror Show, and Jesus in the national tour of Jesus Christ Superstar. The latter mounted above the powder room toilet, a fabulous and surprising placement.
Sebastian lounges beneath a seven-foot-tall image of himself as Dr. Hyde, the Vegas sun bouncing off his blond hair and making his green eyes shimmer a few shades lighter. The first time I saw him in Skid Row’s “Youth Gone Wild” video, I remember feeling distinctly jealous of how pretty he was. When British Vogue’s iconic supermodel cover came out a year later, I thought he would have fit right in.
In many ways, Broadway became his saving grace. After his 1996 ousting from Skid Row, in 1998 Sebastian released an album The Last Hard Men (by the band of the same name, featuring Kelley Deal of the Breeders and Jimmy Chamberlin of Smashing Pumpkins) and his solo debut, Bring ‘Em Bach Alive! in 1999, His meticulously trained voice and undeniable rock star presence made him an ideal celebrity lead for Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde.
Mr. Bach hosts a party in around 2000 to celebrate his role in the Broadway musical Jekyll & Hyde at the Harley Davidson Cafe, NYC. (Photo by Richard Corkery/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images)
Earlier today, Sebastian was practicing singing for an hour. During our interview, he sings many times. I heard “Youth Gone Wild” and “Gloria in excelsis Deo” and a promise that Sebastian would put out a Christmas album of traditional music one day.
Even today, he sticks to the same vocal warmups he learned in 1987, when Jon Bon Jovi sent him to the famed coach Don Lawrence. Lawrence had his students record their $100-an-hour lessons. Sebastian digitized his tapes and plays me a snippet: his 19-year-old self practicing scales under Lawrence’s guidance. He’s shared these lesson tapes with a few rock star friends, including Axl Rose.
“This warmup is the trick to keeping my range,” he says. “When I was a little boy, I was the lead soprano at church and school. When my voice started changing, I thought, ‘I can’t let my voice turn into Peter Brady.’ Every day after school, I locked myself in my room and sang the highest music I could find. Singing heavy metal, you have to know how to do it like the record — but without pushing too hard. You always have to leave something for the next day, or you’re going to cancel shows. I don’t cancel shows.”
Ninety-one cities are listed on the merch from his 2024 tour. “I can’t even name 91 cities,” he laughs. In the past year, Sebastian also competed on Food Network’s Worst Cooks in America Celebrity Edition: Heroes vs. Villains and participated on The Masked Singer as Tiki.
His relationship with reality TV goes back to 2002’s VH1 series Forever Wild. Since then, his television credits have rivaled — even outnumbered — his music ones. Fans especially remember him as Gil, the seasoned rocker on Gilmore Girls. The first time Gil gets referenced, Lane, the fictitious band’s leader, is already planning a SPIN cover “against a blood-red backdrop with a skull hovering over us,” which made me laugh out loud.
Sebastian earned the role thanks to his performance in Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. “Anybody who’s been on [Gilmore Girls] will tell you they make you talk as fast as you can,” he says. “I’d do my lines and every time they’d go, ‘Okay, just do it a little quicker.’ I was like an auctioneer. Then I auditioned for Law & Order and did the same thing. The director said, ‘Whoa! Slow down.’ I said, ‘Sorry, I’m on Gilmore Girls. They make me do it like that!’”
When I ask him how he decides which projects to take, he says, “I like making things.” Recently, that creativity has expanded to visual art. Using digital techniques, he’s completed unfinished pieces by his father, merging their work. He’s also created pop-art style portraits centered around himself. His work is now shown by Wentworth Gallery, alongside Paul Stanley, Rick Allen, Mickey Hart, Ric Ocasek, and Peter Max.
In his 2016 tell-all autobiography 18 and Life on Skid Row, his father’s influence looms large. I am halfway listening through the audiobook, read by Sebastian, and mention my favorite part: Sebastian reading aloud from art books on road trips while his father drove.
His eyes fill, and he looks away. It’s clear how deep that connection still runs.
“That’s why doing this art stuff is incredibly meaningful to me,” says Sebastian. “I get to create this stuff with my dad, who’s no longer here. The fans are digging it, and I’m loving making it. But after I’m done doing that, then I’m going to be raring to go back to the studio. This art opportunity is recharging me to make music again.”
The man, the myth, the leather. (Photo by Jim Louvau)
With everything he has going on, does Sebastian even want to reunite with Skid Row? “I do for the fans and my family too. My family sees all these platinum records, and the kids in the family would love that. Right now, ‘I Remember You’ is one of the lead songs in A Minecraft Movie. It opens the movie. Music has a life of its own, and Skid Row music has a life of its own.
“At the end of the day, the reason we’re not together is business. It’s not a personal thing — as much as they like to say that on the internet, that’s not what it is. We tried to get back together, but it got fucked up.”
Sebastian spent a lot of 18 and Life on Skid Row talking about “partying,” and called himself the “Bazmanian Devil,” which might have led to tension with Skid Row. But now, apart from high-end red wine of an evening, he’s settled. He’s texting his daughter about prom logistics and picking up her shoes later.
He tells me he’s skipping a birthday party this evening to go to hot yoga instead, prepping for a gig with revolving member supergroup Royal Machines next week. He credits Duff McKagan for getting him into it.
“I have an addictive personality,” Sebastian says. “If in your late 50s, you get addicted to exercise, that’s a good thing.”
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