Dio (1989–1991) Rowan Robertson was recruited to join the band
Dio when he was only 17 years of age. The experience launched the young guitarist from obscurity to international fame nearly overnight. News that the band
Dio had replaced departing guitarist
Craig Goldy with an unusually young guitar player circulated in
hard rock and
heavy metal magazines such as
Hit Parader,
Rip, and
Circus months before Robertson's first and only album with the band,
Lock Up the Wolves, was released.
Lock Up the Wolves Lock Up the Wolves sessions initially included
Jimmy Bain,
Vinny Appice and
Jens Johansson. This line-up had already written and recorded parts of
Lock Up the Wolves before Bain and Appice were replaced with Teddy Cook and former
AC/DC drummer
Simon Wright, respectively. The album was released on 15 May 1990, and the band embarked on a tour in support of the album. In 1990 and 1991 the music industry experienced a dramatic shift as
grunge became dominant in rock music:
Soundgarden,
Alice in Chains,
Screaming Trees, were all signed to major labels and performed well commercially.
Second album with Dio shelved Robertson's tenure in
Dio was cut short by music industry persistence for a
Ronnie James Dio reunion with
Black Sabbath. In 1991 it was announced that the reunion would take place. At that time, the Dio band, including Robertson, had been writing songs for an upcoming album that had been scheduled for a May 1991 release. Once a
Black Sabbath reunion with Ronnie James Dio was announced, what would have been Robertson's second album with Dio was shelved. Robertson has confirmed the existence of rehearsal recordings for what would have been the follow-up to
Lock Up the Wolves but he has stated these will remain archived and he does not feel comfortable releasing any of this to the public, maintaining he would have only done that with permission from Ronnie James Dio himself. A reunion nearly took place in 2001 when Robertson was scheduled to replace
Craig Goldy on tour in South Africa in support of Dio's then-new album
Magica after Goldy suffered an injury. However the
September 11 attacks affected the band's tour plans. A second stint for Robertson in Dio never materialised.
After Dio (1991–present) When Dio was put on ice due to the Ronnie James Dio-Black Sabbath reunion, Rowan Robertson began pursuing two new projects: work on an instruction video for guitar players and a new band called Violets Demise with vocalist
Oni Logan (formerly of
Lynch Mob) and drummer
Jimmy Paxson. They recorded an album for Atlantic Records, but it was not released by the label at that time. Atlantic Records eventually released the album – titled
Revisited – in 2002 under a different band name: Logan-Robertson. After Violet's Demise, Robertson spent three years doing session work in Los Angeles, as well as some work in Japan, where he toured briefly. Robertson then worked with the VAST (Visual Audio Sensory Theater), founded and fronted by Jon Crosby, on the tour supporting the project's first album. VAST took a theatrical approach to performances. Although Robertson played live with the band after they had released their first album and he contributed to the development of the second VAST release,
Music for People, he parted ways with VAST due to creative differences. Much of the work Robertson contributed to VAST was on rhythm guitars. One of Robertson's more obscure projects was a band called Happy Birthday. In April 2005 Robertson embarked on a short West Coast tour with Happy Birthday, supporting
Jimmy Chamberlin's band,
The Jimmy Chamberlin Complex. In 2005 Robertson also began collaboration on a project called Wicked Outlaw. "The new band, featuring guitarist Rowan Robertson and Finnish composer and bassist Marko Pukkila (formerly of Altaria)," was "writing original material" and was expected to debut and tour the United States and Europe in 2006 according to Blabbermouth.net. Initial gestures to organise Wicked Outlaw actually dated back to as early as May 2004. DC4 originally featured Shawn Duncan (of Odin) on drums, Matt Duncan on bass, and
Jeff Duncan (of
Armored Saint and Odin) on vocals and guitar. DC4 released their debut album,
Volume 1, with guitarist Hyland Church in 2002. Rowan joined the band in 2006 as a replacement for Church and featured on the band's second album,
Explode, in 2007. Robertson also appeared on their third album,
Electric Ministry in 2011. As of 2014, Rowan Robertson is a member of Bang Tango. ==Other work==