Excerpted from moderndrummer.com
Growing up, Shannon Larkin worshipped at the twin altars of Neil Peart and John Bonham. To say that he was into classic rock would be an understatement. So getting a call to play a one-off show with Black Sabbath in 1997 was the thrill of a lifetime. As Larkin recalls that gig now, everything was going great until the band ripped into "Sweet Leaf" - when he realized he couldn't remember a part of the tune. "I had four bars to get it together," Larkin admits, "so I thought, If anything, I'm just going to accent, stop, and listen. I might miss one beat, but then as soon as I hear it I'll come back in. Well, I stopped, but it was a big guitar accent! Then I remembered and came in with the rolls," Larkin says with a laugh. "But the look of evil that Tony Iommi gave me - it was like he was the prince of darkness." Larkin, of course, wasn't thrilled either. "It was the only mistake I made," he says. "But I was so annoyed that I stood up and whipped my sticks at the backdrop. And then I turned around and there was Ozzy standing there. He was like, 'It's alright mate,' and then he pulled his pants down to his ankles." Then Larkin laughs hard. "Yeah, it was fun."

While this is a peak into Larkin's career, it's not the top of the mountain. Just last year, the journeyman musician got a phone call from old friend Sully Erna, who was looking for a drummer to fill the spot in his multi-platinum band Godsmack. It was a cathartic phone call, since at that point Larkin was debating whether he wanted to continue playing for a living. "I had just finished the Glassjaw record Worship And Tribute, and I was kind of fed up," Larkin admits. "It had been fifteen years of work for me, and I had done fifteen records." At that point he was a member of neo-metal act Amen, but Larkin decided to quit and pursue the session scene. "Two weeks after I left Amen," he says, "Sully called. He had no clue that I wasn't in a band anymore, and I had no clue they were having trouble with Tommy Stewart. It was just like magic. I was like, Wow, man, maybe it is in the cards for me after all."

"I've put so much faith and belief into bands, and then when it didn't happen, I felt like I'd been beaten down. But now I'm so glad that I stuck it out. Perseverance got me the Godsmack gig. And I couldn't be happier."

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