Some believe that certain people can feel that death will come knocking on their door soon. Maybe they have an intuition that they don’t have much time left to continue their endeavors. And just like that, at the most unexpected moment, the tragic news comes rushing in, and the only thing left, in the Rev’s case, is a song that will guide those who are left behind.
The Rev had written a track, which became a duet between him and Sevenfold’s lead vocalist M. Shadows, initially titled ‘Death’ for the band’s fifth studio album ‘Nightmare.’ However, life works in mysterious ways, as just three days later, the musician was found unresponsive in his Huntington Beach home and had passed away when the ambulance arrived at the hospital. Later it was revealed that the Rev had died of an overdose.
The late musician’s bandmates M. Shadows and Synyster Gates shared the uncanny fact about the song in an interview with Hard Drive Radio. They said, “The eeriest thing about it is there is a song on the album called ‘Fiction,’ a nickname the Rev gave himself which started out with the title ‘Death.’ And it was the last song the Rev wrote for the album, and when he handed it in, he said, ‘That’s it, that’s the last song for this record.’ And then, three days later, he died.”
Vocalist M. Shadows had also told Kerrang! that the lyrics turned out to be prophetic in a way. “He wrote all these lyrics about [us] finding the way when he’s not there anymore,” the frontman said. “It was as though he knew he wouldn’t be with us much longer.”
When all the details about the event surfaced, it almost seemed like Jimmy The Rev Sullivan had written ‘Fiction’ to say goodbye to his loved ones. His bandmates considered it a type of how-to manual for those left behind so they could find ways to move on with their lives without him.
The band decided to keep Sullivan’s demo vocals as a tribute to him on the album version of ‘Fiction,’ Shortly after his passing, they also dedicated ‘Nightmare’ and several other songs like ‘So Far Away’ to their late bandmate. It was a tragic ending for the musician and a devastating story to retell.
Even though things we do every day might seem redundant and a part of our jobs, they may also be the very last thing we do because no one knows when death will come knocking except a few that have the sixth sense, including the Rev.
