Lee Waddell is lead guitarist for No Excuses. He got his first guitar in 1963. His mom was a dedicated Elvis fan, giving him exposure to rock and roll music, later influenced by the Beatles. He lived in Greece, on an island called Crete, when he took his first guitar lessons. Later he moved to California and got his second guitar, an electric, where he was infuenced at the time by bands like The Turtles, as well as The Doors who were a regular thing on Channel 13.
Lee joined his first band in junior high school called Zac Hob with Nash. They played a talent show and won, at a time when it was against the law for junior high school kids to dance to live music; kids rioted and teachers couldn’t stop them. Numerous garage bands and bar gigs ensued from that point – he lost count around his 40th band. Eventually, he joined the band Rendezvous and left for Seattle in the late 1970s, playing primarily in Seattle and Portland.
In the early 1980s, Lee loaded up his guitars and headed for Hollywood, landing at Mars Recording Studio where he met Dave Mustein of Megadeth who introduced him to Bruce Elliott, whose guitarist was stolen by the Michael Jackson tour. He played with numerous other groups in the Hollywood area, such as Raven Slaughter, and met a female guitarist around1986 and formed a group called Sick Puppy. He then landed a job at New Rennaisance Records owned by Ann Boleyn, lead singer of Hellion. During this time period, he met and played with Simon Steele, bassist for the band The Claw, which led to studio work with Penelope Ann Spheeris, a Hollywood producer who was producing a movie called “The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years.” It was Lee’s job to fill in all of the empty spaces with dive-bomber guitar lead, including a scene during the Gazzari dance contest. He also worked on another movie at the time called “Dudes“. During this time at New Rennaisance Records, Lee produced the album cover jacket and art for “King Kobra III”, a band formed by drummer Carmine Appice who was also working New Rennaisance Records.
Having returned to the Northwest in the early 1990s, Lee formed the band Nexus and was the guitarist for that band for six years. After Nexus broke up, Lee formed another band with bassist Joe Brosnan called Mozilla. After Mozilla, he met John Westfall, who he describes as “an exceptional drummer”, and they began writing and recording music. Also, Lee spent time playing guitar at Goble Tavern outside of Rainier, OR, with other musicians such as Jerry Modine of The Blind Rootin’ Hogs. He also formed a band with a drummer who was a limo driver when they auditioned a “very excellent vocalist” named Cathi Mauser who came from a blues scene in Hot Springs, AR. Lee, Cathi and John were recording together when they ran into Kim Shegrude, an old friend from Lee’s junior high school years who was a guitarist/bassist. He had played with Kim over the years here and there.
Kim’s band was called White Wolf; Lee, Kim and company played their first gig with White Wolf’s remaining members at a yearly biker function called “The Toy Run” where a very large group of bikers get together to donate toys to underprivileged children. They also played at local bars in Columbia County, OR, later touring bars with the band Off the Hook. Lee later ran into Ray Ryder, whom he had already known from the band No Excuses and some recording help Ray had done for Nexus at Motion Studios. Now here he is, rocking for No Excuses in their reformed lineup. Another notch in a long belt of music for Lee Waddell.


--------------------