Rogue is founding member and band leader of the Crüxshadows. he delivers vocals, violin, drum programming and sequences, keyboard programming and bass programming.
It was the fourth of July in Charlottesville, Virginia. A son was born in the traditional American style, to a traditional military family. He was given the name of his fathers, carried by every first born son in his line for as far back as memory endured...
But no one ever called him that.
His mother had a nickname for him, of course, and in his early childhood he was known by the cuddliest of sobriquets.
His peers, however, awarded him another name. By the time he had become a teenager, he was unanimously known only as Rogue...
Little Rogue was a precocious fellow with an early stage presence. He was performing before he was old enough to attend concerts on his own, and as a child had several roles in touring professional and semi-professional theatrical productions.
His artistic endeavours in youth, as now, were far ranging. At Florida State University he majored in visual arts, and was an active and somewhat infamous part of campus life. Those who knew him recall that he was a serious and dedicated student, but his interests extended beyond the classroom. He helped to found an influential campus political party, participated in sports, and eventually opened and managed a small art gallery.
It was on the campus of FSU that the Crüxshadows was first conceived. Rogue -- who was the driving force behind the project musically and lyrically -- is the only remaining part of the original band line up. It was also around this general era that he met Jessica, and found the relationship that would serve in one way or another as an inspiration for much of his work.
Today most of Rogue's life revolves around his musical and creative endeavors. During the few months every year that he's not on tour, he's generally working on the next album and working on other aspects of forging the phenomena that is the Crüxshadows. Despite this crowded schedule, he maintains a wide range of interests and inspirations, and a wonderful relationship with one huge and goofy Rottweiler, and of course a couple of cats.
Rogue names Dimitri Schostacovich, E.A. Poe, Shelly, Keats, Gibran, Klimt, Fusseli, Bernini, Tim Burton, Sergei Eisenstien, Akhenaten, Bowie, Thomas Jefferson, Sefan Groth, William Blake, Waterhouse, St. Theresa, Peter Murphy, Kate Bush, Siouxsie Sioux, Mozart, Friedrich, Turner, Joan of Arc, The Madonna, Vincent Price, Addams, My Family, Robert Smith, Emily Bronte, Nefertiti, Einstein, Aten-Ra, Arturis Rex Dux Bellorum, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes, Björk, Wyatt Perko, Cocteau, and Jessica Lackey as musical sources of inspiration.