Rude awakening: Guitarist lives dream playing with Tesla

By John Benson

The guitarist was discovered through his MySpace page.

When guitarist Dave Rude was in the seventh grade, he fell in love with hard-rock act Tesla and its 1990 album “Five Man Acoustical Jam.” Little did he know, just over 15 years later he would join the “Little Suzi,” “Modern Day Cowboy” and “Love Song” band as a permanent member.

“It’s funny. I had always wanted to see them live, and then the year before I joined, I ended up randomly seeing them in concert three times,” said Rude, calling from Minnesota. “It was just kind of pretty weird.”

It was during this same time that the San Francisco resident was pursuing his own dreams of rock ’n’ roll stardom as a member of his own Dave Rude Band.

“I had never met anyone in Tesla. There was no connection at all,” Rude said. “People often ask me if I knew the band, and I was just a fan in the crowd. But soon after that, [Tesla guitarist] Frank [Hannon] found me on my MySpace page.

“That’s how it all happened, and even that was random. He didn’t know who I was.”

Rude said his only demand when joining Tesla was to keep playing with the Dave Rude Band, which has a modern classic-rock sound. Considering Tesla tours for a month and then takes a month off, the relationship has worked perfectly so far. Rude added that his own outfit has benefited from his Tesla connection.

“My sort of model is Warren Haynes, who is the leader of Gov’t Mule, but he gained his fame by becoming the lead guitar player in the Allman Brothers Band,” Rude said. “So he does both. He’ll go out with the Allmans during the summer and go out with Gov’t Mule the rest of the year and vice versa. That’s kind of my thing, to do both.”

While Rude made his Tesla debut on the band’s 2007 covers series “Real to Reel,” the guitarist finally contributed to Tesla’s original music catalog on its latest album, “Forever More.” He said his favorites include the rocking lead single “I Want To Live” and the ballad “Falling Apart.”

Granted the future is uncertain, with perhaps Tesla’s glory days being behind them, Rude stressed the group’s live presence remains its calling card. Fans will get a chance to see the Sacramento band “Cumin’ Atcha Live” on Wednesday at the House of Blues.

“Tesla has always been a really great live band, and since I joined, it’s always been a very fun, powerful evening every time we play,” Rude said. “You’ll get a lot of the Tesla classic hits, a couple of obscure album tracks from the past, one or two from the covers records and a good chunk of the new album.

“It’s cool how well the set flows with all of these different eras of the band put together. It really feels natural.”