Classic Rock 93.9

The New York Times released a list of the 30 greatest living American songwriters back in April, based on feedback from more than 250 music insiders and six Times critics. The list drew criticism from music fans, so the paper has now decided to give them their say.

The Times has now released a readers’ choice list of the 100 greatest American songwriters, noting, “As soon as we decided to make a list of the 30 greatest living American songwriters, we could guess how readers would respond to the results: with a combination of enthusiasm and outrage, quickly letting us know which of their favorites we had unconscionably forgotten.”

“We didn’t want all that passion to go undocumented. So we invited readers to assemble their own list — with a formal poll,” they added.

The new list is the result of over 25,000 ballots cast, resulting in “nearly 12,000 distinct choices,” which were  narrowed down to 100 artists.

While the original list didn’t rank the songwriters, the reader’s choice list does. Bob Dylan lands at #1, followed by Paul Simon at #2, Bruce Springsteen at #3 and Carole King at #4. Billy Joel, who did not make the original list, ranks at #5.

Rounding out the top 10 are Stevie Wonder, Taylor Swift, Dolly Parton, James Taylor, who also didn’t make the original list, and Willie Nelson.

Other artists who didn’t make the original cut but landed on the readers’ choice list include: Jackson Browne, David Byrne, Stevie Nicks, Donald Fagen, Don Henley, John Fogerty, R.E.M., Bonnie Raitt, Jack White, Pearl Jam, Stephen Stills, Patti Smith, Beck, Lana Del Rey, Noah Kahan, John Mellencamp, Chrissie Hynde, Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor, Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong, The National and Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl.

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The 25th anniversary edition of New York’s Tribeca Festival gets underway on Wednesday with the debut of a documentary on Earth, Wind & Fire, followed by a performance by the legendary band. The festival closes with an Alicia Keys documentary, and in between, there are films focusing on everyone from Madonna, Sara Bareilles and Katy Perry to Peter Frampton, Travis Barker and Mumford & Sons, all of whom will make appearances.

“Musically related projects in movies or just doing concerts, it’s all great. Music is great, and the more we get, the better,” Tribeca Festival co-founder Robert De Niro told ABC Audio.

“And there are amazing stories about artists and their longevity and what they’ve gone through to be able … to sing their songs,” festival co-founder Jane Rosenthal adds. “And you just learn about different musicians and who they are as people and how they all work together.”

During one of the festival’s closing events, U2’s Bono will present the Harry Belafonte Voices for Social Justice Award to Bruce Springsteen for using his platform to “advance equality, dignity, and human rights.” Patti Smith will perform.

“What he’s doing is great,” De Niro says of Springsteen. “And he has a voice that’s very big … and he’s enraged the way … many of us [are]. So God bless him.”

The festival’s head of music programming, Vincent Cassous, says tapping stars like Madonna to do Q&As after their screenings, and acts like Earth, Wind & Fire to perform after theirs, is part of the festival’s plan to “make it something that you can’t miss.”

Cassou says the Frampton documentary will be a highlight, since the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer will make an appearance despite living with a degenerative muscle disease.

“I think it’s going to be one of the most emotional moments at the festival, for sure.” 

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The Who has shared another performance from their recently released album, Live at Eden Project. 

The latest is a video of the band performing their iconic track “Won’t Get Fooled Again” from their fifth studio album, Who’s Next.

Live at Eden Rock is a recording of the band’s July 2023 concert at Cornwall’s Eden Project, the home of a sustainable network of biomes in the English countryside. The concert was part of The Who Hits Back! tour, which saw Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend backed by the Heart of England Philharmonic Orchestra.

While The Who has no current plans to tour, Daltrey is set to kick off a summer solo tour Aug. 23 in Mesa, Arizona. He recently added a new date to the tour, Oct. 2 in Brookville, New York. A complete list of dates can be found at TheWho.com.

In other Who news … Townshend will sit down for a conversation at London’s Opera Holland Park theater on July 2. The event will benefit the U.K. HIV charity Terrence Higgins Trust.

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Music fans are getting their first look at the new Peter Frampton documentary, Frampton.

The first trailer for the film has just been released. It features a whole lot of archival photos and video, as well as interview clips from Sheryl Crow, Ringo Starr, Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello, director Cameron Crowe, Alice Cooper, Styx’s Tommy Shaw, Heart’s Nancy Wilson, The Who’s Roger Daltrey and more.

There are also clips of Frampton being interviewed, where he comments about the aftermath of the huge success of his 1976 album, Frampton Comes Alive!

“You don’t realize what the onslaught is like until you’re #1 in the world and that’s when the s*** hit the fan,” says Frampton, noting he began drinking too much and doing too many drugs. He was also in a car accident, with Frampton saying, “(I) broke just about every bone in my body.”

Frampton, directed by Rob Arthur, is described as “an intimate portrait of a rock icon who soared, stumbled, and rose again.” It will have its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival on Thursday in New York City. Tickets are on sale now.

(Video includes uncensored profanity.)

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Happy Pride Month! In honor of the occasion, Billboard has put together a list of the 100 Greatest LGBTQ Anthems of All Time, which features songs from Elton John, David Bowie and The Kinks.

The list is a mix of songs by queer artists, songs by gay icons, songs that are popular with the gay community and songs by allies that, as Billboard puts it, “mirror our struggles with self-acceptance and social rejection.”

Elton John’s 1983 classic “I’m Still Standing” is in at #14, and other songs that made the list include Melissa Etheridge’s “Come to My Window,” David Bowie’s “Boys Keep Swinging,” Queen’s “I Want To Break Free” and The Kinks’ groundbreaking “Lola,” about a man who falls in love with an individual who may be a trans woman or cross-dresser.

Interestingly, Queen’s “I Want to Break Free,” whose video featured the whole band in drag, was not written by the band’s gay lead singer Freddie Mercury, but by bass player John Deacon.

Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” came in at #1 on the list.

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Next year will mark the 25th anniversary of the MTV reality series The Osbournes, which followed the lives of Black Sabbath rocker Ozzy Osbourne, his wife and two of their children. And evidently fans may soon get to experience the show in a whole new way.

“We are in talks with a company now about doing a cartoon of The Osbournes, and it would open up a whole younger audience,” Ozzy’s wife, Sharon Osbourne, told Global Licensing Group at the recent Licensing Expo in Las Vegas.

“Nostalgia is the key word these days, so I think it just, you know, leans a lot in there. It’s 25 year ago,” his son, Jack Osbourne, added. “Since we started distributing the show again there’s a whole new audience out there for it.”

Sharon and Jack also discussed their desire to keep Ozzy’s memory alive.

“I think that it’s, you know, the Ozzy brand and legacy is open for business,” Jack said. Sharon noted, “Ozzy’s not going anywhere. He’s with us and he’s not going anywhere and that’s what it’s all about, to keep his legacy alive.”

Ozzy Osbourne died July 22, 2025, at age 76.

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Jimi Hendrix is finally getting a street named after him in New York.

West 8th Street in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village, where Hendrix’s legendary Electric Lady Studios is located, was due to be co-named Jimi Hendrix Way back in February, but an extensive snow storm forced the postponement of the event. The naming has now been rescheduled.

The street will get its new name on June 10 at 11 a.m. ET, with the ceremony taking place a block from the studio.

Among those attending the street naming will be E Street Band guitarist Stevie Van Zandt. The event will coincide with the launch of a new education partnership with the rocker’s education initiative TeachRock, which uses music and pop culture to expand learning in schools. The partnership will result in the addition of a Hendrix curriculum for middle and high school students.

Experience Hendrix LLC President and CEO Janie Hendrix will also be on hand for the ceremony, along with Living Colour’s Vernon Reid, singer Valerie Simpson, Hendrix producer Eddie Kramer, NYC District 2 council member Harvey Epstein, and a group of local TeachRock teachers and students.

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At 83, Paul McCartney doesn’t seem ready to slow down.

The former member of The Beatles, who actually turns 84 on June 18, is still making music, having just released the new album The Boys of Dungeon Lane, and continues to tour, with his last trek wrapping in November. And in a new interview with NME, McCartney reveals whether he’ll ever considering hanging it all up.

“I don’t know. I never know, y’know?” he says,. “I remember when I was 50 years old, my manager at the time said, ‘Well, are you thinking of retiring?’ I went, ‘Uh, I don’t think so.’”

“But he obviously thought, 50 … which, I get it, because we thought 30 was really old [when] we were 20,” he continues. “So 30 was like that’d be unseemly, but it came, and it went, and people were still playing, and audiences like the music.”

McCartney notes that he still gets “creative satisfaction” from songwriting. “There’s something magical about it.”

“It’s still a great achievement to sit down with, let’s say, my guitar and there’s nothing there, and I’m just noodling around, and suddenly, maybe after three or four hours, I’ve got a song. I know how it goes, and I’ve written the lyrics down, and it’s a real achievement,” he says. “That still is a magic feeling for me. I think that’s the creative buzz still, and hopefully always will be.”

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Elvis Costello is returning to North America for a handful of shows this fall.

The rocker has booked six new dates of his Radio Soul!: The Songs of Elvis Costello From The Early Days to the Late Hours tour, starting Sept. 10 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and wrapping Sept. 18 in Muskegon, Michigan.

Costello will be backed by his band The Imposters, made up of Steve Nieve, Pete Thomas and Davey Faragher, with the addition of guitarist Charlie Sexton.

Registration is now open for an artist presale that begins Wednesday at 10 a.m. local time. Tickets go on sale to the general public Friday at 10 a.m. local time.

Costello launched the tour, originally called Radio Soul!: The Early Songs of Elvis Costello, in the summer of 2025. He performed songs from 1977’s My Aim is True to 1986’s Blood & Chocolate, as well as some “other surprises.” The addition of “to the Late Hours” in the title suggests he may be expanding the set list.

Costello is set to kick off a European/U.K. leg of Radio Soul!: The Early Songs of Elvis Costello in Lund, Sweden, on Friday. A complete list of dates can be found at ElvisCostello.com.

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On This Day, June 2, 1941…

Drummer Charlie Watts was born in London, England.

After getting his start playing blues and jazz, Watts joined The Rolling Stones in 1963, and remained with the group for 58 years until his death.

Watts, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards are the only three members of the band who appear on every Stones album. He was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame with the band in 1989.

Watts played his final show with the Stones on August 30, 2019. It was announced in August 2021 that he was going to sit out of the Stones’ No Filter tour due to heart surgery. He passed away on August 24, 2021, at the age of 80.

Watts posthumously appeared on The Rolling Stones’ 2023 album Hackney Diamonds. His drumming was featured on two songs, “Mess It Up” and “Live by the Sword,” which were recorded in 2019. He is also expected to posthumously appear on the band’s upcoming album, Foreign Tongues, which will be released July 10.

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