Classic Rock 93.9

Elton John could win his third Oscar for best original song on Sunday night for “Never Too Late,” the song from his Disney+ documentary of the same name. Elton co-wrote the song with Bernie Taupin, producer Andrew Watt and Brandi Carlile. Watt says Brandi got the initial inspiration for the song after watching what he calls an “early, uncut-down version” of the film.

The doc documents Elton’s roller-coaster life: For years he was on top of the world career-wise, but desperately unhappy in his personal life. Watt tells ABC Audio that Brandi, who’s not only Elton’s friend but also a superfan, “wanted to see the early version … so she could see all the archival footage she’d never seen before.”

After watching it, she unexpectedly started writing the song about Elton’s journey. “She was so inspired by his story … his story is so amazing,” Watt says. “The ups and downs … the drug abuse and the kind of isolation in the first part of his career,” through to the “eternal love” the music legend now enjoys with his husband, David, and their two sons.

“The thing she took away from watching his story, and the arc of the story, was ‘never too late,'” Watt explains. “You know, how there’s never a time where you can’t turn your life into something beautiful. So the words kind of just poured out of her.” From Brandi’s initial draft, she, Elton, Bernie and Watt turned it into the track you hear today.  

And while Elton is probably the best-known nominee in this year’s category, another win isn’t a sure thing. His previous Oscars came in 1995 for “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” and in 2020 for “I’m Gonna Love Me Again” from Rocketman.

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Pearl Jam is shutting down the band’s online shop for a day in support of Friday’s economic blackout effort.

The initiative was launched by the organization The People’s Union USA, which declared a day of no spending for Feb. 28. The blackout calls for people to make no in-store or online purchases for 24 hours, specifically calling out fast food, gas and major retailers.

If you need to spend money on essential or emergency items, the campaign urges you to only buy from small, local businesses.

“If we disrupt the economy for just ONE day, it sends a powerful message,” the organizers say.

The landing page for Pearl Jam’s webstore currently reads, “In support of the 24-Hour Economic Blackout, Pearl Jam is closing the Ten Club Shop on February 28th. For more info on how to participate in the blackout visit https://thepeoplesunionusa.com/.”

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In 2024, when Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy’s tour celebrating R.E.M.’s Murmur hit Athens, Georgia, the home of R.E.M., the members of R.E.M. joined them onstage. Well, their latest tour, celebrating the 40th anniversary of R.E.M.’s Fables of the Reconstruction, came to Athens on Thursday night and it happened again.

The duo brought the tour to Athens’ 40 Watt Club, and video posted online shows R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe, Mike Mills, Peter Buck and Bill Berry hopping onstage to perform the Reckoning track “Pretty Persuasion.”

This was a step up from the 2024 show, where Stipe joined them all onstage but didn’t perform. In fact, this is only the second time all four members of R.E.M. have performed together since their 2011 breakup. The previous time was at the Songwriters Hall of Fame induction in 2024, where they performed “Losing My Religion.”

And while “Pretty Persuasion” was the only song Stipe took part in, according to setlist.fm the other members of the band joined in for various R.E.M. tracks, including the Fables tune “Wendell Gee,” Document’s “Strange,” Reckoning’s “Letter Never Sent,” “Second Guessing,” “(Don’t Go Back to) Rockville” and “Little America” and Murmur’s “Sitting Still.”

Shannon and Narducy also performed two songs by The Velvet Underground, “Femme Fatale,” for which they were joined by Buck, Mills and Patti Smith Group guitarist Lenny Kaye, and “There She Goes Again,” with Buck and Kaye.

Shannon and Narducy bring their Fables of the Reconstruction tour back to Athens’ 40 Watt Club for a second show on Friday. As for whether R.E.M. will return, a post on their Instagram noted, “Who knows what night two, tonight, will have in store.”

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On This Day, Feb. 28, 1983 …

U2 released their third studio album, War, produced by Steve Lillywhite. The album, which is considered the band’s first overtly political record, featured two future U2 classics, “Sunday Bloody Sunday” and “New Year’s Day,” which became the band’s first single to chart on the Billboard Hot 100.

The album became the band’s first U.K. number one, knocking Michael Jackson’s Thriller out of the top spot.

In the U.S., War peaked at 12 on the Billboard 200 chart and went on to become the band’s first album to be certified Gold by the RIAA.

A remastered version of War was released in July 2008, and included a deluxe version that featured a bonus CD made up of B-sides, live tracks and rarities.

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Neil Young is set to drop a new tour documentary and accompanying soundtrack in April.  Both give fans a taste of the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer’s 2023 Coastal tour, which marked his return to the stage following the COVID pandemic.

Coastal: The Soundtrack, dropping April 18, features 11 songs, which were recorded in several cities. In a press release, the album is said to be “as intimate a live album as Neil Young has ever recorded, created at a time when the world was coming out of hibernation from the COVID pandemic.”

The album will be released in a variety of formats including black vinyl, CD, digital and Dolby Atmos, with a limited edition clear vinyl with exclusive poster sold at The Greedy Hand Store and Neil Young Archives.

Coastal: The Soundtrack is available for preorder now.

As for the movie, Coastal, directed by Young’s wife, actress Daryl Hannah, will hit theaters for one night only on April 17. The film previously debuted at the Woodstock Film Festival in September.

“Hannah allows the audience to be an observing participant in a rare, candid peek behind the curtain of this unguarded iconoclast,” reads the film’s description. “It’s a celebration of living that has been a long time coming, and illuminates up close and personal who Neil Young is, where he came from, and in many ways, where he was going.”

Tickets for the film go on sale March 6.

Young was one of the last artists to return to the road following the pandemic. His Coastal tour kicked off in July 2023 and had him playing mostly West Coast dates, treating his fans to set lists filled with rarities and deep cuts.

Here is the track list for Coastal:

“I’m the Ocean”
“Comes a Time”
“Love Earth”
“Prime of Life”
“Throw Your Hatred Down”
“Vampire Blues”
“When I Hold You in My Arms”
“Expecting to Fly”
“Song X”
“ I Am a Child”
“Don’t Forget Love

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Dead & Company is set to return to the Sphere Las Vegas in March for a new installment of their Dead Forever residency, and now they are giving fans a chance to win tickets to the final show of the 2025 run.

The band just launched a new fandiem sweepstakes, with the money raised from entries benefiting the voter registration nonprofit HeadCount and the environmental charity REVERB.

The sweepstakes winner will nab roundtrip travel for two to Las Vegas with hotel accommodations, along with premium reserved or general admission floor seats to the May 17 show. The prize also comes with a preshow dinner for two and a signed Dead & Company poster.

The deadline for sweepstakes entries is April 30.

Dead & Company launched their initial Dead Forever residency in May 2024. They return to the venue on March 20 for 18 shows that wrap May 17. The new residency is celebrating 10 years of Dead & Company.

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Billy Joel and Stevie Nicks are set to headline another stadium together.

The two Rock & Roll Hall of Famers are set to play Levi Stadium in Santa Clara, California, on Oct. 4, the first time both artists are playing the stadium. It is also Joel’s first concert in the Bay Area in 10 years.

A Citi card presale for tickets launches Monday at 10 a.m., with tickets going on sale to the general public March 7 at 10 a.m.

This isn’t the only show Billy and Stevie have on their schedules this year. They are also set to headline Ford Field in Detroit on March 29, MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, on Aug. 8, and Caesars Superdome in New Orleans on Oct. 18.

Billy will also co-headline shows with Rod Stewart and Sting this year, but his next gig is a solo one, headlining Toronto’s Rogers Centre on March 15. A complete list of dates can be found at billyjoel.com.

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A unique piece of Beatles memorabilia now has a new owner.

Joseph Robert O’Donnell, a Beatles and music memorabilia dealer, recently purchased a piece of George Harrison’s leftover toast from 1962.

The piece of toast in question was taken by a 15-year-old Harrison fan named Sue Houghton, who had become friendly with his family. While visiting the family, she pocketed the leftover crust from Harrison’s plate. It eventually made its way to Houghton’s Harrison scrapbook collection, which included other mementos, including fluff from under his bed.

“It’s a brilliant story that is both bizarre, historical and a story I’ll continue telling friends, memorabilia collectors and fellow Beatles fans,” O’Donnell shares.

So far there’s no word on how much O’Donnell shelled out for the toast, but in 1992 items from Sue’s scrapbook collection were put up for auction at Christie’s, with the toast selling for about $1,600.

Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

A unique piece of Beatles memorabilia has just sold at auction.

Joseph Robert O’Donnell, a Beatles and music memorabilia dealer, recently purchased a piece of George Harrison’s leftover toast from 1962.

The piece of toast in question was taken by a 15-year-old Harrison fan named Sue Houghton, who had become friendly with his family. While visiting the family, she pocketed the leftover crust from Harrison’s plate. It eventually made its way to Houghton’s Harrison scrapbook collection, which included other mementos, including fluff from under his bed.

“It’s a brilliant story that is both bizarre, historical and a story I’ll continue telling friends, memorabilia collectors and fellow Beatles fans,” O’Donnell shares.

So far there’s no word on how much O’Donnell shelled out for the toast, but in 1992 items from Sue’s scrapbook collection were put up for auction at Christie’s, with the toast selling for about $1,600.

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Green Day‘s Billie Joe Armstrong has some not-so-nice words about Perry Farrell in the upcoming book Lollapalooza: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock’s Wildest Festival. 

As its title suggests, the book goes into the history of Lollapalooza, which the Jane’s Addiction frontman co-founded. In an excerpt posted to Stereogum, Armstrong talks about the difficulties he had with Farrell ahead of Green Day playing Lolla 1994.

“Perry was a f****** a******, straight up,” Armstrong says. “He wasn’t a part of that conversation, because he’d checked out, but they asked us to play it and we said yes. And it was going to be the Boredoms on the first half, and us on the second half as the opening band. And then all of a sudden, he comes back in and he’s like, ‘I don’t want them on the bill.'”

John Rubeli, Lolla’s second-stage manager between 1993 and 1995, says Farrell thought Green Day was a “boy band.”

“He was like, ‘They’re a boy band. I don’t want to book a boy band,'” Rubeli says. “I was getting a lot of pressure from the label and management, like, ‘You gotta convince Perry.'”

Farrell eventually relented and allowed Green Day on the bill, but it left Armstrong with a sour taste in his mouth.

“For us it was really disappointing, because Perry was someone that we really respected,” Armstrong says. “I think that made us want to play it even more, actually, because we wanted to prove that he had his head very far up his own a**.”

Along with Farrell, Billy Corgan doesn’t come out of the excerpt unscathed. The Flaming Lips‘ Wayne Coyne says that the Smashing Pumpkins frontman was “such a raging a*******.”

Lollapalooza: The Uncensored Story of Alternative Rock’s Wildest Festival is due out March 25.

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