Lynyrd Skynyrd has made their New Year’s Eve plans. The Rock & Roll Hall of Famers will continue to celebrate their 50th anniversary with a performance on CBS’ New Year’s Eve Live: Nashville’s Big Bash, which kicks off Sunday, December 31, at 7:30 p.m. ET.
The special will air live from Nashville’s Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park, with country stars Thomas Rhett and Lainey Wilson also confirmed to perform, and more artists to be announced at a future date.
The concert, which is free and open to the public, will ring in 2024 with a Music Note Drop at midnight. The special will feature over 50 performances from a variety of locations across Music City.
The rockers just announced five new shows at The Venetian Theatre inside The VenetianResort Las Vegas. The new dates kick off January 26 and are followed by shows on January 27, 31, February 2 and 3.
A Styx fan club presale begins Tuesday, October 3, at 10 a.m. PT, with the general onsale set for Friday, October 6, 10 a.m. PT.
Styx fans still have plenty of chances to see the band onstage in 2023. They are set to play Shipshewana, Indiana, on October 12, with several dates on the books for October and November. A complete list of Styx shows can be found at styxworld.com.
Music fans will once again be lining up at their favorite independent record stores to snag one-of-a-kind releases on Friday, November 24, for the 2023 edition of Record Store Day Black Friday.
Among this year’s releases:
Joni Mitchell is contributing Court and Spark Demos, a collection of never-before-heard early recordings of songs off her classic 1974 album, ahead of its upcoming 50th anniversary.
The Doors‘ Live in Bakersfield, which captures a 1970 concert around the time of Jim Morrison‘s indecent exposure trial, will be available as a two-LP and two-CD set.
The March 2, 1969, Grateful Dead concert at San Francisco’s Fillmore West will be released as a five-LP package.
War’s releasing The World is a Ghetto(50th Anniversary Collector’s Edition), featuring alternative takes, reimagined tracks and more off their classic album.
The 2023 Record Store Day Black Friday will also include releases by Jerry Garcia, Faces, INXS, Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, The Beach Boys, The Mamas & The Papas, Gram Parsons, Mötley Crüe, The Monkees, Gov’t Mule and the late Jeff Beck.
For the full list of releases and participating stores, visit RecordStoreDay.com.
After Lindsey Buckingham was fired from Fleetwood Mac in 2018, the band replaced him with two guitarists — Neil Finn and Mike Campbell — and continued. Now that Christine McVie has passed away, Stevie Nicks says the band is over, as far as she’s concerned.
Speaking to Vulture, Stevie says, “When Christine died, I felt like you can’t replace her. You just can’t. Without her, what is it? You know what I mean? She was like my soul mate, my musical soul mate … Christine was my best friend.”
“Who am I going to look over to on the right and have them not be there behind that Hammond organ?” she continued. “When she died, I figured we really can’t go any further with this. There’s no reason to.”
Stevie also talked about her new Stevie Nicks Barbie doll, which she decided should be wearing a Rumours-era outfit, complete with platform boots, chiffon skirt and feathered hair. “It’s who I was, and who I still am,” she tells Vulture.
She also reveals she has a Ken to go with the Stevie Barbie; the early ’80s model features Ken with dark hair, dressed as Elvis in a white jumpsuit.
“I named him Kenelvis, and I introduced Kenelvis to Stevie Barbie,” she says. “I have photographs of these two that will absolutely knock the world’s socks off. They look at each other in a way that’s like they’ve been in love for centuries.”
On social media, Stevie wrote of the doll, “When I look at her, I see my 27 year old self … what we have been through since 1975 … I am her and she is me. She absolutely has my heart.”
The upcoming Power Trip festival is bound to be a good time, and AC/DC is giving fans yet another way to enjoy themselves.
The rockers, who’ll be hitting the stage for the first time in seven years, just announced they’re launching their very own bar outside the festival, where those headed to the shows can stop by for a drink and a fun time.
The AC/DC High Voltage Dive Bar will be open October 5-8 from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. It’s located in Indio, California, about 10 minutes away from the Empire Polo Grounds, where the festival is taking place. The bar’s Instagram page notes it will close early, at 9:30 p.m., on October 7, when AC/DC takes the stage.
“It’s the ultimate way to connect and plug in with fellow AC/DC fans over the weekend and check out iconic AC/DC props and exclusive merch,” reads the bar’s website.
Power Trip kicks off October 6, with performances from Iron Maiden and Guns N’ Roses, followed by Judas Priest and AC/DC on October 7, wrapping with Tool and Metallica on October 8. Complete details can be found at powertrip.live.
Queen’s Brian May has hit out at researchers who seem to have discovered that listening to the band’s music could help release insulin and keep diabetes under control in patients.
The guitarist shared an article originally posted in Forbes about the discovery, explaining on Instagram that while he’s happy “We will Rock You can be good for your health,” he’s not happy scientists “tortured mice” in order to test their theory.
“It’s now well known that many drugs and procedures that work in mice or rats do NOT work in humans,” he writes. “And, ethically, causing pain to one species to cure the ills of another is clearly unjustifiable. So the laws requiring tests on animals MUST be changed.”
He adds, “I’m horrified that these scientists could gaily make these unfortunate animals suffer to prove a point that should have been made using human volunteers. Then I would have been smiling.”
Finally, May concludes, “It’s so easy to gloss over the disgusting way we treat animals. It has to stop. It’s high time that scientists became responsible for what they do. Time they took responsibility for the way they behave,” adding, “I will NOT be celebrating this news tonight.”
While nothing can quite compare to 1985’s all-star charity concert Live Aid, someone is going to try and recreate that feeling in the theater.
Deadline reports Live Aid organizer Bob Geldof is working on a stage musical about the legendary concerts, titled Just For One Day. It’s scheduled to run at London’s Old Vic Theatre from January 26 to March 30.
Live Aid took place in both London and Philadelphia, and featured performances by such huge stars as Queen, U2, The Who, Paul McCartney, David Bowie, Elton John and more.
The show, directed by & Juliet’s Luke Sheppard, is expected to feature several of the songs performed during the concerts. Sheppard tells Deadline that while Geldof will be a character in the musical, it won’t have “people dressing up as the artists and doing it as a tribute — we’ve moved very far away from that.” He notes, “It’s all the extraordinary music from that day, but it’s sung by this fierce generation of musical theater artists, who just blow the roof off.”
Sheppard says Just For One Day will put the historic concerts “in the hands of the people who made it, who were there, who experienced it,” adding, “So, it’s Live Aid for the people essentially, as opposed to a kind of tribute act version of the show.”
So far, Sheppard hasn’t confirmed which songs will be used in the musical, although with a nod of his head, he did suggest to Deadline that Queen’s “We Are The Champions” and “Bohemian Rhapsody” could be in it.
Roger Waters is denying recent accusations made against him in a new documentary that aims to prove he’s antisemitic.
The documentary was released by the Campaign Against Antisemitism. In a new post to his website, Waters says he initially didn’t feel he needed to respond but notes, “now that the attacks are in circulation, I want to put my response on record.”
“All my life I have used the platform my career has given me to support causes I believe in,” he explains. “That is why I am active in the non-violent protest movement against the Israeli government’s illegal occupation of Palestine and its egregious treatment of Palestinians. Those who wish to conflate that position with antisemitism do a great disservice to us all.”
Waters criticizes the makers of the film, noting they’ve faced scrutiny because their “core purpose is waging partisan political campaigns against critics of the state of Israel.”
According to Rolling Stone, the doc, The Dark Side of Roger Waters, features interviews with The Wall producer Bob Ezrin and Waters’ saxophonist Norbert Stachel, claiming Waters made antisemitic remarks in front of them.
“Truth is, I’m frequently mouthy and prone to irreverence, I can’t recall what I said 13 or more years ago,” Waters explains. “If I have upset the two individuals who appear in the film I’m sorry for that. But I can say with certainty that I am not, and have never been, an antisemite – as anyone who really knows me will testify.”
He argues the film’s “seriously misleading in many respects,” noting it’s “a flimsy, unapologetic piece of propaganda that indiscriminately mixes things I’m alleged to have said or done at different times and in different contexts, in an effort to portray me as an antisemite, without any foundation in fact.”
Rush’s Geddy Lee is heading out on tour this fall but without his instruments.
The Rock & Roll Hall of Famer just announced North American dates for My Effin’ Life In Conversation, which will have the rocker discussing his upcoming memoir, My Effin’ Life, due out November 13.
The shows will see Geddy reading and expounding on excerpts from the book. He will also answer fan questions during a Q&A moderated by a yet-to-be-announced special guest.
The tour kicks off Monday, November 13, at the Beacon Theatre in New York City before moving on to such cities as Philadelphia, Boston, Cleveland, Seattle, Los Angeles and more. It wraps December 7 in Toronto, Canada. A complete list of dates can be found at rush.com.
A Citi presale for tickets kicks off Tuesday, October 3, at 12 p.m. local time and will be followed by a general onsale Friday, October 6, at 10 a.m. local time. Each ticket purchased comes with a copy of Geddy’s book, plus $1 from each ticket will be donated to the Neil Peart Memorial At Lakeside Park fund, which is raising money in order to commission a public work of art in honor of the late Rush drummer.
Eddie Vedder and Sammy Hagar joined The Killers onstage during the “Mr. Brightside” outfit’s headlining set at the Ohana Festival on Friday, September 29.
According to setlist.fm, the Pearl Jam frontman joined Brandon Flowers and company for a cover of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers‘ “The Waiting,” while the ex-Van Halen vocalist took the stage to perform his former band’s song “Why Can’t This Be Love.”
The Killers posted photos from their Ohana performance on social media alongside the caption, “Life’s a beach. Thanks Ohana!”
Vedder, who founded Ohana, performed his own headlining set on Saturday, September 30, while Foo Fighters closed out the festival on Sunday, October 1. Dave Grohl and company’s set included a one-verse cover of the Led Zeppelin classic “Stairway to Heaven.”
