Classic Rock 93.9

Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson has formed a new band called Envy of None that will release its self-titled debut album on April 8.

Envy of None also features bassist Andy Curran of the veteran Canadian group Coney Hatch, guitarist/keyboardist Alfio Annibalini and singer-songwriter Maiah Wynne.

The 11-track collection offers up a wide sonic palette, with influences including alternative rock, synth rock and experimental rock mixed with melodic pop.

Lifeson has been working on the Envy of None material for several years, but he says the project really took off when Wynne got involved.

“Maiah became my muse,” Alex maintains. “She was able to bring this whole new ethereal thing through her sense of melody on tracks like ‘Liar’ and ‘Look Inside.’…I’ve never had that kind of inspiration working with another musician.”

The band has released “Liar” as an advance digital track, and a companion lyric video has premiered at the Kscope label’s YouTube channel.

The album ends with a song titled “Western Sunset,” which Alex wrote as a tribute to late Rush drummer Neil Peart.

“I visited Neil when he was ill,” says Lifeson. “I was on his balcony watching the sunset and found inspiration. There’s a finality about a sunset that kinda stayed with me throughout the whole process. It had meaning. It was the perfect mood to decompress after all these different textures…a nice way to close the book.”

The album is available for pre-order now, and will be issued digitally, on CD, on LP — in black vinyl and colored-vinyl variants — and as a deluxe limited-edition package. The latter collection features a blue-vinyl LP, a two-CD set offering five bonus tracks, and a 28-page booklet.

Here’s the full Envy of None track list:

“Never Said I Love You”
“Shadow”
“Look Inside”
“Liar”
“Spy House”
“Dog’s Life”
“Kabul Blues”
“Old Strings”
“Dumb”
“Enemy”
“Western Sunset”

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The Marshall Tucker Band are set to launch a 2022 U.S. tour celebrating their 50th anniversary with a concert tonight in The Woodlands, Texas.

The Southern rockers’ trek currently features more than 40 shows, and is mapped out through a June 24 performance in Riverside, Iowa.

A variety of guest artists will be supporting the group on its anniversary outing, including ex-Traffic singer/guitarist Dave Mason, who will open 17 of the shows in February and March.

Other support acts joining The Marshall Tucker Band on select dates include Firefall, The Atlanta Rhythm Section, The Kentucky Headhunters, The Outlaws and Pure Prairie League.

Meanwhile, two of the concerts will see Marshall Tucker serving as the opening band, a January 22 show in Tallahassee, Florida, headlined by Alabama, and a January 29 gig in Miami headlined by Kansas.

The Marshall Tucker Band also will be bringing some Southern rock to the Carolina Country Music Fest, which takes place June 9-12 in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and featuring such major country stars as Luke Bryan, Jason Aldean and Keith Urban.

The Marshall Tucker Band, which formed in 1972, is best known for their top-40 hits “Heard It in a Love Song” and “Fire on the Mountain,” as well as their memorable tune “Can’t You See.” Founding lead singer Doug Gray is the only original member still in the group.

Check out the band’s full tour schedule at MarshallTucker.com.

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Judas Priest is preparing to relaunch their 50 Heavy Metal Years tour in March, and the legendary British rockers have now revealed that they’re planning to perform as a quartet rather than a five-piece outfit moving forward.

In a new Facebook message, the band says, “We are chomping at the British Steel bit to return to World touring…celebrating 50 Years of Judas Priest as an even more powerful, relentless four piece Heavy Metal band.”

In 2018, longtime Priest guitarist Glenn Tipton announced that he’d been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and would no longer be able to tour regularly with the group. The band’s recent co-producer Andy Sneap was then tapped to take Tipton’s place on the road, although Glenn has frequently made guest appearances at select concerts.

Now, Sneap is stepping away from the Judas Priest touring lineup, although the band notes that Tipton will be “coming out on stage with us here and there as before.”

In the Facebook post, Priest thanks Sneap “for all you’ve done and continuing to be in the production team for our new album.”

As previously reported, Judas Priest was forced to postpone most of its 2021 North American tour dates after guitarist Richie Faulkner suffered an aortic aneurysm onstage during the band’s set at the Louder than Life festival in Kentucky in September.

Thankfully, Faulkner announced in November that his recovery was going well, and he’s expected to be back out with the band when the tour kicks off March 4 in Peoria, Illinois.

You can check out the band’s full itinerary at JudasPriest.com.

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The Rolling Stones, in conjunction with Universal Music Group’s merch company Bravado, have officially sanctioned a new line of high-quality headphones produced in partnership by the high-fidelity audio-device company V-MODA and musical-instrument manufacturers Roland.

The Crossfade 2 Wireless: Rolling Stones Edition over-ear headphones are available in three versions, each featuring a different variation of the band’s famous tongue-and-lips logo on the ear pieces — “Classic Licks,” “No Filter” and “Tattoo You.”

The headphones offer multi-device paring ability, and can be used with both analog and digital devices, including smartphones, computers, turntables, CD players and more. Features of the headphones include large memory foam ear cushions, a sturdy but flexible headband, and the ability to be folded into a small case.

A fourth design will be available in early 2022 exclusively at The Rolling Stones’ RS No.9 Carnaby store in London, and will feature the shop’s updated variant of the band’s logo.

The headphones are being sold for a list price of $279. For more info, visit V-MODA.com.

“We are thrilled for the Rolling Stones to partner with V-MODA and Roland in this category as their world-renowned premium product aligns with the world’s most recognized rock and roll band,” says Bravado executive Frank Bartolotta.

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Elvis Costello has announced that he’ll no longer perform his biggest U.K. hit, 1979’s “Oliver’s Army,” because the song contains a racial slur, and he’s also asking radio stations to stop playing the track.

Costello wrote “Oliver’s Army” about the historic violent conflicts in Northern Ireland, and the song includes the lyric, “Only takes one itchy trigger/ One more widow, one less white [n-word],” a reference to what British soldiers were called by some who opposed U.K. rule in the area.

“That’s what my grandfather was called in the British army — it’s historically a fact,” Elvis tells U.K. newspaper The Telegraph. “But people hear that word…and accuse me of something that I didn’t intend.”

While it wasn’t a hit in the U.S., “Oliver’s Army” is Costello’s highest-charting song in his home country, peaking at #2 on the U.K. singles tally. It appeared on Armed Forces, Elvis Costello’s 1979 studio album with his then-backing group The Attractions.

The tune was played unedited for many years on the radio, but eventually many stations began bleeping the slur.

Costello told The Telegraph that he feels that radio stations that bleep the word are “making it worse…[b]ecause they’re highlighting it then.” He adds, “Just don’t play the record!”

News of Costello retiring “Oliver’s Army” comes a few months after reports that The Rolling Stones had decided to stop performing their chart-topping 1971 hit “Brown Sugar” because of the song’s potentially racially and culturally insensitive subject matter and lyrics.

Costello and his longtime backing band The Imposters will be releasing a new studio album called The Boy Named If this Friday.

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Foo Fighters have debuted the first trailer for their upcoming horror-comedy film, Studio 666.

The clip, which premiered via EW.com, follows Dave Grohl and company as they enter a creepy mansion to record their new album. While the house certainly is unsettling, Grohl is dealing with something even more serious: writer’s block. At one point, he starts playing a new riff that he just wrote, only for drummer Taylor Hawkins to inform him that’s the riff from “Everlong.”

Soon, Grohl starts scribbling away, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”-style, before he’s overtaken by the house’s malevolent forces, turning him into a demonic, murderous monster.

To find out what happens next, you can catch Studio 666 premiering in theaters February 25.

Along with the six Foo members, the Studio 666 cast includes Whitney Cummings, Leslie Grossman, Will Forte and Jenna Ortega. Additionally, the trailer features cameos from Slayer‘s Kerry King and Lionel Richie.

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Stevie Nicks and Robert Plant are among the many acts set to perform at Bonnaroo 2022, taking place June 16-19 in Manchester, Tennessee.

The Fleetwood Mac singer will headline the festival’s final day, Sunday, June 19. The Led Zeppelin frontman will be performing on Friday, June 17, with acclaimed country-bluegrass artist Alison Krauss, with whom he recorded the 2021 duets album Raise the Roof — a follow-up to their Grammy-winning 2007 collaboration Raising Sand.

Other artists headlining Bonnaroo this year include Tool, Machine Gun Kelly, country group The Chicks, and rappers J. Cole, 21 Savage and Roddy Ricch.

The bill also includes Herbie Hancock, CHVRCHES, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, Puscifer, The War on Drugs, Billy Strings, All Time Low and Bleachers.

Additionally, hit songwriter, producer and Bleachers frontman Jack Antonoff will lead the annual Bonnaroo SuperJam, which will be inspired by the year 1984.

Tickets go on sale this to the general public this Thursday, January 13, at noon CT. For the full lineup and ticket info, visit Bonnaroo.com.

Bonnaroo 2022 will mark the first time the festival has taken place since 2019. After COVID-19 canceled the 2020 event, Bonnaroo was set to return in September 2021 before being scrapped again due to the effects of Hurricane Ida.

Nicks currently has one other performance on her 2022 schedule, taking place at Colorado’s JAS Aspen Snowmass in early September. Plant’s Bonnaroo performance with Krauss will come at the tail end of a brief U.S. tour that the duo have lined up in June in support of Raise the Roof.

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Royal Mail, the U.K.’s postal agency, is paying tribute to The Rolling Stones with a series of postage stamps and other collectible items to mark the band’s 60th anniversary this year.

Twelve different stamps honoring the British rock legends are being issued, and will be released on January 20.

A main set will feature eight stamps celebrating Rolling Stones live performances, and featuring photos of the band in concert on various tours in different cities.

These stamps boast images from The Stones’ famous concert in London’s Hyde Park in July 1969; in East Rutherford, New Jersey, in August 2019; in Rotterdam, Netherlands in August 1995; in Tokyo in March 1995; in New York City in July 1972; in Oslo, Norway, in May 2014; in Knebworth, U.K., in August 1976; and in Düsseldorf, Germany, in October 2017.

A separate miniature sheet will feature four other stamps, two of which boast photos of the band’s core four members — including late drummer Charlie Watts — while the other two feature images of posters from select Stones tours.

The stamps will be sold in a variety of configurations and sets, some of which are available with collectible ingots or medals commemorating select tours or eras in the band’s history.

All of the various Stones stamp sets and collectibles can be pre-ordered now at RoyalMail.com.

“Few bands in the history of rock have managed to carve out a career as rich and expansive as that of the Rolling Stones,” says Royal Mail official David Gold. “They have created some of modern music’s most iconic and inspirational albums, with ground-breaking live performances to match.”

The Rolling Stones become the fourth rock band to be honored with a series of postage stamps by Royal Mail, following The Beatles, Pink Floyd and Queen.

 

 

 

 

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It was 30 years ago today that grunge officially made it to the big time.

On January 11, 1992, Nirvana‘s Nevermind hit number one on the Billboard 200, ushering in an age of distorted guitars, disaffected lyrics and flannel shirts.

Having been released a few months earlier in September 1991, Nevermind built to its chart-conquering glory thanks in large part to the lead single “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and its accompanying high school pep rally-meets-anarchist punk mosh pit music video.

Nevermind‘s ascension to the top of the Billboard 200 even dethroned the King of Pop himself, Michael Jackson, whose album Dangerous had spent the previous four weeks at number one.

With Nevermind leading the way, more and more grunge albums started to pop up on the Billboard 200 throughout 1992. Pearl Jam‘s Ten, which was first released in August 1991, eventually peaked at number two nearly a year later in August 1992. Soundgarden‘s most recent release, 1991’s Badmotorfinger, gave the band what was then their highest-charting release when it reached number 39 on the Billboard 200 in February 1992.

The band Temple of the Dog — featuring Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell and Matt Cameron with Pearl Jam’s Mike McCready, Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard, plus guest vocals by Eddie Vedder — released their self-titled debut album to little fanfare in 1991. By September 1992, it had peaked at number five on the Billboard 200.

To date, Nevermind has spent over 550 weeks on the Billboard 200. It’s been certified Diamond by the RIAA for over 10 million in sales. In 2004, the Library of Congress added Nevermind to its National Recording Registry.

Nevermind was reissued this past November in celebration of its 30th anniversary.

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The late Clarence Clemons, founding sax player for Bruce Springsteen‘s E Street Band, was born 80 years ago today.

Known as “The Big Man,” Clemons joined Springsteen’s group in 1972, and his saxophone became an integral part of The Boss’ music for most of Bruce’s career, while the onstage camaraderie between the two men was a key element to the E Street Band’s marathon live shows.

It is Clemons who appears with Springsteen on the cover of Bruce’s seminal 1975 album Born to Run — one of rock’s most iconic images. Clemons’ solo on that album’s closing track “Jungleland” is generally considered one of his finest recorded moments.

Other classic Springsteen tunes that showcase Clarence’s sax prowess include “Rosalita (Come Out Tonight),” “Born to Run,” “Thunder Road,” “Badlands,” “The Promised Land” and “I’m Goin’ Down.”

In all, Clemons contributed to more than a dozen of Bruce’s studio albums.

In addition to his work with Springsteen, Clarence released several albums as a solo artists and with the backing bands The Red Bank Rockers and Temple of Soul.

In 1985, Clemons scored a top-20 solo hit with the single “You’re a Friend of Mine,” which featured him duetting with Jackson Browne and included backing vocals by Browne’s then-girlfriend, actress Daryl Hannah.

Clemons also played and recorded with many other well-known artists, including Aretha Franklin, Roy Orbison, Ringo Starr and The Grateful Dead.

In one of his final collaborations, Clarence played on two tracks from Lady Gaga‘s chart-topping 2011 album Born This Way, including the top-10 hit “The Edge of Glory.”

Clemons died in June 2011 from complications of a stroke. He was 69.

The Big Man was posthumously inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the E Street Band in 2014.

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