Classic Rock 93.9

Pink Floyd’s classic album The Dark Side of the Moon is celebrating its 50th anniversary in March, and a new book is being released to commemorate the occasion.

The album-sized book The Dark Side Of The Moon will feature 129 rare and unseen backstage and onstage photographs shot between 1972 and 1975, while the band was touring the album. Photographers contributing to the book include Storm Thorgerson, Jill Furmanovsky, Aubrey Powell, Storm Thorgerson and Peter Christopherson.

The book will also include U.K. rock writer Chris Charlesworth’s Melody Maker review of the band’s 1972 Wembley show, plus a complete list of Dark Side of the Moon tour dates. It will also delve into how the album’s iconic artwork was created.

Published by Thames and Hudson, the book is set to be released March 7 in the U.S., just a few days after the actual 50th anniversary of the album’s release. Fans can preorder it here.

Pink Floyd released The Dark Side of the Moon on March 1, 1973. It has gone on to be the band’s most commercially successful album, having been certified 15-times Platinum. In 2012 it was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress.

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Bob Dylan is set to drop Bob Dylan Fragments – Time Out of Mind Sessions (1996-1997): The Bootleg Series Vol. 17 later this month, and he’s giving fans another taste of the set.

The rocker just dropped “Not Dark Yet (Version 1),” which is featured on the second disc of outtakes and alternate versions of tracks. He previously shared a version of “Love Sick” recorded January 14, 1997, at Criteria Studios.

Bob Dylan Fragments – Time Out of Mind Sessions (1996-1997): The Bootleg Series Vol. 17 is set to drop January 27 and will be the final installment in Dylan’s Bootleg Series. The set will be released in a variety of formats, including a deluxe five-disc or 10-LP, 12-inch vinyl edition. There will also be a two-disc/four-LP highlights edition.

Dylan released Time Out of Mind, his 30th album, in September 1997. The album went on to win the Grammy for Album of the Year in 1998, along with Grammys for Best Contemporary Folk Album and Best Male Rock Vocal Performance for “Cold Irons Bounds.”

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The Velvet Underground’s John Cale is out with a new song. “Noise Of You” is the latest track off Cale’s upcoming album, Mercy, which drops January 20.

“Yup, it’s a love song,” Cale shares in the video for the track. “When I started sketching this song, it was all about the atmosphere. It made me recall wintertime in Prague.” He noted, “As the instrumentation came together it felt like something I wanted to hear on 1960s AM radio … about a guy trying to get the love of his life back.”

Mercy is Cale’s first album of original songs in a decade. It features Cale working with such artists as Animal Collective, Sylvan Esso and Laurel Halo. According to a press release, the album “moves through true dark-night-of-the-soul electronics toward vulnerable love songs and hopeful considerations for the future.”

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As previously reported, U2 will release the new album Songs Of Surrender on March 17, featuring 40 rerecorded and reimagined U2 classics. They’ve shared the track list for the release, along with their new take on “Pride (In The Name of Love).”

Curated and produced by The Edge, each of the set’s four albums are named after one of the band members. Each song on the album is a completely new recording, with new arrangements and in some cases new lyrics.

Stories of Surrender will be released in several formats, including digitally; a limited-edition 40-track two-CD Hardback Deluxe edition; and a limited-edition 40-track four-LP vinyl edition. Fans can preorder here. Check out the track list below:

Side 1 – The Edge
1. “One”
2. “Where The Streets Have No Name”
3. “Stories For Boys”
4. “11 O’Clock Tick Tock”
5. “Out Of Control”
6. “Beautiful Day”
7. “Bad”
8. “Every Breaking Wave”
9. “Walk On (Ukraine)”
10. “Pride (In The Name Of Love)”

Side 2 – Larry
1. “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses”
2. “Get Out Of Your Own Way”
3. “Stuck In A Moment You Can’t Get Out Of”
4. “Red Hill Mining Town”
5. “Ordinary Love”
6. “Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own”
7. “Invisible”
8. “Dirty Day”
9. “The Miracle Of Joey Ramone”
10. “City Of Blinding Lights”

Side 3 – Adam
1. “Vertigo”
2. “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”
3. “Electrical Storm”
4. “The Fly”
5. “If God Will Send His Angels”
6. “Desire”
7. “Until The End Of The World”
8. “Song For Someone”
9. “All I Want Is You”
10. “Peace On Earth”

Side 4 – Bono
1. “With Or Without You”
2. “Stay”
3. “Sunday Bloody Sunday”
4. “Lights Of Home”
5. “Cedarwood Road”
6. “I Will Follow”
7. “Two Hearts Beat As One”
8. “Miracle Drug”
9. “The Little Things That Give You Away”
10. “40”

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Tuesday marked seven years since David Bowie passed away after a private battle with cancer, and both his wife, Iman, and their 22-year-old daughter, Alexandria ‘Lexi’ Zahra Jones, marked the day with tributes on social media. 

Lexi shared video of them playing keyboards together when she was young, along with a childhood photo, writing, “7 years ago today. I miss you ❤️ .”

Her mom, Iman, also marked the day with a post, sharing a beautiful black-and-white photo of them and writing, “January 10th. For a couple of moments in the immensity of time, we were one,” with #EternalLove#BowieForever.

Bowie died of liver cancer on January 10, 2016, 18 months after being diagnosed with the disease. He never publicly disclosed his illness. 

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Ronnie Wood likely makes a lot of money as the guitarist for The Rolling Stones, but apparently that isn’t his only good source of income. 

The Mirror reports that new documents filed by his art company show Wood’s paintings brought in over $1.7 million in profit last year. The site notes it’s the first time his artwork has brought in over $1 million.

Wood has been painting since the ’60s, when he was a student at Ealing Art College, and picked it up again in the ’80s. In addition to art exhibits in London last year, he earned some of that money selling artistic reproductions of concert set lists from the Stones’ recent Sixty tour, as well as oil paintings and prints of his  bandmates. 

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Twisted Sister isn’t gonna take not playing together anymore.

Dee Snider and company are set to reunite for their first performance in seven years when they’re inducted into the Metal Hall of Fame.

“Looking forward to playing together for the first time since 2016…especially the rehearsal!” Snider tweeted.

Twisted Sister embarked on a farewell tour in 2016 following the 2015 death of drummer A.J. Pero. Ex-Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy manned the drums in place of Pero.

The 2023 Metal Hall of Fame Charity Gala will take place January 26 in Agoura Hills, California. Now in its sixth year, the annual ceremony “enshrines forever those iconic musicians, artists, music industry executives who are responsible for making hard rock and heavy metal music what it is today.”

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Sir Rod Stewart celebrated his 78th birthday on Tuesday and shared a hilarious video proving just how happy he was to blow out another birthday candle.

The legendary singer took to Instagram to show the moment his family turned out the lights and began singing to him. Instead of a cake, Stewart is handed a white plate with “Happy Birthday” written in chocolate in fancy cursive. As for the candle, it’s wedged between a few strawberry slices.

The hitmaker, who’s singing along, makes a few exaggerated expressions before blowing out his candle, which causes his family to laugh hysterically. The video ends with him taking a moment to consider his wish before blowing out the candle.

“Lovely day,” he captioned the sweet video and included a red heart emoji.

Stewart also shared a few birthday tributes to his Instagram Story, with several coming from his children. Ruby Stewart, who is expecting her first child, sent her love to “Grandpapa Stew.” Sean Stewart, Rod’s child with model Alana Stewart, also sent his father some birthday love.

Some of his pals paid tributes by sharing throwback photos of the legendary hitmaker, such as Rolling Stones member Ronnie Wood, who shared a black-and-white photo of his old band Small Faces hanging out with Stewart in 1970.

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Elton John was a close friend of the late Princess Diana and is also close to her sons, Prince Harry and Prince William. But in his new memoir, Spare, Harry details a couple of disagreements the two have had over the years.

In the book, as reported by The Huffington Post UK, Harry recalls watching Elton perform a rewritten version of “Candle in the Wind” at his mother’s funeral in 1997, writing, “I do have one pure, indisputable memory of the song climaxing and my eyes starting to sting and tears nearly falling. Nearly.” 

But according to Harry, when he asked Elton to play the song in 2007 at the Concert for Diana, held on the 10th anniversary of his mother’s passing, Elton declined, fearing it would be too “morbid.” Instead, he played “Your Song,” which, Harry writes, he sang with “a twinkle and a smile, aglow with good memories.”

Another time the two had a difference of opinion, Harry writes, was in 2019, when Harry, his wife, Meghan, and their son, Archie, were visiting Elton at his home in France.

During the visit, Elton said he was going to serialize his autobiography, Me, in the British tabloid The Daily Mail, which Elton, Harry and Meghan had sued for defamatory stories. When Harry asked Elton why he’d chosen a paper that had made his life “miserable,” Elton explained that he “wanted people to read” the book.

Harry then notes that he decided not to push the matter further, writing, “I loved him. I’ll always love him. And I also didn’t want to spoil the holiday.”

Following that visit, Elton publicly defended Harry and Meghan after they were slammed by the British press for using a private jet to fly to France to visit him.

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Def Leppard’s Rick Allen is taking a short break from rocking with the band to help share his art.

The drummer is set to appear at the Wentworth Galleries inside the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on February 11 to support his latest collection. The appearance will take place from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. ahead of Def Leppard’s second of two shows with Mötley Crüe at the Hard Rock’s Arena that night.

Rick’s latest collection includes his painted drum series, mixed media originals and his first works on metal. It also features his “Legends Series,” which includes portraits of such late artists as Charlie Watts, Eddie Van Halen, Kurt Cobain and Johnny Cash, as well as his “Wings of Hope” series.

“Painting has been a passion of mine for quite a while and I was inspired to branch out and try some new techniques,” Allen shares. “One that I particularly enjoyed was working with metal as a medium. I’m really proud of how these new works turned out and I can’t wait to share them at the upcoming Wentworth Gallery Show.” 

The event is free and open to the public, and a portion of the sales proceeds will go to Allen’s Project Resiliency, which helps war veterans.

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