Classic Rock 93.9

Guns N’ Roses, Foo Fighters and Foreigner are among the artists contributing songs to The Majesty of Rock, a digital tribute album to the mock-rock band Spinal Tap.

The officially sanctioned album, which also features contributions from Tool, Queens of the Stone Age, System of a Down, The Go-Go’s, Kyuss, Robyn Hitchcock, Soul Asylum and more, is raising money for the nonprofit Teen Cancer America, which aims to improve the lives of teens and young adults who have cancer.

“The spirit of Spinal Tap has always been about turning it up to 11, and that’s exactly what we aim to do for young people with cancer,” Shannon Sullivan, executive director of Teen Cancer America, says. “This tribute album is a fun, powerful way to raise crucial funds and awareness for the unique challenges facing this age group.”

She adds, “We are incredibly grateful to the brilliant artists who have lent their talents to this project and to the creators of Spinal Tap for allowing us to celebrate their genius for a cause that is so important.”

The Majesty of Rock features 32 covers from the Spinal Tap catalog, including a performance from Teen Cancer America’s Play It Back Players. Only 5,000 digital copies are available for download for a minimum donation of $19.84, a tribute to the year the original This is Spinal Tap was released.

This is Spinal Tap was directed by Rob Reiner and starred Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer. It followed a fictional heavy metal band being filmed for a documentary.

The film’s sequel, Spinal Tap II: The End Continues, is in theaters now.

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Mötley Crüe is celebrating the 40th anniversary of their third studio album, Theatre of Pain, with a new limited-edition deluxe vinyl box set.

Dropping Nov. 14, the box set includes a remastered version of the album on colored vinyl with reimagined artwork, as well as an LP of rare demos and a double-LP of a never-before-released 1985 concert in Long Beach, California, both of which also come on colored vinyl. It also comes with a 76-page hardcover book with never-before-published photos from the band’s Theatre of Pain tour.

As a preview of the set, Mötley Crüe has shared a previously unreleased live version of their classic tune “Smokin’ in the Boys Room” from the 1985 Long Beach concert. It is now available via digital outlets.

The Theatre of Pain anniversary will also be marked with several other reissues, including a standard CD and LP, an exclusive CD and LP variant at Walmart, exclusive LPs at Amazon, Urban Outfitters and independent retailers, and a limited-edition 40th anniversary cassette on the band’s online museum, Crüeseum. The album will also be released in standard audio and Dolby Atmos.

Theatre of Pain (40th Anniversary) is available for preorder now.

Released in June 1985, Theatre of Pain was Mötley’s first album to reach the top 10 in the U.S., peaking at #6. It featured future Mötley classics “Smokin’ in the Boys Room,” which became their first top-20 hit, and the power ballad “Home Sweet Home,” a song the band recently released as a collaboration with Dolly Parton.

Mötley Crüe is currently in the middle of their Las Vegas residency at Dolby Live at Park MGM, which runs through Oct. 3. Their next show is on Friday. A complete list of dates can be found at motley.com.

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Bruce Springsteen is set to appear on Jimmy Kimmel Live! when the ABC host brings his late night show to Brooklyn from Sept. 29 to Oct. 3.

The Boss is confirmed as a guest for the special week in New York, as is The Bear’s Jeremy Allen White, who plays Springsteen in the upcoming movie Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, opening Oct. 24.

This is Jimmy Kimmel’s seventh time bringing the show to Brooklyn. Springsteen previously appeared on one of Kimmel’s Brooklyn shows back in 2019.

All Brooklyn episodes of Jimmy Kimmel Live! will tape in front of a live studio audience from the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Howard Gilman Opera House.

Other guests during Brooklyn week include Emily Blunt, Stephen Colbert, Tom Hanks, Josh Johnson, Spike Lee, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Kumail Nanjiani and Ryan Reynolds, along with musical guests Geese, Living Colour, Public Enemy and Reneé Rapp.

In other Springsteen talk show news … Actor Jeremy Strong, who plays Bruce’s manager Jon Landau in Deliver Me From Nowhere, appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert Thursday, where he revealed that he was a big Springsteen fan and even had Springsteen’s “If I Should Fall Behind,” from 1992’s Lucky Town, played at his wedding. 

As for appearing in the movie, about Springsteen’s making of 1982’s Nebraska, Strong shared, “Nebraska is an album I’ve always loved, so to give back even a modicum of something to give back to someone who has given so much to all of us was a real privilege.”

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On This Day, Sept. 26, 1979 …

U2 made their recording debut with the release of a three-song EP, aptly titled Three.

The release featured the songs “Out of Control” and “Stories for Boys,” which were both later rerecorded for their debut album, Boy. The other song on the release was the B-side “Boy/Girl.”

U2, of course, went on to huge success, releasing 14 studio albums and selling over 150 million records worldwide. They were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2005.

Three was later reissued in November 2019 as part of Record Store Day Black Friday, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of its original release.

U2’s last release was 2023’s Songs of Surrender, which featured reworked versions of previously released songs. They have reportedly been working on a new album, which frontman Bono has described as a “an unreasonable guitar record.”

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Ozzy Osbourne may be gone, but his unmistakable voice now lives on … for a good cause.

A charity version of the Black Sabbath classic “War Pigs” has been released: It’s a collaboration between Judas Priest and the late Prince of Darkness. Judas Priest guitarist Glenn Tipton, who suffers from Parkinson’s as Ozzy did, performed on the track, and all proceeds will go to The Glenn Tipton Parkinson’s Foundation and Cure Parkinson’s.

Judas Priest usually uses “War Pigs” as their walk-on song, and they released their own version of it on July 2 as a tribute to Black Sabbath, because they weren’t able to perform at the band’s final Back to the Beginning show in Birmingham due to previous touring commitments.

Priest frontman Rob Halford later said in an interview that Sharon Osbourne liked their version of the song so much that she suggested Ozzy be added to the recording. When Priest suggested the song be released to raise money for Parkinson’s, the Osbournes approved.

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The inaugural CBGB Festival is taking place Saturday at Under the K Bridge Park in Brooklyn, New York, but if you can’t make it, you can watch it online.

The event features Iggy Pop — doing his first New York show in more than a decade — as well as Jack White, Sex Pistols, Johnny Marr, The Damned, Melvins, Lunachicks and Marky Ramone, plus current acts like The Linda Lindas.

The streaming platform Veeps will livestream the festivities Saturday starting around 4:30 p.m. CT, and it’ll be free for fans worldwide. The only catch? You’ll have to watch it live, because there won’t be a replay option. Claim your free ticket now at Veeps.com/cbgb.

If you decide you want to attend in person, tickets are still available at CBGBFest.com.

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Paul McCartney, Patti Smith and R.E.M.‘s Michael Stipe are among the artists contributing original artwork to an upcoming benefit for Housing Works NYC.

The Turn it Up art benefit will take place at Housing Works’ Crosby Street location on Oct. 9, with donated pieces auctioned off to benefit the organization’s mission to provide housing, health care, and other services to people living with HIV/AIDS and other chronic conditions.

Other musicians contributing pieces to the benefit include Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder, Sean Lennon, Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig, Interpol’s Paul Banks and Chappell Roan, with more artists expected to join.

Information on tickets can be found at housingworks.org/events.

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The much-anticipated Bruce Springsteen film Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere opens Oct. 24, and while some folks may have been surprised The Boss gave his OK to the project, he tells Time magazine there was a simple reason why he finally said yes.

“I’m old. I don’t give a f*** what I do anymore!” he says. “As you get older, you feel a lot freer.”

But getting older is not slowing the 76-year-old Springsteen down. Asked whether he plans to continue touring with the E Street Band, he says, “Of course!”

“I just want to keep going,” he tells Time. “I want to make records that deal with subjects people haven’t heard me deal with yet.”

Springsteen also opens up to Time about his decision to call out President Donald Trump while onstage during his 2025 European tour.

“If I’m going to stay true to who I’ve tried to be, I can’t give these guys a free pass,” he says. “A lot of people bought into his lies. He doesn’t care about the forgotten anybody but himself and the multibillionaires who stood behind him on inauguration day.”

“You have to face the fact that a good number of Americans are simply comfortable with his politics of power and dominance,” he adds.

Asked how he felt about being called “highly overrated” by Trump, Bruce notes, “I absolutely couldn’t care less what he thinks about me.”

“He’s the living personification of what the 25th Amendment and impeachment were for,” he argues. “If Congress had any guts, he’d be consigned to the trash heap of history.”

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Journey has announced their first show of 2026.

The Rock & Roll Hall of Famers are set to play the 2026 Stagecoach festival, which will be held April 24-26 at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California. Journey is part of the April 25 lineup.

While Stagecoach is predominantly a country festival, it has been branching out in recent years. Other non-country artists on the bill for 2026 include Counting Crows, Bush, Third Eye Blind, Hootie and the Blowfish and The Wallflowers. This year’s headliners include Cody Johnson, Lainey Wilson and Post Malone.

Passes for this year’s festival go on sale Oct. 2 at 11 a.m. PT. A complete lineup can be found at Stagecoachfestival.com.

In other Journey news … guitarist Neal Schon was a guest on Wednesday night’s finale of America’s Got Talent. He joined Richard Goodall, who won AGT during 2024’s season 19, for the debut performance of his new song “Long Time Coming.”

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The Rolling Stones have released a video for “Shame, Shame, Shame,” a cover of the Shirley & Company track that will appear on their upcoming reissue of their 1976 album Black and Blue.

The clip, directed by Dutch filmmaker Camille Boumans, features a collage of rare archival photos of The Stones, combined with hand-drawn animation.

The track is one of several outtakes and jams that will appear on the super deluxe edition of Black and Blue, dropping Nov. 14. The set also includes a 2025 remix of the album by producer Steven Wilson, and a recording of a 1976 concert at Earls Court in London, which was part of a six-night residency at the venue.

The super-deluxe edition of Black and Blue will be released as a five-LP or four-CD set. Both come with a Blu-ray that includes the Wilson remix and the Earls Court concert in Dolby Atmos, plus an unreleased TV broadcast of the band’s 1976 concert at Les Abattoirs in Paris.

The Black and Blue reissue will also be released in a variety of other formats, including a limited-edition five-LP black and blue marbled vinyl set; two-disc and one-disc formats on both vinyl and CD; and a limited-edition zoetrope vinyl.

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