Classic Rock News

Journey has unveiled full details of its forthcoming studio album, Freedom, a 15-track collection that will be released on July 8.

In advance of the album, Journey’s first studio effort since 2011’s Eclipse, the band has released a soaring new single titled “You Got the Best of Me.”

Explaining what inspired the new track, guitarist Neal Schon says, “I wanted kind of a punky rendition of ‘Any Way You Want It…I usually don’t go in saying I’m going to look for something like that, but then it just came to me, like ‘Wheel in the Sky’ did years ago. It just kind of flew out of my mouth.”

“You Got the Best of Me” is available now via digital formats. The song was co-written by Schon, longtime Journey keyboardist Jonathan Cain and drummer/producer Narada Michael Walden, who also co-produced the track with Schon. Randy Jackson plays bass on the song. Jackson — who previously played with Journey during the mid-1980s — and Walden were recruited as the band’s new rhythm section after Ross Valory and Steve Smith were fired in 2020, although neither has been taking part in the group’s current tour.

Freedom came together while Journey was off the road because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“During the pandemic, there wasn’t much to do,” Schon notes. “I spent a lot of time in my little studio at home, learning how to play keyboards and looping. Some of those ideas ended up being songs. So it kind of came out of nowhere.”

Freedom also includes “The Way We Used to Be,” which was released as a single last year. You can pre-order the album now.

Meanwhile, Journey’s Freedom Tour 2022 with Toto continues Tuesday, April 27, in Nashville.

Here’s the album’s full track list:

“Together We Run”
“Don’t Give Up on Us”
“Still Believe in Love”
“You Got the Best of Me”
“Live to Love Again”
“The Way We Used to Be”
“Come Away with Me”
“After Glow”
“Let It Rain”
“Holdin On”
“All Day and All Night”
“Don’t Go”
“United We Stand”
“Life Rolls On”
“Beautiful as You Are”

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Founding Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers guitarist Mike Campbell has a very busy 2022 tour schedule plotted out with his current band, The Dirty Knobs, which last month released their second studio album, External Combustion.

The group’s itinerary includes headlining shows at clubs and theaters, some festival appearances, and a stint supporting country star Chris Stapleton at select large venues in June and July.  But perhaps the cherry on top for Campbell and The Dirty Knobs is a recently announced series of seven concerts opening for The Who this fall.

“For me, that’s like, ‘Yeah, man, sign me up! I’m there,'” Mike tells ABC Audio about getting to perform with the British rock legends. “We’re all excited about that.”

He continues, “I’m a huge…’60s fan. The Who is one of my favorite bands, so I’m just kind of thrilled that that happened.”

Campbell cites The Who’s Pete Townshend as a major inspiration, noting, “He is one of the best riff writers and songwriters ever, and from that British mold…That’s what I grew up on was the ’60s, so it’s a big deal for The Dirty Knobs to be on that bill.”

The Dirty Knobs’ seven-show stand with The Who runs from an October 14 performance in St.Louis through a November 1 concert at the famed Hollywood Bowl in LA.

The 72-year-old Rock and Roll Hall of Famer tells ABC Audio that the Hollywood Bowl show will be poignant for him because that’s where Petty & the Heartbreakers played their last concert in September 2017, a week before Tom Petty‘s death.

“[I]t’ll be [a] kind of full circle, emotional thing to go back to the Hollywood Bowl and play, you know, opening for The Who,” Campbell says.

Check out TheDirtyKnobs.com for the band’s full schedule.

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He may be 78 years old, but Mick Jagger is still inspired by current music. In fact, there are two young artists he feels are helping keep rock music alive and well.

In an interview with Sweden’s P4 Extra, the iconic Rolling Stones frontman was asked what “inspires [him] most today musically.”

“I like people with energy, a lot of the time,” Jagger responded. “In rock music, you need energy, and there hasn’t [sic] been a lot of new rock singers around.”

He then added that he feels there’s now “a few” rock singers “coming up.”

“You’ve got a few in England, you’ve got Yungblud,” Jagger said, referring to the British alternative rock artist born Dominic Harrison. He added, “In America, you’ve got Machine Gun Kelly and so on, people like that.”

While he first found fame as a rapper, Kelly, born Colson Baker, has been at the forefront of the current pop/punk revival.  He’s also collaborated with Yungblud.

Jagger continued, “That kind of post-punk vibe makes me thing there’s still a bit of life in rock n’ roll…it’s nice to see people still enjoying doing that high-energy stuff.”

Meanwhile, The Who‘s Roger Daltrey is also a Yungblud fan, telling The Independent, “Rock desperately needs people like Yungblud. The kind of rock we made, it’s kind of gone, hasn’t it? [But] Yungblud is a resurgence of that kind of rock.”

In fact, Daltrey tapped Yungblud to perform at The Who‘s recent Royal Albert Hall charity concert for Teenage Cancer Trust, along with Liam Gallagher, Paul Weller and Ed Sheeran.

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After postponing their April concerts after Warren Haynes fractured his shoulder, Gov’t Mule has now added dates to their upcoming U.S. summer tour.

The tour, in support of Gov’t Mule’s latest album, Heavy Load Blues, starts June 3 in Hayes’ hometown of Asheville, NC.  The newly announced shows include a June 4 show in Birmingham, AL, a June 19 concert in Ojai, CA, a June 21 show in Tempe, AZ and a June 22 show in Tucson, AZ.  The final new date is August 19 in Indianapolis.

Pre-sale tickets for Ojai, Tempe, Tucson and Indianapolis are available via pre-sale on Wednesday; the general on-sale date is April 29 at 10 a.m. local time.  All ticketing information is available at mule.net. 

The tour features a mix of headlining and festival dates, as well as a few support dates with ZZ Top, Grace Potter, and Willie Nelson on his Outlaw Festival Tour. In addition, the band has rescheduled its shows in Philadelphia and New York City for December 29 and December 30 and 31, respectively.

In a statement, Haynes says, “I can’t overstate how happy and excited we are to finally get back on the road and be together with our amazing fans this summer. It’s been far too long, but I’m getting better every day and appreciate the well wishes and your patience.”

He adds, “We’re really looking forward to performing all these new songs for you. We’re also going to dig deep into our catalog and include many songs we haven’t played in a while. As always, every show will be a different experience. See you all very soon!”

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Heart‘s Ann Wilson is releasing her new solo album, Fierce Bliss, this Friday, but her famous band is always looming in the background. For one, Wilson says she’s enthusiastic about the in-the-works Heart biopic which, as previously reported, is being scripted by Portlandia star and Sleater-Kinney member Carrie Brownstein.

Speaking with the U.K. paper The Independent, Wilson says, “It is very strange, just the idea of somebody portraying me. But Carrie just really gets it. She’s the best – so smart and funny and talented.”

“And she’s trying to make sure it doesn’t fall into so many of these rock movie clichés,” Wilson adds. “She’s trying to get away from that and really tell the story of what it’s like for these two people, my sister [Nancy] and I. To make it real.”

While the Wilson sisters went on record earlier this year about their disagreements regarding Heart’s future as a live band, Ann said last month that they have “a bunch of stuff” planned for 2023, which will mark Heart’s 50th anniversary.  For example, Ann tells The Independent that the band is hoping to return to the city where Heart played their very first gig for a 50th anniversary show.

That city is Vancouver, where Wilson recalls that Heart played a venue called The Cave. Their audition for the gig was a disaster, she recalls. Because Nancy hadn’t yet joined the band, Ann was playing guitar as well as singing. “My [guitar] strap came off and so my guitar fell off during “Stairway to Heaven,’” she laughs.

Wilson will kick off a series of tour dates with her backing band The Amazing Dawgs in support of Fierce Bliss starting May 4 in San Francisco.

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Now that Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford and Tony Banks have wrapped up what they say is their final tour, a new book that claims to be the definitive source on all things Genesis is coming this fall.

Called Genesis Reference Manual, the tome, which begins with the band’s 1968 beginnings and ends with their final London shows in 2022, lists all known concerts, recordings and media appearances, as well as those of its individual members’ solo careers. It’s billed as the “final word on one of the world’s most enduring and successful bands.”

The solo career chapters alone should be quite extensive, since in addition to singers Peter Gabriel and Phil Collins, both Banks and Rutherford, plus former guitarist Steve Hackett, have all released multiple solo albums.  In addition, Rutherford has released many albums with his side project, Mike + the Mechanics.

And speaking of Hackett, he wrote one of the forewords for the book, as did original Genesis lead guitarist Ant Phillips, and Richard McPhail, one of the band’s tour managers.

The book, written by Alan Hewitt, is due to be published on September 23. You can order it from Wymer Publishing‘s website.

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In 1976, The Who set a Guinness World Record for the loudest concert in history when they were measured at 126 decibels, which is close to a jet engine taking off. But today, singer Roger Daltrey says he regrets the band’s high-volume shows.

Speaking to the U.K. paper The Independent, Daltrey says his hearing is “terrible, terrible,” adding that without his hearing aids, “everything’s a mumble.” He notes, “It’s a penalty for what we did in our lives. We were too f***ing loud.”

But despite his and Pete Townshend‘s hearing issues, The Who is back on the road, and in June, Daltrey will mount a solo U.K. tour called Who Was I.  One reason, he says, is to help out his band and crew financially.

“Musicians have had a real rough two years, really rough,” he explains. “Most of them are self-employed, they got no furlough, no anything. It’s been brutal on them. So if I can go out there and employ 10 musicians [and] 10 road crew for a month, I’m gonna do it.”

Daltrey is also hard at work on his long-planned Keith Moon biopic, which he’s working on with author Nigel Hinton.

“It’s been quite a journey,” he says. “I’ve had so many scripts written, by very eminent scriptwriters, but they just did not get it. They did not get him, they did not get the music business. It’s been very difficult, but I’m quietly confident that we’ve got something special.”

And while Townshend recently said he hopes to retire from the road, Daltrey’s not interested. He notes, “I’m going to do it as long as I can, but then one day it will give me up and I won’t be able to do it. Simple as that.”

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Stevie Nicks has booked a bunch of festival dates for 2022, but now she’s added four headlining shows to her schedule.

The two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee will perform June 10 in Ridgefield, WA, June 12 in Mountain View, CA, June 16 in Salt Lake City, UT and June 21 in Noblesville, IN.  Tickets go on sale this Friday, April 29 via LiveNation.com.

That’s in addition to her shows May 11 at Red Rocks Amphitheater in Colorado, and May 14 at the Gorge in George, Washington. Vanessa Carlton will open those shows.

As previously reported, Stevie will also headline the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival on May 7, Bonnaroo on June 19 and Jazz Aspen Snowmass on September 4.

In addition, she’ll perform September 17 at Asbury Park, NJ’s Sea.Hear.Now festival, September 24 at Bridgeport, CT’s Sound on Sound Festival, and September 30 at Eddie Vedder’s Ohana Fest in Dana Point, CA.

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Founding Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers guitarist Mike Campbell and his current band, The Dirty Knobs, now have a very familiar face behind the drum kit: Founding Heartbreakers drummer Stan Lynch.

On Facebook, Campbell explained that Matt Laug, the drummer for The Dirty Knobs, has “a commitment touring in Italy through the end of June,” so Lynch will be filling in for him on all the band’s shows through a June 26 show in Aspen, CO. 

Lynch’s first gigs with the band took place over the weekend in Boulder and Denver, CO. Their next show is April 28 in Houston. Laug will rejoin the band in July.

Campbell describes Lynch as “an old friend who I love dearly,” adding, “We’ve had the best time reconnecting.”

Lynch was a member of the Heartbreakers until he left in 1994; he was replaced by Steve Ferrone. He reunited with the Heartbreakers for their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002.

In addition to the Heartbreakers, Lynch, who is also a songwriter and producer, contributed to albums by The Eagles, Bob Dylan, Stevie Nicks, John Mellencamp, Jackson Browne, Toto, Warren Zevon and many other artists.

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Edgar Winter‘s latest album, Brother Johnny: An All-Star Tribute to Johnny Winter, is a celebration of his late sibling’s music that features an impressive lineup of guest artists.

Since Johnny Winter was such a venerated blues-rock guitarist, Edgar made sure to invite many acclaimed players to do justice to his brother’s songs. These included ZZ Top‘s Billy Gibbons and Allman Brothers Band alums Derek Trucks and Warren Haynes.

Gibbons and Trucks both contribute their guitar talents to a blazing version of Johnny’s 1969 song “I’m Yours and I’m Hers,” with Billy also lending vocals to the track.

Edgar tells ABC Audio that he felt “the juxtaposition” of Billy’s and Derek’s playing made the track special, noting, “I love hearing that interplay between the two of them.”

Winter says Trucks’ slide work “was just nothing short of amazing.”

As for Gibbons’ singing on the track, Edgar notes, “I love hearing Billy’s voice. You know, he has such a distinctive voice that you immediately know it’s him…[H]e put a lot of love into it.”

Haynes sings and plays guitar on a rendition of “Memory Pain,” which appeared on Johnny’s third studio album, 1969’s Second Winter. Edgar recalls that Warren immediately insisted on doing “Memory Pain” when asked to take part in the project, noting that Haynes was more than prepared for his session.

“You talk about magical moments in recording,” Edgar enthuses. “He walked up to the mic, he plugged in his guitar and he did that whole song start to finish, singing and playing at the same time. He did the song exactly the way Johnny would have done it with [his] blues trio.”

He adds, “[T]he honesty and sincerity of that just blew me away.”

Here’s Brother Johnny’s full track list:

“Mean Town Blues” — featuring Joe Bonamassa
“Alive and Well” — featuring Kenny Wayne Shepherd
“Lone Star Blues” — featuring Keb’ Mo’
“I’m Yours and I’m Hers” — featuring Billy Gibbons & Derek Trucks
“Johnny B. Goode” — featuring Joe Walsh & David Grissom
“Stranger” — featuring Michael McDonald, Joe Walsh & Ringo Starr
“Highway 61 Revisited” — featuring Kenny Wayne Shepherd & John McFee
“Rock ‘n’ Roll Hoochie Koo” — featuring Steve Lukather
“When You Got a Good Friend” — featuring Doyle Bramhall II
“Jumpin’ Jack Flash” — featuring Phil X
“Guess I’ll Go Away” — featuring Taylor Hawkins & Doug Rappoport
“Drown in My Own Tears”
“Self Destructive Blues” — featuring Joe Bonamassa
“Memory Pain” — featuring Warren Haynes
“Stormy Monday Blues” — featuring Robben Ford
“Got My Mojo Workin'” — featuring Bobby Rush
“End of the Line” — featuring David Campbell Strings

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