Dave Grohl’s ﻿’The Storyteller’ audiobook nominated for 2022 Audie Awards

Dave Grohl’s ’The Storyteller’ audiobook nominated for 2022 Audie Awards

February 3, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Dave Grohl may need to find more room in what’s surely a crowded trophy case.

The Foo Fighters frontman is nominated for the 2022 Audie Awards, which celebrate the best in “audiobooks and spoken-word entertainment.” Grohl’s 2021 autobiography The Storyteller, the audiobook for which he narrated himself, will compete for the top prize: Audiobook of the Year.

Grohl’s fellow nominees include the novels Project Hail Mary and The Sweetness of Water, as well as former President Barack Obama‘s memoir A Promised Land.

The Storyteller, Grohl’s debut book, finds the prolific musician sharing tales from throughout his life, from his childhood to joining Nirvana and forming Foo Fighters. Upon its release last October, it topped two New York Times Best-Sellers lists.

The 2022 Audie Awards will be held virtually on March 4.

Meanwhile, Grohl’s expansion beyond music continues with Studio 666, an upcoming horror-comedy movie starring the Foos. The film premieres in theaters February 25.

Billy Idol forced to pull out of Journey tour support slot; Toto now opening entire trek

February 3, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Back in November, Journey announced plans for a lengthy U.S. trek this year dubbed the Freedom Tour 2022 featuring Billy Idol and Toto opening the first and second respective portions of the outing, but now comes word that Idol has dropped off the tour for health reasons.

Instead, Toto now will be the support act for Journey’s entire trek, which kicks off on February 22 in Pittsburgh and is mapped out through a May 11 show in Hartford, Connecticut. 

Idol’s departure from Journey’s Freedom Tour is due to a chronic sinus infection that will require surgery in the coming days.

“The last thing I ever want to do is cancel shows and I am absolutely gutted that I won’t be able to perform the upcoming dates with Journey as planned,” Idol says in a statement. “I wish Journey only the best on their tour and give thanks to TOTO for stepping in for me.”

The trek features a total of 40 concerts, including two newly added dates that are scheduled for March 4 in Hershey, Pennsylvania, and on March 6 in Manchester, New Hampshire.

Tickets for the two shows will go on sale to the public on Monday, February 7, at 10 a.m. ET. In addition, pre-sale tickets will be available via Ticketmaster starting today, February 3, at 10 a.m. ET. Visit JourneyMusic.com for more information.

Toto originally had been slated to join Journey’s tour in April, and had lined up a U.S. headlining trek that was to have run from February 25 through March 19, but now their own outing has been postponed until a later date.

A note on Toto’s official website advises that tickets purchased for the band’s headlining shows will be honored when the dates are rescheduled. Details about those shows will be announced soon.

Hey ’22: Steely Dan announces Earth After Hours Tour featuring openers Snarky Puppy, Aimee Mann

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Steely Dan has unveiled dates for a 2022 U.S. trek called the Earth After Hours Tour.

The 23-city road trip gets underway on May 20 in Portland, Oregon and is mapped out through a July 3 show in Bethel, New York.

The tour originally was to have featured Steve Winwood as the opening act, but according to a message on SteelyDan.com, the former Traffic frontman “is no longer able to appear due to unforeseen circumstances.” Instead, contemporary jazz-rock ensemble Snarky Puppy will open most of the concerts from May 20 through June 19, while singer/songwriter Aimee Mann will serve as the support act from June 21 until the end of the trek.

Following the Earth After Hours Tour, Steely Dan will play a series of rescheduled U.S. dates from their postponed 2021 Absolutely Normal trek. Those shows run from a July 15 performance in Richmond, Virginia, through an August 4 concert in North Charleston, South Carolina.

Tickets for all dates are on sale now. Visit SteelyDan.com for the band’s full itinerary.

Ronnie James Dio documentary premiering at South by Southwest Film Festival

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

A new documentary about Ronnie James Dio is set to premiere at the 2022 South by Southwest Film Festival.

Titled DIO Dreamers Never Die, the film is said to be the “definitive career spanning documentary” on the late Dio frontman. It takes its name from a lyric off Dio’s 1987 song “I Could Have Been a Dreamer.”

The SXSW Film Festival takes place March 11-19 in Austin, Texas, with Dreamers Never Die making its debut on March 17. For more info, visit SXSW.com.

Dio died in May 2010 from stomach cancer. He was 67. In addition to fronting his namesake band, Dio also sang in Rainbow alongside Deep Purple‘s Ritchie Blackmore, and joined Black Sabbath after Ozzy Osbourne was fired in 1979.

Crosby, Stills and Nash join together to ask that their music be removed from Spotify in support of Neil Young

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Tuesday, Graham Nash announced that he was removing his solo music from Spotify in solidarity with Neil Young over alleged COVID-19 misinformation hosted by the streaming service. Now Graham and his Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young band mates David Crosby and Stephen Stills have joined together in support of Neil.

While its been years since they’ve collaborated, the members of Crosby, Stills & Nash have teamed up to ask their labels to pull all of their collective recordings from Spotify.

A statement from trio reads, “We support Neil and we agree with him that there is dangerous disinformation being aired on Spotify’s Joe Rogan podcast. While we always value alternate points of view, knowingly spreading disinformation during this global pandemic has deadly consequences. Until real action is taken to show that a concern for humanity must be balanced with commerce, we don’t want our music — or the music we made together — to be on the same platform.”

The request covers recordings by CSN, CSNY and Crosby & Nash, as well as David’s and Stephen’s solo projects.

Young recently announced that he was pulling his music from Spotify after he was alerted to an open letter signed by hundreds of scientists and medical professionals expressing concern that harmful misinformation was being circulated on some recent episodes of the popular podcast The Joe Rogan Experience, which is hosted exclusively by the streaming platform.

Neil had sent a letter to Spotify that basically gave them an ultimatum, and the service ended up removing his music rather than cutting ties with Rogan.

After Young exited Spotify, the company did announce that it will be adding content advisories before podcasts that discuss COVID-19.

Bob Marley’s 77th birthday celebrated with series of special events this week

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

This Sunday, February 6, marks what would’ve been Bob Marley‘s 77th birthday, and to commemorate the milestone the late reggae legend’s family is curating a series of special in-person, virtual and charitable events that will take place in the coming days.

Marley’s 77th Earthstrong ROOTS festivities include a newly curated exhibit at the Bob Marley Museum in Kingston, Jamaica, dubbed The 7 Roots of Bob Marley’s Livity, which will feature artwork by young, up-and-coming artists. Submissions will be accepted until Friday, February 4.

Also on February 4, The Marley Brothers, a group featuring Bob’s sons Ziggy, Stephen, Damian, Julian and Ky-Mani Marley, will release a new cover of their dad’s song “Cornerstone,” a day before the siblings perform a headlining set at the CaliVibes Festival in Long Beach, California.

The 77th Earthstrong ROOTS festivities will wrap up on Bob’s birthday this Sunday with a limited-capacity concert celebration at Tuff Gong International studio in Kingston, Jamaica that will be streamed live on Marley’s official YouTube channel and the Tuff Gong Television YouTube channel. Also that day, a performance by Stephen Marley from his Lion’s Den Studio in Miami will premiere at Bob’s YouTube channel.

For more information about Bob’s 77th birthday festivities, visit Tuff Gong International’s official Facebook page.

Find out what “truly happened” with ‘Pam & Tommy’ on new Hulu limited series

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Kickstart your Wednesday with Pam & Tommy.

The new Hulu limited series, which tells the story of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee‘s infamous sex tape, premieres today. The Baywatch superstar is played by Baby Driver and Yesterday actor Lily James, while The Falcon and the Winter Soldier‘s Sebastian Stan trades his vibranium arm for a pair of drumsticks to portray the Mötley Crüe rocker.

Speaking with ABC Audio, Stan shares that he feels Pam & Tommy will tell the truth of such a highly sensationalized story.

“You hear things about it, or you’ve heard something about it, but you don’t really know what happened, you don’t really know the true story,” Stan says. “I think it was a nice opportunity for us to be able to tell that story, finally, as it pertains to how it affected [Anderson and Lee], but also really, truly what happened.”

In playing Lee, Stan says that was “always conscious” of the real person.

“I think any time you’re playing a real person, it’s inevitable that you’re gonna be thinking about them, just purely from a sense of respect,” Stan says. “You wanna learn about that person as much as you can, and you wanna be able to go out there and take your best shot.”

“You’re not these people, you’re never gonna be these people,” he adds. “You can give it your best shot and your best guess. But, absolutely, you’re always conscious of them.”

The Pam & Tommy cast also includes Seth Rogen, Nick Offerman and Taylor Schilling.

Ronnie Wood selling signed prints of new Picasso-inspired Rolling Stones painting

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Rolling Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood has celebrated his famous band with a new painting, a Pablo Picasso-inspired piece title “Abstract Performance” that offers a surreal depiction of the legendary rock group playing live.

Wood was on hand to debut the painting on Tuesday during a surprise visit to Wood Lane in London outside the popular Westfield shopping center. A billboard teasing the painting appeared at the same location earlier this week. You can check out photos of Ronnie’s visit to Wood Lane, including a pic of him with his wife, at his Twitter page.

Limited-edition prints of “Abstract Performance” are available for purchase now through February 15 at the Art Store section of RonnieWood.com, priced at $2,000. Each print will be hand-signed and hand-numbered by Wood and feature a personal dedication from him.

“Abstract Performance,” which Wood completed in 2020, is among a recent series of abstract, Picasso-inspired paintings of The Rolling Stones that Wood has created.

“Picasso did his own take on a lot of artists, but I bet he never thought no one would ever do a take on him,” Wood says. “I hope and think he’d be flattered, but also a bit shocked and pleasantly surprised at my take on his work.”

Meanwhile, a new post on Wood’s Instagram page reports that “[e]xciting new works [are] coming soon from Ronnie’s art studio.” The message is accompanied by a photo of a variety of paintings on which he apparently is currently working, including another abstract of The Stones and a portrait of Buddy Holly.

Metallica pays tribute to Jon Zazula: “Heavy music lost one of its great champions”

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Metallica has shared a tribute to Megaforce Records co-founder Jon Zazula, who died Tuesday at age 69.

In an Instagram post, the metal legends write, “Heavy music lost one of its great champions.”

Zazula launched Megaforce alongside his wife, Marsha Zazula, in 1982, and soon signed a then-unknown Metallica to their first-ever record deal. Megaforce would later become the home of artists including Anthrax and Testament.

“In 1982, when no one wanted to take a chance on four kids from California playing a crazy brand of metal, Jonny and Marsha did, and the rest, as they say, is history,” Metallica’s post reads. “He was a mentor, a manager, a label head and a father figure to us all…Metallica would not be who we are or where we are today without Jon Zazula and his wife, Marsha.”

Jon’s death comes just over a year after Marsha passed in January 2021.

“Our love and sympathy go out to Jonny’s children and his grandchildren, whom he cherished and brought to our shows from the time they were in diapers,” Metallica writes. “We hope they will be able to take some comfort in knowing that he is reunited with Marsha, and that he helped bring so much incredible music to so many. Hopefully there’s a great show goin’ on up there tonight to welcome you!”

Pat Benatar, Judas Priest and Devo among 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame nominees

February 2, 2022 by Classic Rock 93.9

Pat Benatar, Judas Priest and Devo are among the 17 artists who have been nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2022.

The other nominees are Beck, Kate Bush, Duran Duran, Eminem, Eurythmics, Fela Kuti, MC5, New York Dolls, Dolly Parton, Rage Against the Machine, Lionel Richie, Carly Simon, A Tribe Called Quest and Dionne Warwick.

To be eligible for induction, an artist must have released their first commercial recording 25 years before the year of their nomination.

Benatar previously was nominated in 2020, while Judas Priest and Devo both received nods twice before.

Speaking with ABC Audio, Rock Hall VP of Education & Visitor Engagement Jason Hanley notes, “I think it’s a great year for someone like Pat Benatar. Between her and [her husband and guitarist] Neil Giraldo…they wrote some of the great classic songs of the 1980s.”

He adds that songs like “Hit Me with Your Best Shot” “were…delivered with this great rock edge, classic kind of clean but distorted ’80s guitar, and Pat’s just amazing voice.”

As for Judas Priest, the band’s induction might help soothe the critics who think the Rock Hall has an anti-metal bias.

“[Judas Priest is] the band that takes the early days of heavy metal from bands like Black Sabbath and Deep Purple, and they turn it into what we know as metal,” Hanley says.

Hanley also feels Devo definitely deserves to be in the Rock Hall, praising the group for their “humorously disguised political songs,” and for being “innovators of sound and technology and music video.”

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