Classic Rock News

Queen has earned quite an honor in the U.K. The Rock & Roll Hall of Famers have just been awarded the Brit Billion Award, which “celebrates the band’s outstanding achievement as recording artists in surpassing the landmark of one billion career streams in the U.K.”

“Thank you for presenting Queen with a BRIT Billion Award. We’re grateful to all our fans that support us and continue to enjoy our music. Rock on BPI,” Queen’s Brian May shared in accepting the honor. Roger Taylor added, “I’m thrilled to accept the BRIT Billion Award on behalf of Queen,” noting, “I would like to say thanks to everyone who has extracted a morsel of enjoyment from our music. We are still around and we hope to entertain you a little.”

The award was given to the band by BPI, the organization which represents the U.K.’s record labels and music companies and is responsible for the Brit Awards.

“There can be few artists who have done more to popularize and promote British music around the world than Queen,” Dr Jo Twist, BPI chief executive said. “The term iconic barely does justice to their monumental achievements as recording artists.”

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On This Day, July 20, 1975…

Ahead of the release of his third studio album, Born To Run, Bruce Springsteen launched a new tour at the Palace Theater in Providence, Rhode Island. 

The show marked Steve Van Zandt’s first official gig as a member of the E Street Band and also the live debut of the future classic “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out.” Other songs in the set included “Born To Run,” “Thunder Road,” “Rosalita” and more.

Born To Run was released August 25, 1975, and peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 album chart. It has gone on to be considered one of the greatest albums of all time and has been certified seven-times Platinum by the RIAA.

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Fleetwood Mac fans are about to get a new way to enjoy the band’s classic 1977 album, Rumours.

The Rock & Roll Hall of Famers are set to release Rumours Live, a double live album of their August 29, 1977, concert at the Forum in Los Angeles. The 90-minute concert, the opening night of a three-night stand, features live versions of most of the songs on the album, including “Never Going Back Again,” “Songbird” and “The Chain” as well as tracks from 1975’s Fleetwood Mac, including “Landslide” and “Rhiannon.”

The new release is the first time most of these performances have ever been released live, with the exception of “Gold Dust Woman,” a bonus track on Fleetwood Mac’s 1980 release Live: Deluxe Edition. A previously unreleased live version of “Dreams” is out now.

Rumors Live, dropping September 8, is being released digitally and as a two-CD or two-LP set. It is available for preorder now. There will also be a crystal clear-vinyl edition sold exclusively through Walmart.

Here’s the track list for Rumours Live:

“Say You Love Me”
“Monday Morning”
“Dreams”
“Oh Well”
“Rhiannon”
“Oh Daddy”
“Never Going Back Again”
“Landslide”
“Over My Head”
“Gold Dust Woman”
“You Make Loving Fun”
“I’m So Afraid”
“Go Your Own Way”
“World Turning”
“Blue Letter”
“The Chain”
“Second Hand News”
“Songbird”

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Soft-hearted Rod Stewart gave a struggling family in Scotland a cash gift after one of their kids wrote a heartfelt note about their situation.

As a school project asking students about their hopes for the future, 10-year-old Sophia McKenzie wrote, “I have a dream that one day we will live in a world where the cost of living crisis stops and everything is free and nobody struggles with not being able to eat.” Her note was eventually published in The Daily Record.

Sophia’s mother Heather, a single mom with four kids, told the paper, “Sophia sees how much it upsets me when I can’t get them everything they want and she’s seen me go without food so they have enough to eat.”

Rod read Sophia’s letter and contacted the paper. “It broke my heart,” he said. “I simply had to find a way to help.” He ended up giving the family 2500 pounds, which is about 3200 dollars.

“I told [Sophia] what Mr. Stewart did and it has completely thrown her,” Heather told the paper. “We obviously never expected anything like this to happen…it is going to be amazing to see her not have to worry anymore.”

She added, “This is a life-changing amount of money and it means so much to all of us. Mr. Stewart is just an incredible person. I cannot thank him enough. I am so grateful from the bottom of my heart.”

In the past year, Rod has also helped bring a family of Ukrainian refugees to the U.K. and pledged to pay their rent and bills for a year. In addition, he’s paid for patients’ MRI scans at a hospital near his home to reduce wait times.

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Gov’t Mule kicks off their Dark Side of the Mule tour on July 22 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, which will have the band celebrating the music of Pink Floyd and the classic album The Dark Side of the Moon.

Mule frontman Warren Haynes tells ABC Audio the idea for the shows originated from the band’s annual Halloween tradition, where “we give ourselves permission to play somebody else’s music.” He notes they’ve covered Neil Young, The Who, Jimi Hendrix and many others.

“In 2008 we did Pink Floyd and the fans really dug it, and we released the recording and it was something the fans really like, so they encouraged us to do it more,” Haynes says.

After releasing the live album in 2014, Haynes says they thought they’d retired it. “[But] when the 50th anniversary of Dark Side of the Moon came around, we’re like, ‘All right, we’ll do it one more time,’ which I’m really psyched about.”

The Dark Side of the Moon was released in March 1973, but it’s an album that has only grown in popularity over the years — Haynes thinks that’s because it contains “timeless music.” 

“It was written and performed and recorded in a way that is never going to get old,” he says. “You know, there’s so much music. If you go back decades, some of it has a stamp on it and doesn’t live up to your expectations later on. But that music is better now than it was at the time.” 

Gov’t Mule’s Dark Side of the Mule tour, which features a full set of Gov’t Mule songs, followed by the Pink Floyd tribute, wraps August 20 in Vienna, Virginia. A complete list of dates can be found at mule.net.

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A new docuseries that explores the music of San Francisco is set to premiere in August on MGM+, formerly EPIX. 

San Francisco Sounds: A Place in Time focuses on the Bay Area music scene from 1965 to 1975, a period that launched legendary artists like the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Sly and the Family Stone, Janis Joplin, Steve Miller, Santana and more to national stardom.

The two-part series, from the same team behind the Emmy-nominated music documentary Laurel Canyon: A Place in Time, will air over two Sundays, August 20 and 27, at 10 p.m. ET.

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The story of legendary rock band R.E.M. is being told in a new biography, Maps and Legends: The Story of R.E.M., by John Hunter. 

Although Hunter did not interview band members Michael Stipe, Mike Mills, Peter Buck or Bill Berry directly, the book is culled from previous video and audio interviews given by the Rock & Roll Hall of Famers. It also pulls from newspaper and magazine articles, as well as interviews with people close to the band, including high school classmates and bandmates, friends and producers.

The book promises to not only delve into R.E.M.’s entire career, which includes such hit albums as Out Of Time and Automatic For The People, but also explore their childhoods, their teenage bands, solo work and more.

Maps and Legends: The Story of R.E.M. will be released August 2.

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Dead & Company recently wrapped their Final Tour with a three-night stand in San Francisco, but it turns out, that may not really be the end of the band.

John Mayer, who formed Dead & Company in 2015 with Oteil Burbridge, Jeff Chimenti and Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann, took to social media to reflect on his experience with the group and added some comments about their future.

In the post, Mayer writes that playing with Dead & Company “has made me a better player and this band made me a better person,” calling the whole experience an “opportunity of a lifetime.”

As for the future, he says, “Dead & Company is still a band – we just don’t know what the next show will be,” adding, “I speak for us all when I say that I look forward to being shown the next shaft of light… I know we will all move towards it together.”

Finally, Mayer offers, “This band changed my life, and I love you all for it. An incredible tour, an unforgettable ride, and a beautiful world of memories to visit. I’ll be seeing you.”

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The members of Def Leppard are helping Queen guitarist Brian May celebrate his 76th birthday.

In honor of May’s July 19 birthday, the band shared a musical birthday wish on social media to the tune of the Queen hit “Tie Your Mother Down.”

Joe Elliott, Phil Collen, Vivian Campbell and Rick Savage are featured in the clip, which has Elliott on guitar. In it, they sing, “Happy birthday! Happy birthday! / Stay awake from the cake but a drink’s ok / Happy birthday! Happy birthday! Happy birthday Brian May!”

“Join us in wishing our good friend @DrBrianMay a very happy birthday today!” the band wrote in the caption. “Keep on rockin’.”

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Pretenders are set to open for Guns N’ Roses on their stadium tour this summer, but if you’d rather see them in a smaller venue, you’re in luck.

The band just announced a short set of intimate club dates that kick off August 16 at New York’s Bowery Ballroom. They’ll also play club shows in Nashville; Asbury Park, New Jersey; Washington, D.C.; Detroit; Minneapolis; Los Angeles and Pioneertown, California, before wrapping the run in San Francisco on October 6. 

Tickets for all shows go on sale Friday, July 21, at 10 a.m. local time. 

The new tour dates come as the Pretenders get ready to release their new studio album, Relentless, on September 15. Their tour with Guns N’ Roses kicks off August 11 in Hershey, Pennsylvania. A complete list of all Pretenders tour dates can be found at thepretenders.com.

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