Classic Rock News

Peter Gabriel, who sang about Native Americans in his song “San Jacinto,” has now become involved in a documentary highlighting the struggles of Canada’s First Nation indigenous peoples.

According The Hollywood Reporter, Gabriel is executive producing New Blood, which focuses on the historical trauma faced by First Nations people. The documentary shares its name with Gabriel’s 2011 album, which featured him performing some of his songs, including “San Jacinto,” with an orchestra.

Gabriel first became involved with the project when he allowed music from that album to be used in an Alberta, Canada, high school dance production inspired by the true story of a First Nation chief named Vincent Yellow Old Woman.

The documentary focuses on the fact that until the 1990s, the Canadian government funded so-called “residential schools” run by the Catholic Church, where indigenous children were taken from their families and sent to be assimilated. In 2021, Canada underwent a national reckoning after the remains of hundreds of indigenous children — students in those schools — were discovered in unmarked graves.

The New Blood documentary chronicles Chief Vincent’s own experience in a residential school, which led to him becoming a drug addict and then, later in life, becoming chief of Siksiká Nation, one of the four nations of the Blackfoot Confederacy. 

The film will air on Canada’s CBC on Nov. 22.

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

On This Day, Nov. 7, 1943 …

Joni Mitchell was born in Alberta, Canada.

Born Roberta Joan “Joni” Anderson, Mitchell’s rise to fame began in the ’60s and ’70s with such classic songs as “Big Yellow Taxi,” “Chelsea Morning,” “River” and “Both Sides Now.” She also wrote “Woodstock,” which later became a huge hit for her friends Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.

Mitchell has released 19 studio albums over the course of her career, but it’s her fourth album, 1971’s Blue, that is considered by many to be one of the best pop and rock albums in history.

In 2015 Mitchell suffered a brain aneurysm. She once revealed that she had to learn to walk again following the medical emergency. She made few public appearances after that and hadn’t performed live in 20 years when, in 2022, she surprised audiences at the Newport Folk Festival, joining Brandi Carlile for a guest-filled Joni Jam.

Since 2022, Mitchell has played a few more Joni Jams, and performed on the Grammys in 2024. She most recently headlined two nights at the Hollywood Bowl in California in October, with Elton John joining her onstage during one of the shows.

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Ahead of the presidential election, Bruce Springsteen, who’s been touring in Canada, introduced his song “Long Walk Home” as “a prayer for my country.” And in his first post-election show Nov. 6 in Toronto, he underscored that sentiment by actually opening the show with that song.

At the concert, he first apologized to the audience for starting late due a flight delay, then introduced the song by saying, “This is a fighting prayer for my country.” 

The lyrics for “Long Walk Home,” from Bruce’s album Magic, go in part, “My father said ‘Son, we’re lucky in this town/ It’s a beautiful place to be born/ It just wraps its arms around you/ Nobody crowds you and nobody goes it alone/ Your flag flyin’ over the courthouse/ Means certain things are set in stone/ Who we are, what we’ll do and what we won’t.'”

He followed that up with another fitting song, “Land of Hope and Dreams,” which he performed at a rally for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz on Oct. 28. In that song, he sings, “Leave behind your sorrows/ Let this day be the last/ Tomorrow there’ll be sunshine/ And all this darkness past.”

According to setlist.fm, Bruce also took requests from the audience for two other songs that appeared to match that theme: “Reason to Believe” and “Better Days.”

In addition to campaigning with Harris, Springsteen appeared in an ad for her and posted a lengthy video on Instagram explaining why he was voting for her.

But the Nov. 6 show wasn’t all seriousness: As part of his first encore, Bruce also performed his holiday favorite tune, “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town,” after a fan requested it.

Bruce’s next show is Nov. 9 in Ottawa, Canada.

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

The new Bruce Springsteen documentary Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band is streaming now on Hulu and Disney+, and while the movie gives fans insight into the band’s live show, it also turns the camera on Bruce’s dedicated fans.

The film’s director, Thom Zimny, tells ABC Audio that he’s always felt welcomed by the fans, noting that for many, coming to a concert is about more than just getting to see Bruce play some songs.

“When I was interviewing the fans, the beautiful thing I encountered was this universal connection to the music,” he says. “And it goes beyond fandom.” 

“I really talked to the people at length and found, to have simple stories of their connection to be a really powerful thing,” he says. “It wasn’t being obsessed with celebrity or chasing a rock god. It’s more that they’ve taken this positive thing in their life, made a community out of it and it reinforces ideas for them that bring joy in their life.”

He adds, “That silent communication that you see in people’s faces with the music and the band, it’s something that I abstractly wanted to try to get across. It’s really hard to put into words.” 

Zimny himself is one of those fans, and when asked to pick his favorite Springsteen album, he had a hard time choosing.  

“For me, every day there’s an opportunity to step into a Springsteen album. … Every day you can find an album to start at the beginning and play straight through till the end,” he says. “The narrative arc and the journeys on these albums are flawless and they stay with me in a timeless way.” 

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

In what we’re guessing is not coincidental timing post-Election Day, the David Letterman YouTube channel has uploaded unearthed footage of Green Day‘s 2004 performance of “American Idiot” on the Late Show.

The episode aired on Sept. 20, just a day before Green Day dropped their American Idiot album.

In introducing Billie Joe Armstrong and company, Letterman quipped, “I don’t know how our next guests slipped past Secret Service.”

Green Day celebrated the 20th anniversary of American Idiot by playing it in full on their summer tour and with a deluxe box set reissue, which dropped in October.

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

After canceling his live dates in September due to what he called an “urgent heart condition,” Dave Mason has now given fans a major health update.

On Instagram, the ex-Traffic rocker reveals that he’s going to have heart valve replacement surgery on Nov. 11. He says specifically, he’ll be having a kind of surgery called TAVR, or transcatheter aortic valve replacement. It’s a minimally invasive procedure that Mason points out has already yielded great results in another rock legend.

“Mick Jagger has had the same surgery, and we’ve all been lucky to have him continue to entertain us,” the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer writes. “They say I should feel significantly better in 30 days, and fully rocking in 90, given a smooth operation.”

Mason says that he and his wife are “looking forward to getting my health back and feeling better than I have in quite a while.” He adds, “We’re feeling great about the future. Music is my life, and it means the world to me to be able to share it with you … I’ll update you all again soon. Until then, take care of yourselves and each other.”

The 78-year-old Mason, who recently released his memoir, Only You Know and I Know, originally had dates booked through Oct. 12 on his Traffic Jam 2024 tour.  When he canceled in September, he said that “doctors detected a serious heart condition during a routine appointment that requires immediate medical attention.”

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Not only is Scorpions drummer Mikkey Dee not dead, he’s also extremely ticked off.

A fake news article claiming that he’d died — from a website that had previously published a fake story claiming that Deep Purple‘s Ritchie Blackmore had died — has been circulating on Facebook. Dee took to Instagram to share a screenshot of the Facebook story with the word “FAKE!” written across it.

“NO! I AM NOT DEAD!,” he wrote. “I am very much alive and kicking, although angry as a MF!! How low can you go, you absolute pest of a human being!? This is so inappropriate and potentially harmful.”

“Spreading rumors that I have died is wrong on so many levels. Let’s keep reporting these bastards and let’s put some pressure on Facebook to deal with this problem,” he added. “P.S. I have marked the photos ‘Fake’ in red so not to spread the rumors further.”

According to Classic Rock magazine, another website that published the fake article also falsely claimed that Pink Floyd‘s David Gilmour and Yes/King Crimson drummer Bill Bruford had both died.

Scorpions are set to launch a new run of shows at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas starting Feb. 27, with Buckcherry supporting.

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

On This Day, Nov. 6, 1993 …

Meat Loaf scored his one and only #1 song with the track “I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That),” from his multi-Platinum album Bat Out of Hell II: Back into Hell, the sequel to his 1977 debut, Bat Out Of Hell.

The track, written by Jim Steinman, who penned Meat Loaf’s other classic tunes “Paradise by the Dashboard Light” and “Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad,” featured singer Lorraine Crosby and had an album run time of over 12 minutes.

The song went to #1 in 28 countries and was certified Platinum in the United States. It also earned Meat Loaf a Grammy Award for Best Rock Vocal Performance, Solo.

The song’s lyric “I’d do anything for love, but I won’t do that” left fans wondering what the “that” was, with Meat Loaf saying it was one of the most common questions he was asked. He later explained it was just a repetition of the things he said he’d never do earlier in the song.

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Judas Priest will mark the 35th anniversary of their 1990 album Painkiller on their 2025 Shield of Pain tour.

In an Instagram post, the metal legends tease, “This rare unique set including beloved classics will be defending the metal faith in a truly memorable experience throughout Europe this summer.”

The RIAA Gold-certified Painkiller spawned singles in “A Touch of Evil” and the title track. It marked the final Priest album to feature frontman Rob Halford before his departure in 1992. He rejoined the band in 2003.

The Shield of Pain tour launches in June. So far only European dates have been announced.

Judas Priest’s latest album, Invincible Shield, was released in March.

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

New documentary The Session Man about the late rock keyboardist Nicky Hopkins is out now on Prime Video, giving fans insight into the famed musician who played on records by The Beatles, The Who, The Kinks, The Rolling Stones and more.

The film features interviews with Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, as well as The Kinks’ Dave Davies, The Who’s Pete Townshend and Peter Frampton, who met Hopkins when he was hired to play guitar on Harry Nilsson‘s album Son of Schmilsson. 

“Nicky and I hit it off straight away,” Frampton tells ABC Audio. “I mean, he was a gentle soul, a gentle man, and very much so. And that shows in his emotional playing.”

Newly minted rock & Roll Hall of Famer Frampton thinks Hopkins deserves to be in the Rock Hall as well, especially when you consider his body of work. He played on The Beatles’ “Revolution,” as well as the Stones’ Exile on Main St. and Let It Bleed; The Who’s Who’s Next; The Kinks’ Face to Face; and John Lennon‘s Imagine. He played on 250 albums in all.

“[Do] you know the list of people he played with?” says Frampton. “It’s incredible who he didn’t play with!”

When it comes to the many classics Hopkins played on, Frampton says you can really get the feel for who he was as an artist by listening to his work on Joe Cocker’s top five hit, “You Are So Beautiful.”

“I mean, it’s just Joe and him playing piano,” Frampton says. “And it’s an incredible piece of piano playing. So he was definitely a genius. Didn’t realize it.”

He adds, “You know, I’m sure he knew he was good. But that was the beautiful thing about him. He was always so modest and that’s why I was a friend of his.”

Copyright © 2024, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.