Classic Rock News

ELO’s Jeff Lynne, Gloria Estefan and Sade are among the artists chosen for the Songwriters Hall of Fame this year.

Other artists making up the 2023 class include Teddy Riley; Snoop Dogg; Glen Ballard, who is best known for writing such hits as Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” and Alanis Morissette’s ”You Oughta Know”; and Liz Rose, whose work includes Taylor Swift tunes “You Belong With Me” and “All Too Well.” 

“The music industry does not exist without songwriters delivering great songs first. Without them there is no recorded music, no concert business, no merch … nothing, it all starts with the song and the songwriter,” SHOF Chairman Nile Rodgers shares. “We are therefore very proud that we are continually recognizing some of the culturally most important songwriters of all time and that the 2023 slate represents not just iconic songs but also diversity and unity across genres, ethnicity and gender, songwriters who have enriched our lives and, in their time, literally transformed music and the lives of billions of listeners all over the world.”

Artists who were nominated, but not chosen this year, include Bryan Adams, the members of R.E.M., Patti Smith, Steve Winwood, Heart’s Ann and Nancy Wilson, Tom Johnston, Michael McDonald and Patrick Simmons of The Doobie Brothers and Blondie’s Debbie Harry, Clem Burke and Chris Stein.

The 2023 class will be celebrated at the 52nd annual Songwriters Hall of Fame Induction and Awards Gala, taking place June 15 in New York City.

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Randy Newman is once again postponing his United Kingdom and European tour. Last March Randy pushed the tour to 2023 in order to recover from surgery to repair a broken neck, but now he’s pushing the dates again in order to continue his recovery. 

“Unfortunately, due to ongoing recovery from his most recent surgery, Randy Newman is unable to safely travel or perform; therefore his European tour must be postponed,” read a post on social media. “His medical team is currently unable to determine when he will be ready, and they will continue to work on his healing and monitor his progress so he can return to doing what he loves: playing music for his fans.”

Randy’s An Evening with Randy Newman tour was initially supposed to kick off in Dublin, Ireland, in March 2022. The new dates were supposed to start next month.

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Former music exec Tony King is opening up about the crazy experiences he had working as head of A&R for The Beatles’ label, Apple Records, back in the day.

“It was so mad, Apple. The poor office boy had to do Ringo (Starr‘s) shopping every Friday,” King shares in a new interview with The Guardian. “There would be all these toilet rolls stacked in the lobby while they counted them out, making sure they’d got the right number for Ringo.”

Noting that the “mad side of it was lovely,” King went on to reveal, “We had an Apple darts team and we’d challenge different record companies. Keith Moon showed up wanting to play, but he was so drunk, the office boys had to hold him up so he could throw a dart.” 

King, whose new memoir, The Tastemaker, comes out January 31, was friends with plenty of artists over the years, including Elton John, John Lennon, Freddie Mercury and Charlie Watts. He feels there was a simple reason they liked him. “I suppose I was always very straightforward, a straight speaker,” King says. “I wasn’t an artist but I understood the artists, I was in their camp. I think I had an innate understanding of what artists needed, and I didn’t put up with bullsh**.”

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A new book dedicated to the late ELP keyboardist Keith Emerson has just been released. The book, Emerson: The Official Illustrated Story, features never-before-seen photos of the rocker from the private Emerson family archives, along with live performance photographs and more. 

The book also features new interviews with Keith’s friends and family sharing their favorite memories of him. There are also interviews with fellow artists, such as ex-ELP member Carl Palmer, Rick Wakeman, ex-Doobie Brothers guitarist Jeff “Skunk” Baxter and many others.

The book has been released in two versions, the Classic and the Signature, the latter of which is signed by author Chris Welch and Keith’s son Aaron Emerson. It features a CD of an unheard Emerson interview, an exclusive art print portrait of Keith and sheet music for a song called “Quatermass Boogie Woogie,” the first piece Emerson composed at just 12 years old.

Emerson died by suicide in March 2016. He was 71.

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Steve Vai has been reunited with one of his classic guitars that’s been missing for almost 40 years. In case you missed it, the guitar great shared on Facebook that he’s once again in possession of his Joe Despagni “Swiss Cheese” guitar that was stolen 36 1/2 years ago.

“I used ‘Swiss Cheese’ in the original ‘Yankee Rose’ video while I was with David Lee Roth, and stretched it out in rehearsals and was planning on touring with it,” he says, “but this guitar, along with 3 others, was stolen in Pasadena CA at Perkins Palace during rehearsals for the Eat Em and Smile tour.”

He adds that a man named Iván Gonzáles Acosta found the guitar in his grandparents’ home in Tijuana, Mexico, noting, “It seems the people that lived in his grandparents house before them purchased the guitar somewhere along the way and it was just stuck in the attic only to be discovered recently when they were reorganizing things.” After Acosta posted pictures of the guitar on social media, Vai associate Mike Mesker noticed it and arranged to have it returned to Vai, who met with Acosta.

“The condition of the guitar when I saw it was a shocker,” Vai says. “It’s as if it was put in the case and never played for 36 years. The colors are still vibrant and the neck is in great shape,” adding, “Receiving this guitar feels like an old friend has returned home after so many years to jam with me. I believe that we will make a wonderful Ham and Swiss sandwich together.”

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Guns N’ Roses guitarist Richard Fortus, Poison drummer Rikki Rockett and Rob Zombie guitarist/current Mötley Crüe touring member John 5 are all taking part in the upcoming “80s Anthems” edition of Rock ‘N’ Roll Fantasy Camp.

The program takes place May 4-7 in Los Angeles. Participants will be able to jam their favorite ’80s tunes alongside the all-star mentors, culminating with performances at the famed Viper Room and Whisky a Go Go venues.

“I can’t wait to relive the ’80s, jamming out to the most iconic and huge rock anthems of the decade at Rock ‘N’ Roll Fantasy Camp with my fellow campers,” Rockett says. “See you there, and prepare to lead the Whisky a Go Go in some epic sing-a-longs.”

For more info, visit RockCamp.com.

Other upcoming Rock ‘N’ Roll Fantasy Camps this year will take place January 19-22 in Nashville with Halestorm‘s Lzzy Hale and Vicki Peterson of The Bangles and March 16-19 in LA with Soundgarden‘s Kim Thayil, and Stone Temple Pilots‘ Robert and Dean DeLeo.

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Phil Lesh & Friends, Robert Plant & Alison Krauss and Nile Rodgers & Chic are among the artists booked to perform at the 2023 Echoland Festival, taking place May 11 to 13 in Live Oak, Florida.

The festival, which goes down at Spirit of the Suwannee Music Park, also features Gov’t Mule, The Flaming Lips performing the album Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots in its entirety, Tyler Childers, Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats, Tenacious D, Grace Potter and more.

Early access tickets go on sale January 19 at 10 a.m. ET. Click here for more info and the full lineup.

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Fleetwood Mac, Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell are among the artists who have contributed items to the new MusiCares Charity Relief Auction, set to coincide with this year’s Grammy Awards.

Items up for grabs include three guitars from MusiCares Person of the Year honorees. There’s a 2014 Gibson Les Paul electric guitar signed by the five members of Fleetwood Mac — Mick Fleetwood, Stevie Nicks, Lindsey Buckingham, and Christine and John McVie — who received the honor in 2018; a black Epiphone acoustic guitar from the 2015 celebration of honoree Bob Dylan, signed by the artists who paid tribute to him, including John Mellencamp and Bruce Springsteen; and a 2021 Gibson Hummingbird acoustic guitar signed by the 2022 MusiCares Person of the Year, Joni Mitchell, which is paired with an autographed four-LP vinyl box set of The Reprise Albums (1868-1971).

There is also a Joni Mitchell watercolor painting that was created live by artist Rob Prior ahead of the 2022 event, which Mitchell added a few strokes to, as well as a signed print of Joni’s original painting of Jimi Hendrix. 

And that’s just a little of what’s up for bid. The auction will also include items from such artists as Slash, David Lee Roth, The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, Ozzy Osbourne, Robert Plant, Sting and The Who. Check out the full list of items available here.

The auction is scheduled for February 5 at 11 a.m. PT; it will take place at Julien’s Auctions and online. Proceeds benefit MusiCares, the Recording Academy’s charity arm that provides health and human services to the music community.

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A never-before-heard interview with the late Jeff Beck is featured in the latest Rolling Stone Music Now podcast, where he opens up about the important role guitar played in his life.

“The only friends I had were pretty low-life,” Beck says of his childhood, in the unearthed audio from an interview with the mag’s Kory Grow. “They were one step away from jail, most of them. The guitar saved me from that.” 

In the interview, Beck, who passed away Tuesday from bacterial meningitis, also discussed how it may have been a good thing that he “never made the big time.” “When you look around and see who has made it huge, it’s a really rotten place to be when you think about it,” he says. “Maybe I’m blessed with not having had that.”

In addition to the interview, the podcast features tributes to Beck by such fellow guitar legends as The Heartbreakers’ Mike Campbell, Living Colour’s Vernon Reid and Joe Satriani.

You can listen to the podcast here.

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Axl Rose is sharing his grief over the loss of his friend Lisa Marie Presley, who died Thursday after suffering cardiac arrest. She was 54. 

“I will miss my friend Lisa. Her passing, just as her son’s, or as a kid, her father’s, doesn’t seem real,” the Guns N’ Roses frontman shares with People. “Lisa loved her family, all her children. My heart goes out to them.”

Axl tells the mag that he knew Lisa Marie, the only daughter of Elvis Presley and wife Priscilla, had a hard time dealing with the July 2020 death of her son, Benjamin Keough. “It was something that, at a point, you obviously didn’t want to bring up but awkwardly would in an effort to let her know you cared and were thinking about her, about them, and to be of any comfort one could, which she appreciated.” 

He also revealed that after Benjamin’s death he used to send her “jokes, news articles and lots of animal vids” to try to make her smile, sharing, “I wanted her to be happy, to feel good about things, at least as much as one could under the circumstances. But truthfully, it didn’t seem, at least without some real time passing, a reasonable reality.”

Finally, he notes, “What comes after life who knows but I’d like to think they’re together, her and Ben with her father and Ben’s grandfather in some way, and Lisa, and the most important men in her life are happy together.”

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