Papa Roach’s Jacoby Shaddix is reportedly doing great now that the band is back on the road after his vocal cord surgery, according to bassist Tobin Esperance. Speaking to Metalshop, Esperance said about his bandmate, “The first two shows (after the surgery) went really well, and his voice is holding up and he sounds great and he feels good . . . It’s kind of like a strict regimen of just conserving his voice, like not talking too much during the day, warming up and eating the right kind of foods that don’t agitate the vocal cords, like acid reflux-type stuff. Just things you’ve gotta do over the years.“
Esperance added, “When we were younger, when we first started, it didn’t matter — you just did it all and you didn’t think about the wear and tear. But even having a couple of drinks (now) at the end of the night, I get a f**king headache if I drink too much. I wake up in the morning, and I’m, like, ‘Goddamn! What the f**k?’ And that didn’t use to be like that. Oh, man — the good old days.”
Back in 2012, Shaddix had similar surgery to remove a nodule on his vocal cord. He told us at the time that it forced him to take better care of his voice: “I’ve got to concentrate on my warm-ups. Concentrate on what I eat. You know, concentrate on getting proper rest — like, all these things that I never wanted to do before, like, I have to do now. ‘Cause I’m gettin’ old! (laughs)”
Shaddix told Rolling Stone five years ago that his vocal cord problem was caused by “all the stresses in your life, whether they be emotional, physical, sleep deprivation or just overuse.”
Papa Roach is on tour at the moment in Europe and has spent the last few months on the road in support of its ninth studio album, Crooked Teeth, which was released on May 19th. The band had to cancel several dates in August so that Shaddix could have his surgery. The latest single from the LP, “American Dreams,” is currently Number Three on the rock radio chart. (Thanks Blabbermouth and The Pulse Of Radio.)
Brave Words and The Pulse Of Radio reporting Stone Sour and Slipknot vocalist Corey Taylor discussed his son Griffin‘s interest in music in a new interview with Junkee.com. Asked if Griffin had been into music since he was young or something he’d gotten into as he got older, Taylor replied, “It’s a bit of both . . . He’s such a big music fan. He’s actually the one that got me into Babymetal! (laughs) I’d never heard of them, and he comes running up to me and is like, ‘You gotta check this out.’ I was so amazed . . . His enthusiasm is what got me into them.”
Taylor continued, “He’s been a fan of music for as long as he’s been able to respond to it. His talent’s always been there, too. I can remember on his second birthday, we got him a keyboard with a little microphone attached. As soon as he realized that the microphone made noise, he started making noises into it.”
Taylor said that he and his son have “bonded so strongly through music” as Griffin has gotten older, adding, “I’m still a dad first and foremost, but I’ve also been doing what I can to teach him what I know about music.”
Griffin has performed with Stone Sour at several stops on the band’s current tour, including a recent show at the PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel, NJ.
Stone Sour is on the road in support of its sixth studio album, Hydrograd, which arrived in June and features the chart-topping single “Song #3.” The band just embarked on a month-long headlining tour with Steel Panther along as support.
Nothing More just hit the road and have already added 2018 dates to their tour in support of their killer new album, The Stories We Tell Ourselves. See Road Rage for all the dates!
If only…..Prophets Of Rage guitarist Tom Morello revealed in an interview with Music Feeds he and late singer Chris Cornell — with whom Morello recorded and toured in Audioslave — had discussed an innovative way to stage a reunion of the latter band before Cornell died last May. The idea came up after Audioslave reunited for a brief three-song set last January, with Morello explaining, “We started talking about maybe doing some sort of similar thing where maybe it would be a Prophets Of Rage show and then we would drop an Audioslave set into the middle of it, and we’d have a ball.”
As for that show last January — the last time all four members of Audioslave played together — Morello said, “I just say ‘Thank god we played it,’ you know? Audioslave hadn’t played in 12 years, although I’d played another show with Chris about a year before that. And it was wonderful to be close friends and to rock again and to play some Audioslave songs and stand next to him onstage with his – you know – his rock god powerful self, and his amazing voice and his amazing hair and his amazing whole thing, you know? It was wonderful.”
Morello also recently revealed the existence of unreleased Audioslave music from the sessions for the three studio albums the band released. But he told us that at this point he doesn’t know what will happen with it: “You know, we recorded music for Audioslave records, and then we recorded more songs than made those records, and I’m certain at some point it will come out but there’s no plans for it. We had talked about it when, you know, Chris was alive and we thought at some point there will be the right time to put it out. Now I don’t know that there’s ever a right time to put it out, but there’s no reason that it shouldn’t come out at some point.“
Morello, Audioslave bassist Tim Commerford and Audioslave drummer Brad Wilk — who were also bandmates in Rage Against The Machine — are now in Prophets Of Rage, who just released their debut LP. Cornell committed suicide last May, following a show with his primary act Soundgarden. He recorded three studio efforts and one live album with Audioslave from 2002 to 2007 before leaving the group.
Meanwhile, congrats to the band! Their self-titled debut album, released on Sep 15th by Fantasy Records, scored top chart entries in multiple countries across the globe in its first week. The album sold more than 21,000 copies in the U.S., entering Billboard’s Top 200 Album chart at No. 16. The set’s strong international chart showings include a No. 6 debut in the U.K., No. 8 in France, No. 14 in Germany, No. 4 in New Zealand and NO. 11 in Australia. (Thanks Blabbermouth)
And now….this!
Eddie Vedder takes a knee. This was at the Pilgrimage Festival Sunday night in Franklin, TN. Just prior to his second song, “Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town,” Vedder dropped to one knee as a sign of solidarity with NFL players who have protested racial inequality and are now protesting Donald Trump‘s tirade against them by kneeling during the National Anthem.
Although a relatively small amount of players followed the lead of former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick last season by taking a knee, many more players, coaches and even owners have shown a unified front in the wake of Trump’s call for players who kneel to be fired.
Pearl Jam itself also voiced its support for Kaepernick and Seattle Seahawks star linebacker Michael Bennett, who claims he was the victim of police violence while in Las Vegas last month. The band tweeted, “We support (Michael Bennett), (Colin Kaepernick), and everyone’s constitutional right to stand up, sit down, or #takeaknee for equality.”
Vedder also addressed the audience with his concerns over the nuclear brinksmanship being displayed by Trump and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, noting it would take 30 minutes for a nuclear missile to reach his home in Seattle from North Korea.Vedder told the crowd, “What would you do? You’d scream at the sky and go ‘What the f**k? How could this f**king happen? But at that point, that’s not gonna do any good whatsoever. What the f**k? Are you kidding us? Can you please stop? Just stop.”
He continued his criticism of Trump’s taunts at Kim Jong-un, saying, “We all maybe need to raise our voices. We need to request and desire diplomacy . . . It’s called, ‘Quit f**king with the lives of millions and millions of people.’”
Happy 47th to Sheri Moon Zombie!