Well, he made it! Looks like Lou Brutus had a kick ass time this weekend at Rockfest in Cadott, WI! Many thanks to the RockFest folks (especially you, Jill Brenner) and the team there for taking such great care of our guy! Pictures tell a thousand words, eh?
Be listening this week to hardDrive XL for Lou’s time at Rockfest this year.
OZZY!!!!! Ozzy Osbourne played his first solo concert since the completion of Black Sabbath‘s farewell tour on Friday night (Jul 14th) at the Rock USA festival in Oshkosh, WI. Ozzy last performed live in Feb, when Sabbath played its two final concerts in Birmingham, England to conclude its “The End” victory lap. The singer was joined for the solo show by guitarist Zakk Wylde, who was Ozzy’s regular axeman from 1988 to 2007 and is doing Ozzy’s current solo run.
Ozzy’s touring lineup also includes Rob “Blasko” Nicholson on bass, Adam Wakeman on keyboards and Tommy Clufetos on drums. Clufetos also played drums on the last two Sabbath world tours. Ozzy has spoken about recording a new solo album — his first since 2010’s Scream — but official details have yet to emerge.
Ozzy told us a while back what motivates him to keep performing live: “I was watching 60 Minutes and there was a segment on Bruce Springsteen where they asked him the same question, and he said, ‘You know what? It’s fun. It’s what I like doing. I like making them have fun and I like having fun for me by seeing them have fun.’ And it’s pretty true, you know. It’s because I just love to see the kids. It’s like a challenge for me.”
Ozzy also performed last night (Jul 16th) at the Chicago Open Air Festival and currently has only six more dates scheduled between now and early Nov. Next month will see the singer play the Buffalo Chip in Sturgis, SD, Treasure Island Resort & Casino in Welch, MN and the Moonstock festival in Cartersville, IL. More shows will follow in Sep and Oct, with the final date set for this year’s edition of Ozzfest Meets Knotfest on Nov 4th in San Bernardino, CA. (The Pulse Of Radio.)
Green Day singer/guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong has teamed up with Rancid frontman Tim Armstrong — no relation — to launch a new punk supergroup called The Armstrongs. Billie Joe’s son Joey Armstrong, who played in the punk band SWMRS, and Tim’s nephew Rey Armstrong round out the quartet, which has released its first song, called “If There Was Ever A Time.”
The Armstrongs recorded the track cut for the documentary Turn It Around: The Story Of East Bay Punk, which the members of Green Day helped produce. The film focuses on Berkeley, California’s legendary all-ages, non-profit punk venue 924 Gilman, where acts like Green Day and Rancid got their start. Limited theatrical screenings for Turn It Around: The Story Of East Bay Punk begin Jul 25th, with a New York premiere and Q&A with special guests set for Jul 28th and 29th at the IFC Center. Check out the Turn It Around site for more information.
“If There Was Ever A Time” will be released on flexi-disc through Pirates Press, limited to 1,000 copies, with all proceeds from the sale of the single benefiting 924 Gilman. The song will also available on streaming services and digital music stores.
Meanwhile, Green Day just wrapped up a European tour in support of its latest album, Revolution Radio, and will begin a North American trek on August 1st in Auburn, WA. (Thanks The Pulse Of Radio and Alternative Press.)
Blabbermouth reporting a documentary about the musical movement that came out of Seattle and came to be known as “grunge” is getting its first release on Blu-ray and an updated DVD reissue 20 years after its release. The movie, called Hype!, was directed by Doug Pray and features rare performances by Soundgarden, Pearl Jam and Nirvana — including footage of the first live performance of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” — along with many other acts. Also included are interviews with members of Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, numerous other acts and both label and management personnel involved in that seminal scene.
The new home video editions of the film are out on September 29th and will include a new audio commentary with Pray, vintage interviews and performances, outtakes, and a new featurette featuring some of the original artists in Hype! two decades later.
To this day the “Seattle scene” has had an impact on rock music. Pop Evil singer Leigh Kakaty spoke to hardDriveRadio a while back about recording the band’s last album in the same studios as Pearl Jam and Soundgarden: “There’s something special about Seattle, man. There’s something special about those places that just brought — I think it just raises your level of excellence. You don’t want to be slacking when you know all those great bands that put out such great music in these studios. So you want to, like, bring your A-game, so to speak, and I think that’s what’s special. There’s so much support.”
Hype! chronicles the history of the grunge movement from local bands playing for their friends to Sub Pop Records cornering the market on the “Seattle sound” to Nirvana hitting Number One with “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Hype! premiered in competition at the 1996 Sundance Film Festival, won Best Documentary at the Seattle International Film Festival and went on to receive wide critical acclaim and international theatrical distribution. It was listed at Number 10 among the top 25 music DVDs of all time by Rolling Stone, and one of the top 50 best music documentaries of all time by Vulture.
BTW: Pray’s most recent project is HBO’s four-part series The Defiant Ones, for which he was executive producer, writer, and editor. The Defiant Oneschronicles the rise of rap artist and mogul Dr. Dre and music industry executive Jimmy Iovine.
More news in brief:
Unfortunately, Korn has canceled its performance at the Alternative Press Music Awards. In a statement posted at its social media accounts, the band wrote, “Due to unforeseen circumstances, we are unable to perform at Monday night’s show . . . We don’t take these things lightly, and hope to see you all soon.” The 2017 APMAs are scheduled to take place tonight (Jul 17th) at 7:00 p.m. EST in Cleveland, OH. Apparently, there were not ready…. ;> !!! (The PRP)
Nine Inch Nails have announced a surprise show this Wednesday (Jul 19th) in Bakersfield, CA. The band’s first concert in three years will serve as a warm-up for its Jul 23rd performance at the FYF Fest in Los Angeles and other upcoming dates this summer and fall. The new Nine Inch Nails EP, Add Violence, is out this week. (Stereogum)
Dave Grohl has posted more outtakes online from the 2014 Sonic Highways documentary, in which he and producer Barrett Jones unearth and listen to old demos Grohl recorded at Jones’ Laundry Room studio. The clip finds Grohl and Jones listening to a pair of songs called “Watered It Down” and “Slackers Password” with Grohl reacting negatively to the former but responds more favorably to the latter. (Loudwire)
Guns N’ Roses canceled plans to visit Jerusalem after reports of violence at a holy site in the city. It was reported that “three Israeli citizens of Palestinian origin” were involved in a shootout with police at the entrance to the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif complex. All three gunmen were killed, along with two Israeli police officers. Due to security concerns, a number of events were canceled in the aftermath of the shootings, including a visit by members of Guns N’ Roses ahead of the band’s Saturday night (July 15th) concert in Tel Aviv. (Ultimate Classic Rock)
Blabbermouth reporting Alter Bridge recently announced its special Royal Albert Hall shows for early Oct, which sold out extremely fast, followed by additional U.K. and Ireland dates. Due to the great demand to get them back to Europe’s mainland, the band now can proudly announce “The Last Hero” tour all across Europe. Starting in Paris at the Elysee Montmartre, the trek leads Alter Bridge from France to the Netherlands, from Germany over Austria to Poland, Hungary, Switzerland all the way down to Spain and Portugal, where they also ended their last tour just a couple of days ago. In case you saw the band live on this past tour or at any of the summer festivals, the band’s upcoming tour will see them playing a totally different set.
Tour dates:
Oct. 02 – London, England – Royal Albert Hall
Oct. 03 – London, England – Royal Albert Hall
Oct. 05 – Edinburgh, Scotland – Usher Hall
Oct. 07 – Dublin, Ireland – Olympia
Oct. 08 – Belfast, Ireland – Ulster Hall
Oct. 10 – Paris, France – Elysee Montmartre
Oct. 11 – Groningen, Netherlands – Oosterpoort
Oct. 12 – Stuttgart, Germany – Porsche Arena
Oct. 15 – Hannover, Germany – Swiss Life Hall
Oct. 16 – Oberhausen, Germany – Turbinenhalle
Oct. 18 – Vienna, Austria – Gasometer
Oct. 20 – Warsaw, Poland – Progresja
Oct. 22 – Budapest, Hungary – Sport Arena
Oct. 24 – Zurich, Switzerland – Samsung Hall
Oct. 26 – Barcelona, Spain – Razzmatazz 1
Oct. 27 – Madrid, Spain – La Riviera
Oct. 29 – Lisbon, Portugal – Coliseu
Alter Bridge will release a new live album and rarities collection, Live At The O2 Arena + Rarities, on September 8 via Napalm Records.
Celebrating life: Geezer Butler of Black Sabbath is 68. The HOFF! David Hasselhoff is 65.
And finally today, two passings to report:
Martin Landau, the Oscar-winning actor who starred in television’s Mission: Impossible and the films North by Northwest, Ed Wood, and Crimes and Misdemeanors, died Saturday in Los Angeles. He was 89. Over the course of his career, Landau was nominated for three Academy Awards and five Emmys; his first Oscar was for his 1994 portrayal of Bela Lugosi in Tim Burton’s Ed Wood. Mission: Impossible, which also starred Landau’s wife, Barbara Bain, became an immediate hit upon its debut in 1966. It remained on the air until 1973, but Landau and Bain left at the end of the show’s third season amid a financial dispute with the producers. They starred in the British-made sci-fi series Space: 1999 from 1975 to 1977.
Legendary horror film director George A. Romero died in Toronto on Sunday from lung cancer, at age 77. Romero started the modern zombie genre in 1968 with his low-budget classic Night of the Living Dead, which he followed up with five more Dead movies and two remakes. Romero’s zombies were always social or political commentary, stand-ins for perceived political or societal ills, including racism, conformity, materialism and mall culture, and class warfare.