Good morning Radicals! Hope everyone had a pleasant weekend. Here’s what’s up in the world of rock!
Foo Fighters released a surprise new song called “Run,” accompanied by a music video, on Thursday morning, June 1st. The clip, directed by Foos main man Dave Grohl, shows the band members as elderly rockers playing in an old age home. Grohl called into Los Angeles radio station KROQ to discuss the song, saying, “It’s something that we came up with not too long ago, maybe three or four months ago. We’re about to go out and do a bunch of shows this summer so we kind of felt weird going out on tour without anything new to play, so we thought we’d offer this up before we go out.”
Grohl said that the band, which is playing a string of European dates this summer, was itching to get back on the road, explaining, “We haven’t been on the road in a couple of years and we miss it, so we’re going back out . . . We’re restless the way we work. We’re actually friends too, so we keep in touch when we’re not on tour. We just like to play, so we’ll get together and jam and write. We have our own studio so we’ll record stuff every now and then, but we do miss playing.”
In other Grohl related news, Dave said in a new interview with Beats One that Them Crooked Vultures — the supergroup he founded in 2009 with Queens Of The Stone Age’s Josh Homme and Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones — could possibly return one day. Asked about a potential revival for the power trio, Grohl said, “We do talk about it. Every once in a while, you’ll be up at night drinking a bottle of wine by yourself, and you’ll watch some Crooked Vultures live thing on YouTube and go, ‘We were so good!’ and then we’ll text each other saying, ‘Miss you man!’”
Them Crooked Vultures released its self-titled debut album in 2009 and toured behind it, although plans for a follow-up in 2011 never came to be. Grohl told us at the time of the first album’s release that the project was pure fun for him: “It’s easy to be in a band like this, because not only is it fun, but it works. And it works well. I think the less we talk or think about anything, the better it works, you know. So to make the album was, it was really, really easy, and fun.”
Also in the Beats One interview, Grohl confirmed that longtime Foo Fighters keyboardist Rami Jaffee is now an official member of the group. Although Jaffee has been part of the lineup for some 14 years, he is now listed as a member and appearing in band photos. Grohl said, “He’s such a big part of the band too. He’s amazing, if you’ve ever hung out with him, he’s the sweetest guy in the world. He’s one of the most talented people I’ve ever met.” An official welcome to you, Rami!
System Of A Down opened its latest tour on Thursday night (June 1st) in Zurich, Switzerland with a 31-song set that included four tunes the band has not played live in more than a decade. Two of those tracks, “Violent Pornography” and “This Cocaine Makes Me Feel Like I’m On This Song,” made their first live appearances since 2006, while “Highway Song” was played for the first time since 2005.
But the biggest surprise was a performance of “Pictures,” a cut from 2002’s Steal This Album! that has not been played live since 2000 — before that record even came out.
Despite not releasing a new album since 2005 and touring only sporadically since 2011, System Of A Down retains a loyal fan following, a fact guitarist Daron Malakian told us a while back he appreciated: “The fans treat us good. They show up! You know what I mean? They have a lot of nice things to say in different ways. We owe a lot to those people, man. I think they’re the most important part of any band.”
System drummer John Dolmayan said in a recent interview that it was “very disheartening” that the band hasn’t released a new album in nearly 12 years, adding, “I don’t know why we aren’t coming out with an album . . . it seems like we all get along, we all have a great time touring, we still are putting together really good music.”
Dolmayan revealed in a 2016 interview with Kerrang! magazine that System Of A Down had written more than a dozen new songs for a possible follow-up to Mezmerize and Hypnotize, which came out in 2005.
The band went on hiatus in the fall of that year, although they have toured most summers since 2011. The group is now playing summer festivals and select headline dates in Europe through July.
If you don’t have enough YouTube videos to watch today, here’s some more musical goodness for your ears and eyes: First, the surviving members of Audioslave, who now play in Prophets Of Rage, were joined onstage at Germany’s Rock Im Ring festival on Saturday, June 3rd by System Of A Down singer Serj Tankian for a tribute to late Audioslave and Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell. With Prophets vocalists Chuck D and B-Real flanking them, Tankian, guitarist Tom Morello, bassist Tim Commerford and drummer Brad Wilk performed Audioslave’s “Like A Stone.” Tankian and Cornell both contributed music to the recent film The Promise.
As Lions, the band fronted by Austin Dickinson — son of Iron Maiden singer Bruce Dickinson — has released a lyric video for “World On Fire,” the follow-up to its first single, “Aftermath.” Both tracks can be found on the group’s recently released debut album, Selfish Age. “Aftermath” is Number 12 on the rock radio chart and climbing.
In This Moment has unveiled a new live music video for their song, “Oh Lord.” The clip features footage of the band performing at this year’s Carolina Rebellion festival last month in Concord, North Carolina. “Oh Lord” is the first single from In This Moment’s recently announced sixth studio album, Ritual, which comes out on July 21st.
Finally, happy birthday to Iron Maiden drummer Niko McBrain, Aaron “P-Nut” Wills, bassist for 311, Pete Wentz of Fall Out Boy and Mark Whalberg! Have a great day everybody!