Search Results for: folk

R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck is a bit miffed that the group’s newer music doesn’t get much air time. “We do really good work, and I hate to brag but our records are better than most people’s records,” Buck told reporters. “So sometimes it kind of hurts my feelings when I see a record that is obviously a piece of garbage, and everyone knows its garbage, and the guy can’t sing, and then we put out a really good record and they don’t put it on the radio because it doesn’t fit the formats.” R.E.M. is releasing a greatest hits album… Read more »

John Mellencamp has lashed out at PresidentGeorge W. Bush and America’s foreign policy. In an open letter he co-wrote with his wife Elaine, Mellencamp blasts the powers that be for demonizing as “anti-American and unpatriotic” anyone who questions the policies of the U.S. government and the war in Iraq. Mellencamp uses words and phrases like “systematically lied to,” “the political ‘hijacking’ of Iraq,” “this misadventure,” and “the globe’s leading bully. Arrogant and thoughtless” to describe the current situation, before writing, “Now, each day, as the dust settles and the truth slowly surfaces, more and more people come to the inevitable… Read more »

The music industry is hoping that the availability of child pornography on peer-to-peer networks such as Kazaa will help put file sharing out of business. Record executives have been frustrated that Congress hasn’t acted to curb piracy on these services, but some are now optimistic that lawmakers will intervene. “This is like Al Capone and taxes, which is how the government got him,” says Jimmy Iovine, chairman of Interscope Records. “This shows peer-to-peers for what they really are.” At a September 9th Senate hearing on the connection between porn and peer-to-peer, Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, warned about the “great risk… Read more »

The pressures on a frontman are fierce. Besides remembering the words and singing in key, you have to look cool. Keep the guitar slung low. Get close to the mic and sneer. Don’t be afraid to windmill. But what if you’re a singer without an axe to wield? Good luck trying to make like Pete Townshend with a piano, but somehow Andrew McMahon pulls it off. “I think it’s the whole idea of not trying to look cool,” he offered as an explanation of why he appears just the opposite when leading his band, Something Corporate. “I don’t think that… Read more »

Robert Palmer, the well-tailored British rock singer who created one of the first iconic music videos with the look-alike models of “Addicted to Love,” has died of a heart attack. He was 54. A two-time Grammy winner in the 1980s, the star behind the hit “Simply Irresistible” died of a heart attack Friday at a Paris hotel during a stopover after a promotional tour in Britain, manager Mick Cater said. Sporting designer suits and a thick mane of hair, Palmer shot to fame in the mid-’80s with two videos featuring a “backup band” of dark-haired women in black miniskirts strumming… Read more »

George Harrison, Prince, John Mellencamp and Jackson Browne are among those who’ve made the list of nominees for the 2004 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ballot, a hall of fame spokesperson confirmed Monday. Artists are eligible for induction 25 years after the release of their first record. Criteria for consideration include “the influence and significance of the artist’s contributions to the development and perpetuation of rock and roll,” according to the organization. Several names that have not made the hall before are back for another try, including the Sex Pistols, Lynyrd Skynyrd, ZZ Top, country rock legend Gram Parsons,… Read more »

Jewel has canceled her North American tour due to the death of her bass player, her record company announced Thursday. Terome “T-Bone” Hannon died Sept. 4 after suffering a stroke. The Detroit native, who was 39, had played with Jewel for three years. “T-Bone was a phenomenal player and we all loved him,” Jewel said in a statement released by Atlantic Records. “We are all just in shock and hurt.” The tour had been set to begin on Sept. 19 in North Charleston, S.C. Although Jewel will not perform with her band, Atlantic said she plans to perform alone at… Read more »

Singer-songwriter Warren Zevon, who battled death with the same twisted sense of humor found in his songs “Life’ll Kill Ya,” “Werewolves of London” and “Excitable Boy,” has lost his yearlong fight against lung cancer at age 56. Zevon, among the wittiest and most original of a broad circle of performers to emerge from Los Angeles in the 1970s, died in his sleep Sunday at his home, publicist Carise Yatter said. “I’m just glad it was quick and he didn’t have to suffer for much more time,” said Zevon’s music producer friend Jorge Calderon, who worked with the singer on a… Read more »

It looks like Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel are reuniting for a concert tour. The former duo has reserved dates at concert arenas across the country, said Gary Bongiovanni, editor of Pollstar, a concert industry trade publication. And they were scheduled to make a “very special announcement” at a New York nightclub on Tuesday, publicists said. There has been talk of a tour since Simon & Garfunkel performed together to open the Grammy Awards ceremony in February, and they’ve done the logistical groundwork, Bongiovanni said. “Everyone’s been expecting it,” he said. “It was still in the speculative stages, because you… Read more »

The Jagermeister Fall Music Tour is coming, and heavy metal icons, Slayer, will lead the assault! Produced and promoted by Clear Channel Entertainment, the tour will let loose on October 8th in Minneapolis, MN and finish up in Los Angeles on November 29th. Slayer’s recent release of their live DVD, War at the Warfield (American Recordings/UME), debuted at #3 on the Billboard charts in its first week. Their highly anticipated box set, Soundtrack to the Apocalypse (American Recordings/UME), due out on November 18, 2003, commemorates Slayer’s 20th anniversary as the undisputed thrash/punk/metal kings and will include classic Slayer tracks taken… Read more »