Heading back to the office today and I am happy to be saying that! Sucks when you’re illin’!!!..And on a programming note, come on folks, Smash or Crash is BEGGING for your votes! This week, it’s Avenged Sevenfold vs Kid Rock! Get on over to the home page and get voting! And while I’m on the subject, have you made sure you’ve registered to VOTE on Nov 6th? It’s Election Day and it’s your civic duty to get out and make your voice heard! No belly-aching when it’s all said and done, ok? www.rockthevote.org… Pulse of Radio reports Linkin Park will stage the seventh annual LP Underground Summit on Nov 7th in Cape Town, South Africa. Ever since it began holding these fan gatherings, the band has varied the locations to give fans in as many parts of the world as possible a chance to participate. Past summits have taken place in London, Sydney, Chicago, Hamburg, Tokyo, and Camden, New Jersey. This marks the first time Linkin Park itself has visited South Africa, and singer Chester Bennington told us he couldn’t be more excited to go: “I’m really looking forward to that. We’ve been invited there so many times in the past and we just haven’t been able to make it work. So I’m really stoked that we’ll be able to do that.” Each summit features the band offering meet and greets, backstage tours, the opportunity for fans to jam on their gear or walk across their stage, soundcheck entry, Q&A sessions and acoustic performances. Passes for the event, as in the past, are available for free only to members of the LP Underground official fan club. They will become available tomorrow (Oct 19th)….Just heard the Deftones will be having a throw-down party Nov 13th in Dallas, TX as they celebrate the release of the new album, Koi No Yokan. The members will be DJing at their party (well, at least Frank will, maybe the other guys too, but somehow I don’t see Abe or Steph as DJ’s!) Anyhow, sounds like fun! I’ll be talking to Chino when the band comes to NYC on the 29th…The Red Hot Chili Peppers performed in bass player Flea‘s backyard on Tuesday (Oct 16th), both to celebrate his 50th birthday and to raise money for the Silver Lake Conservatory, the non-profit music school he founded 11 years ago in Los Angeles. Flea told Rolling Stone before the event started, “For this to happen on my 50th birthday tonight is the best gift I could ever hope to receive.” Nice!….Go get ’em boys! Van Halen bassist Wolfgang Van Halen, current touring bassist for Mark Tremonti‘s solo band, has gotten into a beef with boy band One Direction. According to Ultimate Guitar, Van Halen called out the group on Twitter after a run-in with them at a hotel in Birmingham, England, where Tremonti is on tour at the moment with Slash. Van Halen wrote, “Fun fact: Was just insulted by that sh**ty boy band #OneDirection in the lobby of our hotel this morning!” He continued, “No joke. That ACTUALLY happened. That group of kids in #OneDirection were d**kheads to (Tremonti band members guitarist Eric Friedman, drummer Garrett Whitlock) and I.” Van Halen later joked, “They must call themselves that because all of their hair points in #OneDirection.” Whitlock later tweeted, “Had a run in with some boy band in the hotel lobby. no worries. I can’t take a insult from someone who doesn’t even write there own tunes.” HA! Serves ’em right!…..Puse also reports Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi, singer Ozzy Osbourne and bassist Geezer Butler are continuing to work with producer Rick Rubin on their first album together in 34 years. according to Metal Injection. Some 15 songs have reportedly been written for the project, with 12 likely to make the final cut and the other three put aside as bonus tracks for various special editions. The site has also confirmed that one of the songs is called “God Is Dead.” No release date has been announced yet. I guess I hadn’t heard Rubin was working with them. Seems odd they would turn to him for this, but ok. I really hope the band can come to some reasonable terms with Bill Ward, don’t you???….Loudwire is where I got these two stories: Nine Inch Nails main man Trent Reznor is teaming up with rap legend Dr. Dre to contribute to the latter’s Beats By Dre company, which makes headphones and other high-end audio products. Reznor posted that he’s partnering with Dre on several projects that will begin arriving in 2013, writing, “I have been wanting to experiment and focus my energy and creativity in some different directions, and Beats has afforded me that very opportunity. The process has been challenging and fascinating and as much as I’d like to tell you about the things we’ve dreamed up . . . I just can’t.
Not yet.” Reznor’s How To Destroy Angels musical project will release an EP in November. (Editor’s note: Trent and Dre once both recorded for the same label, Interscope, back in the 90’s, where they first met up and admired each other’s work. Cool stuff)…..And I’m glad this happened: DJ Lethal has rejoined rap-rock act Limp Bizkit after parting ways with the band earlier this year, allegedly over his hard-partying ways on and off the road. Now Lethal has issued an apology to his bandmates and returned to the lineup for their next album, writing online, “I have had some personal issues over the last few years that have led to some outbursts. I lot of the things I said about the band and Fred (Durst, frontman) was out of pain and anger. None of which I really meant deep down inside . . . Today is the day that I can finally be a man and step up and say I’m sorry.” Say what you will about Limp Bizkit. If you were a former fan and you see them live again, those feelings will come back fo’ sho’ as the band is t-aight as evah! Good luck to them, as there is a release pending in the coming months. And Fred directed a really good film called “The Education of Charlie Banks” that is a must-see. Find it on NetFlix…..See Road Rage for a new tour with Theory of a Deadman, Adelitas Way and Charm City Devils! Kicks off tomorrow! (Thanks RockAccess)…Five Finger Death Punch new video for “The Pride” is here…And Stone Sour is dropping snippets off their forthcoming “House of Gold and Bones-Part 1” which is coming out on Tuesday! See the band’s website. And they have a date Oct 28th in Des Moines! Happy Halloween indeed!..Happy 86th Birthday to the originator of rock, Mr Chuck Berry! The man, the myth, the legend!
