Good morning Radicals! took a small break on news, but now we’re back in the DIRT! Let’s see what’s up this morning:
Metallica performed the final North American show of the “WorldWired” touring cycle on Wednesday night (March 13th) in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The band’s 18-song set closed out a run of arena shows that set several attendance records this year, including recent dates at venues in Wichita, Kansas, Raleigh, North Carolina, Tulsa, Oklahoma and Indianapolis.
The trek was the band’s second on these shores in support of the band’s 2016 Hardwired…to Self-Destruct album, following a summer stadium jaunt in 2017. The tour was Metallica’s first full-length tour of North America in eight years.
Bassist Robert Trujillo told us a while back that Metallica has striven to give fans the best show possible: “Bringing the show to life on the big stage is always great with Metallica. You know, there’s a lot of creative energy and focus that goes into that. Visual production, bringing it to life, while trying to create, you know, as much as possible something that’s intimate…just get out there and, you know, make it happen visually and sonically.”
Metallica will head to Europe and Australia later this year before likely the tour cycle for Hardwired. Trujillo hinted in a recent interview that he doesn’t the band will take up to eight years to complete its next collection of new material, as it did with Hardwired.
Red Hot Chili Peppers played a groundbreaking show on Friday (March 15th) at the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt. The entire concert was live streamed for free, marking the first time that any event has been live streamed from the last standing wonder of the ancient world.
No matter how exotic the locale, bassist Flea told us not long ago that the band approaches each show the same way: “You know, with gigs, it’s always the same for me — some are fun, some aren’t fun, but that doesn’t really matter. Actually serving the mighty tradition of performing for people is just something that I and we as a band care about deeply. So no matter what the scene is, we’re just in to go out there and tap in the source and reach into the most hardcore depths of who we are, to get what we can.”
The live stream was produced by Nugs.net, the leading distribution platform for concert recordings and live streams. CEO Brad Serling remarked, “We’ve produced live streams from some exotic places like the North Pole, but never from as magical a setting as the foot of The Great Pyramid. We’ve been releasing live recordings from the Chili Peppers for several years, so we jumped at the opportunity to broadcast the band’s historic appearance in Giza.”
The audio of the show will be released at LiveChiliPeppers.com in multiple download formats ranging from MP3 to hi-resolution audio. The Chili Peppers started releasing live recordings of every show they play in 2011 with Nugs.net, and have since added a handful of archival shows dating back to 2000 to LiveChiliPeppers.com.
System Of A Down singer Serj Tankian wrote that he was “heartbroken and depressed” after at least 49 people were killed and more than 40 people injured after at least one shooter opened fire at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand on Friday (March 15th).
Tankian, who calls New Zealand home and lives on a rural property about an hour north of Auckland, took to social media earlier today to condemn the terror attack and expressed his desire to protect New Zealand’s image as one of the safest countries in the world.
Tankian wrote, “I feel heartbroken and depressed seeing this type of hatred and violence brought to NZ’s beautiful shores. I consider this an affront to the tolerance and respect this country has always stood for. NZ may not be perfect but it is one of the most perfect places on this planet and we’re not gonna let that change.”
New Zealand police have charged a 28-year-old man with murder and have taken two others into custody. A fourth person turned out to have been arrested on an unrelated charge.
Surviving Beastie Boys Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz and Mike “Mike D” Diamond gave a keynote interview on Friday, March 15th at the South By Southwest music conference, where they revealed that they will give three events next month in New York and Philadelphia, all of which will be filmed by director Spike Jonze.
It’s unclear exactly what the shows will entail, but they will be multi-media speaking appearances and will take place on April 5th at the Tower Theater in Philadelphia and on April 8th and 9th at the Kings Theatre in Brooklyn.
The shows will be similar to last year’s “Live & Direct” mini-tour in connection with the release of the Beastie Boys Book, which topped the New York Times bestsellers list in November. The massive, nearly 600-page tome covered the entirety of the group’s career and included rare photos, original illustrations, a cookbook, a graphic novel, mixtape playlists and other surprises.
The Beastie Boys ceased recording and touring in 2012 following the death of founding member Adam “MCA” Yauch from cancer.
Motley Crue has posted its cover version of Madonna‘s 1984 hit “Like A Virgin” online. The track is one of four new recordings by the band that appear on the soundtrack of The Dirt, the Motley Crue biopic that will premiere on Netflix this Friday (March 22nd).
Crue bassist Nikki Sixx told Billboard that the idea to record “Like A Virgin” came to him while he was taking a stroll with his dogs, saying, “(It) popped in my head, and I sort of like looked up, as if to laugh at God, and went, ‘You’re pretty funny.’” Sixx initially felt it was “actually a really horrible idea” to cover the song.
Asked if Madonna knows about the cover, Sixx said, “I don’t know. She will soon, I imagine. Maybe we can get her in the video.”
The soundtrack to The Dirt, which also arrives on Friday, features 14 Crue classics such as “Dr. Feelgood” and “Girls, Girls, Girls” that all appear at significant moments in the film. In addition to the Madonna cover, the set also contains three brand new songs, including “The Dirt (Est. 1981),” “Crash And Burn” and “Ride With The Devil.”
Finally, we’d like to wish a Happy Birthday to Alice In Chains guitarist Jerry Cantrell! Have a great day everyone!
