Good morning Radicals! Here’s what’s happening today in music news:
Tool performed two new songs, “Descending” and “Invincible,” as part of its headlining set on Sunday night (May 5th) at the Welcome To Rockville festival in Jacksonville, Florida.
Although Tool has previously played an instrumental version of “Descending” live, Sunday night’s concert marked the first performance of the completed song with lyrics and vocals sung by frontman Maynard James Keenan.
“Descending” and “Invincible” are both expected to appear on Tool’s long-awaited follow-up to 2006’s 10,000 Days album. There’s still no official release date for the disc, but Keenan said in February, “Best ballpark guess — release date somewhere between mid-May and mid-July. More focused updates to follow as we progress.”
The show kicked off a string of festival and headlining dates for the band. Drummer Danny Carey told us a while back that it always takes a little time for Tool to find its groove onstage: “Live-wise, yeah, it always takes a week or two before you really start having that feeling in a band when you’re breathing together, you know, and the songs really start taking on a life of their own. But we rehearse enough, you know, before we head out that it reaches a bare minimum where we think it’s gonna get the job done, even before we reach our ideal of perfection, I guess you’d say.”
Tool next plays on Tuesday night (May 7th) in Birmingham, Alabama.
As rumored last month, Hellyeah has officially recruited Stone Sour‘s Roy Mayorga as its new drummer. The band issued a statement on Monday (May 6th), saying, “Please welcome our dear friend and brother Roy Mayorga, who will be guesting behind the drum kit as we honor our brother Vinnie Paul. These men had so much love and mutual respect for each other, this makes our transition so much easier. Ready or not, here we come!”
Mayorga will follow in the footsteps of founding Hellyeah drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott, who passed away in June 2018 from heart disease. The legendary Pantera and Damageplan drummer was just 54 years old.
Word of Mayorga’s involvement with Hellyeah gained strength last month after Mayorga posted two Instagram photos of his new drum setup, which some deemed “very Vinnie Paul-like.” Mayorga previously played with Hellyeah bassist Kyle Sanders in Medication, which also featured members of Ugly Kid Joe and Machine Head.
In March, Hellyeah released the official music video for a new song titled “333.” The track is taken from the band’s sixth album, which is due later in the year. The LP will mark the group’s final effort with Abbott, who recorded his drum tracks before his death.
Mayorga will make his live debut with Hellyeah on Saturday (May 11th) at the House Of Blues in Las Vegas, Nevada, where the band will celebrate Abbott’s life with a special performance.
Breaking Benjamin frontman Benjamin Burnley has told Consequence Of Sound that he’s been working on an acoustic LP while the band has been touring. Burnley explained that the disc will have “Breaking Benjamin songs done acoustic, plus two or three new songs. We’re working on arrangements and strings on there, so it’s been a lot of fun, and we’re looking forward to it coming out.”
Burnley told Music Mayhem last December that he hopes to eventually incorporate the acoustic material into the band’s rock show. Burnley told us a while back that the hardest part about playing live these days is coming up with a set list: “The old saying holds true here that you can’t please everyone all the time, you know. We basically have to do a trial/error with the album and try different songs to see the reaction of each one and then we’ll kind of cater our set list as we go along. To play something new means that I would have to not play something old. So that’s probably what’s gonna happen, you know — just older songs will get replaced with newer songs.”
Breaking Benjamin continues to tour in support of its sixth studio album, Ember. The disc debuted at Number Three on the Billboard 200 chart and has yielded two chart-topping rock radio hits with singles “Red Cold River” and “Torn In Two,” which became the band’s eighth and ninth Number One singles to date.
The quintet will embark on a North American headlining tour later this summer. Special guests such as Chevelle, Three Days Grace, Dorothy and Diamante will appear on select dates. The 35-city outing kicks off July 21st in St. Louis and will wrap up on September 25th in Salt Lake City.
Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale has told Consequence Of Sound that the band is putting the finishing touches on its next album at a Los Angeles studio with producer Tyler Bates, who has previously worked with Marilyn Manson.
Rossdale remarked, “The whole record is really heavy. I decided to make a really heavy record. The last record I made was a bit more commercially minded because for whatever reason, I wanted to do that. But this time I was (inspired by) playing so many live shows and all these heavy metal festivals.”
Rossdale confirmed that the band has finished laying down its tracks for the record, which needs to be mixed and mastered for a fall release. He added, “It’s going to devastate people.”
Bush will hit the road with Live later this spring on “The Alt-Imate Tour,” on which the two bands will celebrate the 25th anniversary of their respective landmark albums Sixteen Stone and Throwing Copper. The 33-city trek kicks off June 6th in Mashantucket, Connecticut, wrapping on September 8th in Rochester, Michigan.
Incubus has announced that it will hit the road to celebrate the 20th anniversary of its platinum-selling 1999 album Make Yourself. The California act will take the “20 Years Of Make Yourself & Beyond” tour to 39 cities across the country, playing songs from that era as well as other songs spanning its entire eight-album career.
Make Yourself was Incubus’ third full-length LP and the band’s commercial breakthrough. Singer Brandon Boyd told us a while back that it took the band a long time to reach that peak: “Our career has been a series of small goals that we have reached for. There was never just one huge, big break for us where someone handed us something. We’ve sweated this thing out almost ’til, like, the death. It’s been great fun, it’s been an incredible experience but it’s been a lot of hard work too, a lot of dedication.”
The trek will begin on Friday, September 13th in Denver, Colorado and will conclude on Saturday, December 7th in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Tickets for the tour will go on sale to the general public starting Friday (May 10th) at 10:00 a.m. local time at LiveNation.com. Fan presales will begin on Tuesday (May 7th), also at 10:00 a.m.
The band will celebrate the tour announcement with a launch event at the Troubadour in Los Angeles on Wednesday (May 8th). The band will also launch a pop-up merch shop featuring new custom merch items at Brooklyn Projects on Melrose Avenue, also in Los Angeles.
Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl jumped behind a drum kit for a performance of Thin Lizzy’s “Jailbreak” and Motörhead’s “Bomber” during a surprise appearance at the fifth annual “Ride For Ronnie” motorcycle ride and concert. The event, held annually in tribute to late legendary singer Ronnie James Dio, took place on Sunday (May 5th) in Encino, California.
Grohl’s appearance at “Ride For Ronnie” apparently wasn’t pre-planned, with the former Nirvana drummer not knowing about the event until a fan approached him in a grocery store and asked if he was going. Grohl replied, “Now I am.” Despite no rehearsals or any advanced notice, Grohl ripped through the two songs with a backing band that also featured former Buckcherry guitarist Keith Nelson, current Thin Lizzy vocalist Ricky Warwick and bassist Robbie Crane.
Grohl spoke at the event, saying, “I am here on this beautiful day in Encino (because) everybody loves Ronnie James Dio. He was my neighbor actually; we lived down the street from each other. I encourage everybody to come out and support the cause, because it’s a beautiful day with a bunch of beautiful people and we hope to see you next year.”
Ride For Ronnie launched in 2015 to raise awareness and money for the Ronnie James Dio Stand Up and Shout Cancer Fund. The event includes a giant motorcycle ride that starts in Glendale, California and ends at Los Encinos Park, where the concert was held. Last year, Ride For Ronnie raised $50,000 for the Cancer Fund. Dio, who sang for Rainbow, Black Sabbath and his own self-named band, died of stomach cancer in 2010 at the age of 67.