Good morning and Happy Loving Day! For those who don’t know, June 12th is the anniversary of the Supreme Court decision that legalized interracial marriage in the US! The couple that brought the case to the highest court in the land were named Mildred and Richard Loving, a perfect name for the precedent set! Okay, now that the history lesson is over, let’s get to the music!
Today, Grammy Award-nominated and platinum Sevendust co-founder, vocalist, and guitarist Clint Lowery surprise released the Grief & Distance EP via Rise Records. Lowery recorded the five-song set entirely in quarantine at Sawhorse Studios. The EP features three brand new songs, as well as acoustic versions of “What’s The Matter” and “Kings” from Lowery’s January 2020-released, striking solo debut God Bless The Renegades.
“This EP was my way to process the loss of my mother, and the hard hit and the uncertainty of my livelihood from the pandemic,” Lowery says. “I escaped into my basement and into the songwriting process…it never fails me.”
Watch the video for the song “Distance,” which was also recorded during the lockdown, below:
Bad Wolves singer Tommy Vext has walked back comments he made in a video earlier this week, in which he promoted conspiracy theories about the origins of Black Lives Matter and downplayed the effects of racism.
On Monday (June 8th), Vext posted a video in which he offered the debunked theory that “Black Lives Matter” was created by people like George Soros, the billionaire Holocaust survivor who is the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories, along with the Clinton Foundation. Vext also asserted that racism in the U.S. is “manufactured.”
On Thursday morning (June 11th), Vext once again took to his Instagram to clarify his earlier post and to slam “certain media outlets” for allegedly “misrepresenting” his “inquiries as opinion.”
He wrote, “On Monday I shared a diagram of a theoretical scenario that was explained to me which has been widely misunderstood as my beliefs and opinion . . . Predictably certain media outlets misquoted and misrepresented my inquiries as opinions and lambasted me to serve their own purposes making the video go viral.”
Meanwhile, Bad Wolves guitarist Doc Coyle said that he “wholeheartedly disagree(s)” with the contents of Vext’s video but that there was no trouble brewing within the band.
Several hours after Vext’s “clarification” was posted online, Coyle took to his social media to write, “While it should be noted that I advocate for free speech and don’t want to censor anyone, I wholeheartedly disagree with the content of this video . . . Thankfully, today Tommy offered a retraction/clarification on his thoughts on the matter and the video has been deleted. That means a lot to me.”
After apologizing “to anyone who was hurt,” Coyle continued, “Some in the media will exploit this as a flashy band-feud, but Tommy and I have spoken. We’ve heard each other, and that’s what this time should be about. Listening to one another . . . I offer solidarity to those addressing historical and systemic racial inequities in this country.”
Bad Wolves is currently sitting at Number Two on the rock radio chart with “Sober,” from the band’s second album, N.A.T.I.O.N.
Metallica will release a document of last year’s S&M2 concerts, in which the band performed alongside the San Francisco Symphony, as a box set this August.
Drummer Lars Ulrich announced the release Wednesday night (June 10th) on Jimmy Kimmel Live! when he surprised Long Island nurse and Metallica fan Tracy Bednar during the host’s #HealthCareHero segment. Bednar told the host that she unwinds from her stressful job, in which she treats children who have COVID-19, by listening to Metallica loudly on the radio.
Bednar was visibly shocked and delighted to see Ulrich, who promised her the first signed copy of the S&M2 set. The drummer also invited Bednar out to the next Metallica concert in her area, whenever that is, saying, “I look forward to meeting you and thanking you in person for everything that you do.”
Last September, Metallica performed two nights with the San Francisco Symphony, revisiting songs they’d recorded with that ensemble 20 years earlier for their original S&M release and working up new arrangements for a variety of other songs.
Ulrich told us that doing things like the orchestral shows keep the band energized and engaged when they are not recording new music: “We certainly never want to turn into a nostalgia band, but at the same time, you’ve got to keep yourself, I guess, creatively alive and that’s what we do by playing these gigs and doing all these other projects and doing movies and festivals. I mean, it’s just, all that stuff’s a lot of fun, but it takes a lot of time, you know.”
Bush main man Gavin Rossdale spoke about his decision to make the band’s new album a heavier affair in a new interview with Los Angeles radio station KLOS.
Rossdale said about the band’s upcoming eighth LP, The Kingdom, “When I made this record, it was after two years of getting my life back on track, of touring, getting great new management. It just felt like the right thing to do, having played live so much.”
Rossdale continued, “I wasn’t interested in making songs or making a record that I don’t expect to be in the set. (I didn’t want to) make some midtempo ballads, get that done, get the record out, and then go play the old songs. That’s the opposite of what I want.”
The Kingdom is due out on July 17th and follows up 2017’s Black And White Rainbows. Rossdale said about that record, which was written in the wake of his divorce from Gwen Stefani, “It came out at a really difficult time in my life and (had) some really heavy moments on it. There were some achingly sad songs on there . . . it was a really hard time in my life, as anyone who’s got divorced knows.”
The first single from The Kingdom, “Flowers On A Grave,” was unveiled in March. The group, which broke up in 2002 but reunited in 2010, has released three albums since reforming.
Past and present members of Breaking Benjamin, Crobot, Candlebox and other acts have united to record a cover of Temple Of The Dog‘s 1991 classic “Hunger Strike.”
The song is part of Cold guitarist Nick Coyle‘s “Corona Sessions” series, which features a rotating list of all-star musicians recording in quarantine. The track features Coyle and Crobot’s Brandon Yeagley on vocals, ex-Breaking Benjamin members Aaron Fink on guitar and Chad Szeliga on drums, Crobot’s Chris Bishop on guitar, and Candlebox‘s Brian Quinn and Adam Kury on acoustic guitar and bass respectively.
According to Coyle, his mission for the project is to “bring artists together despite social distancing and offer fans a sense of inclusiveness during these troubling times.”
Coyle said he and the musicians specifically selected “Hunger Strike” not only because of its importance to the 1990s music scene and the impact it had on each of them as musicians, but because of the relevance it still has today.
Prior to “Hunger Strike,” Coyle released a rendition of Filter‘s hit “Take A Picture” with past and present members of Filter, Cold, Breaking Benjamin and others.
A Los Angeles group called Sons Of Silver will release its third EP, titled Doomsday Noises, on June 26th. The group has previewed the set with two singles and videos, “Read ‘Em Their Rights” and “World On Fire.”
The band features original Pearl Jam drummer Dave Krusen, along with former Skillet guitarist Kevin Haaland, ex-Candlebox bassist Adam Kury, singer Peter Argyropoulos and keyboardist Brina Kabler.
Krusen left Pearl Jam after completing its 1991 debut LP Ten due to his struggle with alcoholism. He got sober and managed to continue a career that included stints with Candlebox and other artists. He told us a while back what he learned from his time with Pearl Jam: “I learned to get my act together, as far as personally, you know? And take care of whatever demons I had that were kind of running my life at the time. And just to be, like, grateful that you get another shot at it. To get one shot is amazing, and to, like, get any other shots at it, you know, you should be glad you’re doing it and make the most of it.”
Argyropoulos said about the EP’s timely title, “There’s a lot of ‘shouting’ going on in the world at the moment, a lot of bullying, a lot of pontificating. The noise is deafening. These are the sounds of societal transformation. But they can easily be misinterpreted as social collapse. We probably should’ve put a question mark at the end of the phrase.”
Sons Of Silver have released two previous EPs and a 2017 album called Tender Souls.
That’s a wrap, everyone have a lovely weekend!
