Ya know, there are rockstars and then there are ROCK STARS and after my session yesterday with Brent Smith of Shinedown, he is just one of the best. So kind, so smart, so just all around great guy you wish was your next door neighbor guy, ya know what I’m sayin’? Love him. Be sure you do not miss the Year End Revue on hardDrive the weekend of Dec 29-30 when Brent co-hosts with Lou Brutus….Well, with all the Instagram hate going on out there, what with the company taking your name and pictures to use in advertising on their co-owned Facebook, I’m actually GLAD I didn’t figure out how to get the picture I took over to Alice in Chains to post for the lyric video for “Hollow.” I may have told you yesterday the band has not revealed the album title for their 5th album, due in April sometime. And the first official radio single isn’t coming til the new year. But man, the song is soooo good! I love it! If you haven’t heard it yet, what are you waiting for? Hit Alice in Chains website! Dunno how long it will be posted, so check it out now!….And of course, I’ve got a daily Dave Grohl item.This one from Pulse: Soundgarden tapped the Foo Fighters frontman and documentary director yesterday (Dec 18th) to shoot the band’s new video for its song “By Crooked Steps.” (My fav!) The track is taken from Soundgarden’s first album in 16 years, King Animal, which came out last month and sold 83,000 copies in its first week of release to debut at Number Five on the Billboard album chart. Grohl has directed a number of videos for Foo Fighters, and has completed his first feature-length documentary, Sound City, which will be released Feb 1st. The film chronicles the history of the legendary Los Angeles studio where acts like Nirvana, Fleetwood Mac, Tom Petty, Metallica and many others recorded classic albums. See, I told you the guy never stops working!…Pulse Content reports Stone Sour and Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor is working on a follow-up to his best-selling 2011 memoir, Seven Deadly Sins: Settling The Argument Between Born Bad And Damaged Good. According to Brave Words, Taylor has almost completed work on his second book, which will be about ghosts. He explained, “The working title is A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Heaven, and it’s basically my experiences with ghosts, which I know is going to freak a lot of people out. It’s just about the things I’ve seen, the places I’ve lived, telling some of my friend’s stories, because it seems like everyone either has a ghost story or desperately wants one.” Taylor added he hopes to deliver the book to his publisher in the next few months and have it out by summer….Oh goodie! Tool’s webmaster posted a lengthy message online this week in which he claims the band may be “more than halfway” finished writing the music for their fifth studio effort. The webmaster wrote, “While riding with Danny (Carey, drums) to Chili John’s yesterday, I heard a lot of new Tool music (sans Maynard [James Keenan, vocals]). This was the most new material I’ve heard so far, although a few of the riffs and arrangements were familiar.” He added, “Dare I say that it sounded like . . . Tool (some of it reminiscent to earlier Tool stuff, with other parts pushing the envelope), and I assume it will sound even more like Tool once the vocal melodies, etc. have been added. To answer your next question, I cannot say how far along in the writing process the band is. If I had to GUESS, I would say more than half way (and keep in mind in the past, at least, the writing went faster once the first few [more complex] songs were finished).” So Maynard, sounds like the ball is in your court, my friend! Get crackin’! We want MORE NEW ROCK in 2013 including a NEW TOOL ALBUM AND TOUR! …..Metallica have announced they are starting to get down to the nitty gritty writing their next album, they SAY will be out in 2014! 2014!!!! Come on boys, does it really take you THIS LONG to write and record an album? Don’t you want something out by June to be able to promote it at the second annual Orion Music + More festival? I would if I were you! It confounds me when bands take years to make a record. Record a few songs and deliver them like you’re spoon feeding us. Shake things up! Give the fans something! (Are you listening, Tool?) How hard can this be? It helps keep radio strong, it helps you, hell, it might even start a movement! Perhaps writing blocks and other stigmas which surround the creative process would melt away if the machinations were changed. What do you have to lose? Albums aren’t selling like they were even 5 years ago. In the 60’s, bands would release 4 song 45’s (those were these thin black plastic things with a label on them surrounding a large hole in the middle. You would place them on this portable turntable with an arm that held a diamond point that when placed on the grooved vinyl would magically play music! And the really cool music magazines had floppy plastic inserts that you would also take and play on your turntable!) When artists did this, it would help bridge the gap between albums. It was GREAT! Maybe we should think about that! Or whatever happened to the days when you would mark your calendars the day of the release of your favorite band’s album! You would rush to the record store and buy it with your babysitting money. You would rush home, open it up, look at the cover and inner liner notes. Play the thing over and over til you knew all the words. It was great! Now, everything’s changed, hasn’t it? We need that excitement back. We need MORE NEW MUSIC from the big bands. Not less! OK, I wlll descend from my soapbox now….Deftones have rescheduled some of the dates it missed during Superstorm Sandy and added a whole bunch more. They begin in early March. See Road Rage for the deets….Serj Tankian, another workaholic, is creating the score music for a video game coming from the company Industrial Toys in early 2013 called Morning Star. Of the project Serj commented: “I’m really enjoying working on ‘Morning Star’ because it gives me the ability to create new musical worlds to complement the new visual worlds in the game. Though most of the gameplay will be action oriented cues, the stunning artwork and static scenes have inspired unique sounds unheard before.” Check out the trailer for the IOS game here. (Thanks Loudwire)….Wow, RockAccess posted a video of Hurt & Smile Empty Soul in the studio recordinga cover of Alice in Chains “No Excuses”. It’s pretty cool. Also contains pix of scenes on the road together. Check it out here.…I forgot to mention on my birthday I heard new music from the forthcoming Killswitch Engage album, which is set for an April release. HEAV-EEEE stuff! We’ll have a single in the new year… Escape the Fate have signed to Eleven Seven Records. 2013 will include a release from them too!…Later today, Lou Brutus will have CJ Pierce of Drowning Pool on the hotLine to talk all about their new singer and their great new album, Resilience, due in March or April. And they’ve just announced their tour with Flyleaf! See Road Rage…..Gotta run and wrap my Secret Santa present. Have a good day!
