Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2025 i Classic Rock

he frontman for acclaimed Cleveland-based experimental rock band Pere Ubu, and formerly T Rocket From The Tombs, has died at the age of 71 following a long illness. The experimental, boundary-breaking Pere Ubu formed in Cleveland, Ohio in 1975. Thomas, their only constant member, described the group’s raucous, free-wheeling sound as “avant-garage”. Rolling Stone described their influential 1978 debut album The Modern Dance as “harsh and wilfully ugly”. Writing in Classic Rock in 2004, Malcolm Dome said it was “a touchstone of art-rock genius, a true masterpiece… Without this album, much of the more esoteric rock music recorded in the decades since would have simply remained unheard”. In fact, Thomas himself once claimed that Pere Ubu were actually a mainstream act, declaring: “You can trace a straight line from the…

John Corabi is perhaps best known for his short spell fronting Mötley Crüe in the 90s, but his career has seen plenty of twists and turns. Currently the affable Philadelphia rocker is the with The Dead Daisies, having left in 2019 to rejoin in 2023. The band released their seventh album, Light ’Em Up, in 2024, and are about to release a covers record, Lookin’ For Trouble, full of Daisy-fied takes on blues standards. We caught up with Corabi. You had a few years away. Is anything different with the Daisies of today? Honestly, it’s like I never left. From joining the band [in 2015], it was tour, tour, tour, do a record, then back on tour. I felt like I needed to tap out for a second. But we…

A collection of seven complete records made by Bruce Springsteen between 1983 and 2018 – 82 previously unreleased songs, 74 of which have never been heard – with the title Tracks II: The Lost Albums is released on June 27 via Columbia Records. “The Lost Albums were full records, some of them even to the point of being mixed and not released,” Springsteen explains. “I’ve played this music to myself and often close friends for years now. I’m glad you’ll get a chance to finally hear them. I hope you enjoy them. “I often read about myself in the 1990s as having some ‘lost period’,” he says in a promo video. “Not really. I was working the whole time.” The set is available in limited-edition nine-LP and seven-CD formats, including…

To chat with When Rivers Meet is to bask in the warm, friendly energy of Grace and Aaron Bond. Based on the Essex coastline (but very much ‘have van, will travel’ sorts), the couple’s staunchly independent blues-rock band has been making some serious waves of late. In less than a decade their mixture of soul-soaked blues and gritty, swaggering rock has taken them from the most humble beginnings as a function duo playing pubs to the upper echelons of the charts. Not that it’s changed them one iota. The title track from their new album, Addicted To You, is about them, Aaron says. “We’ve been together for over twenty years and we’re still like that.” “Maybe that’s what makes it work,” Grace adds. They often finish each other’s sentences. “We’re…

When did the idea for the Back To The Beginning show come about? We’ve been working on it for a year and a half. It came because Ozzy kept saying that his one big regret was that he didn’t get to say thank you and goodbye to his fans. He just felt terrible about it. I was thinking: “How can we do that? How can we make that happen?” And our good mates at LiveNation came forward. I couldn’t have done it without them. How important was it that Bill Ward was involved in this? It was important to Ozzy. It was very important to him. We’re just delighted he said yes. Ozzy’s very, very happy. Why did you ask Tom Morello to act as musical director? Tom’s been incredible. I’ve…

When Rivers Meet Addicted To You ONE ROAD In a modern industry where good bands drop like flies, it’s been heartening to chart the rise of When Rivers Meet from the greenhorn circuit to something approaching mainstream contention. The uptick is no mystery, with Grace and Aaron Bond not only oozing star aura – like The White Stripes reimagined by Tim Burton – but also going beyond the dead-eyed blues dogma that keeps less imaginative artists playing for the mullet-and-bumbag crowd in mainland Europe. The opening title track underlines all that. Dancing between fuzzy riffs, psych wiggery and prog harmonies, it feels like three songs in one, all of them excellent. Still Standing nixes the notion that you should choose a time signature and stick to it. Coming Up For Air…

Lookin’ For Trouble SPV Musical collective kick back down south with blues covers album. Traditionally, when a band has a little spare studio time while recording an album, they knock out a B-side or two. That is, if they’re not using those precious hours to indulge in extra-curricular activities long associated with the profession. While John Corabi, David Lowy and friends were finishing the recording of last year’s Dead Daisies album of originals Light ’Em Up, though, they felt sufficiently inspired by the heritage of their surroundings in Fame Studios, Muscle Shoals, Alabama, to jam a few blues numbers while the mood took them. It might not be the most original idea ever to occur to a band, and anyone who has endured less-than-inspired blues-rock covers in public houses across…

Live! EDSEL Classic live double repackaged in eight-CD set with three full show recordings. It has been suggested now and then that Status Quo tracks can sound a little, well, samey. But that’s only to those who don’t appreciate them. Yet even Quo diehards might find largely the same set of songs performed four times in the same box set (two of which are literally identical) a little repetitive. Nonetheless, as a polished up re-release of a classic live album, a careful remastering of these recordings from Glasgow Apollo in October 1976 (with all three nights’ full performances thrown in), it does a handsome job, heightening the best qualities of the original without smoothing off any essential rough edges. People often refer to Quo as being ‘at the peak of…

Simon Goddard OMNIBUS Latest in a series of BowieOdyssey series is another engaging triumph. This is the sixth in Simon Goddard’s series of near-flawless Bowie Odyssey books, and once more the reader is caught, enraptured, ensnared right from the opening sentences. Those opening sentences are about Bowie’s mum. Of course they are. Why wouldn’t they be? Rule number one of writing: tell a story. They mumble in whispers thinking she won’t be able to hear them. But for a woman of 61 she has remarkably sharp ears. And eyes. She spotted them the moment she picked up her basket in Sainsbury’s… The chapter teases, lively and sad and open-eyed with a childish sense of wonder. “Look mum. I’ve made a record with a Beatle” (and not just any Beatle), before…

“I’m always conscious of what we played the last time in a city. This time, with no new album to promote, I can relax and pull out some deep cuts.” Known for a sultry fusion of blues, country, rock and folk, Bonnie Raitt has been releasing albums since 1971. Almost two decades later, her career went stellar with the multi-platinum album Nick Of Time. Its follow-up, 1991’s Luck Of The Draw, included the über ballad I Can’t Make You Love Me later covered by George Michael, Adele and many more. The Californian-born singer, guitarist and political activist previews her 10 British and Irish shows. Having toured here two years ago, this is a fairly speedy return. I wanted to play more than one city in Scotland, and other places in…

The original Alice Cooper Band have regrouped for their first album since 1973’s Muscle Of Love. The Revenge Of Alice Cooper is set for release on July 25 via EarMusic. It has Alice on vocals, of course, plus rhythm guitarist Michael Bruce, bassist Dennis Dunaway and drummer Neal Smith, with a posthumous appearance from lead guitarist Glen Buxton, who died in 1997. It was produced by Bob Ezrin, who helped to make the band’s classic early releases. “This album is a celebration of friendship, nostalgia, and the timeless sound that solidified Alice Cooper as a rock icon,” the band say in a statement. “Expect a powerful and nostalgic experience that bridges the gap between our storied past and the present.” In another surprise, drummer Kenney Jones has revealed that the…

My name is Alan Niven. I am going to tell you some stories. Random rock’n’roll stories. Populated by an interesting cavalcade of characters. Among them are Guns N’ Roses. I took them from the gutters of Sunset Boulevard to Wembley Stadium. I took Great White from the backwater clubs of Orange County to Wembley Arena. Along the way we all joined the parade of misfits and madmen that strut and fret their hour upon their stage. Every story paints a picture. Of personality. Of an event. I hope that at least they will amuse. At best they might contain the germ of wisdom’s insight. Iz made the move to the city first. He packed his suitcase and went to lay the foundation of a band. Rattlesnake hide or not, you…

“When I was younger I was obsessed with becoming a celebrity,” Tobias Forge admits. “It came with the trade I wanted to be in – a successful musician.” A surprising admission, perhaps, for a man who has built his success fronting Swedish theatrical hard rockers Ghost while wearing a succession of ornate masks, his face obscured, accompanied by a band referred to as Nameless Ghouls. His true identity was revealed officially only in 2017, and not by choice, after former ghouls broke ranks to complain about more earthly matters such as financial remuneration. Now, although this bearded 44-year-old has regularly been seen out of costume talking about his work (usually in a death-metal T-shirt and jeans, although choosing not to go on camera for our video call – old habits…

It’s Friday night at London’s Roundhouse. Skunk Anansie have just launched into raging 2022 polemic Piggy, and Skin is sailing across the crowd on a massive pig. A snarling, nose-ringed inflatable that would frighten the hell out of Pink Floyd’s porcine mascot, it’s a darkly sardonic steed for the woman we’re transfixed by. It’s hard not to smile when she does. An otherworldly but very likeable punk queen at 57, she soars effortlessly through operatic notes, honeyed warmth and hard-rocker grit, flanked on stage by three of her best friends, all of them striking powerhouses in their own right. For all the Orwellian visual swings and political punches (far-right extremism, social media trolls, inequality…), a Skunk Anansie show is one of the most fun rock-geared nights out you can have.…

The Ravagers On the Loose SPAGHETTY TOWN Baltimore is known for a few cool things: John Waters, Edgar Allan Poe’s old house, a ridiculously high crime rate, and the goddamn Ravagers. High-level sleaze rockers in the rich vein of Hanoi Rocks, Hardcore Superstar and the Backyard Babies, they deliver razor-sharp riffs and big ol’ scream-along choruses, and sharp lyrics about important topics like getting eaten by wild dogs, dealing with drunk idiots, and general despair. I mean, is there a more perfect anthem for this moment than No Tomorrow No Problem? It’s funny, back in the 90s, bands like this would write songs about how it’s the end of the world, but it totally wasn’t. Now it is, and we should be glad that we’ve got The Ravagers to sing about…

Let All That We Imagine Be The Light BMG Keep your gold watch. Shirley Manson and co. are still in their prime. ‘I ’m not dead, I’m not done,’ Shirley Manson declares on Chinese Fire Horse, a vitriolic kick-back against journalists who of late have been asking her if she’s planning to retire. Not a chance. With the electro-goth revival reaching full throttle (The Cure, Heartworms, Eurovision hexmaker Bambi Thug) and synthetic space-rock very much coming of age, even following the cancellation of the tour to support 2021’s No Gods No Masters - due to an old on-stage hip injury that left Manson requiring surgery and lengthy recuperation - these originators are as relevant as ever, and going both nowhere and back to the future-rock frontline. Manson’s rehabilitation period has,…

Listen Like Thieves (40th Anniversary Deluxe Edition) UNIVERSAL Aussie big hitters’ overseas breakthrough. INXS came up the hard way on the Australian pub circuit. Their fourth album, 1984’s The Swing reached No.1 at home, spearheaded by the Nile Rodgers-produced single Original Sin, but stalled just outside the US Top 50. The band regrouped in Sydney to plot their next move, working with Chris Thomas (Sex Pistols, Pretenders etc). As a new album neared completion, Thomas, as has been the way with producers since (recording) time began, didn’t hear a hit single. He steered main songwriters Michael Hutchence and Andrew Farris towards a demo marked ‘Funk Song #11’. Out of that they forged What You Need, which gave the band their first US top-five hit and opened doors. Follow-up Listen Like…

It’s a long way from thrashing the hell out of Badfinger’s Without You in a hardcore band called The Beaumonts to writing two of the most enduring singles of the 90s: Iris and Slide from 1998’s Dizzy Up The Girl. In between, John Rzeznik and Goo Goo Dolls have done it all: alcoholism; sued by former band members, and sued former record labels themselves; reached both the zenith and the nadir of songwriting creativity, and somehow transcended genres from hardcore to hard rock to the nation’s favourite balladeers. It’s fair to say that the dazzlingly pretty Rzeznik has been on more schoolgirls’ bedroom walls than Blu Tack. To his credit, he and his band (bassist Robby Takac is the mainstay, drummers come and go) have taken their lumps and managed…

Formed more than a decade ago in Basel, Switzerland, Zeal & Ardor are an experimental metal band with four albums to their name, the most recent being last year’s Greif (sic). Leader Manuel Gagneux previews their co-headline slot at this year’s Desertfest in London. Zeal & Ador have been tagged with many labels, including ‘avant-garde metal’, ‘neosoul’ and ‘industrial grunge’. How do you describe your music? There are so many descriptions. I don’t like any of them. The one I wouldn’t use is ‘avant garde’. The band’s sound is derived from spiritual music from the time of American slavery and black metal, two styles that most people would consider poles apart. I was with another band, but kinda burnt out with it all, so I asked people which genres I…

Stan Lynch’s career has had three acts: drummer with Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, producer/songwriter for Don Henley, The Mavericks and more. Now, at age 70, he’s a member of The Speaker Wars, whose hard-edged Americana sound adds the best of Lynch’s experience and returns him to the kit. “It’s good to have my old job back,” he says. We caught up with Lynch for a chat about everything from learning the secret of the groove to attending a Frank Sinatra concert with Bob Dylan. Was it in your plans, or did you ever expect, to be in another band when you were seventy? I’ve had no plan my entire life! The last thing I remember, I was playing at a topless bar and had a Volkswagen bus and a…

This is how it all begins. It’s May 1969 and four young men are crammed into a room in the Newtown Community Centre in Aston, Birmingham, inventing the future. Between them they sport an array of haystack hairstyles and unkempt moustaches, although they’re all barely out of their teens. The eldest is a dark-haired figure who plays his guitar left-handed and emits an air of menace. At 21 he’s their unofficial leader. The rest of them are barely 20. They’ve been playing together for nearly a year by this point, briefly under the name the Polka Tulk Blues Band, then even more briefly as plain Polka Tulk, and now as Earth. For most of that time they’ve been grabbing gigs wherever they can, mostly playing blues and blues-rock covers. But…

A part from a five-year hiatus during the mid-80s, The Doobie Brothers have been rockin’ on down the highway for more than half a century. With 10 US Top 10 hits to their name, including two No.1s, the multiple-Grammy-winning Californian band also made some of the most popular albums of the 70s. Their 1976 greatest hits collection, Best Of The Doobies, has achieved diamond status, selling 10 million copies in the United States alone. Yet as staples of an FM Radio scene that critics joyfully eviscerated as the epitome of blandness, probably few could identify a member of the Doobies – except perhaps for keyboard player and vocalist Michael McDonald, who also carved a hugely successful R&B/crossover career of his own – should they pass them on the street. “When…

Author’s note: I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve interviewed Lemmy, but I clearly remember I never had anything less than a great time. The first was in 1981 in Los Angeles, when Motörhead were on a US tour, opening for Blizzard Of Ozz. The last was also in LA, in 2006, at the legendary Rainbow Bar & Grill on Sunset Boulevard. Since Lemmy moved to America, that rock bar, a short walk up the hill from his modest flat, had become his home from home. The waitresses all adored him. The bar owners cemented a black marble Motörhead slab on the floor just outside the entrance, like a one-band metal Hall Of Fame. Lemmy said drily that it reminded him of what made him leave Britain: being trodden on…

The Painful Truth FLG Veteran Brit-rockers defy challenging times with ambitious midlife reboot. A whole quarter century has passed since Skunk Anansie’s history-making show as the final band of the previous millennium to headline Glastonbury, which rounded off a blazing run of multi-platinum albums and monster hits. A lengthy sabbatical, solo albums and side projects followed before these trailblazing British “Clit Rock” icons reunited in 2009. Alas their ongoing second act has so far produced just two fairly patchy albums. Skunk Anansie’s first album in nine years, The Painful Truth lands in the thick of an extended rough patch for the band. Following management shake-ups, plus bassist Cass Lewis and drummer Mark Richardson both undergoing cancer treatment, life has acquired a new urgency. And resting on their laurels would mean…

Walk That Road RHINO Whoa-oh-whoa, they’ve brought the big gun back into the band. A new Doobie Brothers album might not be a surprise in itself, since core members Tom Johnston, John McFee and Patrick Simmons have been chugging along merrily this century, releasing four well-crafted albums. What is a surprise – and a very pleasant one – is the return of vocalist Michael McDonald, an intermittent guest of late but now a full participant for the first time since 1980’s fractious One Step Closer. The format, though, echoes 2021’s Liberté, for which songwriters Johnston and Simmons collaborated individually with producer John Shanks before taking the finished product to the group. McDonald has submitted to the same regime. And while it sounds awkward, at their best the Doobies were a…

Marty And The Bad Punch Marty And The Bad Punch ENGHARDT MEDIA Munich-based guitarist and songwriter Martin Punsch returns with a thirdalbumfromhis (almost) self-titled project. Following its immediate predecessor, 2020’s Walk A Straight Line, it introduces a set of new yet familiar faces, except for guitarist Tommy Denander, who was a guest last time out. Here, Denander steps up for the entire album, joining a crack team fronted by up-and-coming hotshot British vocalist Dan Byrne, plus celebrated bassist Tony Franklin (The Firm, Blue Murder) and Levara drummer Josh Devine. With the Americana-style material of the past now seemingly abandoned, radio-friendly hard rock anthems sit alongside some slower-paced moments. Featuring an impassioned display from Dan Byrne, Have Faith is without doubt the record’s centrepiece – a powerful, moving ballad with additional colour from…

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Brothers In Arms (40th Anniversary) MERCURY Mark Knopfler’s crowning achievement; mildly dated, largely evocative. Was it written in the starlight? Mark Knopfler’s Newcastle pub-turned-arena rockers Dire Straits had certainly built a formidable following by 1985, thanks to his brimstone-and-ambrosia guitar playing on debut single Sultans Of Swing and beyond, the breathless melodic beauties of 1980’s Making Movies album and the immersive tonal song-films of 1982’s Love Over Gold. But 30 million sales? The first CD to shift a million? Somehow, above the cramped Caribbean studio of its making, the planets aligned. Revisiting their behemoth fifth album Brothers In Arms on this five-LP/three-CD reissue four decades on, its era-defining charms still exude the assured, enfolding warmth that first made it such a massive hit with estate agents testing the limits of…