Legendary Velvet Underground vocalist/guitarist Lou Reed died at his home in Southampton, NY, last Sunday, October 27. His passing came after a struggle with end-stage liver disease and a subsequent transplant (nearly 6 months ago).
Lou had been suffering for months following the transplant, and when it became apparent nothing more could be done for him medically, he returned home to be with his wife, musician Laurie Anderson. He was 71. Lou’s most recent release was Lulu, his 2011 collaboration with Metallica. Rockers took to Twitter to pay tribute to the rock pioneer:
Ex-Judas Priest guitar great K.K. Downing celebrated his 62nd birthday on October 27 with this birthday message reminsicing about his younger days:
“Well, it’s that time again! Another birthday comes around! All of you that were there with me in the late ‘60s/’70s and onwards will know what I mean. Isn’t it crazy that Mick Jagger is 70, for example? And Jimi Hendrix would also have been 70 this year. Anyway, not to be too down about it, because at least we were there to witness everything that is relevant to the music that we know and love today. I always say that I couldn’t have been born at a better time. I was just in my early teens when John Mayall, Cream and all of the early blues artists were just coming to fruition along with The Stones, Pretty Things, Troggs, and The Kinks, etc. This was all back in the day when music was everything to us, and it was all we had and we were more than happy with just that. Although I can remember having an insatiable appetite that always wanted feeding, so I had to go to concerts and festivals as much as I could. That’s because what I wanted was still scarce on radio and television. I seem to remember being 16 and there was only the late and great John Peel who played anything close to what we wanted to hear. Although John’s taste was often a little too diverse for me, including, for example, T. Rex, Captain Beefheart and the Third Ear Band, John was still the greatest pioneer and champion of our cause at the time.
Am I jogging some memories here? Again starving for the real thing, I was lucky enough to see two shows on this Jimi Hendrix tour, Coventry 19th of November and Bristol 24th of November 1967. I can’t remember which tour it was but can remember being ecstatic when I myself with Priest played these venues later on, especially following in Jimi’s footsteps playing on stage right. Another great venue close to my heart: Newcastle City Hall — where Priest have played many times. I have only just found out that the tour went there. It is said and written that the great Lemmy [of Motorhead] himself was also working the tour as a roadie. I have hung out with Lemmy many times and never knew this; otherwise I would have wanted a gig by gig report off him. Anyway, my devoted friends, it is for sure that the Internet is our greatest friend and our worst enemy at the same time. But I am certainly grateful to the Internet today, in order to be able to bring this blog to you now. Please take care and please continue to feed the flames of metal.”
Will Motley Crue frontman Vince Neil be appearing on the next Celebrity Apprentice? Reporter Norm Clark of the Las Vegas Review-Journal says that Vince “has been telling friends” he’ll be taking part in the Donald Trump-led reality TV show next season.
Vince responded on Twitter: “Been off for awhile. New phone password didn’t work! The rumor about Apprentice was started by a loser wannabe reporter Norm Clark who I haven’t seen or talked to in over 2 years! I’ve talked to the show but that’s it! But if I got the offer I’d do it!! Sounds fun!” Other headbangers who have competed on the show include Twisted Sister frontman/HOH host Dee Snider and Poison’s Bret Michaels.
Motley Crue’s Mick Mars has once again defended his position that his health has absolutely nothing to do with the Crue’s plans to disband in the near future. Mick suffers from ankylosing spondylitis (AS), a disease that causes spinal vertebrae to fuse.
Bandmate Vince Neil was the first to say that Mick’s health was “not that good” and that touring was “tough on him.” Mick denied that his condition was part of the decision to stop touring. Then drummer Tommy Lee said something similar in a recent interview on video, saying that Mick’s condition is painful and he “doesn’t wanna tour much longer.” Mick tweeted this after Tommy’s comments were reported.: “Once again, any rumors regarding a farewell tour due to ‘my poor health is BS,” write Mick. “I am doing fine, my AS has never kept me from touring.” He added, “Thank all of you for knowing the truth… When I’m done touring, you’ll hear it from me.” Lee responded directly to Mick: “It’s probably not so much about your physical health it’s more about our mental health as a band! Haha!”
Cooking Hostile with Phil Anselmo is the name of a new animated web series with a made-up angle: what if Pantera singer Phil Anselmo hosted a cooking show set to Pantera songs reimagined as cooking-themed tunes?
The show was dreamed up by Joey Siler, a singer with a Gainesville, Florida-based Pantera tribute band called Good Friends & A Bottle Of Whiskey. “I was just joking around at band practice after we got done jamming ‘5 Minutes Alone’ and I told the guys, ‘What if Phil had his own cooking show and I changed the lyrics to ‘5 Minutes On Low?’,” he told Vanyaland.com. “Everyone got a good laugh out of it. It was nothing more than a joke, but I had recently got into doing animation as a hobby at the beginning of this year and had messed around with making a few animations and decided to come up with some ideas for the Cooking Hostile With Phil Anselmo [two-and-half-minute short] video.
During the next week, I picked a few Pantera songs and worked on changing the lyrics up and showed the guys and they thought it was hilarious, so we laid down the tracks and I started working on the animation. The whole project was probably done in about four weeks.” Anselmo himself has seen the piece, and recently told an interviewer that is was, “f***ing hilarious, f***ing fantastic,” and gave it “two big thumbs up.” “It was just great to hear he wasn’t suing us!” laughed Siler. “But really, Phil seems to have a great sense of humor and it was awesome to just to know he had seen it and got a good laugh out of it. We couldn’t have asked for a better response.” Check out the first episode.
It’s a go! Metallica will be rocking the miles of ice in Antarctica for the first time ever as Coca-Cola Zero presents “Música Zero” this December. The contest has been launched in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica and Mexico, with entrants asked to demonstrate what they’d do to win a chance to be there with Metallica. “After over 30 years as a band, we have been unbelievably fortunate to visit just about every corner of the earth…except for one,” said the band in a statement.
“That is all about to change as we are set travel to Antarctica, the only continent that Metallica has never played on until now!! We are partnering with Coca-Cola Zero for one of the most unique and special concert events in our career as we’ll be performing near the heliport of the Argentine Antarctic Base Carlini on Sunday, December 8, 2013.” Previously, the only rock gig ever performed in Antarctica was at the British Antarctic Survey’s Rothera Research Station by its own house band (made up of scientists), Nunatak. They played in front of 17 people…and an unknown number of penguins.
Queensrÿche frontman Geoff Tate says he hasn’t spoken to the original members of the band (also recording and touring under the name Queensrÿche, and with whom he’s embroiled in a lawsuit over the use of the name) since last summer, nor has he listened to the other Queensrÿche’s latest studio album.
“Oh, I’m not interested at all,” he told Smashing Interviews. “I haven’t listened to it and won’t listen to it. I really ripped off the rear view mirror, and I’m speeding down the road. I’m not interested in what they’re doing. I spent thirty years with those guys. I know what they’re doing. I spent 30 years with those guys having to bend over backward and compromise and please everybody. I worked incredibly hard at taking care of everybody and making sure that everybody made a great living and had advantages only to have that friendship and trust betrayed. For the first couple of months after it happened, I was an emotional wreck. I was really hurt by all this, and then I finally put it in place, and I’m not interested in looking back.”
Meanwhile, Queensrÿche original member Michael Wilton (guitar) says things are going great over in the other camp: “I think what is great about this new rendition and new rebirth of Queensrÿche is that we have almost come full circle to when we were writing as teenagers,” he told Myglobalmind.com. “We were writing the EP and The Warning in Scott’s basement. We were five guys in a room throwing out ideas, riffs, drum riffs anything to create these songs together. It was really powerful, and we have almost come full circle in that aspect. Obviously we have the technology now, so now we all live farther apart. When we have the Internet and computer tools and everything, but its still that same vibe. Everybody is throwing in their ideas and their creativity. It’s not one person telling you what to do.”
Doubling up on Zzzzzzs is Lita Ford’s key to playing well and looking smokin’ hot. “Sleep is really important, especially if aging…sometimes people don’t get enough sleep, so I will go out of my way maybe once a month and sleep,” she told CryptMagazine.com in a recent interview.
“You know, you get that saying when people say, ‘God, I wish I could sleep for a year.’ You know, it’s like you go into hibernation. Well, I actually do — I will take a weekend and I will turn everything off in my house, I won’t get dressed and I just sleep. So it helps, and then you come out of it and you look at yourself in the mirror, take a hot shower, and you’re like, ‘God, I look refreshed.’ [laughs] It really works!”
From the “This question never gets old. No, really.” department, former Guns N’ Roses guitarist Slash was interviewed by Larry King recently and asked about the possibility of an original member G N’ R reunion. Said Slash, “That’s the $64,000 question. But it’s not something that any of us have reached out to each other and said that we wanted to do thus far. So, rather than be a pessimist and say, ‘No, it’ll never happen,’ it’s not like I’m harboring a lot of resentment. But it’s not something that we’re all thinking about doing. So if it happens one day, it happens. If it doesn’t, I don’t think anybody’s, you know, losing any sleep over it.”
Love/Hate is at work on a new studio album, Crucified, due out early next year.