Favorite Seventies Artists In The News

Posted by Administrator on August 19th, 2016

After their first wave of vinyl reissues were released in June, Pink Floyd has announced a second batch of vinyl reissues of three of their 1970s albums -- Atom Heart Mother, Meddle and Obscured by Clouds -- will be released on heavyweight 180g vinyl on Sept. 23. The band previously announced that vinyl reissues of The Wall and The Division Bell will hit stores on Aug. 26, and all of Pink Floyd's albums are due to be reissued eventually. - New Musical Express, 8/18/16...... A three-finger hand gesture slyly given by Steven Tyler in the intro video to the Rock N' Roller Coaster at Florida's Disney Hollywood Studios has finally been removed -- some 17 years after the Disney people realized Tyler was pulling one over on them. The gesture, which is hardly wholesome and known as "the shocker," has now been digitally edited to have the Aerosmith frontman holding up four fingers instead. A few hours after learning Disney's action, Tyler responded to the news on social media with a somewhat different hand gesture, a four-letter word hat, and a mocking facial expression. A Disney spokesperson could not be reached for comment. - Billboard, 8/18/16...... Former Bee Gees legend Barry Gibb announced on Aug. 19 that he'll release his first solo album with new material, In the Now, on Oct. 7 via his new contract with Columbia Records. The album sees Gibb collaborating with his sons Stephen and Ashley Gibb, and the three along with other members of Gibb's band will perform never-before-heard material from the new LP before fans at the Hit Criteria studio in Miami, Fla., on Aug. 20 from 7:00 PM-8:30 PM EDT. The event, dubbed In the Now 360 - The Live Stream with Barry Gibb, will be streamed on YouTube using 360 technology, providing fans with a unique opportunity to catch an intimate glimpse of their rehearsal. The live stream can be viewed and the new album can be pre-ordered on BarryGibb.com. - Billboard, 8/19/16...... David Bowie's longtime producer Tony Visconti has revealed in a new essay for the UK music mag Uncut that Bowie once abandonded a planned remake of a Bruce Springsteen song after meeting with the Boss. Visconti writes Bowe planned to cover Springsteen's "It's Hard to Be a Saint in the City" during the sessions for what would eventually become Bowie's 1975 album Young Americans. "David took [Springsteen] into another room for a private chat," Visconti recalled. "By the time Bruce left, he was more pleasant and said his goodbyes to the rest of us. David and I never worked on 'Saint' after that, although it was finished or re-recorded eventually with someone else." Bowie's version of "Saint," which appears on Springsteen's 1973 debut album Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ, eventually appeared on his 1989 box-set Sound + Vision. A new Bowie box set of mid-'70s recordings, Who Can I Be Now? 1974-76, will drop on Sept. 23. Other upcoming Bowie-related releases include the soundtrack of the late music icon's classic 1976 film The Man Who Fell to Earth. Featuring specially composed music by Japanese prog-rock musician Stomu Yamash'ta and John Philips (the main songwriter for '60s pop band The Mamas And The Papas), the LP uses recently rediscovered "lost" master tapes, and will be released on Sept. 9, the same day the film is reissued in cinemas. The vinyl and box set are due on Oct. 24, the same day the film is reissued on DVD. In still more Bowie news, his widow Inman posted a picture of the couple's daughter Alexandria on Aug. 15 to celebrate her 16th birthday. Alexandria "Lexi" Zahra Jones, the couple's only child, was born in Aug. 2000. "Happy sweet 16th birthday to my baby girl Lexi! Stay sweet "Classy with a hint of sassy," Inman tweeted. - NME, 8/19/16...... Bruce Springsteen posted the foreword of his forthcoming autobiography, Born to Run, on his official website on Aug. 16. The opening lines begin with a bit of embellishment, with the musician writing that he hails from a "boardwalk town," aka Asbury Park, New Jersey (Springsteen grew up inland in Freehold). "I come from a boardwalk town where almost everything is tinged with a bit of fraud," he writes. "So am I. By 20, no race-car-driving rebel, I was a guitar player on the streets of Asbury Park and already a member in good standing amongst those who 'lie' in service of the truth artists, with a small 'a.' But I held four clean aces. I had youth, almost a decade of hard-core bar band experience, a good group of homegrown musicians who were attuned to my performance style and a story to tell." The book, which is due on Sept. 27, will be accompanied by a new album Chapter and Verse. - Billboard, 8/16/16...... Iggy Pop will release an autobiography called Total Chaos on Nov. 17 via Third Man, the vinyl-obsessed record label headed by former White Stripes musician Jack White. Co-authored by Jeff Gold, Jon Savage and Johan Kugelberg, the book boasts that it will be "the first time [his] story has been told in Iggy's own words," and includes Pop's recollections about his days with the proto-punk band the Stooges from 1967-1973, and the Stooges revival in the early 2000s. The Stooges' last studio album, Ready to Die, was released in 2013, and earlier in 2016 Pop released his latest solo album, Post Pop Depression. - Billboard, 8/18/16...... As she campaigned in Cleveland, Oh., on Aug 17, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton stopped by the Quicken Loans Arena where Paul McCartney was soon to be performing and met with Sir Paul and his wife Nancy Shevell behind closed doors. No photos were taken during the meeting, but McCartney later posted a photo on his Twitter account of the two with the headline "She's With Me. pic.twitter.com/vHPMHMjFvV." After the pic was posted on Facebook, reactions ranged from "I love Paul's music but like him just a bit less now" to "Great pic! Rock on Sir Paul!" Meanwhile, Universal Music Group has announced that McCartney is returning to Capitol Records in a new worldwide recording agreement. Touted as a "historic deal," the contract will encompass McCartney's entire catalog of master recordings beginning with the 1970 McCartney album. It also marks a return to the label where he started his solo career. "This is genuinely exciting for me. Not only was Capitol my first U.S. record label, but the first record I ever bought was Gene Vincent's 'Be-Bop-A-Lula' on the Capitol label," McCartney said in a statement. Capitol/UMe will service McCartney's albums on his current label, Concord Records, beginning in July 2017. Capitol also revealed that the former Beatle is currently working on a new studio album. - Billboard,. 8/17/16...... In other Beatles-related news, Yoko Ono has named the four recipients of the 2016 Lennon Ono Grant For Peace, which will be presented in Reykjavik, Iceland on Oct. 9, what would have been John Lennon's 76th birthday. The winners are Chinese activist and artist Ai Weiwei, Inidian artist Anish Kapoor, Danish artist Olafur Eliasson and Hungarian poet and performance artist Catalan Ladik. The award, which is presented every two years, was founded in 2002. - New Musical Express, 8/17/16...... Elsewhere on the Fab Four front, Ringo Starr's rep confirmed on Aug. 15 that the famous drummer is now a great-grandfather, as his granddaughter, Tatia Starkey, and her partner, Adam Low, welcomed a son named Stone Zakomo Low on Aug. 14. Tatia is the daughter of Ringo's son, Zak Starkey, who is a drummer for the Who, and has also drummed in the past with his dad's All-Starr Band and Oasis. Tatia Starkey also has a musical career as a member of the band Belakiss. Ringo will kick off his latest All-Starr band tour in Sonqualmie, Wash., on Oct. 15. - Billboard, 8/16/16...... Barbra Streisand has previewed a duet of "Pure Imagination" from Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory with Seth MacFarlane that will be featured on Streisand's upcoming duets album Encore: Movie Partners Sing Broadway. "I've always loved the song 'Pure Imagination,'" Streisand says in a behind-the-scenes video. "I thought Seth MacFarlane would be great." Encore: Movie Partners Sing Broadway drops on Aug. 26. - Billboard, 8/17/16...... A deluxe reissue of Big Star's 1978 album Third featuring a whopping 69 tracks including original demos, rough mixes, early mixes, vocal takes and a cover of the Velvet Underground's "After Hours" is being planned for a fall release. Third was actually recorded in chaotic circumstances three years earlier in 1975 with the band disintegrating and the declining mental state of singer Alex Chilton, and by the time it was released, Big Star had already split. The release, called Complete Third, and an accompanying photo book that documents the band's entire career, will be released in October. - NME, 8/16/16...... Thousands of Elvis Presley fans made their way to the King of Rock & Roll's Graceland mansion in Memphis, Tenn., on Aug. 16 to hold their annual candlelight vigil, despite a heavy rainstorm. Police presence was reportedly heightened due to a nearby protest by activists supporting the Black Lives Matter movement. 2016 marks the 39th anniversary of Presley's death, and the fans walked slowly through Elvis's gravesite while holding candles. It was the culmination of Elvis Week, the annual celebration of his life and career. - AP, 8/16/16...... The Rolling Stone website has posted the full court transcript of Jimmy Page's testimony during the recent "Stairway To Heaven" plagiarism case. The transcript documents the Led Zeppelin guitarist's full questioning during the hearing in Los Angeles in June. Page and the rest of the band had been accused of stealing the band Spirit's song "Taurus" from 1968. The transcripts reveal that the trial contained some moments of humor, including Page's deadpan response of "Well yeah" to the question "you had a gift in being able to play the guitar, correct?" by the prosecutor. - NME, 8/15/16...... A Minnesota judge has given the administrator of Prince's estate the green light to sell six of the late artist's properties.Carver County Judge Kevin Eide gave the trust approval to list the properties, which include homes, vacant lots and buildings in Prince's hometown of Chanhassen, a suburb of Minneapolis. The list includes a commercial building estimated at $22 million and a 156-acre piece of land in Lakes Ann and Lucy valued at $13.7 million. Prince's home and recording studio Paisley Park is not among the 15 properties to be liquidated. - Billboard, 8/14/16...... Ozzy Osbourne's wife Sharon Osbourne weighed in on the recent announcement that Mick Jagger is set to become a dad for the eighth time with girlfriend Melanie Hamrick. Appearing on her TV show, The Talk, Osborne said: "The thing that gets me is that at 73 his face is so wrinkly. All I do is I think his genitalia must be so wrinkly... it must be hanging, wrinkly and grey," she shuddered in front of the audience. "I just couldn't think of anything worse. Because you look up and that is wrinkly and you look down and that is wrinkly, and that is like 'no'. He is 73. How much longer is he going to have anyway? Amazing - now he has got somebody to push him around in a wheelchair," she continued, adding that she's never found Jagger attractive. - WENN.com, 8/18/16...... Actor/comedian Jack Riley, best known for portraying Elliot Carlin on the 1972-77 CBS sitcom The Bob Newhart Show as well as appearing in several Mel Brooks films, died in Los Angeles on Aug. 19 after a battle with pneumonia and infection. He was 80. A native of Cleveland, Oh., Mr. Riley began his career as a regular on the 1962-63 ABC sitcom Occasional Wife, which was narrated by Vin Scully. He went on to guest on dozens of popular TV series including I Dream of Jeannie, Hogan's Heroes, Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In and The Partridge Family before landing what would become his signature role -- the neuroses-laden Elliot Carlin on The Bob Newhart Show, which starred Bob Newhart as a Chicago psychologist. Carlin appeared in nearly 50 episodes as a patient of Newhart's who had a persecution complex and constantly put himself down. He appeared in all six seasons of the show, which also starred Suzanne Pleshette and Marcia Wallace. During that show's run, Mr. Riley could also be seen in episodes of such series as M*A*S*H, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Happy Days, Cannon, Columbo and Police Woman. In 1976, he played a Hollywood executive in Silent Movie, Mel Brooks' follow-up to Young Frankenstein, and later appeared in the Brooks films High Anxiety (1978), History of the World, Part I (1981) and Spaceballs. He continued to work steadily throughout the '80s and '90s and through the 2000s, with his later-career highlight as the voice of Stu Pickles, the father of Tommy and Dil on Rugrats. Mr. Riley appeared on more than 140 episodes of the animated series, reprising the role in the 1998-2003 film trilogy and several episodes of follow-up series All Growed Up! He is survived by his wife, Ginger Lawrence. - Deadline.com, 8/19/16...... Longtime political talk show host John McLaughlin, the host of The McLaughlin Group for 34 straight years, died on Aug. 16 at the age of 89. Known for his combative and irascible style, Mr. McLaughlin was a former left-leaning jesuit priest and teacher who lurched rightward and embarked on a Senate run in 1970 as a Republican. He became famous defending Richard Nixon during Watergate, telling CBS News that the president was "the greatest moral leader in the last third of this century." He compared the Watergate investigation to the Spanish Inquisition, insisted that Nixon hadn't committed any crimes, and likened the House Judiciary Committee to Lord of the Flies, according to a 2014 story in the Jesuit magazine America. "For 34 years, The McLaughlin Group informed millions of Americans," a post on the show's Facebook page reads. "Now he has said bye bye for the last time, to rejoin his beloved dog, Oliver, in heaven. He will always be remembered." - TheHill.com/CBS News, 8/16/16...... Veteran actor Fyvush Finkel, an Emmy Award winner best known to contemporary audiences for his roles on Picket Fences and Boston Public, died on Aug. 14 in his Manhattan home. He was 93. Mr. Finkel spent most of his early career on Gotham's Lower East Side performing in the Yiddish theater. His son, Ian, said his father had been suffering from heart problems. - Variety, 8/14/16.

Stevie Nicks and Keith Richards will be among the contributors to rocker Sheryl Crow's next studio album. Crow, 54, made the announcement at the BlogHer16 conference in Los Angeles on Aug. 5, where she told the crowd that she has been free of breast cancer for 10 years after being first diagnosed with the disease in 2006. The 54-year-old Crow, who last released an album in 2013, added that she is in the process of recording a new album at her home studio in Nashville that is "inspired by the people who have inspired me since I was a kid." - Billboard, 8/12/16...... Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Leonard Cohen will release his 14th studio album in the fall via Sony. Titled You Want it Darker and produced by Cohen's son, Adam Cohen, and will be the follow-up to the 82-year-old artist's 2014 LP, Popular Problems. - Billboard, 8/12/16...... On Aug. 11 the Rolling Stones announced a comprehensive 15-disc box set of mono recordings of their 1960s ABKCO material. Due Sept. 30, The Rolling Stones in Mono features both the British and US releases of their albums from 1964's The Rolling Stones to 1969's Let It Bleed. All 186 of the songs the band recorded in mono will be featured, which includes their B-sides and non-album singles and EPs. The release will be available as 15 CDs, 16 vinyl LPs and digitally. The physical formats feature a 48-page book containing an essay by Rolling Stone's David Fricke and rare photographs of the Stones by rock photographer Terry O'Neill. - New Musical Express, 8/11/16...... In a new interview with the Australian media outlet WA Today, Alice Cooper cited current turbulent world events as the reason why it's "impossible" for a rock band to shock an audience. "I don't honestly believe that a rock band can shock an audience anymore," said Cooper, whose controversial stage antics in the '70s included guillotines, decapitated baby dolls and hanged mannequins. "With ISIS, with people shooting cops, with cops shooting blacks -- now CNN is so much more shocking than Rob Zombie or Marilyn Manson or Alice Cooper," he added. Cooper also said it was "easy to shock the audience in the '70s... because we were much more wholesome... Now, with the internet, it's literally impossible to shock an audience. I mean, somebody just killed 50 people in a gay bar. That shocks me." Earlier in 2016, Cooper launched a campaign to become both Prime Minister of the UK and President of the USA, with a campaign platform including "adding Lemmy [Kilmister] to Mt. Rushmore" and a "ban on taking selfies." - New Musical Express, 8/14/16...... As Elvis Week in Memphis, Tenn., approaches in the fourth week of August, officials at Elvis Presley's Graceland attraction have announced that a new 200,000-square-foot entertainment complex will be built across the street from the Graceland mansion. According to the Aug. 11 announcement, the new $45 million complex will include exhibits that highlight the late singer's life and career exploits in music and film. It will be part of a $137 million expansion that includes the construction of a $92 million hotel, The Guest House at Graceland. The hotel is scheduled to open on Oct. 27, and the new complex is set to be completed in the spring of 2017. In related news, Elvis's daughter Lisa Marie Presley has reportedly checked herself into a rehab center to tackle an addiction to prescription pills. Lisa Marie, 48, has struggled with substance abuse during her youth and is now receiving professional help at the luxury Hills Treatment Center in Los Angeles. "She's doing OK but needed to get this under control," a source close to Presley said. In July, Presley filed for a legal separation from her fourth husband, Michael Lockwood, to whom she has been married for 10 years. - AP/New Musical Express, 8/12/16...... Phil Collins has announced he will play his 1982 smash "In the Air Tonight" at the US Open tennis tournament on Aug. 29, during the event's opening ceremony. The song is particularly appropriate because it will also mark the first occasion where the Arthur Ashe Stadium's new retractable roof will be operational. The performance will Collins' second live performance since coming out of retirement in 2015. In March, Collins gave a seven-song set at a benefit concert in his current hometown of Miami. Collins is also prepping an autobiography which will be published in October. - NME, 8/12/16...... In a new interview with Rolling Stone, Paul McCartney compares the creative process of his "Only One" collaborator Kayne West to that of pop art icon Andy Warhol. "He's got a room full of guys working on riffs, and he walks around going, 'I like that one'," Sir Paul explained. "It reminded me of Andy Warhol, these artists who use students to paint their backgrounds and things. It's a well-used technique," he added. McCartney also said the two agreed that if their collaboration didn't feel right, they wouldn't tell anyone it happened. Of the sessions that also produced "All Day" and the Rihanna collaboration "FourFiveSeconds," he added, "I thought, 'I don't know how I'm going to fit into that, but let's see. Here goes nothing.'" In the same interview, Macca said that the Beatles were "threatened" back then as Yoko Ono was "sitting on the amps" as they recorded. "Most bands couldn't handle that. We handled it, but not amazingly well, because we were so tight," he said. When asked if he would ever tour with Ringo Starr, McCartney concluded, " I don't think either of us have ever thought why do it, or why not. It's just that our roads are parallel, with intersections and diversions. He's a great drummer, man. That's the thing about Ringo. He has a feel that nobody else has. As to going out on the road, it might be complicated." - Billboard/NME, 8/11/16...... Participating in the unveiling of a plaque at a UK cancer hospital, Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi revealed that his cancer is in remission. Iommi has been receiving treatment at the Spire Specialist Care Centre, and Iommi unveiled the plaque which recognized the facility's high standard of patient care. "I can't thank them enough for what they have done for me and others like me," he said. In Jan. 2012, Iommi revealed that he had been diagnosed as being in the early stages of lymphoma, just a few months after Black Sabbath announced it was writing and recording its new studio album, 13. Iommi's condition reportedly forced the band to withdraw as a headliner for the 2012 Coachell festival, but it returned to the road in 2013-14. The band is currently on its farewell tour, which it announced in Sept. 2015, with their last U.S. show set for Nov. 12. In Feb. 2017, the members will play their last dates ever as Black Sabbath in their hometown of Birmingham, UK. - Billboard, 8/10/16...... Yusuf Islam/Cat Stevens has announced a string of North American concerts this fall to commemorate the 50th anniversary of his first hit single, "I Love My Dog," in 1966. Dubbed the "A Cat's Attic Tour," the run of intimate-sized venues kicks off Sept. 12 in Toronto, also visiting Philadelphia (9/15), Boston (9/17), New York's Beacon Theatre (9/19, 20), Washington, D.C. (9/22), New York's Global Citizen Festival in Central Park (9/24), Nashville (9/27), Chicago (9/30) and San Francisco (10/3) before winding up with a two-night stand on Oct. 6 and 7 at the Pantages Theatre in Los Angeles. According to a press release, Yusuf's tour will feature "a night of songs, storytelling and goodwill." - Billboard, 8/11/16...... The UK's Rewind South festival will take place on Aug. 19-21 with such acts as Leo Sayer, Adam Ant, Rick Astley, Marc Almond and Andy Bell of Erasure, among others. The festival is celebrating its eighth year and will take place at Temple Island Meadows, Henley-on-Thames. - Noble PR, 8/11/16...... The manager of Ted Nugent's 340-acre ranch in Pulaski Township, Mich., has been charged with supplying a fatal heroin dose to an acquaintance of Nugent's named Jim Lawson, who lived in a house he rented from Nugent on the property until his death on Apr. 29. The property manager, Melissa Mullins, faces a court hearing on Aug. 16 to determine if there's enough evidence to send the case to trial. Lawson appeared in Surviving Nugent, a 2003 documentary on cable channel VH1, and after his death Ted Nugent posted a message on his Facebook page saying that "hearts are shattered" because of the death. - AP, 8/14/16...... Actor/director Robert Redford rescued a horse stranded by a freeway in New Zealand earlier in August as he was on his way to the set of the upcoming Disney movie Pete's Dragon. "There was a horse that was on the side of a freeway that we would all take to get to work and we noticed for 24 hours this horse continued to be there... There's no water, there's no hay and the horse looked like it was abused," Redford's co-star Bryce Dallas Howard noted on the TV show The Talk. "Bob saw this... and figured it out, went door to door; no one said, 'This is my horse', and he got folks to come in and bring the horse out and rescue it and now he's set up the horse for the rest of its life... He actually is the horse whisperer." Howard added that Redford was "an incredible, phenomenal human being... He would walk to work every day. He was so present with everyone. He's this wonderful man." - WENN.com, 8/9/16...... Folk singer/songwriter Glenn Yarbrough, a founding member of the folk trio The Limeliters and who later charted such solo hits as "Baby the Rain Must Fall," died on Aug. 11 at his home in Nashville, Tenn., after a bout with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, dementia and other health issues. He was 86. The Milwaukee-born Mr. Yarbrough sang and played guitar with fellow Limeliters members Lou Gottlieb and Alex Hassilev from 1959 and 1963. The group was known for such songs as "There's a Meetin' Here Tonight," "City of New Orleans," "A Dollar Down" and "Lonesome Traveler." After leaving the group in 1963 (though he often returned for reunion tours), Mr. Yarbrough had a solo career that spanned nearly 40 years, with his highest-charting success in 1965 with "Baby the Rain Must Fall," which was featured in the Steve McQueen and Lee Remick movie of the same name. It reached No. 2 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart, and No. 12 on the Hot 100 pop singles chart. Mr. Yarbrough was also a sailing enthusiast who, according to his daughter, "would sail until the money ran out; then he'd get back on the road to play some more shows." He continued this routine until he was 80. Though he suffered from dementia in the last years of his life, his daughter said her father remained a "warm happy man." - AP, 8/12/16...... Barbara Gibb, the mother of Bee Gees members Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb as well as Andy Gibb, died in Miami on Aug. 12. She was 95. Born in Manchester, England, Mrs. Gibb had lived in Miami for the past 20 years. With her late husband Hugh Gibb, she managed the Bee Gees early career. Sadly, Mrs. Gibb saw three of her five children (she also had a daughter named Lesley) pass away during her lifetime: Andy in 1988 at age 30 of a heart condition, Maurice in 2003 at age 53 due to complications of a twisted intestine, and Robin in 2012 at age 62 from liver and kidney failure after battling cancer. - Billboard, 8/13/16...... Veteran music industry manager David Enthoven, who helmed the careers of such '70s acts as T. Rex, King Crimson, Emerson, Lake & Palmer and Roxy Music as well as contemporary singer Robbie Williams, as died at age 72. Enthoven was also the co-founder of the London-based management company ie:music, which he formed in 1992 with former Island Records executive Tim Clark. Williams was always its star client, but the pair also helped guide the careers of Sia and Bryan Ferry, with its current roster including Lily Allen, Lamar, Passenger and Will Young. - Billboard, 8/12/16...... British actor Kenny Baker, best known for portraying the Star Wars droid R2-D2, has died at age 81 after a long battle with a lung condition. Mr. Baker's family paid tribute to the diminutive 3 ft. 8 in. actor by issuing a statement saying he "brought happiness to a lot of people." Mr. Baker received a credit in the latest Star Wars film which came out in 2015. - The Daily Mail, 8/13/16.