Indholdsfortegnelse for May 2024 i Classic Rock

THE COVER: DIDI ZILL It’s a really tough question: which is your favourite Deep Purple track? Over the past couple of years, Classic Rock has been putting that question to the great and good of the rock world, including members of Deep Purple themselves, past and present. So, who picked a track “just to annoy” a bandmate “who doesn’t like it”, and which track is it? Which stone-cold DP classic was “literally done in about two hours of drunkenness”? Hint: it’s the same track that Brian May believes features “the best drum break in the world”. The answer to all these questions and way more besides can be found from p22. Elsewhere we talk to the Scorpions about the making of their classic Love At First Sting as it celebrates…

THE CELEBRATED FORMER vocalist of pioneering Krautrock group Can has died at the age of 74. Cause of death has not been announced, although in 2014 he was diagnosed with colon cancer. Japan-born Suzuki was famously discovered busking in Munich in 1970 by Holger Czukay and Jakki Liebezeit of Can. They subsequently invited him to replace the recently departed Malcolm Mooney. Suzuki remained with Can until 1973, through arguably the band’s most fruitful period, appearing on their albums Soundtracks, Tago Mago, Ege Bamyasi and Future Days, on which he developed his often improvised vocal style. After quitting Can, Suzuki also left the music business. He returned to music in 1983 with the Damo Suzuki Network and toured prolifically. His most recent album, Arkaoda, was released in 2022. He was also…

VOCALIST, GUITARIST, SIDEMAN, songwriter and arranger Bobby Tench is best remembered for being a member of the Jeff Beck Group, Humble Pie, Streetwalkers and Van Morrison’s band, and also for his work with Freddie King, Ginger Baker, Eric Burdon, Topper Headon and Linda Lewis, and the bands Beck Bogert &Appice, Boxer and Widowmaker, among others. Tench was 79 years old. Cause of death has not yet been announced.  Born in London in 1944, Tench formed Gass in 1965, and their 1970 album Juju featured a cameo from Peter Green. The following May Tench joined the Jeff Beck Group, and sang on their albums Rough And Ready and Jeff Beck Group. Along with other Beck alumni he formed the rock-meets-soul outfit Hummingbird, before joining Streetwalkers. He had two stints in Humble…

ONE HALF OF the much-loved Hairy Bikers, Dave Myers first found fame alongside his partner Si King as aTV chef way back in 2004. He had been diagnosed with cancer two years ago. Myers was 66 years old.  Born and raised in Barrow-in-Furness, Myers was a Northerner and proud of the fact. He and sidekick King met in the 90s. Together they became known for travelling around the world on motorbikes, sampling and cooking food from different regions. The Hairy Bikers published more than 30 recipe books, selling in excess of six million copies. Myers’s celebrity status increased when he appeared on Strictly Come Dancing in 2013. Myers and King were huge fans of rock music, and the pair hosted The Hairy Rock Show on Planet Rock Radio from 2015…

Former Beatles Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr are to be the subjects of four separate biopic feature films directed by Oscar-winning English director Sam Mendes. Financed by Sony Pictures Entertainment, they are expected to be released in 2027. Fraudsters posing as Ritchie Blackmore have conned a pensioner out of her life savings. Debbie Horwood, 80, from Hampshire, who knew Blackmore in her youth, fell for an online scam and was persuaded to part with £115,000. The real Blackmore later commented: “I hope they catch the thief and everything works out fine.” Winger have announced a farewell UK show at Islington Assembly Hall in London on June 7. Support comes from Joe Hoekstra &Brandon Gibbs. Little Feat are to release their first new studio album in 12…

Five Day Rain were a short-lived psychedelic-tinged progressive-pop/ rock band, sadly destined for failure. But they left behind an excellent, commercially unreleased album, which featured more than several very well thought-out songs. They were formed from the ashes of Essex based power trio Iron Prophet, and expanded to a four-piece. It’s thought that only 20 acetate copies of the initial album were cut as promo items, making it a holy-grail artefact for prog and psych collectors. Recorded in the summer of 1970, it captures the spirit of the time, bringing to mind other keyboard-driven bands such as Brian Auger & The Trinity and Netherlands legends Earth & Fire. ‘The album is a holygrail artefact for prog and psych collectors.’ Beginning with a decent rendition of Dylan’s Too Much Of Nothing,…

NEWS OF A Slayer reunion of has astonished – and, for the most part, delighted – the world of extreme metal. The Californian four-piece retired in 2019 following an extensive worldwide farewell tour. And that was that. Or so we thought. Now, amazingly, Slayer have announced that they will play three festival dates in the US in September and October. Only a month before the announcement of their return, straight-talking guitarist Kerry King had given an explosive interview to Rolling Stone in promotion of his debut solo album Idle Hands (due on May 17). King used the platform to explain that after almost four decades of being bandmates, he and frontman/ bassist Tom Araya hadn’t communicated at all since the split. “Not even a text. Not even an email,” the…

If he wasn’t a musician, Kris Barras could work for the Torquay tourist board. “It’s a beautiful place to live, especially when the sun is shining,” the former MMA champion-turned-singer and guitarist says of his West Country home town. “I’ve never moved to London, though I’m not sure how much of a choice that is; I’ve got a house here, my wife’s job is here.” He may not have gone far geographically, but musically it’s a different matter. The Halo Effect, the Kris Barras Band’s fifth album, is the heaviest thing they’ve recorded to date, bringing even more metal muscle to their music and moving further away from their original blues-rock sound. You wrote a lot of The Halo Effect on the tour bus while you were out supporting your…

There are several popular images of Gary Clark Jr: the hipster bluesman; the guitar prodigy who made Eric Clapton want to play again; the political firebrand who channelled his experience of the American South into 2019’s triple Grammy-winning album This Land; the devastated Black man who gave an incendiary response to George Floyd’s death at the hands of a white police officer in Minneapolis in 2020. “We just want to wake up in the morning, go and make the most out of what we can, get what we can for ourselves and for our family, and go the f**k back home,” he posted on Instagram at the time. “That’s all.” And of course there’s the most familiar, wellmeaning if somewhat reductive label: ‘the saviour of the blues’. “People get that…

Cock Sparrer Hand On Heart CHERRY RED Street-punk progenitors stand firm. Uncannily ageless, the most widely respected, enduringly influential yet bizarrely overlooked punk band in the genre’s history have produced an eighth album (52 years into their career) that’s as strong, if not stronger, than anything they’ve ever done. An East End institution, they continue to be the most unpretentious, most entirely street street-punk band of them all. The blurring hardcore riffs, the ubiquitous ‘woah-oh’-ing mob vocals, the casually deployed anthemic choruses are all pretty par for the course. The Sparrer’s deeply indebted spiritual progeny (Rancid, Dropkick Murphys et al) have long-since mastered the band’s core MO, but what marks out the five-piece (all four original ’72 founders and a newbie rhythm guitarist of a mere 31 years standing) as…

Bodega Our Brand Could Be Yr Life CHRYSALIS Brooklyn’s Bodega previously released a hugely ambitious lower-fi first draft of OBCBYL in ‘15. This lusher Mk II is a culturally conscious opus, equally dripping with classic 90s alt.US indie ambition (think Weezer, Neutral Milk Hotel). Well worth seeking out. Acracker. 8/10 Shambolics Dreams, Schemes &Young Teams SCRUFF OF THE NECK Scotland’s Shambolics spice swaggering Arctic Monkeys spikes with an Ash-alike ear for the commercial. As exuberant as prime-time Terrorvision, crossover/radio friendly. What’s not to like? That’s what’s not to like. Surely anything this likeable’s got to be suspect. 7/10 Marc Valentine Basement Sparks WICKED COOL Former Last Great Dreamers frontman Marc Valentine’s second solo album is an engaging power-pop confection matching starburst glam dynamics with perky, eager-to-please choruses. Assured songwriting, popcore…

‘It’s not hard to see why they landed the gig opening for GN’R.’ Dirty Honey London Electric Ballroom Trad rockers dish the deliciously ballsy dirt. With influences not so much worn on their sleeves as tattooed across their faces, Dirty Honey aren’t reinventing any wheels. Happily, their wheels of choice are pretty great. The legacies of Aerosmith, The Black Crowes and GN’R glitter through swaggering bangers like California Dreamin’, Tied Up and Don’t Put Out The Fire; grooves are thick and tasty, Chris Robinson-style bling drips off their bodies, and wearing sunglasses indoors is basically a religion. But it’s the songs that take Dirty Honey beyond thin retro gimmickry. Now bolstered by the range of 2023’s Can’t Find The Brakes – from the fiery ballsiness of the title track to…

When you talk about ‘dad-rock’ with Wolfgang Van Halen, it has a totally different meaning. The son of the late, legendary guitarist Eddie Van Halen can still recall getting his first paternal music lesson at age of nine. “The first song I ever learned how to play on the drums was Highway To Hell,” he says. “That’s how my dad taught me to play drums. He put magazines on a table and was like: ‘Here’s the hi-hat, here’s the snare.…’” By age 15, Wolf was touring as bassist/vocalist with Van Halen, and in 2015 he debuted with his own band, Mammoth WVH (Mammoth was the name of Eddie’s pre-VH band). On the heels of 2023’s Mammoth II, Wolf is looking ahead to a headlining world tour and also opening shows…

PHIL DUNK Ever wonder how the images in CR look so good? Meet our image manipulator Phil. He’s been a creative retoucher for over 20 years. “Rock music runs in my blood,” he says. “My dad has been a lead singer in rock bands for over forty years, and my uncle had success with Bleak House. Some say I was born in the wrong era! Like most, Smoke On The Water by Deep Purple was the first song I was taught on the guitar.” DAVE LING As a teenager, CR co-founder Dave discovered Deep Purple via the collection 24 Carat Purple, before buying his first copy of Machine Head on purple vinyl (he later had it signed by Ian Gillan). Machine Head changed his life for ever. In this month’s…

Ian Aimy May 15, 1944 – February 15, 2024 Better known as Tich from the 1960s British Invasion band Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick And Tich, with that band Ian Aimy topped the UK singles chart with The Legend Of Xanadu, one of two by the band that sold more than a million copies. The guitarist’s passing at the age of 79 leaves Beaky (ak John Dymond) as the group’s sole surviving original member, Dave Dee having died in 2009, Dozy in 2015, and Mick in 1964. Tich, who retired from the band in 2014, died following a short illness. John Rowe April 13, 1942 – February 22, 2024 The pianist with The Quarrymen, Paul McCartney, John Lennon and George Harrison’s pre-Beatles group, has died aged 81. Sometimes known as…

ABASSIST, SONGWRITER and session musician of distinction, during his lifetime Paul Martinez performed with an impressive selection of artists, most notably working on and touring Robert Plant’s first three solo albums Pictures At Eleven, The Principle Of Moments and Shaken ‘N’ Stirred, released between 1982 and ’85. He co-wrote several songs with Plant, including the worldwide hit Big Log. Martinez was also a part of Plant’s side project the Crawling King Snakes. In 1985, he played with Led Zeppelin for their 20-minute set at Live Aid in Philadelphia, taking over on bass from John Paul Jones when Jonesy moved over to keyboards for Stairway To Heaven. Prior to his stint with Plant, Leicester-born Martinez had worked with Stan Webb’s Chicken Shack, The Adverts, John Otway, Cat Stevens, Renaissance and Stretch.…

FORMER VAN HALEN drummer Alex Van Halen is to share the details of his relationship with late younger brother and long-time bandmate Edward in a revealing new book titled Brothers. Described by publishers HarperCollins as an “intimate and open account, nothing like any rock memoir you've ever read”, it’s available on October 22. Alex Van Halen promises that the book, written with writer Ariel Levy, will “set the record straight on Edward’s life and death”. Apress release quotes the 70-year-old drummer as saying: “We shared the experience of coming to this country and figuring out how to fit in. We shared a record player, an 800-square-foot house, amom and dad, and a work ethic.”  Since Edward’s passing and the subsequent, inevitable break-up of Van Halen in 2020, the drummer has…

Phil Ehart has stepped away from live performance with Kansas as he recovers from a major heart attack. An original member of the band, Ehart is also their manager. Drum tech Eric Holmquist, who has stepped in in previous similar circumstances, is filling in as the band continue their 50th-anniversary tour. London’s Brixton Academy reopens on April 19, 16 months after the crush there that killed a security guard and a fan. . Steve Harris says he would love to write a book at some point. “It’s just a question of time, because there’s so many other things that I do when I’m not on tour,” the Iron Maiden bassist tells broadcaster Eddie Trunk. “I probably would write a book just about the early days, really.” The Doobie Brothers are…

“We like a lot of the seventies New York punk stuff.” “I SEE IT as a time capsule of what it’s like to be in your twenties, during the end of the world as we know it,” says Genevieve Glynn-Reeves. The singer/lyricist laughs, but there’s a sincerity in her tone. At a time when spikily confessional voices like IDLES, Amyl &The Sniffers and Kid Kapichi are so prevalent in rock, Gen &The Degenerates’ debut feels ripe for success. Produced by Ross Orton (Gang Of Four, Arctic Monkeys), Anti-Fun Propaganda is a smart, funny slice of the modern age, told in riffy, punky alt.rock vignettes. Online living, gender politics and global tensions are explored with incisive energy. It’s silly, sexy and serious. “I think we’re accidentally punk,” Glynn-Reeves say. “We like…

With 2024 very much under way, our inboxes have been brimming with music from rock’s newest voices, under-the-radar talents and returning favourites. This month we’ve dipped into all those areas – sifting through the great, the ‘fine’, the dreadful and just about everything in between – to bring you the crème de la crème of the moment, from hard-rocking Brits to Louisiana freakniks, bluesy Nigeriens, a hotly tipped Mexican sister trio and much more. And while we’d never be ones to judge a book (or an artist) principally by its cover, you can’t deny that many of this month’s Hot Listers have pretty fucking great ‘covers’ – and that’s no bad thing. Does presentation maketh the band? Or at least have some bearing on how we, as listeners, ingest them?…

The Nuthins 1 Step Forward… Further Steps DETOUR You’d be forgiven for mistaking bowl-cut ’n’ Chelsea-booted 90s Salisbury garage quartet The Nuthins for an actual pep-pilled, hep-cat combo straight out of mid-60s Nuggetsville USA. This 33-track raveup’s attention to detail and unbridled mania is irresistible. 8/10 Peter And The Test Tube Babies The Complete Singles CAPTAIN OI! Punk Pathetique. What was that all about? Sussex louts P&TTTB effectively defined this tirelessly self-sabotaging genre with their indie-chart-bothering run of almost humorous ‘hits’. And they’re all here (including 1982’s Banned From The Pubs) on two CDs. 6/10 Virgin Prunes ANew Form Of Beauty BMG Irish post-punks the Virgin Prunes featured Gavin Friday (before he was Gavin Friday) and Dik Evans (before he was U2 Edge’s brother). Imagine a glam Birthday Party or…

THE DRUMMER WITH Georgiabased southern rockers Blackberry Smoke has died at 57. Brit Turner had battled glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, since late 2022. Astatement from the band said: “If you had the privilege of knowing Brit on any level, you know he was the most caring, empathetic, driven and endearing person one could ever hope to meet. Brit was the compass that instituted the ideology that will continue to guide this band.”  Before Blackberry Smoke, Turner and his brother Richard, the group’s bassist, were members of the thrash metal band Nihilist. The pair then hooked up with Charlie Starr in Buffalo Nickel, whose one album, Longplay 331 ⁄3, was released in 2000. The trio then formed Blackberry Smoke with guitarist Paul Jackson. Brit Turner appeared on all…

ANATION MOURNED following news of the passing of DJ and broadcaster Steve Wright – also recognised by the name of his long-running BBC radio show Steve Wright In The Afternoon. The 69-yearold died following an incident at his home. Police said his death was “unexpected” but was not being treated as suspicious.  Born in Greenwich, South London, Wright joined the BBC in the early 70s as a clerk, and left in 1976 for a broadcasting opportunity at Thames Valley Radio. His big break came three years later when he was handed a nightly show on Radio Luxembourg. He presented Steve Wright In The Afternoon for 12 years on Radio 1, before moving to Radio 2, where it ran for 23 years. He was also a regular presenter on Top Of…

“Alabama Shakes, Brittany Howard and the production style have been huge influences on us.” CONSIDERING THEY HAVE a young, excitable son, Lucky, married duo Issy Ferris and Archie Sylvester are bright-eyed for our morning chat, brimming with cheer when asked about their success at the UK Americana Awards, where they were nominated in three categories, and won Best Album for their 2022 debut Superhuman. They’re also excited about their new album Otherness. Comprising 14 tracks of what Ferris terms “folk-blues rock’n’roll”, it’s the result of “years of writing what’s best for the song, and also what holds an audience’s attention when they might be chatting”. The pair met in 2016 through playing at respective live music nights at the (sadly now defunct) Spiritual Bar in north London. London-based Sylvester was…

An expanded, multidisc version of Def Leppard’s multiplatinum-selling 1983 album Pyromania will belatedly celebrate the album’s 40th anniversary. Available on April 26, the reboot includes the previously unreleased song No You Can’t Do That, plus demos and rough mixes. Adeluxe edition also includes a book of interviews conducted by Classic Rock’s Paul Elliott. Jethro Tull have replaced guitarist Joe Parrish with Jack Clark, a multiinstrumentalist who has previously played live with the band. Tull leader Ian Anderson recently confirmed that he played flute on tracks from forthcoming album by the progmetal group Opeth. The main artists for the second ever Aftershock festival in California have been confirmed. Taking place on October 10-13, its headliners are Iron Maiden, Slipknot, Mötley Crüe and the newly reunited Slayer, along with 130 bands spread…

It’s difficult to believe we’ve had the pleasure of Sheryl Crow’s company for three decades now – not least to the singer-songwriter herself. “I’ll be honest with you, I don’t know if anybody ever really feels their age,” she considers. “I mean, I’m sixty-two and I need to get my lips done, I need to get a little facelift. But unless I’m looking in a mirror, mentally I feel like I’m about thirty-six.” Talking in the music room of her home in rural Nashville, sitting in front of a rack of vintage acoustic guitars befitting the queen of heartland roots rock, Crow is everything we need right now from our rock stars. Witty, articulate, informed and inquisitive, she is nobody’s vacuous pin-up. She has opinions: on gun control, climate change,…

‘Back after athree-year break, the band show no sign of rustiness.’ With a string of 25 Top 75 hits dating back to 1997’s Tangerine, Feeder have been around for three decades now. Not that you’d know it. There’s no ostentatious display of anniversary survival tonight. Feeder have never been the type of band to nostalgically perform past albums in their entirety, or metaphorically hang out the bunting as another year passes. Welsh singer, guitarist and songwriter Grant Nicholas is more concerned with summoning their next radio-friendly ear worm. Alongside Nicholas still stands Taka Hirose, who became Feeder’s bass player after arriving in London from Japan 39 years ago. As a non-writer, Hirose’s exact role within the band is slightly uncertain, although those who saw the recent documentary on Wham! may…