Saturday, February 7, 2015
Marc Almond: Royal Birthday Plans & The Velvet Trail
Marc Almond has revealed his 60th birthday plans of a concert at London’s Royal Albert Hall.
Almond releases his new album The Velvet Trail on March 9, but has already begun plans to see in his 60th birthday on July 9, 2017.
He told us: “I want turning 60 to be a great celebration. I’ve already provisionally booked The Royal Albert Hall to play a concert that night.”
There are also plans for a wealth of reissues to coincide with Almond’s landmark birthday, including a Soft Cell box-set, a career-spanning singles compilation and an anthology of Almond’s own favourite songs. He said: “I’m fighting to get some of the rights back to some of my old singles, and that’s slowly going my way. I want to be able to say ‘This is what I’ve done over the past 40 years.’”
He added: “So much of my work has been missed out over the years. I’d love to do an anthology of my personal favourite tracks, as I’ve worked hard to make a good varied body of work. As for Soft Cell, I’d love to do a box-set. I’ve got loads of live concerts from our early days that no-one has heard, even if some of it’s on not-great-quality cassettes.”
Almond’s new single Scar is the first taste of The Velvet Trail, which was made with Lana Del Rey/Rihanna producer Chris Braide, a lifelong Almond fan.
Almond said: “Scar is a big, polished ballad, the type of song I don’t often get to do. I was flattered and honoured that Chris sent me such great songs to write lyrics for and sing. He deliberately picked bits from throughout my career so that it sounds like a Best Of. With me feeling nostalgic, planning the birthday celebrations, I was ready to embrace that.”
Almond goes on a 12-date tour, ending on May 1 at London Shepherds Bush Empire.
Neal X: New Band, The Montecristos
Sigue Sigue Sputnik singer Neal X has formed a new band, The Montecristos, who release their debut album Born To Rock N Roll on March 26.
The six-piece features Emma Goss (double bass), Gemma B (trumpet), Hugh Wilkinson (drums) and saxophonists Sophie Freeman and Orlando La Rose. X said: “I’m still totally head over leopard-print high heels in love with rock & roll. I wanted to form a band that took the energy and spirit of Little Richard in The Girl Can’t Help It and make it look and sound totally contemporary for the 21st century. It’s glammy, trashy, classy and sexy rock & roll – driven by my fist-sized overactive adrenal gland.”
In recent years, X has been guitarist and co-writer for Marc Almond, who guests on the song Brand New Cadillac. The album also features a version of Sigue Sigue Sputnik’s hit Love Missile F1-11.
http://www.classicpopmag.com/2015/01/x-marks-spot-sigue-sigue-sputnik-marc-almond/
The six-piece features Emma Goss (double bass), Gemma B (trumpet), Hugh Wilkinson (drums) and saxophonists Sophie Freeman and Orlando La Rose. X said: “I’m still totally head over leopard-print high heels in love with rock & roll. I wanted to form a band that took the energy and spirit of Little Richard in The Girl Can’t Help It and make it look and sound totally contemporary for the 21st century. It’s glammy, trashy, classy and sexy rock & roll – driven by my fist-sized overactive adrenal gland.”
In recent years, X has been guitarist and co-writer for Marc Almond, who guests on the song Brand New Cadillac. The album also features a version of Sigue Sigue Sputnik’s hit Love Missile F1-11.
http://www.classicpopmag.com/2015/01/x-marks-spot-sigue-sigue-sputnik-marc-almond/
The Pretenders: Time to Pretend
The Pretenders’ first eight albums are being compiled into a self-titled box-set.
Released on February 16, the box-set takes in the band’s albums from 1979’s self-titled debut to 1999’s Viva El Amor, with a wealth of B-sides, live songs and demos across the albums alongside DVDs for each album featuring TV appearances from shows such as Top Of The Pops.
Videos for all the album’s singles are included on the bonus DVDs, taking in hits such as Brass In Pocket, I’ll Stand By You, Back On The Chain Gang, 2000 Miles and Don’t Get Me Wrong.
Each album comprises two CDs and a DVD, apart from Packed and The Isle Of View, which feature just one CD and a DVD, with the relevant B-sides as those albums’ bonus tracks.
Released on February 16, the box-set takes in the band’s albums from 1979’s self-titled debut to 1999’s Viva El Amor, with a wealth of B-sides, live songs and demos across the albums alongside DVDs for each album featuring TV appearances from shows such as Top Of The Pops.
Videos for all the album’s singles are included on the bonus DVDs, taking in hits such as Brass In Pocket, I’ll Stand By You, Back On The Chain Gang, 2000 Miles and Don’t Get Me Wrong.
Each album comprises two CDs and a DVD, apart from Packed and The Isle Of View, which feature just one CD and a DVD, with the relevant B-sides as those albums’ bonus tracks.
Saturday, January 24, 2015
Spandau Ballet: Relive the Romance
Just before his band's encore at London's Royal Albert Hall on September 30th, singer Tony Hadley of New Romantic survivors Spandau Ballet told a story about seeing his vocal hero, Frank Sinatra, at this opulent Victorian theater in the late Seventies and actually meeting the Chairman of the Board backstage.
"What do you do, son?" Sinatra asked Hadley. "I'm a singer in a band, and someday I am going to play here," the younger man replied. He did – six years later, when Spandau Ballet's tiptoe-R&B ballad "True" was Number One in Britain and a lot of other countries.
The group – Hadley, guitarist-saxophonist Steve Norman, drummer John Keeble, songwriter-guitarist Gary Kemp, and bassist Martin Kemp, Gary's younger brother.
Spandau Ballet made their live New York debut: in May, 1981 at a club called the Underground. The venue was new but less than romantic – a midtown basement. But the group worked the small stage like a catwalk with a small, potent set list drawn from their first album, Journeys to Glory, and much closer in its crisp tension and funk momentum to the Chic-meets-Sex Pistols ideal of hairspray brethren Duran Duran.
Spandau Ballet were destined for more than the dole, as Hadley reiterated in the shiny 1983 gallop "Gold" ("You're indestructible/Always believing/You are gold")
Their breakup in 1990 – a combined product of exhaustion, mounting tensions over Gary's control of the writing and the Kemps' defection to acting. Even after Hadley, Keeble and Norman sued Gary in the Nineties for royalties and lost, it was Gary who largely initiated the 2009 reunion.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/spandau-ballet-relive-the-romance-in-soul-boys-documentary-20141001#ixzz3PloOwIrI
"What do you do, son?" Sinatra asked Hadley. "I'm a singer in a band, and someday I am going to play here," the younger man replied. He did – six years later, when Spandau Ballet's tiptoe-R&B ballad "True" was Number One in Britain and a lot of other countries.
The group – Hadley, guitarist-saxophonist Steve Norman, drummer John Keeble, songwriter-guitarist Gary Kemp, and bassist Martin Kemp, Gary's younger brother.
Spandau Ballet made their live New York debut: in May, 1981 at a club called the Underground. The venue was new but less than romantic – a midtown basement. But the group worked the small stage like a catwalk with a small, potent set list drawn from their first album, Journeys to Glory, and much closer in its crisp tension and funk momentum to the Chic-meets-Sex Pistols ideal of hairspray brethren Duran Duran.
Spandau Ballet were destined for more than the dole, as Hadley reiterated in the shiny 1983 gallop "Gold" ("You're indestructible/Always believing/You are gold")
Their breakup in 1990 – a combined product of exhaustion, mounting tensions over Gary's control of the writing and the Kemps' defection to acting. Even after Hadley, Keeble and Norman sued Gary in the Nineties for royalties and lost, it was Gary who largely initiated the 2009 reunion.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/spandau-ballet-relive-the-romance-in-soul-boys-documentary-20141001#ixzz3PloOwIrI
Saturday, January 17, 2015
Returning to Saturdays from 4-6:00 pm!
"Living In The '80s" is now on Saturday from 4 PM to 6 PM PST.
Tune in with DJ Danny "On The Radio" for all your favorite '80s music,
streaming at www.kzsc.org.
Only on KZSC, The Great 88 - Santa Cruz 88.1 FM!
Only on KZSC, The Great 88 - Santa Cruz 88.1 FM!
Saturday, December 6, 2014
Top Songs of 2014
Compiled from the number of views received on YouTube as of 12/6/2014, here are the rankings for the best songs released this year. What was your favorite new release this year?
1. U2 - Every Breaking Wave 564,967
2. Billy Idol - Can't Break Me Down 'Kings & Queens of the Underground' 389,041
3. JIMMY SOMERVILLE - Smalltown Boy (Reprise 2014) 295,477
4. Morrissey - World Peace Is None Of Your Business, debuts at #14! 270,950
5. CHRISSIE HYNDE - Dark Sunglasses ‘STOCKHOLM’ 229,859
6. Brian Eno & Karl Hyde - The Satellites 'Someday World' 175,651
7. Thurston Moore - The Best Day 144,377
8. CULTURE CLUB - More Than Silence 87,205
9. ERASURE - Elevation ‘THE VIOLET FLAME’ 63,887
10. ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN - Lovers On The Run ‘METEORITES’ 59,651
11. U2 - The Miracle (Of Joey Ramone) 56,343
12. Holly Johnson - In And Out Of Love 'Europa' 38,262
13. HOLLY JOHNSON - Follow Your Heart 'Europa' 29,166
14. ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN - Market Town ‘METEORITES’ 25,495
15. CULTURE CLUB - Like I Used To 18,610
16. MARC ALMOND - Worship Me Now 'Tasmanian Tiger' 13,413
17. Peter Buck - Drown With Me (w/Corin Tucker) 'I Am Back To Blow Your Mind Once Again' 3,719
18. BLANCMANGE - Living On The Ceiling (Vince Clarke Mix) ‘Happy Families Too’ RE-RECORDED 3,272
19. PET SHOP BOYS - Part 09 [Sorry] ‘A MAN FROM THE FUTURE’ 2,915
1. U2 - Every Breaking Wave 564,967
2. Billy Idol - Can't Break Me Down 'Kings & Queens of the Underground' 389,041
3. JIMMY SOMERVILLE - Smalltown Boy (Reprise 2014) 295,477
4. Morrissey - World Peace Is None Of Your Business, debuts at #14! 270,950
5. CHRISSIE HYNDE - Dark Sunglasses ‘STOCKHOLM’ 229,859
6. Brian Eno & Karl Hyde - The Satellites 'Someday World' 175,651
7. Thurston Moore - The Best Day 144,377
8. CULTURE CLUB - More Than Silence 87,205
9. ERASURE - Elevation ‘THE VIOLET FLAME’ 63,887
10. ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN - Lovers On The Run ‘METEORITES’ 59,651
11. U2 - The Miracle (Of Joey Ramone) 56,343
12. Holly Johnson - In And Out Of Love 'Europa' 38,262
13. HOLLY JOHNSON - Follow Your Heart 'Europa' 29,166
14. ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN - Market Town ‘METEORITES’ 25,495
15. CULTURE CLUB - Like I Used To 18,610
16. MARC ALMOND - Worship Me Now 'Tasmanian Tiger' 13,413
17. Peter Buck - Drown With Me (w/Corin Tucker) 'I Am Back To Blow Your Mind Once Again' 3,719
18. BLANCMANGE - Living On The Ceiling (Vince Clarke Mix) ‘Happy Families Too’ RE-RECORDED 3,272
19. PET SHOP BOYS - Part 09 [Sorry] ‘A MAN FROM THE FUTURE’ 2,915
U2: Unleashed a Brilliant Surprise
From Rolling Stone's 50 Best Albums of 2014
There was no bigger album of 2014 – in terms of surprise, generosity and controversy. Songs of Innocence is also the rebirth of the year. Bono, the Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. put their lives on the line: giving away 11 songs of guitar rapture and frank, emotional tales of how they became a band out of the rough streets and spiritual ferment of Seventies Dublin. This is personal history with details. In the furiously brooding "Cedarwood Road," named after Bono's home address as a boy, he recalls the fear and rage that drove him to punk rock. "The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)" is a glam-stomp homage to the misfit voice that inspired Bono to sing. And that's his mother, who died when Bono was 14, still guiding and comforting him in the chorus of "Iris (Hold Me Close)."
This is a record full of the band's stories and triumph, memory and confession detonated with adventure and poise. In its range of sounds, there may be no more complete U2 album: The band bonded its founding post-punk values with dance momentum in "Volcano" and the raw, jagged "Raised by Wolves," and humanized the digital pathos of "Every Breaking Wave" and the harrowing "Sleep Like a Baby Tonight" with the vocal folk-soul warmth of The Joshua Tree. "I have a will for survival," Bono sings in the closing track, "The Troubles." Songs of Innocence is the proof – and the emotionally raw rock album of the year, at any price.
Read more
There was no bigger album of 2014 – in terms of surprise, generosity and controversy. Songs of Innocence is also the rebirth of the year. Bono, the Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. put their lives on the line: giving away 11 songs of guitar rapture and frank, emotional tales of how they became a band out of the rough streets and spiritual ferment of Seventies Dublin. This is personal history with details. In the furiously brooding "Cedarwood Road," named after Bono's home address as a boy, he recalls the fear and rage that drove him to punk rock. "The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)" is a glam-stomp homage to the misfit voice that inspired Bono to sing. And that's his mother, who died when Bono was 14, still guiding and comforting him in the chorus of "Iris (Hold Me Close)."
This is a record full of the band's stories and triumph, memory and confession detonated with adventure and poise. In its range of sounds, there may be no more complete U2 album: The band bonded its founding post-punk values with dance momentum in "Volcano" and the raw, jagged "Raised by Wolves," and humanized the digital pathos of "Every Breaking Wave" and the harrowing "Sleep Like a Baby Tonight" with the vocal folk-soul warmth of The Joshua Tree. "I have a will for survival," Bono sings in the closing track, "The Troubles." Songs of Innocence is the proof – and the emotionally raw rock album of the year, at any price.
Read more
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