Britain’s Rick Parfitt, of the band Status Quo, died of an infection just two months after quitting the band that launched him into stardom.
“The Quo,” as the group is affectionately called, has sold more than 125 million records, and can claim more than 50 No. 1 singles in its native Britain.
The 68-year-old Parfitt was hospitalized in Marbella, Spain on Thursday, after suffering “complications to a shoulder injury incurred by a previous fall,” his family and manager said in a statement. He died of an infection Saturday.
Parfitt and the band found global success with a string of hits including “Rockin’ All Over The World” and “Whatever You Want.”
Their first album was released in 1968 and brought them their first hit, “Pictures of Matchstick Men.” It reached No. 7 in the UK charts and No. 12 in the United States, the highest the band would ever chart in the States, according to Billboard.
The band went on to release more than 40 other albums and play more than 6,000 shows, according to its own estimate.
But after a musical career spanning nearly 50 years, Parfitt collapsed after a show in Turkey in June, suffering his third heart attack.
He later told Sky News he “had died for several minutes.”
Fearful of “dropping dead on stage in front of the fans,” Parfitt pulled the plug on touring, announcing he was leaving Status Quo.
“It’s my fault,” he said in the September interview. “You live the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle and at some stage you’ve got to pay for it. I am now paying for it.”
Nevertheless, Parfitt was going to launch a solo career, with an album and autobiography planned for the new year, his family and manager, Simon Porter, said.
Tributes to Parfitt poured in after news of his death. “He joyfully rocked our world,” tweeted Parfitt’s 1970s contemporary, Queen guitarist Brian May…
…Parfitt is survived by his third wife, Lyndsay, their twins Tommy and Lily, and his adult children, Rick and Harry, according to the statement.
After Parfitt’s death, the band’s official website was updated to show a picture of him doing what he loved — performing on stage with his guitar
Ruben Mosqueda of Metal Titans spoke with Accept guitarist Wolf Hoffmann. Excerpts from the interview appear below.
Metal Titans: To clarify you have a live DVD titled Restless & Live coming in January [2017], right? I ask this because you also added a live DVD as the bonus to the last album Blind Rage. The bonus DVD on that album was filmed in Chile.
Wolf Hoffmann: I can tell you this; Restless & Live is a package with three round discs! [laughs] One is a complete live performance on DVD; filmed in Germany, multi-camera and it was filmed at a European festival called Bang Your Head. It’s full production, great quality and the full show. The CDs are live material from shows from various shows all across Europe. I think it’s like an addition 27 songs of material.
Metal Titans: Will there be any select U.S. dates to promote Restless & Live or are you aiming to use this as a means to tide fans over between albums?
Wolf Hoffmann: That’s exactly what it is. We did this just for the fans until the next album is released. We toured a lot more behind the Blind Rage album, we have a couple new members and it’s going to be a few months before we have new material released. We felt that Restless & Live was a great release between [studio] records. As I said we are working on new material and the new studio album will be released next year. At the moment we’re looking at July or August [2017].
It should be released then but as you know sometimes things change. After we release the next album we begin our touring cycle which we’re hoping brings us to the U.S. this time around. I’m desperately hoping [to tour the U.S.] because it has been so long.
Metal Titans: That’s right because you were out in the Northwest when you promoted ‘Blood of the Nations’ then again behind ‘Stalingrad’ that was a co-headline with Kreator but nothing for ‘Blind Rage.’ That was a disappointment but that has nothing to do with the band but rather more to do with the promoters who book bands.
Wolf Hoffmann: It is or then there’s a timing issue. If you’re committed to touring somewhere else then it makes it impossible. Touring the U.S. has completely changed; touring the U.S. 6-8 weeks like we have done in the past has become harder and harder to do. There are some markets that just don’t…the ticket sales aren’t there and the promoters don’t want to take the risk.
We are happy to play wherever anyone books us; the last few years we have been concentrating on shows in California and on the East coast. There’s all these other markets that we’d love to play in between too…So we’ll put the feelers out and spread the word and see what happens. Fans ask us why don’t you ever come to Portland? Well it’s not like we can jump on a plane and ‘just play’ in Portland? It doesn’t work that way! [laughs] Fans don’t understand that it needs to be planned out months in advance and it has to coincide with other stuff.
Metal Titans:…has there ever been discussion of recutting some of the classics in studio with Mark? Not as a standalone release but more as bonus cuts?
Wolf Hoffmann: [long pause] It has been discussed but I’m not really sure that it would be a good idea? [long pause] I have heard where other people have done that; it’s been in circumstances where the label owns their masters. The idea is if you re-record it then it’s yours and you can license it for commercial use. I don’t know…I don’t really see the point? I’ll be honest I’d much rather spend my time writing and creating new stuff. I imagine if you really want to hear what the old songs sound performed by this Accept you can pick up Restless & Live and you can do that.
Watch a live clip of Stampede from Restless & Live, here.
Overkill have released a lyric video for the song, Mean, Green, Killing Machine. Listen to it below.
The song appears on the band’s forthcoming album, The Grinding Wheel, which is set for release on February 10th, through Nuclear Blast. The band previously released a lyric video for Our Finest Hour. Click here to listen to the song.
Pre-order the album digitally and receive Mean, Green Killing Machine” and Our Finest Hour as instant-grat tracks.
The Grinding Wheel track listing:
1. Mean, Green, Killing Machine
2. Goddamn Trouble
3. Our Finest Hour
4. Shine On
5. The Long Road
6. Let’s All Go To Hades
7. Come Heavy
8. Red White And Blue
9. The Wheel
10. The Grinding Wheel
…[While talking with former Pantera frontman Phil Anselmo], he says he…identifies with marginalized people because of his upbringing. He grew up in New Orleans’ French Quarter – “That’s a diverse f–king crowd of people,” he says – and he was raised by a single mother who “dated black men and whatever and they were in my house that I lived in – they spent the night and all that – and all I had was f–king love for them.” His nanny when he was young, he says, was a transgender woman who was assigned male at birth named Wilma. “I loved her,” he says repeatedly. He points out that he uses the past tense when talking about her not because he no longer loves her, but because she is now dead.
“This is shit I’ve never f–king opened up about until now,” he says. “But when people constantly talk about being a victim or something, there are going to be certain points where I have to step back and go, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa.’ Especially when people shout and scream about us living in a rape culture and men are this evil product. … Guess who was molested his entire child-f–king-hood by numerous people, both men and women. … ” He pauses, and lowers his chin to make eye contact. “Me.” He pauses again and sharpens his glare. “Me.”
Anselmo resituates himself, closing the bathroom door to let the heat build back up. “I’ve never told the world this, but I am now maybe because I’m almost 50 and I don’t give a f–k anymore,” he says. “But it happened. I never blamed the world for it like I’m seeing kids today do, putting everybody in one box. And the same thing goes for race and all this s–t.”
In addition to the scrutiny of the world at large, Anselmo also faced derision in the press from one of his former Pantera bandmates, drummer Vinnie Paul. A rift grew between them as the band broke up in the early 2000s and it has widened since an insane fan gunned down Dimebag Darrell at a 2004 concert by Darrell and Paul’s post-Pantera band Damageplan, as Paul alluded that Anselmo had stoked the killer by comments he made in the press. Paul has claimed he hasn’t seen Anselmo in person since 2001.
Earlier this year, when Paul was asked for a comment on Anselmo’s white-power salute, he was dismissive. “I can’t speak for him,” he said. “He’s done a lot of things that tarnish the image of what Pantera was back then and what it stood for and what it was all about. And it’s sad.”
Anselmo recoils at first when thinking about Paul’s comments, but soon turns dismissive. “Yeah, I saw that he said that but anything out of that dude’s mouth is … ugh … it seems sour,” he says. “I don’t have anything in common with that guy at all.” He pauses to find his words. “But Vince better be caref– …” He stops mid-word and seamlessly switches sentiments. “One day I’m really not gonna care about whatever the legacy of Pantera [is]. It’s great that we had such an awesome fan base and still continue to have this awesome fan base, but there will be probably be a whole lot of ’em that would be perhaps a little disappointed in my assessment of the whole situation. So I’ll just leave it at that. And that’s why I’m not going to speak out about it, even though I know when this interview comes out, people are going to say, ‘Well, you almost went off on that.’ And yeah, almost. Operative word.”
He says he’s careful with his words because he wonders about Paul’s mental well-being, even more than a decade after the fatal concert. “You have to worry about Vince’s state of mind, just like you have to worry about all of our states of mind,” he says. “I know in my heart I have to accept what happened to Dimebag because it’s just real. He’s gone. He was murdered. But there’s a giant chunk of me that will never understand it. I’ve spoken to the police about it. I’ve spoken to the cop that was on hand that ended things, murdered the murderer. I’m not sure I’ll ever understand it…”
…Anselmo has since resumed a regular working pace. He’s played live with Superjoint and they have a tour planned for next year. And he has announced the release of the Bill and Phil record, Songs of Darkness and Despair, which comes out January 20th and is a departure musically for him. The music, for which Anselmo plays guitar, straddles blues-rock and avant-rock with synthy detours, as Moseley – whose film credits include The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2, Army of Darkness and The Devil’s Rejects – sings somewhat bizarre words.
“We’ve been friends for years, and we had a three-day weekend so we said we want to come up with six ridiculous songs,” Anselmo says. “The dude can sing. He’s got a great range. He’d come in with lyrics and I’d look at the title and say, ‘This is a ridiculous title, Bill…'”
…Anselmo also has many other releases he would like to put out in the coming year that range from sounds you would expect from him to what he calls “un-metal,” mellow songs which he will release under the name Illegals in Minor. “That stuff is heavy in its own right,” he says. “Extremities come in all genres. Like, there isn’t anybody alive that’s going to convince me that Björk ain’t extreme. So if it helps the project by using a cello or stand-up piano or a waterphone, then so be it. I’m going to use it.”
He opens the bathroom door so he can smoke again and likens the vibe of that music to Nick Cave, David Bowie and the Smiths and says he sings in his natural baritone. The lyrics deal with his lack of fear of death, something he says he knows about as he’s been declared medically dead more than once. “As a guy who’s croaked a few times, I’ll let you know straight up, there wasn’t much there,” he says with a laugh. “And if there was, it ain’t memorable. It was pretty peaceful from what I remember. The best way I could put it is if you could have memories of the safety of a womb, so to speak, it was something like that. But being resuscitated medically – the hecticness of that – it makes you think, ‘Damn, being dead was sure a lot easier than dealing with all this shit, man.'” He laughs.
Metal Blade Records (celebrating their 35th Anniversary), Scorpions, and the Rainbow Bar and Grill have just joined the list of Metal Royalty who have been nominated for induction into the the 2017 Hall of Heavy Metal History. The All-Star Induction Ceremony will take place on Wednesday, January 18th, 2017 at the Anaheim Expo Center, Anaheim CA. Television and radio legend Eddie Trunk will host the event.
Performing at the Ceremony will be Dio Disciples featuring Craig Goldy, Simon Wright Scott Warren, Bjorn Englen, Tim ‘Ripper’ Owens, and Joe Retta. Ross “The Boss” (band), will also be performing, which features Iconic guitarist Ross ‘The Boss’ Friedman, Rhino (Formerly of Manowar), vocalist Marc Lopes, and Mike LePond (Symphony X). Surprise artists will also take part in the event. Supporting bands include Budderside, and LA rockers Diamond Lane.
Proceeds from the event will benefit the Ronnie James Dio Stand Up And Shout Cancer Fund. To read more about this event, please click here.
Riot V, the band featuring the remaining members of the band Riot, released their debut album, Unleash The Fire, in October 2014 via SPV/Steamhammer. The band has released a video for the song, Bring The Hammer Down, from the album, and which can be viewed below.
Unleash The Fire is the band’s first release from without founding guitarist Mark Reale, who passed away in early 2012.
, Scorpions, and the Rainbow Bar and Grill have just joined the list of Metal Royalty who have been nominated for induction into the the 2017 ... )
