BILLY SQUIER’S CAREER GETS A BOOST FROM HIP HOP

billysquier640 Maureen Callahan of the New York Post reports:

Ask anyone under 25 if they’ve heard of Billy Squier, and the answer is likely no. But that doesn’t mean they haven’t heard him.

Squier has one of the most unusual stories in all of pop culture: a one-time superstar who, in the ’80s, straddled glam, pop and hard rock. Then, in 1984, after his unintentionally camp video for Rock Me Tonite hit MTV, featuring Squier prancing around in fluffy hair and satin sheets, his career was over, just like that. “Flapping his wrists like a French chef whose souffle has just fallen,” said Rolling Stone.

Thirty years on, the most famous of Rock N’ Roll exiles has a stealth second career as the most sampled musician in the history of hip-hop.

“I think he has millions of fans that love his body of work but probably thousands of fans that love him,” says Big Daddy Kane, who has sampled Squier’s The Big Beat so often he’s lost count.

“He’s definitely someone who helped mold and shape hip-hop with his music,” Kane says. “I would put him in the category of James Brown, the Honeydrippers and Chic. He gave the B-boys and B-girls a track to dance to, but it would only be a DJ or an MC who knows who Billy Squier is.”

Or a producer — like the legendary Rick Rubin, who sampled The Big Beat on Jay Z’s 99 Problems and Squier’s 1981 hit The Stroke on Eminem’s Berzerk.

“People sometimes write that Billy is the king of hip-hop,” Squier said in 2005. “I didn’t even know what hip-hop was back then.”

Nor do many of the artists who sample Squier know much, if anything, about him.

“My producer found that beat,” says Mickey Avalon, who heavily sampled The Stroke for his 2009 single Stroke Me. “I didn’t even know what happened to Billy Squier.”

[When] the rock world abandoned Squier, the hip-hop community discovered him, stripping his singles for parts and, in the process, proving just how unerring and malleable a songwriter he was.

The Big Beat — the song that would change everything — never charted, but the record did, and in 1983, Run-D.M.C. sampled the song on “Here We Go (Live at the Funhouse). It’s the first known commercial hip-hop sampling of Billy Squier — one of nearly 200 today.

“For a rock star, he was always someone who put the rhythm track first,” says Rob Sheffield, writer for Rolling Stone and author of the karaoke memoir Turn Around Bright Eyes.  ‘The Big Beat’ was not a hit, but that immense drum track got a lot of attention. I don’t know if Billy Squier thought he was becoming part of the future of the funk, but that’s the way hip-hop works.”

Since then, Squier has been sampled by everyone from Grandmaster Flash to Kanye West to Alicia Keys to A Tribe Called Quest to Jay Z.

“Billy Squier was one of the rock stars who learned from Led Zeppelin that massive drums do a lot of the talking,” Sheffield says. “He was the first guy to really figure out their production trick — that isolated thunder.”

Hence the hip-hop appeal: “You can put anything on that.”

Oscar-nominated songwriter Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne agrees. “Billy Squier had a tendency to start his singles with the drums ‘in the clear’ for a few bars — i.e., playing alone before the rest of the band comes in, which makes them really easy to sample,” he says.  ‘The Big Beat’ and The Stroke both start this way. And Chouinard played really big, simple John Bonham-esque beats that work great for rock and hip-hop.”

It’s estimated that Squier has earned millions of dollars through sampling alone — and a mostly uncredited second life as a Billboard superstar.

He’s still slightly puzzled by his preeminence in hip-hop and is bitter the rock establishment hasn’t re-embraced him in the same way. “I wouldn’t want to end up in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as the ‘Master of Hip-Hop Samples,’ ” he said in 2005, “but you take what you can get.”

Rap songs that Squier’s beats have been featured in:

The Stroke 1981 has been sampled in:

Eminem, “Berserk”
Mickey Avalon, “Stroke Me”
Company Flow, “Wurker Ant Uprise”
Grandwizzard Johnny O and the Might Sorcerer Crew, “When It Breaks”

The Big Beat, 1980 has been sampled in:

Jay-Z, “99 Problems”
Kanye West and Pusha T, “Looking for Trouble”
Dizzee Rascal, “Fix Up, Look Sharp”
Nas feat. Will.i.am, “Hip Hop is Dead”
Puff Daddy, “Can’t Nobody Hold Me Down”
A Tribe Called Quest, “We Can Get Down”
Big Daddy Kane, “Put Your Weight On It,” “Get Down,” “Ain’t No Half Steppin,” “The Beef Is On” and “3 Forties and a Bottle of Moet”
Ice Cube, “Jackin’ for Beats”
Alicia Keys, “Girl on Fire”
Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, “Magic Carpet Ride”
Run-D.M.C, “Here We Go”

Read more at the New York Post.

source: nypost.com

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PHILIP ANSELMO & THE ILLEGALS ANNOUNCE LEG TWO OF “TECHNICIANS OF DISTORTION” TOUR

philanselmo Philip Anselmo and his band The Illegals – guitarist Marzi Montazeri (Superjoint Ritual), bassist Steve Taylor (16 Horsepower, Woven Hand), and Jose Manual “Blue” Gonzalez (Warbeast) on drums – will hit the road bright and early in 2014 for the second half of its Technicians of Distortion tour. It begins January 10th in Houston, will play intimate rock clubs exclusively, and is in support of Anselmo’s first solo album, the critically-acclaimed Walk Through Exits Only that was released last July, as well as the recently-released, limited-edition two-song Housecore Horror Fest 10-inch vinyl EP that will be available for purchase on all tour dates.

Tickets go on sale November 22nd log onto TheHousecoreRecords.com for all ticketing information.

Reprising his support slot from the first part of the tour will be Author & Punisher, while the avant-garde metal band Hymns (signed to Anselmo’s label Housecore Records) will open all shows. Hymn’s self-titled album will be available on all tour dates.

Confirmed dates for Leg Two of the Technicians of Distortion tour are as follows:

January

10 Warehouse Live/Studio Room, Houston, TX
11 Riverside Warehouse, Shreveport, LA
13 Pop’s Nightclub, St. Louis, MO
14 Waiting Room, Omaha, NE
15 Summit Music Hall, Denver, CO
17 El Corazon, Seattle, WA
18 Hawthorne Theatre, Portland, OR
20 Ace of Spades, Sacramento, CA
22 Metal Masters, Los Angeles, CA
24 Pub Rock, Scottsdale, AZ
25 Launchpad, Albuquerque, NM
27 Backstage Live, San Antonio, TX
28 Trees, Dallas, TX

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EDDIE DISCUSSES HIS BOOK WITH GOLDMINE, INTERVIEW POSTED HERE

eddietrunk Patrick Prince of Goldmine spoke with Eddie Trunk about his book and his personal memorabilia. The interview appears in its entirety below.

Goldmine: When did you come up with the idea for a second book [Eddie Trunk’s Essential Hard Rock and Heavy Metal Volume II]? Were you thinking about continuing this as a series when you were doing the first book?

Eddie Trunk: Yeah, I actually was, because what ended up happening with the first book is that I overwrote it. I wanted to include a ton of bands that I found out I didn’t have room for. The first book being my first-ever book — first time working with a publisher — I had no idea of how it all worked. I thought that if there are extra bands, you just add extra pages. I didn’t realize there were only a certain amount of pages to be used and all that. I had written about a bunch of extra bands, and for the people who have the first book, many of those bands ended up with quick little paragraphs in the last couple pages under a header that said “more essentials.” I originally intended for those to be more in-depth. And when I found out they couldn’t be, I thought if the first book does well and I get the opportunity to do a second one, I’ll get a chance to pick up on most of those bands. Not every one of them, but most of those bands are getting full treatment in Volume II. And, hopefully, there’s a Volume III down the line, because I certainly could do one. It’s crazy to say, but I ran into the same problem this time around, too. I mean, I started and I looked at the “more essential bands” as a framework, and then when there were others I wanted to include, I realized I was running out of space again. Someone just pointed out to me — and I feel like crap about it, because the guy couldn’t be nicer to me and just had me onstage the other day — I fully intended to do a Rob Zombie/White Zombie chapter in this new book, but in the shuffle they got lost, too. I wanted to do an overview on one of my favorite guitarists, John Sykes, too, but it just didn’t happen this time around. There were a lot of bands like Whitesnake and Ratt and bands like that that were very big bands at one point in that “more essentials” chapter of that first book that needed to get the full treatment.

GM: It’s also nice to see the inclusion of bands like, say, Riot. There’s a new generation of fans who should know more about certain underrated bands of the past.

ET: That’s the balance that I needed to create. You know, for every Whitesnake and Ratt and the more mainstream stuff — hit bands from the ’80s or what have you — I wanted to throw in some of these bands that were extremely important and are in there for selfish reasons than commercial reasons. In the case of a band like Riot, I think they were a phenomenal band that far too many people don’t know about or have any clue who they are. They were a band I was very on the fence about doing a section on, only because I was hit with these choices, like if I’m going to do a full section on Riot that means, well, maybe Rob Zombie or Sykes doesn’t make it. But I had to make those choices, and in the case of Riot, I kind of just leaned on stuff that was really important to me when I was a kid. And that kind of steered me in that direction. I think Fire Down Under is one of the greatest metal records ever. For every five bands you get that everybody knows about, there’s gonna be Riot — slightly under-the- radar stuff that I think creates some balance where people say, “Hey, I don’t really know about this band,” or they do, like you, and they are really pumped up to see some photos or hear my thoughts on them. So that was really the balance I was going for.

GM: A great addition to the books are the songs lists (Eddie’s Playlist) for each band. As a kid, were you always into Top 10 lists and creating tapes of your top songs?

ET: I was always really into making mix tapes. I still have a lot of them on cassette, being before I started in radio, which is 30 years now.
I mean, I was pretending to be on the radio by making mix tapes. I never got into lists and countdowns all that much, but it became a very big thing with my TV show. You know, lists are good, because they get people to debate and stuff. My whole thing with lists is more like a playlist. And I wanted to use the playlist to be songs for people to check out beyond the obvious. People didn’t understand how I didn’t have Hot For Teacher or Panama on the list for the Van Halen chapter in my first book. First of all, anyone who knows me knows that I’m not a hit-oriented guy. The hits from most bands that I love are songs that I kind of check out on, because I don’t ever need to hear them again. Not that they’re bad songs. I’m just burnt out on it. I’ve heard from a lot of people who use the first book as a reference. You know, they’ve given it to their kids or looked at it and discovered bands or songs that they never heard from bands, and they got the song to listen to it. So I didn’t need to tell people in my first book that Guns N’ Roses have a song called Welcome to the Jungle. I do want to tell them, though, check out their Dead Boys’ cover Ain’t It Fun; it’s really cool. That was really the purpose of the playlists. And in this book, the one difference I made when the playlists came in, I relegated it to 10 songs. That wasn’t the case in the first book. So this time, I was going to give 10 songs, in not any sort of order, that I like from these bands that people should check out.

GM: This book continues to show your personal memorabilia, like ticket stubs and backstage passes. Do you acquire a lot of band memorabilia?

ET: The stuff that I have is like the scans that are in the book — stuff I got from going to shows, mostly ticket stubs or backstage passes. In the first book, one of the things I really value is this button from my first-ever concert, which was KISS at the Garden in ’77, and WPLJ used to hand out buttons when you walked in. And I still have that button. So that kind of memorabilia is really important to me. But certainly if bands give me stuff, I value it and hold onto it.

GM: You must get a lot of stuff from musicians: “To Eddie, thanks.” That stuff will not only be worth a lot to you but to your fans and fans of the bands.

ET: One of the bands I did a section on in the new book is Buckcherry, because they were a more recent band that was really important to me, and I kind of helped them a lot in their comeback effort. When they first had that huge comeback a few years ago with Crazy Bitch and that 15 album, they sent me a gold and platinum record. But Keith (Nelson), the guitarist, sent me this photo and wrote on it “You were there first. Thanks for believing.” It was a little picture, but I still have that up on my wall. Stuff like that that’s really personal. I know people who collect guitar picks or drumsticks, and I was never that guy. I don’t mean to diminish it, but I was never into that sort of thing. The other thing is, especially doing the TV show, a lot of amazing musicians who I have been a huge fan of have given me instruments. I mean, Michael Schenker gave me a V (guitar). Billy Sheehan gave me a bass. Dave Mustaine just gave me a V. I mean, it’s amazing, but I don’t play any instruments, and I don’t really have the room in my house to display them properly. So as much as I value these things, for the most part, for now, they’re kind of in boxes or stored until I can find the right thing to do with them and put them up on my walls.

GM: What do you think your next book will be about?

ET: I honestly don’t know. I certainly think I can easily do a third book. It can really keep going. And every day, I’m discovering new bands. I think from a selling standpoint, most people want hear the stories, and the content is gonna come from the old bands. That’s what I love, and that’s my passion — the classic stuff I grew up with. But there are a lot of new bands that I like, too, so who knows as their stories unfold. And at some point — I don’t know when — maybe within the next 10 years, I do want to write more of an industry-driven book, more of a book that tells my behind-the-scenes stories from being in this business 30 years and counting. There are a lot of stories that I probably can’t tell right now because I kind of have to work with people, you know (laughs). But I’d like to someday tell about “How the heck did you get on the radio? What was it like working with all these radio companies? What really goes on behind-the-scenes? What really goes on with TV? How did you get the TV gig?” You know, that sort of stuff, the business side of my story, if you will. So, yeah, I have more books in me, if people care to read them. I don’t claim or intend for these books to have any groundbreaking secrets here. I don’t claim or intend to be this know-it-all guru guy.

GM: It’s basically a labor of love.

ET: Yeah, it’s my love letter to those bands. I’ve been lucky enough to carve out a following of people who care enough about what I say and play and do and look at it as some sort of reference point or some sort of guide, some sort of trust. “If Eddie says he likes it and behind it, it’s gotta be cool to check out.” And that’s all I ever got into this business for. That’s why I got into radio. To spread the word on bands I love. And into TV. So, these books are nothing more than that. They are for people who listen or watch or read me and like where I’m coming from on this stuff. It’s just another outlet. And I try to, when possible, make it personal enough so it’s not like you’re reading a Wikipedia page. Whenever I meet people now, it’s “Tell me about this guy.” So I try to put a little bit of that in there, so it creates a balance that seems to work.

source: Goldmine

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MOTLEY CRUE FRONTMAN VINCE NEIL CELEBRATES GRAND OPENING OF NEW LAS VEGAS HOTSPOT

vinceneilvegasbar250 On November 5th, Vince Neil started the party with a VIP opening event for his closest friends. Vince arrived with girlfriend Rain Andreani and joined special guests that included Guns N’ Roses guitarist Dj Ashba, artist Michael Godard, famed comedian and fellow “Gold Club” member Scott Thompson, a/k/a Carrot Top, Pantera’s Vinnie Paul, actor Chuck McCann and rapper Coolio. Cult character actor Michael Berryman, who portrayed the principal from Motley Crue’s hit video
Smokin’ in the Boys Room, presented Vince with an A++ for his school assignment reminiscent of the 1985 video he appeared in. Guest musicians Paul Shortino and Andrew Freeman from the hit show Raiding the Rock Vault joined the Sin City Sinners on stage for Dio’s classic, Rainbow in the Dark; and Ron Keel covered Whole Lotta Love by Led Zeppelin.

The venue is truly a tribute to Vince Neil’s momentous career spanning over three decades and includes the rocker’s gold and platinum records mixed in with memorabilia of some of his most prized possessions, including a few stage costumes and even his racing suit displayed on mannequins. The décor, straight out of the Decade That Rocked on the Sunset Strip, is filled with an array of iconic photographs of Vince by rock photographer Mark “Weissguy” Weiss, who was an integral part of the creative vision for the restaurant and bar areas.

“This is great! It reminds me of the Rainbow back in the day–the red booths, the photos, the album covers. It’s a great hang! It’s almost like making a
record. You have this thought in your head and you see it progress and progress. Then, all of a sudden you hold the album in your hand–like back in the day–and you say oh my god. This turned out so good. It’s the same thing when someone opens a restaurant or bar. You have a vision and you see it finished. You look around and you say wow– this really turned out great!!”

“I want this to be a cool hangout not only for the locals here and the local rockers in Las Vegas, but the bands that come into town to play the clubs in
Vegas… and this is the place to come hang out afterward or before.” Vince Neil told Ron Keel on his radio show “The Streets of Rock & Roll” at the Grand Opening.

Saturday night, Neil welcomed the public to experience Eat-Drink-Party! for the first time with a night of live entertainment by the Rat Pack of Rock N’ Roll, Sin City Sinners, along with plenty of scantily clad go-go girls dancing on the bar tops. Vince spent the majority of the evening in his custom-designed Gold Room, hanging with venue co-owners and longtime restaurant aficionados David Tuttleman and Mark Green. Saturday’s Grand Opening event welcomed notable faces in the crowd such as Chris Phillips of Zowie Bowie, Felix Silla, Cousin Itt from the Adams Family, Phil Lewis of L.A. Guns, master puppeteer Bill Diamond and more. Just before 11 PM, Vince thrilled the amped-up crowd when he joined the Sinners to perform Highway to Hell by AC/DC and Rock and Roll by Led Zeppelin. Next up, Pantera’s Vinnie Paul joined in a chorus of Run to the Hills by Iron
Maiden and Rock and Roll Hall-of-Famer, Howard Leese (Heart, Bad Company and Raiding the Rock Vault) performed All Right Now by Free. John Payne (Asia,Raiding the Rock Vault) and the Sinners closed the show with a fitting rendition of With a Little Help From My Friends.

EAT-DRINK-PARTY! serves up a mouth-watering menu of food and drink, including Vince’s signature Tatuado brand. The winning combination of Neil’s affinity for tattoos and tequila along with Tuttleman and Green’s emphasis on a party-like environment is the perfect showcase to host a variety of entertainment events. Everything from national acts and local Vegas rock stars to tribute acts, book signings, CD release parties, acoustic performances and meet and greets, are all planned for the venue.

“I have wanted to expand the Tatuado brand and bring it to The Strip for awhile,” said Vince Neil. “Teaming with David and Mark to recreate Rock & Rita’s
into my own spot will create a true home for the brand. People can come have a great time and enjoy my signature line of spirits while they party.”

To view photos from Vince Neil’s EAT-DRINK-PARTY, go to www.markweiss.com/EDP_party_and_interiors_web.

For more information on Vince Neil’s Tatuado EAT-DRINK-PARTY, Vince Neil’s Party Bus Bar and Rock & Rita’s sports bar at Circus Circus, please visit www.VinceNeilsParty.com.

Watch a video, featuring highlights from the grand opening, below.

vinceneiltatudo650

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BLACK SABBATH EXTEND TOUR INTO 2014, NEW DATES ANNOUNCED

blacksabb2013 Following wildly successful shows in North and South America, Australia, Asia and now Europe (which begins November 20th in Helsinki, Finland), Black Sabbath have announced additional shows in North America and Europe in 2014. The 2014 North American dates begin March 31st at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, NY and will hit ten cities in Canada, including stops in Quebec, Montreal, Ottawa, Calgary and Edmonton, before wrapping up April 26th at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, CA. Tickets for the North American dates go on sale beginning Friday, November 22nd at www.livenation.com Beginning today, fans can visit (http://bit.ly/RSVPBlackSabbath) to RSVP for early access to presale tickets available Wednesday, November 20.

These dates will be part of the band’s final shows of their 2013-2014 world tour in support of their first studio album in 35 years, 13, which entered the charts at #1 in 13 countries (including their first #1 in the U.S.).

For more than three decades, rock fans have hoped for the return of Black Sabbath, but few could have predicted the forceful return-to-form of 13, which was produced by seven-time Grammy-Award winning producer Rick Rubin. With epic songs like God Is Dead?, End of the Beginning and Loner, 13 is a testament to the enduring relevance of Black Sabbath’s long-running reign. The original Black Sabbath has sold over 70 million albums worldwide.

Black Sabbath–Ozzy Osbourne (vocals), Tony Iommi (guitar) and Geezer Butler (bass)–began their 2013 world tour on April 20th. The fall European tour launch coincides with the release of Black Sabbath: Live…Gathered in Their Masses DVD, Blu-Ray, combo pack and deluxe box. Filmed April 29th and May 1st, 2013 in Melbourne, Australia, Black Sabbath: Live…Gathered in Their Masses features the first-ever live performances of songs from the band’s 2013 critically acclaimed 13 album, along with Sabbath classics.

Black Sabbath’s 2014 North American tour dates are as follows:

3/31 Brooklyn, NY Barclays Center
4/3 Halifax, NS Metro Centre
4/5 Quebec City, QC Colisee Pepsi
4/7 Montreal, QC Bell Centre
4/9 London, ON Budweiser Gardens
4/11 Hamilton, ON Copps Coliseum
4/13 Ottawa, ON Canadian Tire Centre
4/16 Winnipeg, MB MTS Centre
4/18 Saskatoon, SK Credit Union Centre
4/20 Calgary, AB Scotiabank Saddledome
4/22 Edmonton, AB Rexall Place
4/26 Los Angeles, CA Hollywood Bowl

For more information, please visit blacksabbath.com.

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SOUNDGARDEN TO TOUR IN 2014 WITHOUT DRUMMER MATT CAMERON

soundgarden400 Soundgarden will be hitting the road again next year, but drummer Matt Cameron will be taking a temporary break from playing live with the band due to his commitments as Pearl Jam’s drummer, Cameron announced today (November 15th) in a statement on Soundgarden’s website.

“I will be taking 2014 off from Soundgarden touring due to prior commitments promoting [PJ’s album] Lightning Bolt with my brothers in Pearl Jam and the desire to have more time at home with my family,” Cameron says in the Soundgardenworld.com posting. “I am trying to balance the many twists and turns of my awesome music career. This is temporary. I am still an active member of Soundgarden.”

It’s been a busy time for Soundgarden since they reformed in 2010, with regular tours and 2012 studio album King Animal. It’s been twice as busy for Matt Cameron, who has also been Pearl Jam’s drummer since 1998.

additional source: Billboard

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