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GUITARIST PAUL GILBERT TO RELEASE 17TH SOLO ALBUM, “I CAN DESTROY,” ON MAY 27TH

It’s a question every artist has to grapple with: if you’re not pushing yourself creatively, how can you grow? And that’s exactly what acclaimed guitar maestro Paul Gilbert tackles with fervor on his 17th solo album, I Can Destroy, set for release May 27th through The Orchard. As an added bonus, fans who pre-order the album will receive an automatic download of the title track, I Can Destroy.

“My guitar playing was born from playing in my teenage heavy rock bands,” Gilbert explains. “After playing for 40 years, I’ve been able to evolve the way that I see the fretboard, and how I hear the guitar in my head. This opens up my soloing, and also my writing. I couldn’t have written this music when I was a kid. I couldn’t have written these lyrics either. I needed time to live…to experience joy, and anger, and love, and frustration at people who don’t use their turn signals.”

It’s no accident that I Can Destroy cuts a wide swath of styles and textures, from the full-frontal assault of Everybody Use Your Goddamn Turn Signal to the jazz-blues lament of One Woman Too Many (which also features Gilbert’s patented four-pick Makita drill-bit riffery) to the radio-friendly balladeering of Love We Had to the smoking-hot gut/heart punch of I Am Not the One (Who Wants To Be With You), the latter track’s title a playful reference to the ubiquitous number one hit he enjoyed as part of his gig as lead guitarist for the still-going-strong Mr. Big.

Gilbert knew that I Can Destroy producer Kevin Shirley (Led Zeppelin, Iron Maiden, Rush, Joe Bonamassa), whom he previously collaborated with on Mr. Big’s 2011 release What If…, would push him to do his best from the get-go. “One thing I knew about working with Kevin as a solo artist is that there weren’t going to be that many overdubs on the record — not that many takes, and not many fixes,” he reports. “As a musician, that puts the fear into you. It’s a good fear, and it made me want to prepare in a pretty healthy way.”

With Shirley onboard to get behind the board, Gilbert next had to cull together some top-drawer musicians to bring into the studio. “On drums, we’ve got Thomas Lang, who’s somewhat of a drumming legend, and on bass is Kevin Chown,” details Gilbert. “He was the only guy I’d never worked with before, and he was great. He played all the right stuff. He’s played with everybody from Chuck Berry and Little Richard to Sebastian Bach.”

Ultimately, the joy he expresses all throughout I Can Destroy celebrates the freedom and creativity he enjoys as a solo artist. “I do my best. It’s pretty incredible to have been living the dream and putting food on the table by banging it all out on an electric guitar,” he concludes. “This is actually my 30th year as a recording artist, and I still enjoy the search. I like looking around, trying to find things I haven’t done yet, and then seeing if I can do them.”

In other news, Paul Gilbert recently announced details for his Great Guitar Escape 3.0 which is being held July 25th-29th at the Cambria Pines Lodge in Cambria, CA. Packages are available at the event’s official site, GreatGuitarEscape.com.

For the camp’s third year, the legendary shredder went all out and invited a few iconic friends to join him as guest instructors. These include Megadeth’s Kiko Loureiro and Dave Ellefson as well as former Guns N’ Roses guitarist Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal [Art of Anarchy], Andy Timmons [Danger Danger], and Bruce Bouillet [Racer X, The Scream]. This all-star lineup will be hosting workshops, reflecting their signature sounds and styles and offering an immersive experience for 75 campers. Moreover, they’ll be jamming, performing, and hanging with you 24/7. About the Great Guitar Escape 3.0, Gilbert comments, “I really feel like we got the best lineup possible for version 3.0. Each instructor brings something extremely unique to the table. You’re going to learn, feel inspired, and most of all have a great time. This is four days of complete and total guitar immersion. We can’t wait. Get ready!”

If For the camp’s third year, the legendary shredder went all out and invited a few iconic friends to join him as guest instructors. These include Megadeth’s Kiko Loureiro and Dave Ellefson as well as former Guns N’ Roses guitarist Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal [Art of Anarchy], Andy Timmons [Danger Danger], and Bruce Bouillet [Racer X, The Scream]. This all-star lineup will be hosting workshops, reflecting their signature sounds and styles and offering an immersive experience for 75 campers. Moreover, they’ll be jamming, performing, and hanging with you 24/7. About the Great Guitar Escape 3.0, Gilbert comments, “I really feel like we got the best lineup possible for version 3.0. Each instructor brings something extremely unique to the table. You’re going to learn, feel inspired, and most of all have a great time. This is four days of complete and total guitar immersion. We can’t wait. Get ready!”

If I Can Destroy is any indication, Gilbert is on the right path to continue creating material that’s clearly built to last. is any indication, Gilbert is on the right path to continue creating material that’s clearly built to last.

Paul Gilbert online:

paulgilbert.com
facebook.com/paulgilbertmusic
twitter.com/PaulGilbertRock

ON THE 30TH ANNIVERSARY OF “5150,” SINGER SAMMY HAGAR REFLECTS BACK ON HIS TIME IN VAN HALEN

Andy Greene of Rolling Stone spoke with singer Sammy Hagar. Highlights from the interview appear below.

RS: This week is the 30th anniversary of 5150. How do that feel?

SH: What a trip, man. Unbelievable. I just got out of bed, and what a thing to wake up to. I need some coffee for that one. Wow.

RS: Were you fan of Van Halen back in the 1970s?

SH: I gotta say that the first time I heard Eruption into You Really Got Me I thought it was badass. I was like, “Wow, who are these guys?” The thing that always impressed me about Van Halen is that they were like a pop band that was heavy. They had attitude and were reckless and everything that is cool for rock and roll, but they were really poppy. The music was very major chord-ish. Bands like Black Sabbath were minor, deep, dark. Van Halen wasn’t dark at all.

RS: What did you think of 1984?

SH: To me, it was all about the first and last albums [with David Lee Roth]. 1984 was fantastic. They really got the sound, pretty heavy. It was great.

RS: You had no trepidation about replacing a frontman that was so iconic?

SH: I was never a fan of Dave. He wasn’t the kind of artist I was looking at and going, “I want to be like that.” Never in a million years. My favorite artists were Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Peter Gabriel. I know it sounds crazy, but those kind of artists were who I looked up to and who I wanted to be like. After playing with those guys, I realized the band was really about the music, and all this showmanship and stuff was attractive, but once that flamboyant thing got your attention, your attention immediately went over to Eddie. You’d go, “That guy is really unique. That guy can play.”

RS: There was talk of it being called Van Hagar at one point, right?

SH: Yeah, that’s what Warner Bros. and Geffen wanted. I was on Geffen then and [David Geffen] was talking to Mo Ostin about how it could work. They start saying, “What if it don’t work?” I’m sure they tossed around the idea of calling it Van Hagar as an experiment just in case Van Halen got back together. We all said, “No.” It would have been interesting. Looking back now, it’s sort of a way to divide the two eras up. But we were so fearless when we realized what we could all do together.

Ed was freaking out when he heard me sing, Al and Michael Anthony too. They were going, “Holy s–t, this guy has rhythm in his voice, he has pitch and a range from hell.” I could pick up a guitar and say, “Hey Eddie, how about a groove like this?” and play some rhythm and he’d go, “Holy s–t, let me play organ.” We were all over the place. It was such an inspiration back and forth that it started elevating both of our musical abilities. Everyone around us got goosebumps. It was magical. That doesn’t happen every day…

RS: The first show was in Shreveport, Louisiana. How did you feel walking onstage that night?

SH: I was a f–king wreck. It was Valerie Bertinelli’s hometown. She had her whole family backstage and I didn’t even know those people. There were all these people around. When I would tour solo I was real private. These guys were back there getting drunk. I was a wreck. I was like, “What the f–k man? I hope this gonna work. Rehearsal is one thing, but the gig is another.” The record hadn’t come out yet since we were late getting the mixing and the packaging together, so the only thing out was Why Can’t This Be Love. And we were going out and playing all of the album.

They had just come off their biggest album. It was the only time I felt fear. I was like, “I hope they’re ready to hear all new s–.” But man, when we came out they tore down the f–king barricade down. It was that way for about nine years.

I didn’t see Van Halen on the 1984 tour, but I know they weren’t getting along or having fun. They were over-the-top drinking. People I know that saw that tour told me they did about eight songs. The show was one guy at a time coming out and doing a 20 minute solo and Roth doing his schtick. They really weren’t into it like we were. When I joined the band we wanted to play every song we knew. We’d start jamming Led Zeppelin’s Rock and Roll and Robert Palmer’s Addicted to Love. We’d bust into Young Man’s Blues by the Who. We busted out Mississippi Queen one night. We were having so much fun and were so fearless and excited and in love with each other that it was really, really special.

That’s the sad part about it. I don’t know how that can change. I guess you fall in love with someone and wind up hating their guts.

RS Watching [5150] hit Number One must have been really vindicating.

SH: Yeah, that was real validation. It was the first Number One record for all of us, and it stayed there for five weeks. The crazy thing is that it took three weeks to go to number one. It was a lot more difficult back then before Soundscan. Back then, it wasn’t all about sales and it kept building and building. I think we sold something like a million records in the first week, but they didn’t count it that way for the charts. It was some weird system.

It was a big deal for us all to have our first Number One record together. I remember us drinking champagne in Atlanta at the Ritz Carlton. Our manager told us the news and we popped a bottle at 2 in the afternoon, which wasn’t my style, and we probably had a pretty good show that night. I don’t remember that one.

RS: Do you look back at the first year together as your best times with the group?

SH: No. We continued to have good times. I got to tell you, they were all good times until the Balance record. That was the end of the good times. For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge was a good time. I was going through a divorce and it was a hard time personally, but on tour I might have had a better time than I’ve ever had in my life. I was becoming a free man, being the lead singer in one of the biggest bands in the world. There was nothing wrong with those times either.

Read more at Rolling Stone.

source: rollingstone.com

RUMORS FLYING THAT GUNS N’ ROSES’ AXL ROSE WILL BE FILLING IN FOR BRIAN JOHNSON ON AC/DC’S REMAINING TOUR DATES, AC/DC PR NEITHER CONFIRM NOR DENY

The internet is going crazy with “reports” that Guns N’ Roses frontman, Axl Rose, will be replacing AC/DC lead singer Brian Johnson on the band’s current world tour.

On Tuesday, Jason Bailey, a DJ on Atlanta Radio 100.5, said that “a very very good source” confirmed to him that Rose is taking over singing duty for the Australian rockers.

“This is what I’m being told, Axl was meeting with the AC/DC group, because it’s all but a done deal that Axl will front AC/DC for the 10 remaining shows. All 10, including Atlanta,” he said.

Further confirmation came Wednesday night, from Ross Malcolm Young — nephew of Angus Young, the lead guitarist and founding member of AC/DC , and son of fellow band member Malcolm Young.

“It’s true,” Ross Malcolm Young wrote in a comment he shared on his personal Facebook page about Rose potentially replacing Johnson.

NME reports that a press representative for AC/DC has responded to recent reports that Guns N’ Roses frontman Axl Rose is set to fill in for Brian Johnson as the band’s frontman for the rest of the hard rock outfit’s tour.

Their PR replied, stating: “Nothing official to announce. Will update you if that changes.”

[Dana’s note: Thank you to both Bob D. and Doug R. for the information]

additional source: nydailynews.com