Hard-hitting new rock band, California Breed together legendary vocalist-bassist Glenn Hughes, drummer extraordinaire Jason Bonham and 23-year-old newcomer guitarist-singer-songwriter Andrew Watt. Today (3/19), the powerful trio have unleashed their first single and video Sweet Tea. Check out the video below.
California Breed will be available as a CD, digital download and a Deluxe Edition CD + DVD featuring the bonus song Solo, two video clips and a documentary. Fans that pre-order the digital download on iTunes will receive an instant download of the first single, Sweet Tea upon ordering. It is also available as a pre-order from Amazon in CD format and as a CD Deluxe Edition CD + DVD.
March 19th is the 32nd anniversary of the tragic passing of Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Randy Rhoads.
To pay special tribute to his life and the working relationship that he had with bassist Bob Daisley, Bob has not only agreed to answer some questions regarding the seven hours of audio tapes that he recorded during the writing, rehearsing and recording sessions of the “Blizzard Of Ozz” and “Diary Of A Madman” albums, he has also agreed to share some snippets of those recordings with the fans.
Some snippets from the Q&A appear below.
Q: Why do you refer to your tapes as ‘The Holy Grail’?
BD: Several years ago, I was talking to someone about what I have on tape and I said that to those people who love that band and the Blizzard and Diary albums, what I have would be considered ‘The Holy Grail’ to them. It just refers to its rarity, a sort of ‘ultimate treasure’, not to any religious connotations.
Q: What time-span does the ‘Grail’ cover?
BD: From December the 8th 1979 to March the 23rd 1981.
Q: Have your cassette tapes been transferred to digital?
BD: Yes, all of my analogue tapes have been transferred to digital for safety sake, although I still have the original cassettes as well.
Q: Have the Osbournes, or the Rhoads family, heard any of your tapes?
BD: Ozzy heard them when we were writing and rehearsing in 1979/’80/’81, the whole band did, but Ozzy hasn’t since then. Kelle Rhoads has heard snippets that I played him over the phone, and he loved what he heard, he’d love to see the ‘Grail’ released.
Q: A so-called rare demo of Suicide Solution was on YouTube for a while, the sound quality was poor to say the least, is that ‘demo’ from your tapes?
BD: No, that’s not from my ‘Grail’, I don’t know how that got out there, and it’s not a ‘demo’. It is us, we were writing Suicide Solution, but we didn’t demo it, and if we had, the quality would’ve been way better than that. That’s not Lee Kerslake on it either, it was a drummer that we were auditioning at the time, before we found Lee, but we tried out many drummers so I’m not sure who it is. Maybe he made a tape that day too. We only ever went into a demo studio once and recorded four songs – I Don’t Know, Crazy Train, Goodbye to Romance and You Looking at Me. I remember writing the outro lyrics to Goodbye to Romance in the control room at the demo studio before Ozzy recorded the vocal. That was in Birmingham in early 1980, we had a drummer with us called Dixie Lee. We thought that he might be ‘the guy’ but he wasn’t the final piece of the puzzle.
Read more and listen to “Holy Grail” examples at bobdaisley.com.
Vinny Appice has explained why he left his band Kill Devil Hill-citing one of the main reasons was the band’s failure to generate interest in their work.
Appice admits it was “really, really hard” to grab attention, even though the lineup also included former Pantera bassist Rex Brown.
The former Black Sabbath drummer tells Mitch Lafon (via Blabbermouth): “Kill Devil Hill was my band, then Rex came in and it became a great band. So it’s not a musical problem at all; it’s more a business thing. You devote four years, almost five years to this thing. And it’s like, ‘Wow! What does it take to get this across?’ People know Rex, people know me – it’s not like it’s a bunch of new guys trying to make it. It was, like, ‘It’s really, really hard to get this thing off the ground.’ You’re going out and you’re making merch money, but it’s all going back into keeping this thing alive. There’s no tour support, there’s no advertising.”
Instead, Appice had decided to concentrate on Dio offshoot Last In Line and WAMI, his project with Doogie White and Marco Mendoza.
“Last In Line is a lot more sellable on this level than Kill Devil Hill when it comes to agents booking gigs,” he says. “That’s the way the business works. People want to see or hear music that they know.”
The band are currently working on new material after touring a set of classic early Dio tracks.
Judas Priest have finally completed work on their first album without original guitarist KK Downing, frontman Rob Halford has revealed.
The band started on the follow-up to 2008′s Nostradamus following Downing’s surprise departure in 2011. He was replaced by Richie Faulkner.
Halford tells Artisan News: “The record is absolutely finished as of today. It’s a relief, because whenever Priest make an album you put your heart and soul into it. It’s not an easy thing to do 40 years later. But Priest has always been up for the challenge of that. It’s one of the things we love to do more than anything else. This is a great time – 40th anniversary, a brand new record. Life couldn’t be better.”
A release date has yet to be confirmed for what will be the band’s 17th studio album, although it is expected later this year. They’re unlikely to embark on a large-scale world tour in support of the launch, after saying their Epitaph tour, which ended in 2012, would be the last of its kind.
On the heels of Metallica performing a new song The Lords of Summer in South America, the band have now posted “garage demo” version of new tune. Listen to it below.
Metallica are currently on the first part of their Metallica by Request tour.
Had a great hour episode of TMS with Peter Criss yesterday that will premiere this Saturday on VH1 Classic. We discussed many things and of course got Peter’s take on the HOF. Always good to see Peter who is still clearly excited about being inducted with the band he was a founding member of in a few weeks. When I asked him about not playing his response was; “it’s a shame we couldn’t give the fans 10 minutes on stage together for the 40 years they gave us”. See it all this Saturday night on Wayne’s World… I mean That Metal Show. VH1 Classic’s longest running program and a show so many Kiss fans love and watch! Thank you all for your support and hope you like this one. Also thanks to Richard Christy for playing in the episode. He is a huge Peter Criss fan and was pumped! More soon.
PS: Ace Frehley will be on the show again soon. He had to reschedule since he is now on the W Coast and could not break free from a deadline on his new album.
