Tesla guitarist Frank Hannon has posted a video for the song, Born Free, from Hannon’s forthcoming solo album, World Peace. Watch it below.
In a burst of creative energy, Tesla guitarist Frank Hannon started writing his own batch of songs shortly after Tesla released its latest album, Simplicity, in June. While on the road touring during the summer or 2014, Frank spent all the lonely hours in his hotel rooms recording musical ideas on a little Boss hard disc recording machine, and the ideas started flowing so much that he would literally be recording music in the dressing rooms five minutes prior to TESLA stepping onstage! After returning home, Frank knew he had a batch of strong material, so current Frank Hannon Band members Aaron Leigh (bass) and Kelly Smith (drums) joined him in the studio to help put the album into fruition.
After the majority of songs were recorded, an old original concept came back to Frank Hannon’s mind from the year 2000 when the guitarist wrote an instrumental native American chant song he titled World Peace? which asks the question: “When will it come?” This was long before the Guitarz From Marz album. With that concept in mind, the flames grew hotter and the final group of songs were written and recorded.
Featured songs will include powerful heavy protests such as The Picture, Electric Chair, Born Free and the happier positive melodies of Lucky 13, Down The Road and Break The Silence. Both the title track and the album World Peace not only showcase Hannon as a powerful lead singer and shredding lead guitarist, but also a prolific songwriter. The recognizable sound of Tesla is evident here, but the sound of an unleashed artist is also heard
Heavy metal fans are left banging their heads … against the wall.
On Tuesday, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame unveiled its 2015 class of inductees, and once again iconic hard rock and metal bands like Deep Purple, Iron Maiden and Judas Priest were strummed off the list.
What really gets Anthrax guitarist Scott Ian’s goatee is the long-running omission of Deep Purple, a band the Queens-born rocker feels should get the same respect as Led Zeppelin.
“Just based on the intro riff to Smoke on the Water which came out in 1972, it’s safe to say that almost every guitar player in a band that did make the Hall of Fame, picked up a guitar because of that riff and learned how to play off that riff,” says the Queens-born rocker.
“That song alone should gets Deep Purple into the Hall of Fame. Just Ritchie Blackmore’s riff alone. That intro defines rock n’ roll.”
Ian wishes the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame operated more like Cooperstown. “When you talk about sports, you look at the stats, it’s all math,” says Ian. “Babe Ruth hit x average and x home runs and so he gets in. Numbers don’t lie. When it comes to music it comes strickly down to taste.”
In the case of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, relatively small selection committee comes up with a pool of nominees that are voted on by a group of more than 600 artists and music professionals. On average a group of five to seven acts make the final cut each year.
And judging by the results, not many of those 600-plus voters own a Metallica T-shirt.
“Iron Maiden goes to anywhere in the world and they play in front of 50,000 people by themselves and you telling me they don’t f— belong in there?,” Exodus lead singer Steve “Zetro” Souza complained to the Daily News.
“In our type of music, we don’t expect kudos,” added the thrash rocker, whose band’s latest album, Blood In, Blood Out, reached the Billboard’s Top 40 charts. “But it’s hard not to be disappointed by the voting.”
Radio host Eddie Trunk says he’s given up on any semblance of respect for the uneven way the Hall has honored certain bands and ignored others with longer track records of success.
“How can you have a Hall of Fame where it takes Kiss, Rush and Alice Cooper twenty years to get in,” he says, “but Green Day and Guns N’ Roses go in on first ballot and Deep Purple doesn’t get in.”
Last year, he attended the induction ceremony in Brooklyn as a guest of original Kiss guitarist Ace Frehley and had an epiphany: he’s not going to pull his hair out any more over the continuing snubs.
This is a symptom of the disrespect across the board toward hard rock and heavy metal,” says Trunk. “The Grammys haven’t gotten any better since they gave Jethro Tull a Grammy instead of Metallica (for the first ever Best Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Performance trophy in 1989).”
Exhibit A of that lack of respect: late, great Slayer guitarist Jeff Hanneman was a glaring omission from this year’s In Memoriam segment at the Grammy Awards.
While touring with Exodus in Cleveland last year, Souza got to visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum for himself for the first time. And his reviews are mixed.
“There was a Bruno Mars suit there, but he didn’t put in the time,” says Souza. “There’s a Katy Perry dress there, but she hasn’t put in the time.”
Still, it heartened him somewhat to see some of metal acts like Black Sabbath and Metallica have their own displays. It’s a start. But call him when Maiden and Priest, Saxon and Scorpions make the cut. He’s not expecting any love for his own band, which has been the soundtrack for moshpits since the mid-80s.
“For those of us who have been doing this for thirty years, we don’t care about or expect anything from the establishment,” Souza says.
The punk trio Green Day is the 48th act to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in their first year of eligibility, joining acts such as Nirvana, R.E.M. and the Clash as first-ballot honorees. Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble, Bill Withers, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts and Lou Reed will join them in the class of 2015 being inducted April 18 at Cleveland’s Public Hall.
In addition, Ringo Starr will be honored with the Award for Musical Excellence and the “5” Royales will receive the Early Influence Award.
The Smiths, Nine Inch Nails, Kraftwerk, N.W.A, Sting and Chic were among acts on the ballot that did not make cut.
A voting body of more than 700 artists, historians and members of the music industry chose the 2015 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame performer inductees. To be eligible for nomination, an individual artist or band must have released its first single or album at least 25 years prior to the year of nomination. The 2015 nominees had to release their first recording no later than 1989.
Induction ceremony presenters, performers and broadcast information as well as additional details about the week of events leading up the show ceremony will be announced at a later date.
Want to see Anthrax’ Charlie Benante, Scott Ian and Frank Bello, Megadeth’s David Ellefson, Testament’s Chuck Billy and Alex Skolnick, Sepultura’s Andreas Kisser, Death Angel’s Mark Osegueda, Mike Portnoy, Chris Broderick, Troy Sanders, and John Tempesta all jam on the same stage? If you live in the Anaheim, California area, you’re in luck. It has been announced that all the aforementioned metal musicians will be gathering together on the evening of January 21st at the House of Blues in Anaheim, under the name of Metal Allegiance, which will feature an evening of various classics being performed by different line-up configurations. Also of note is the cost of the tickets are being kept quite affordable, and can be purchased at Ticketmaster or at the House Of Blues Anaheim box office. Two Metal Allegiance participants, Megadeth bassist David Ellefson and ex-Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy, chatted with BraveWords correspondent Greg Prato about how this union happened, and what fans can expect.
BraveWords: How did the idea come about to do Metal Allegiance, and how did you all get involved in the project?
David Ellefson: “This whole thing started back with the Big 4, when we did those shows. And it developed out of the bass clinics me and Frank (Bello) were doing, which were really unprecedented in metal music. I think for a period, we were seen as competitors, and what the Big 4 and Clash of the Titans did was it broke down the competition and brought us all together as comrades. And Metal Allegiance was born out of that. It started with me and Frank, Mike Portnoy, and Charlie Benante, and then we just started calling all the guys in the neighborhood – Scott Ian, Kerry King, Phil Anselmo, etc., and it spread. The real launch of Metal Allegiance as an entity started on Motörhead’s Motörboat back in September. Then Megadeth had to step aside because there was a health issue there. And all of a sudden, it was, ‘Well, we’re all going to be on the boat. Let’s make this happen.’ And that’s when it started. And it’s really blown up beyond anything we’ve probably imagined it would – just because it’s so much fun. And the fans love seeing all these guys on stage at the same time, jamming with each other. Different combinations playing a whole bunch of different songs that we were just kind of winging on the fly. It was just such a great spirit about it. And I think when fans were like, ‘Metal Allegiance was one of my favorite things on Motörboat,’ that’s what they’re talking about – this impromptu, very unscripted moment that happened. I’ve talked to a lot of fans, and they’re like, ‘We couldn’t believe you guys came out (and played)’ – more and more people kept coming out. It was kind of like the Grammys of heavy metal.”
BraveWords: So both of you have played previously with Metal Allegiance, right?
Mike Portnoy: “Well, Metal Allegiance – as it’s now called – has only done the Motörboat shows, but David and I, and Frank Bello and Charlie Benante and Kerry King and Phil Anselmo, we’ve done this under a different name in the past. We’ve done five shows through the years as a thing called ‘Metal Masters.’ But this is basically taking that same idea and moving it forward, and it’s going to evolve and develop into all different places in the years ahead.”
BraveWords: How different is it playing as part of an all-star band compared to a full-time band? Is it a lot looser?
Mike Portnoy: “It’s totally looser. This is all about camaraderie. In all of our other bands and our normal ‘day jobs,’ those are our careers, and you have to make career moves and career decisions. This is just for the fun of it. There’s nothing at jeopardy, there’s no career decisions that need to be made – financially or creatively. It’s a bunch of guys that are metalheads and metal fans, and we’re all friends with each other, and we do it just because we love this music and we have a good time with each other. That’s it. That’s where it began and that’s what is all about. I said this on stage at the last one, but it’s the truth – all of us on stage and behind the stage are having as much fun as the people in the audience. We look out into the audience and we see a sea of metal fans. And all of us on the stage and backstage are the same. We’re hanging out backstage, watching everybody else jam, having a good time, getting psyched to see the different configurations of players going on at any given time. We’re hearing these cool songs being pulled out of the setlist. It’s basically we’re just metalheads and metal fans doing it for the fun of it.”
BraveWords: Do you find you still pick up new things by playing with other musicians?
Mike Portnoy: “Of course. I mean my God…not to go there, but that was the entire reason why I left Dream Theater. I spent 25 years playing with the same guys, playing the same style of music. And I needed to branch out and do different styles with different people. So to me, to answer your question, you have to play with other people to grow. Change and getting that different inspiration and different personalities is what you absolutely need in order to develop and grow. And that’s been my mission statement for the past four years, with everything I’ve been doing.”
BraveWords: Who are you looking forward to playing with most at this upcoming show?
David Ellefson: “There’s the winter NAMM show coming up, and there’s a whole cast of characters that are going to be there. Because winter NAMM is an international event – artists from all over the world are going to be there. And we’ve already got a beat on a couple and reached out to a few of them. It’s going to be a really, really cool show. And metal week is kind of this interesting crossroads, because we have two versions of it we can do – we can do this big ‘celebration,’ where everybody in the house is there. Like at NAMM and ShipRocked. We’re getting asked now to do some other territories outside of the United States. Those open up other opportunities to different people to participate, and that’s the whole part of the Metal Allegiance – what you hear is metal and pledge allegiance and be a part of it! It’s something that’s open to the entire neighborhood, y’know? It’s not some exclusive little club. What’s fun about it is you realize pretty quickly that people who are inclined to participate in something like this, in the past when we’ve done certain jam sessions with guys like Kerry King showing up – and I’ve played with Kerry over the years and we’ve all been friends with him – I would never think he would be a part of something like that. But certain people are like, ‘I’d love to be a part of that.’ I think that the personalities and just the general feel-good nature of it is that keeps a pretty wide door open for everybody to come in and hang out with us.”
Mike Portnoy: “And you never know who is going to jump up, too. You have the guys who are part of the Metal Allegiance – there’s the core group and the guys that play all the shows, but then in the past, Geezer Butler came up and played with us, Steve Vai came up and played with us. You never know what special guests can pop up and end up jamming at any given moment.”
BraveWords: I was impressed by the low cost of the tickets, compared to how expensive tickets are nowadays to most rock shows.
David Ellefson: “Yeah, for sure. It’s funny – Megadeth in the past, we’ve been the kings of the ‘low dough shows.’ In fact, at times over the years, I remember promoters saying that, ‘Let’s do a low dough ticket,’ and the next thing you know, 5,000-10,000 people show up, because they’re metalheads, man. Metalheads…granted, a lot of them are grown up and live in the suburbs, and some of our bands have been around a while, at its core, it’s a lot of young people. And young people are in school and it’s the middle of the school year, and people don’t have jobs and stuff. We want to make it something that’s fun for everybody to come out. You hate to make money the reason that people have to say ‘No.’ So we tried to take the money part out of it.”
BraveWords: More shows after this one at the House of Blues?
David Ellefson: “Yeah, we’re going to be doing ShipRocked – about a week later, actually. The first week of February. And then there’s also quite a few other cool little things that look like they’re developing in 2015, as well.”
Blabbermouth reports that singer Michael Starr (real name Ralph Saenz; ex-L.A. Guns) of parody band Steel Panther tells The Tennessean that, despite the band’s cult band status, “now, with where we’re at with 25 employees, trucks and buses, there’s a lot riding on what comes out on our CDs. Plus, we’re getting a lot of pressure to write clean stuff from people surrounding our camp, so they can make money off of what we’re doing,” he adds. “They’re like, ‘Look, we need a serious record from Steel Panther.’ From day one, we said, ‘No. We’re not doing that.’ ”
Starr explained the band’s attitude in a 2012 interview with Billboard.”We just have fun. We’ve always had fun. We’re guys that obviously are just comedic all the way to the core. We just decided, ‘Hey, let’s have fun and not take ourselves seriously.”
He continued, “And you know what, dude? I’m glad that we did it this way, because now I’m happy. This is who I am, y’know? We have the [different] names but we’re not putting on, like, an act. I don’t have to act like some other dude. I get to be myself and people dig it. Even people that laugh at us are still fans, which is really cool.”
Having wrapped a highly successful run as main support for Judas Priest in North America last month, Steel Panther is currently on a North American headlining run, which began in Charlotte, North Carolina. Following the North American headlining dates, the band will be play a series of “Threesomes,” two three-night residencies, one in their hometown of Los Angeles and the other in nearby Las Vegas, at the cities’ respective House Of Blues venues in February.
Steel Panther’s third album, All You Can Eat, sold around 13,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to land at position No. 24 on The Billboard 200 chart. The CD arrived in stores on April 1 via Open E/KLS.
Read more at http://www.blabbermouth.net/news/steel-panther-has-no-interest-in-making-serious-album/#7mLRF2qdiYby8IES.99
Black Star Riders has releases a lyric video for the song, The Killer Instinct, from their forthcoming album of the same title, due in February. Listen to the song below.
To read more about this release, please click here.
 of parody band Steel Panther tells The Tennessean that, despite the band's cult band status, )
