Today's Day in Rock Stories

Bill Ward Addresses Black Sabbath Reunion Rumors

Rhett posted the following initial news online, "Thoughts and prayers for my brother, Dallas. He [has] been airlifted to the trauma center at Shands. He was in a serious 4 wheeler accident at our house wearing no helmet and hit a sign. It doesn't look very good. I love him."

A few hours later he posted this update, "I think hes going to be okay. He's still unconscious. They said he'll be in the hospital for quite a while. He has tons of broken stuff, lacerations, internal bleeding and head injuries though.

"I just spoke with my family and it looks like he'll pull through. Please don't bombard the hospital. I'm sure he'd love to see everyone but he isn't even conscious at this point."

Underoath posted the following about their former singer, "Sadly, our original vocalist Dallas Taylor was involved in a horrible ATV accident yesterday, had to be air-lifted to the hospital and is currently in the ICU. All our thoughts and prayers are going out to him and his family.

"If you're the praying type, please send one up for him. Also, due to the severe nature of his injuries, a GoFundMe account has been created to help him with medical bills for what is sure to be a long road to recovery.

But while the road trip seems likely to happen in some form next year, recording plans are less certain. Fleetwood tells Rolling Stone: "We're all dedicated to getting together about a year or so from now and doing another two years of touring all over the world, probably.

"And we also have a huge amount of recorded music. A huge amount. None of it's with Stevie, or very little. Some of it's very, very old stuff that Lindsey Buckingham maybe did with her years and years ago. We're not quite sure what will happen with it."

Araya recently discussed the possibility of bowing out after 35 years, saying: "It just gets harder and harder to come back out on the road." Asked about those comments, King tells EMP Rock Invasion: "He's very unclear. That's just how he is. I don't know if he likes holding his cards in his pocket or what.

The Ohio outfit will also promote their forthcoming sixth album Transit Blues on The Rise Up Tour. It's due out on October 6. Last month The Devil Wears Prada announced that they had split with drummer Daniel Williams, though the band didn't offer an explanation for the move.

They said: "We wish him nothing but the best with everything he does going forward. We're putting the finishing touches on our new album and look forward to releasing new music very soon."

Williams also confirmed the news and apologized to fans, saying: "I'm sure I'll be getting a lot of questions today - I wish I was able to answer them. Just know that the fans are all that matter to me.

Aside from frontman and the band's namesake Don Dokkon, the tour will reunite the lineup of guitarist George Lynch, bassist Jeff Pilson and drummer Mick Brown.

The Unleashed in the East Tour is set to kick off with a show in Osaka, Japan at Namba Hatch on October 5th and includes concerts in Fukuoka, Hiroshima, Aichi, Tokyo and an appearance at the Loud Park Festival.

And he believes the publicity surrounding the incident was a blessing in disguise, because it meant the singer could no longer hide his problem. Moody was abandoned by his colleagues during a show in Memphis, Tennessee, after he tried to perform drunk.

He later accepted the drama had been "humiliating" and attended rehab, then the band put the event behind them - although they changed their habits on the road to help prevent a repeat.

Bathory tells Kerrang (via Blabbermouth): "For the longest time, the stage was sacred. After that incident we looked at him like, 'Dude, you've drawn a sword in a church - this is absolutely not okay.'

"I was pissed. By the time you get to the point we'd made it to, you've basically climbed the Himalayas barefoot. We were planting our flag. And he was too f***ing wasted to remember it."

Vocalist John Corabi says of the track, which was inspired by drummer Brian Tichy: "Lyrically it's about being on the road - all this stuff of checking in and out of hotels, and stages, and people you meet."

Ex Motley Crue man Corabi is joined in the band by Doug Aldrich (Whitesnake, Dio), Marco Mendoza (Whitesnake, Thin Lizzy) and Tichy (Ozzy Osbourne, Whitesnake) plus bassist David Lowy.

The frontman recently told Classic Rock: "The thing about this band is that because we're based all over the world, guys drop in and out for certain tours. Doug's already right at home, and he had a ton of great ideas for this record - as did everybody.

A statement reads: "On Guidance, Russian Circles carry on in their quest to conjure multi-dimensional dramatic instrumental narratives and scout out new textures from their respective instruments.

"The songs aren't constructed out of highbrow concepts - they're forged out of gut instinct and base emotional response. Nor was the band interested in testing their fans' patience or securing a new broader audience with a radical reinvention.

The live package is released on September 23 via Nuclear Blast Records. It was recorded in November 2014 during the band's performances at Hovet in Stockholm and Scandinavium in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Guitarist Bjorn Gelotte said: "This DVD is for everyone who has been following our career. We have songs from the early years, the middle years and the new era.

Now the festival, in conjunction with Arte TV, have released a full schedule featuring sets from artists including Clutch, Parkway Drive, Steel Panther, Bullet For My Valentine, Ministry, Henry Rollins and Arch Enemy.

The project is led by bassist and singer Nick Beggs, who has previously worked with Steven Wilson's solo band and been a part of Steve Hackett's Genesis Revisited shows. He is joined by Marco Minnemann and Roger King - Minnemann is also a member of Wilson's band while King has worked with Hackett for years.

Beggs says: "Welcome to the Church of the Mute God. Where terrible things are done in his name." He also told TeamRock earlier this year that he is gauging the response to their album before deciding whether or not to tour.

The 17th date on the group's trek across North America saw the trio of Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan deliver a 24-song set of classic, with an emphasis on 1987's "Appetite For Destruction" - the biggest-selling debut album of all time with more than 30 million copies sold worldwide.

When the summer shows wrap up at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, CA on August 22, Rose will regroup with AC/DC for ten US dates starting August 27 in Greensboro, NC.

"He's been really good," raves Angus Young of Axl's performances. "He prepares himself, ready to go. We sit and chew the fat before we get on, work out what songs we want to do. It's gotta be fun for him, and for us.

Lynyrd Skynyrd lead guitarist and Blackfoot co-founder Rickey Medlocke has also recruited a new-look lineup - guitarist and vocalist Tim Rossi, guitarist Rick Krasowski, bassist Brian Carpenter and drummer Matt Anastasi. He'll make guest appearances at some of their stage shows later in the year.

Medlocke had the following to say: "This record is head-to-head old school meets new school - classic to new rock for a brand new generation. Turn it up loud!"

But in the midst of a furious family row over rights to the Zappa name and estate, Moon tells Rolling Stone: "He wouldn't have been my first choice. He might not have been my 100th choice."

He tells Metal Hammer: "The idea of Transcendence is about getting over myself. Not that I am, but it was about getting over that need to be that controlling prog dude.

"I wrote 50 or 60 songs and kept sending them to everybody, the band, management and label. I asked them to tell me which ones they liked and so we'd start working on that. I narrowed it down to 10 or 11 songs, I took them to the band, and what I did, as opposed to directing every last detail, was start from the beginning, go through each riff and then discuss it.

Called "Dive and Slam," the Trent Reznor-penned tune looks to arrive September 16. Nine Inch Nails last released the EP Seed Eight in 2014, but that remixed four older songs from their catalog, their last studio album came in 2013 with Hesitation Marks.

The song was the opening tune and third single from the group's fourth studio album, "Destroyer", which became the band's first platinum record for US sales of more than 1 million copies.

When "Detroit Rock City" failed to chart Stateside, radio stations flipped the single and began playing the b-side "Beth", earning KISS their first US Top 10 hit.

Due August 26, "KISS Rocks Vegas" presents the band live during their nine-show 2014 Las Vegas residency at The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel And Casino.

"Guerilla kayaking," explains Roth. "Karen is and was - and still is - a knockout. Cell phones are starting to come in, and she would stand around a corner on the West Side highway right around 14th street where the Sanitation department is.

The corner is big enough and sweeping enough and long enough that if she stayed there on the cell phone, she could tell us when the cops were coming. Cuz what we did was we cut a hole in the fence at the Sanitation department, pulled it apart, and that's where we snuck the boats through."

She tells Planet Mosh: "I would love to record a second classical album. That would probably be something like German leads or European songs in general within Chamber music, because that's my thing within classical music.

Thirst originally appeared on the band's 2014 album From Parts Unknown. The US outfit are gearing up to release their eighth album Low Teens, which will launch on September 23 via Epitaph Records - a record that is described as "their most poignant and impassioned album in a career full of sardonic illuminations and pit-inciting fervour."

The opening riff to "Andromeda" was one that had been drifting in and out of my brain for a few months. I actually came up with the progression while sitting on my couch after a night out. I'd had a few drinks and I remember thinking "this is so cool" - because I don't usually write songs starting with power chords nor do I ever write songs with quick-succession chord changes. It was different. Though, by the next morning I'd forgotten all about it. A week later it just came back to me at rehearsal and James (Heavy Static's drummer) and I jammed with it for a little while. Shortly after the practice, however, it was once again forgotten. Luckily, a few weeks later I remembered the riff again. Even more fortunate was that we were planning the "Here Comes The Fear" EP recording sessions when the song resurfaced.

Although it was a cool riff, it was quite difficult to build a song around because I didn't want to ruin the flow and energy. I've never been one to spend too much time working on a song because either it works or it doesn't work - but this song seemed like something worth sweating it out for. The song originally went by the working title "Sputnik." The word "Sputnik" was the first thing that came to mind when I tried to fit something lyrical in between that opening riff. I have no idea why. But that became the inspiration to the song's space-travel theme. When the song was recorded I still hadn't written any lyrics for the song. It's the first time I ever did that. That's how quickly the song was conceived and recorded.

The day I was to lay down vocals for the song, I still hadn't written any lyrics. I really wanted to find the right words. It was scary because I was very cognizant of the mistake of hastily jotting down lyrics. I had to be extra-vigilant that I wouldn't listen back to these words in a few months and think "I hate that line!" I wanted words that were close to rhyming but didn't actually rhyme in the typical way. Out of nowhere I came up with the line "The Oort's erratic ... " as the first line. It was so weird that it was perfect. Has anyone ever referenced the Oort cloud in a song? I don't think so! The rest of the words flowed from there. It's funny, because "static" is mentioned a few times in the song and that is actually where the band name is derived from. I was working on that particular song at the exact right time when we were looking for a new name for the band. I keep thanking my lucky stars that I wasn't working on something extremely uncool at the time or else we may have ended up with an embarrassing name like "Pearl Jam" or "Rainbow Butt Monkeys" (Yes, that last name is actually a Canadian band from the '90s).

Just before my final session for vocals, I realized I still hadn't come up with something to sing at the end of the song. I must have come up with 20 different melodies but nothing was working. I didn't really realize what exactly I was writing about when I wrote the lyrics, to be honest. I just had a space-travel theme in my head. But when I really started to post-analyze them, I realized that "Sputnik" wasn't the song. "Sputnik" was an instrument, a thing. I needed a place, and the name "Andromeda" came to mind. It seemed like the kind of place I'd want to find if I was lost. As soon as I came up with that idea, the end of the song wrote itself and the melody worked perfectly. The guitar lead at the end still sounds like circus music to me. A circus seems like the perfect thing for a welcome party on Andromeda!