Today's Day in Rock Stories

Metallica Frontman Addresses Lady Gaga Speculation

Former J. Geils Band vocalist Peter Wolf posted a tribute on his Facebook page with a classic photo of the group with the caption ""Thinking of all the times we kicked it high and rocked down the house! R.I.P. Jay Geils".

The album will be entitled "Lindsey Buckingham/Christine McVie" and fans will be getting their first taste of the effort when the first single, entitled "In My Word", is released this Friday, April 14th.

The show, taking place at the site of the recent Ozzfest meets Knotfest, will also feature additional sets from Primus, a "special" as yet unannounced guest and Melvins.

Ozzy will be playing on the event's Wolfman Jack Stage on August 9th. Sturgis Buffalo Chip president Rod Woodruff had these comments, "You never know what to expect with Ozzy, but you can be sure it will be over the top.

The prog legends had this to say, "While Jon Anderson has rights to use the name as one of the co-owners of the trademark, Yes' position is that every effort should be made by promoters, ticket agencies and all involved to respect Yes' magnificent and loyal fanbase and minimize confusion regarding the use of Yes Featuring Anderson, Rabin, Wakeman."

Homme spoke with News.com.au about their upcoming road trip Down Under this July and he also told the site that the new album will not feature any guest appearances.

The former Van Halen frontman promoted the release of "This Is Sammy Hagar Vol. 1 - When the Party Started" last November by releasing a series of track by track videos and "No Worries" was one of the songs he discussed.

The remaining members Brandon Yeagley and Chris Bishop broke the news to fans with the following Facebook posting: "We regret to inform you all that Jake and Paul Figueroa will no longer be continuing as members of Crobot.

The rock supergroup, which features Doug Aldrich (Whitesnake, Dio), John Corabi (Motley Crue, The Scream), David Lowy (Red Phoenix, Mink), Marco Mendoza (Thin Lizzy, Whitesnake), and Brian Tichy (Ozzy Osbourne, Foreigner), will be launching the trek as part of their Live & Louder World Tour.

Richards wrote, "To Put Chuck Berry into words! That is a task. If I flip the coin and wonder how the f*** Chuck Berry reacted to me when he first heard my feeble efforts to spread his groove, my guess is a disdainful chuckle and then a gleam as he imagined the royalties roll in. Then a realization that his music was far more important than he had ever imagined. (He did thank me for that). And, let's face it, Chuck had imagination. Just check the songs. All is revealed on 'Monkey Business', 'Wee Wee hours', 'Jo Jo Gunne', 'You Can't Catch me', 'Childhood Sweetheart'� let alone on 'Johnny B. Goode', 'Little Queenie' or 'Around & Around'. It goes on and on: 'Let it Rock', 'Sweet Little Sixteen' or the heartbreaking 'Memphis.'

The special event is scheduled to take place on July 24th through 28th at the Asilomar Center in Carmel, CA and will feature special guests Phil Collen of Def Leppard, Mr. Big's Paul Gilbert and Ratt's Warren DiMartini

Satriani had these comments,, "I'm thrilled to have guitarists Phil Collen and Warren DiMartini joining Paul Gilbert and myself for this year's G4 camp. What an incredible lineup! Phil, Warren, and Paul are all virtuosos with a wide range of professional experience in the music world. Together, we look forward to sharing all of our musical knowledge with this year's G4 campers."

Titled "How Did We Get So Dark?", the follow-up to the group's 2014 self-titled debut will be issued on June 16. "We had a warehouse space in Burbank [in California] and it was great," said Kerr recently. "We'd party at night and write all day. By that point, we felt the record was coming together and there was a bit of a theme between the songs."

The song comes from their forthcoming debut, the "41" EP, which will be released on April 21st and Ben Lionetti shared these background details about the track and video, 'The song 'Kings' was really conceived about my time working with Mitch Lucker (Suicide Silence) and after his passing.

"'Kings' really took on a life of its own and morphed into just a fun heavy song with a self-empowering message, and that's something Mitch wanted to create. We wanted the music video to have a real night & day / yin & yang vibe and wanted to tell our listeners we're not going to be held down by whatever generic genre standards people think a band should abide by.

Kimball had the following to say about the new effort,, "As artists and musicians we live our lives chasing a dream � the dream of expressing ourselves through the songs we create and sing.

The Desert Rocker launched the tour in support of his latest album "Tao Of The Devil" which was released last September. He had this to say about the trek, "I'm stoked to bring our Rock to the US again. Get your butt to the show and lets have some fun".

Urie will be taking over the role from Killian Donnellyin beginning on May 26th at The Hirschfeld Theatre and will continue with the production until August 6th,

The new EP was produced by The Gaslight Anthem star Brian Fallon and was recorded at the Red Bull Studios in New York City. Frontman Jared Hart shared the following background on the new song:

"Hostage is a song I had been meaning to write for a very long time. It takes place in the communities and streets that we all know. It's about a person in isolation due to a past or a present that you will never know. It's about thinking about that person and wondering if anyone else in the world is thinking about them.

The film was directed by Stephen Kijak (Stones in Exile, Scott Walker: 30 Century Man) produced by the production team behind the acclaimed film "Searching for Sugar Man."

Obsonatus is the one of three tunes I just releasing. A little over a year ago I began writing for my Solo Trio project where I play guitar, drum set, and sing simultaneously. I got about 20 usable songs out of that writing fit-which I was super pleased with because I had not been writing for several years as I was primarily focused on drumming. Obsonatus is one of the last songs I penned in this phase.

During that time, I was waking up every morning, ignoring all technology and human communicatory attempts and desires. I got straight out of bed, did not eat or drink, and would sit down and begin meditation for at least 30 minutes. While in meditation, lyrics, hooks, melodies, riffs, would come to me. I would keep my phone close by with the voice recorder armed. I often lose many ideas if I don't at least try to document them quickly. They just go, haha. It can be frustrating. After the initial meditation period, I would go directly to the guitar and write with the ideas for a few hours. This flow wasn't just happening during meditation. Ideas manifest frequently and rapidly while driving, showering, sleeping. It's a joyous time, really!

I will say, even in this state, songs and composition still require work to complete and refine. Though, you do get the occasional happy accident where the song basically falls out of your brain and mouth finished-as a gift-like it didn't come from you. I got a few of those during this time. THAT is always exciting! Obsonatus was one of those. The song just started happening out of me. I didn't expect it. I think I may have even been mid improvisation and there it was.

I often sit and improvise with the voice recorder going. I'll recognize something that is song-like material. I find, at this point, the music I am making as an improviser is different from the music I make as a songwriter. I'd like to close that gap eventually. I am excited for a time when I can make songs from the free improvisation. I am very interested to hear how they will sound! However, I also enjoy the difference, for now. That being said, everything I improvise is not meant for my current song structure. When I am improvising, I can usually identify that which would work well for a song. In this case, Obsonatus just went-and I was recording!! So I got it!

I laughed out loud! It is-or was-not like anything I had ever written. As usual, I wasn't sure if it was any good. I played it for some friends and nobody really had much to say or knew what to say. Their response was simply, "You wrote that?" I felt weird about the tune but confident (I guess). So I got it ready for live performance on a gig to see how the audience would receive it. The first night I pulled it out, the crowd hung in there with some interest. By the end of the tune, people were singing-or yelling-the chorus! Ah ahhhhh, Ah ahhhh, Ah ahhhh, Ah ahh, Ah ahh, Ah ahh. It was rad!!

When I began collaborating with producer, Raul del Moral, upon hearing Obsonatus, he immediately wanted to work with the tune. He kept saying, "Man, this is a hit, this his a hit, this a Vevo video, man!" Ha! So, we went in. Myself, Raul, and Ryan Cullen produced and recorded Obsonatus and the other tunes in this set: Fall In and Show Me. We worked at Raul's studio in Washington, DC and Ryan's studio Annapolis Audio Lab in Annapolis, MD.

As for the meaning of the tune, I do enjoy a bit of subtlety-though I don't know that is achieved here. I'll just say that I often write songs of awareness and the current human condition. This song is one of those songs. Looking forward to setting it loose and getting more stuff out!! I release music on Spotify, iTunes, FaceBook, and YouTube. Find the things there!