Reverend Guitars has launched a line of basses that use Joe-Naylor-designed pickups, a Korina body, string-through bridge with a top-load option, a five-piece neck and pan-control. The Thundergun is a set-neck with the Thick Brick pickup at the bridge and the Split Brick pickup at the neck. The body has a raised center ridge. For more, visit reverendguitars.com.
Iconic Metal’s AxSys 1.0 is a combination chair/guitar stand that provides proper playing ergonomics and posture for the player, and a padded stand for the instrument. Its frame is made up of aircraft-grade aluminum tubing with penetrating welds, with welded end caps on the tubing and leather support pads. The seat incorporates high-density foam and a non-skid seat cover. See more at iconicmetal.com.
| Tom Morello is set to release a new EP, Union Town, May 17 with a physical CD and vinyl release to followJuly 19. All profits from the disc will benefit The America Votes Labor Unity Fund. The studio recording consists of eight pro-union songs featuring three Tom Morello originals, as well as the Woody Guthrie classic “This Land Is Your Land.” The title track is available now at SaveWorkers.org. On the heels of Union Town, Tom Morello, as The Nightwatchman, will release his third full length solo album, World Wide Rebel Songs, later this summer.
On February 21, Morello performed at the Capitol Square in Madison, Wisconsin, in protest to an anti-union bill put forward by Governor Scott Walker. |
| “Seeing 100,000 people in the streets, demanding justice, inspired me to record an album of union fighting songs,” Morello said. “I’ve been a proud union man for 22 years and my mom was a union public high school teacher, so for me this fight is very personal. Unions are a crucial counterweight to the raw corporate greed that torpedoed our economy, threatens our environment, and wants to strip away decades of social progress. From Cairo to Madison, workers are pushing back and tyrants are falling. Here’s a soundtrack for our fight.” |
Morello is an original member of Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave. He released his first album as The Nightwatchman in 2007. In ’09, he formed the band Street Sweeper Social Club with Boots Riley of The Coup. He is a graduate of Harvard University with honors as a Political Science major and has been a recognized political activist throughout his career. In ’06, he was the recipient of the Eleanor Roosevelt Human Rights Award.
The Kenny Wayne Shepherd Band’s new album, How I Go, is set for release August 2. It follows the release of the Grammy nominated Live! In Chicago. Recorded in Studio D and produced by Kenny Wayne Shepherd and longtime collaborator /producer Jerry Harrison (Trouble Is, Live On,10 Days Out, Blues From The Backroads, Live! In Chicago), How I Go signals the band’s return to the studio. With the help of co-writers Mark Selby and Tia Sellers (“Blue on Black”), as well as Zac Maloy and Danny Tate, the new album offers a bounty of new material as well as covers from Albert King, Bessie Smith and The Beatles.
Kenny and his band, which includes Noah Hunt, Chris Layton, and Riley Osbourn, along with special guest Tommy Shannon, have delivered a refreshing and inspiring take on guitar-driven rock and roll. How I Go offers a blues infused collection of music and more. “We poured our hearts and souls into the recording of How I Go,” Shepherd said. “My goal was to give longtime fans exactly what they want to hear on one of my records, while providing new fans an opportunity to experience my brand of blues based rock. I’m certain music lovers will clearly hear our musical roots while experiencing the growth and emotion that this record represents.” The band is planning a U.S. tour to begin in July.
Phoebe Snow, the singer/songwriter who gained fame with her 1974 hit single “Poetry Man,” died Tuesday morning in Edison, New Jersey. She was 60, and suffered complications after a brain hemorrhage in January, 2010.
Born Phoebe Ann Laub to white Jewish parents in New York City in 1952, she was nominated for best new artist at the 1975 Grammys after her self-titled debut album and the hit single “Poetry Man” turned the singer into a star. She subsequentyly appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone and as musical guest on “Saturday Night Live”. She later became known as a folk guitarist who made forays into jazz and blues, covering soul classics such as “Shakey Ground,” ”Love Makes a Woman” and “Mercy, Mercy Mercy.” on over a half dozen albums.
Her 1976′ album, Second Childhood, achieved gold status, but subsequent albums found smaller audiences. Through the ’80s and ’90s, Snow continued to occasionally perform, and sang commercial jingles for companies including Michelob, Hallmark and AT& T. She sang the theme for NBC’s “A Different World” and sang at Howard Stern’s wedding, as well as at Camp David for President Bill Clinton.
Jimmie Vaughan has announced the July 26 release of More Blues, Ballads and Favorites, a follow up collection to last year’s Grammy-nominated Blues, Ballads and Favorites, his first new studio album in nine years.
With 14 covers of classic tunes that are close to his heart, the album – recorded, like the previous one, in his hometown ofAustin, Texas – reunites Vaughan with the same cast of musicians that helped him out on the previous set. Also returning for round two, to assist with the vocals, is Lou Ann Barton, whose powerful pipes grace several tunes on the new release.
“The first album was a success,” says Vaughan. “And what happened is I never really stopped. Even after I turned the first one in I was still recording. I’ve decided that, as long as I feel like it, I’m going to do that from now on.”
While touring in support of Blues, Ballads and Favorites, Vaughan performed “Just A Little Bit” from the album on “Conan,” and also gave a surprise performance on Conan O’Brien’s Legally Prohibited From Being Funny on Television Tour.
Vaughan – who first came to prominence as co-founder of the pioneering Texas blues-rock band the Fabulous Thunderbirds in the ’70s – has certainly earned the right to do whatever he wants whenever he wants to do it. Since he was a kid,Vaughan has dedicated his life to mastering his axe and reminding folks what American music is all about – music, he says, that need not be categorized.
On the self-produced More Blues, Ballads and Favorites, bringing it all together is exactly what Jimmie Vaughan does. From the opening track, Pierce’s “I Ain’t Never,” to the closer, “The Rains Came,” originally by the Texas Gulf Coast band Big Sambo and the House Wreckers and later reworked by the late, great Doug Sahm; Vaughan and his like-minded pals keep things rockin’ and rollin’. Other highlights include two tracks by the recently deceased Bobby Charles, “No Use Knocking” and “I Ain’t Gonna Do it No More”; two picked up from the semi-obscure New Orleans R&B singer Annie Laurie, “It’s Been a Long Time” and “I’m In the Mood For You”; and great, often lost songs originally cut by Hank Williams (“I Hang My Head and Cry”), Jimmy Liggins (“Teardrop Blues”), Jivin’ Gene (“Breaking Up Is Hard to Do”), Teddy Humphries (“What Makes You So Tough”), Ray Charles (“Greenback Dollar Bill”), Nappy Brown (“Cried Like a Baby”), Lloyd Price (“Oooh Oooh Oooh”), and Jimmy Reed (“I Want to Love You”). Learn more at .jimmievaughan.com.
C. F. Martin & Co. is partnering with the Songwriters Music Series to benefit the VH1 Save The Music Foundation. The concert series will kick off on May 10 at the Hard Rock Café in New York City with a short acoustic set by musician and “Glee” star Matthew Morrison. Following the launch in New York, the series will travel to Nashville June 2 for a performance by The Band Perry at the Hard Rock Nashville’s Reverb Room and will finish in Los Angeles in September with an artists to be announced.
The series benefits the VH1 Save The Music Foundation in its mission to restore music education programs in America’s public schools and raise awareness about the importance of music as part of education. Learn more at vh1savethemusic.com/songwriters and martinguitar.com.
Founding Slayer guitarist Jeff Hanneman stepped onstage with his band at this past Saturday’s Big 4 concert in Indio, California, marking the first time he has played with Slayer since last October. In January, Hanneman contracted necrotizing fasciitis, likely caused by a spider bite, and has since been undergoing surgeries, skin grafts, and rehab. Hanneman surprised the crowd of 50,000 when he walked out onto the stage, unannounced, and played the two-song encore, “South of Heaven” and “Angel of Death.”
Gary Holt, guitarist for Exodus, has been the primary guest guitarist with Slayer since the band started its 2011 touring schedule in February, and will continue in that capacity until Hanneman has completely recovered.