Rock In Rio @rockinriousayahoo-qa - Tumblr Blog

Posts

dummymags

yjacklondon

I know you love images

So I made this for you.

yjacklondon

Adventures in long form content

You know, sometimes we want to write more than just 140 characters. We want to write a lot, with many paragraphs and maybe even some images in the middle. I wonder how these stories will look like in the dashboard. Will my formatting survive? What if I write a full sentence in bold? And in italic? And in bold and italic, crazy, huh?

The second paragraph is also an achievement. I can use it to link to some website that you should definitely visit today. And then I can set up the scene for an image that is coming up next.

The image above is cute, right? Some of the elements that make it great:

It’s a puppy

It’s a corgi

It’s sleeping

It’s hugging a toy

If you’re reading so far, congratulations. Especially because this text doesn’t say anything of substance, it’s just a test.

So, what’s next?

Well, after a fancy heading in the middle of the story like the one above, we need to find some interesting assets to keep the narrative going. Hold on a sec while I go on to screen and find a video. And of course it needs to come from pet tube.

All right! This is going well! Moving on, I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs.

I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs. I’ll just repeat the same thing over and over so we have many paragraphs.

Thanks for sticking around and happy reblogging!

yjacklondon

This is supposed to be my title

And this is just regular text. Taylor Swift is great!

ash-rao

Ten apps you must take on your travels

Forget carting around giant travel wallets and over-sized guidebooks; modern travel has become a lot easier with nifty travel apps. We check out our favourite 10.

Travel List

Say good bye to endless bits of paper and rough memo notes, instead get Travel List on your phone. With this app you can organise your ‘to-do’ lists, making sure you don’t forget to pack your undies, toothbrush, camera chargers, and passport. The interface is neat and user-friendly for even the most tech-challenged traveller.

Photo: Thinkstock

Click here to read about the 9 other apps you must take during your travels.

Get ready, America! This is Rock in Rio! Check out the website: www.rockinrio.com/usa

CMT "Next Women of Country" Event Aims to Put a Lot of "Girl(s) in a Country Song"

The state of females on country radio has been so dire that, when you see CMT has an initiative called “Next Women of Country,” the name almost seems too naively hopeful. Will there be a next woman of country? As long as country radio has Miranda Lambert to play, doesn’t that fulfill their entire quota for the year?

CMT put on a showcase for some of these young women during CMA week in Nashville at the City Winery, co-hosted by Lee Ann Womack, odd man out Gavin DeGraw, and CMT exec Leslie Fram. The talent on view was so strong that it was hard to believe that at least one of these acts couldn’t rise up and crash through the bro ceiling. Actually, at least one of them is making big waves at the moment: Maddie & Tae performed their protest song “Girl in a Country Song,” which has somehow risen into radio’s Top 10, despite being openly (if playfully) oppositional to the subtle chauvinism that the format has lately seemed to stand for, where women usually ride shotgun, not in the driver’s seat. Go figure, and go forth!

A couple of others gal on the bill at this industry showcase have also had some success at country radio, notably Jana Kramer, who had her breakout hit in 2012 and is working on a sophomore effort. RaeLynn also has “God Made Girls” still impacting at the format. The others were largely unproven at radio but clearly rarin’ to go: Mickey Guyton, Angaleena Presley, Natalie Stovall, Lindsay Ell, Kelsea Ballerini, and Kelleigh Bannen. (Brandy Clark, a CMA Best New Artist nominee, was also set to perform but had to bow out because of the flu.)

I talked with Maddie & Tae about their unlikely success at country radio. “We were probably just as surprised as you were!” said Maddie Marlow. “But the message is definitely something we believe in. It’s honest, and a different story. You’ve been hearing from the males for so long, and everyone’s just ready to hear a female perspective.” Added Taelyn Dye, “It’s crazy how country radio has just embraced us with open arms, with our first song, right out of the gate, so we feel so blessed.” They have a debut EP out just this week, with a full album to come in the spring.

Jana Kramer debuted a powerful new ballad called “I Got the Boy” — the sad addendum to which is that her ex-sweetheart’s ultimate wife got the man. “It’s probably one of my favorite songs on the (forthcoming) album,” she told me. “It’s about my high school sweetheart, Matthew. I feel like everybody can relate to a high school sweetheart. And at the end of the day I got the boy and she got the man. Although I bet she would tell me she got the boy and I got the man!” she laughed. “Things always work out and I’m in a very happy place, but on my album there’s songs from my past as well as songs about my future.”

Does this more emotional tack suggest Kramer’s coming album might be a little rougher around the edges? She confirms it, in the strongest terms. “I think in the darkest times was when I finally figured it out: Why am I still trying to hide behind something? All of a sudden my voice came out and I was like all right, I got it,” Kramer said. “All of a sudden I went from a s—-ty performer to a confident performer. I had no idea who I was as an artist. It happened so fast, my first album. I didn’t have time to figure me out on the first album. It was like holy crap, I got signed, and now I need an album two months later! This time Scott Hendricks, my producer, who I adore, would give me a song and I was like ‘No, absolutely not, I’m not singing it.’ Where before I would be like ‘Well, if you like, it, I’ll sing it’… I wrote a ton, too. I wrote half the album. I’d go into (co-writing) rooms and say ‘This is exactly what I’m writing and I’m not going to settle for anything less.’ So I was empowered on this album! Hopefully you’ll hear there is a change. For me, this is my baby album.”

Another highlight of the Next Women of Country event was Kelleigh Bannen’s rendition of a Liz Rose/Nicolle Galyon co-write called “Church Clothes,” which is the kind of ballad that would burn up the charts if this were the 1990s and Trisha Yearwood were still having smashes. Bannen told the story of meeting with one of her songwriting heroines, Jessi Alexander, who told the young singer that she’d finally broken through as a hit songwriter when she “started writing guy songs.” “Y’all, that’s really sad,” said Bannen. “There’s just not a voice for her songs for the most part in this moment. And I think that’s a really serious statement.”

Sometimes there’s something to be said, though, for excelling at something usually associated with guys. Lindsay Ell proved when she turned in some acoustic-guitar-hero licks to punctuate her song “Shut Me Up,” which is sort of a country update on ‘Til Tuesday’s not-gonna-keep-it-down “Voices Carry.”

Angeleena Presley is close to being this year’s Brandy Clark; like Clark in 2013, she has one of the most critically acclaimed albums of the moment, although country radio is unlikely to touch it, despite her having charted with the Pistol Annies. With truthful songs like “Pain Pills,” she may find the most acceptance in the Americana world — toward which, not coincidentally, cohost Womack has recently drifted.

Mickey Guyton seems destined for big things within the world of mainstream country radio, if big things are indeed still possible. Last February, she brought down the house at a Universal Nashville radio programmers’ showcase at the Ryman with “Better Than You Left Me.” Introducing Guyton at the CMT event, label group chief Mike Dungan explained that the problem was they only had that one song in the can at that time and nothing to follow it with. But with a debut album nearly complete, spring may tell whether Guyton’s powerful pipes can push through the radio logjam.

Keith Urban, Other Country Stars Pay Tribute to Vince Gill at BMI Awards

If you’re looking for great country music bromances, look no further than the one between Vince Gill and Keith Urban. Gill was honored at Tuesday night’s annual BMI Awards in Nashville with the “Icon” lifetime achievement award, and the highlight of this dinner every year is the all-star musical tribute to the honoree. Urban led a band of the city’s best session musicians through a selection of Gill classics, in an example of one of the genre’s very few true triple-threats — singer, songwriter, shredder — giving it up for another.

Urban sang a stunningly strong version of Gill’s biggest ballad, “I Still Believe in You,” as if the song were his own, as well as jamming out on the barnburner “Liza Jane.” Gill protege Ashley Monroe joined Urban for “Whenever You Come Round,” followed by Michael McDonald putting a soulful spin on “When I Call Your Name.” While the event was not recorded for broadcast, you can see snippets of a couple of these Gill covers here.

Said Urban from the stage, “You’re a singer’s singer, Vince, a songwriter’s songwriter, and as best as I can see — and Amy testifies to it every time I see her — you’re a husband’s husband. I don’t want to marry you, Vince, I’m just saying,” he added, as wife Nicole Kidman looked on, presumably relieved. “I don’t live in that state.”

The big non-lifetime winners at the BMIs included Rhett Akins, honored as songwriter of the year for co-writing seven of the past year’s 50 most played tunes, including “Boys ‘Round Here,” “Hey Girl,” and “When She Says Baby.” The award for the most played song of the year went to “Wagon Wheel,” as performed by Darius Rucker and co-written by Bob Dylan and Old Crow Medicine Show’s Keith Secor. . “I’m really glad to have just a little piece of Bob Dylan to share with all of the songwriters that are here tonight,” Secor told us shortly before learning that his tune had won the top award.

Gill gave a touching and funny acceptance speech in which he talked about his early days in Nashville as well as what he learned post-stardom. He spoke of many years ago approaching another BMI Icon winner, Bill Anderson, and asking if he could write songs with him — to Anderson’s shock, since he’d pretty much given up writing and assumed he’d been forgotten by younger generations. Gill challenged the mostly young-ish writers of the winning songs to do what he’d done and hook up with some older tunesmiths. Songwriter of the year Akins was listening to that, as he used his speech to ask Gill to collaborate with him.

Gill got a lot of laughs from the industry crowd, even as he occasionally expressed some unpleasant truths. He Ashley Monroe — whose latest album he produced — “a beautiful soul, and the voice to go along with it. The great mystery of life is why they won’t play her records. That’s the dumbest s—- I’ve ever heard of in my life!”

He spoke of his nascent experiences as a songwriter, the last of his triple talents to really fully develop. “It took me a long time to figure out how to write good songs. My voice always overshadowed everything else I did, whether I could play or whether I could write songs. I’d sing ‘em pretty good and it would fool people. They’d go, ‘Oh, I like the voice. I don’t give a s—- what he says!’

“Rodney (Crowell) and Emmy (-lou Harris) were unbelievable,” Gill elaborated. “They were the ones that first inspired me to try to write a song. I think I’d written six or seven songs, and I joined Pure Prairie League as a 20-year-old kid. We were getting ready to go make a record right after I joined the band. They said ‘Have you got any songs?’ and I said ‘Yeah, I’ve got six or seven.’ Those dumb-asses recorded five of them!”

Gill reminisced about his friendship with one of country’s most legendary songwriters, Harlan Howard, singing on his demos for $10 a pop when he first got to town, along with their mutual love of White Russians. “He told me ‘Kid, you might be one of the best singers I’ve ever heard.’ I said, ‘Oh, thanks, Harlan.’ He said, ‘And you’re a hell of a guitar player.’ I said ‘Thank you.’ ‘And… you’re a pretty good songwriter.’” A pregnant pause for that damnation with faint praise to kick in. “I said ‘Okay, I understand what you’re saying.’ It was really great constructive criticism, and it made me try harder.”

On the red carpet, we asked some of the attending singers and songwriters for what had impressed them about Gill over the years…

Rascal Flatts

Gary LeVox: “His heart and him as a person are bigger than any hit he’s ever had. And as a singer, that tenor voice I’ve heard since I was little, and it did something to me. I’ve always been inspired by great singers, and Vince was probably the first one on the list growing up.”

Jay DeMarcus: “It’s hard to believe he’s 70. [Kidding] It really is. I was blown away by that… No, the guy can do it all. But my favorite memories are on the golf course with him. I‘m privileged to play with him probably a couple of times a week. I love those moments of sitting beside him in the cart and just talking about life. He’s one of the best human beings I’ve ever met.”

Lauren Alaina

“I sang ‘Go Rest High on That Mountain’ at my uncle’s funeral. He was a huge Vince Gill fan, just like my whole family is. He’s just as genuine and nice as he is crazy-talented.”

Old Crow Medicine Show’s Keith Secor

“One of my favorite Vince moments was the realization that the place I like to play golf for about $6 a round is a place that Vince Gill gave to the city of Nashville — a gift called Vinnie Links, at the Shelby Park. He made golf accessible to young and old. I’m just really glad that he set up this golf course that kids can afford to play golf. And I’m there too, because I’m a cheapskate.”

Dustin Lynch

“Vince has been a huge influence on me. No one can do it like Vince. He’s a pretty good golf player, too. Not as good as me, but that’s all I’ve got against him. I can take his lunch money on the golf course.”

LoCash Cowboys’ Preston Brust

“I love everything he sang on every album. Remember that song he did for the Maverick movie with Mel Gibson? I’m sorry, I’m a little bit of a stalker of Vince Gill. One of our favorite moments with Vince, was when we were on Man Versus Food (on the Travel Channel). Vince’s favorite show is Man Versus Food. He and his daughter watch it together. So when we were doing the show, we sat down to eat these ginormous steaks, live on the show. And just on the other side of our table is Vince and his daughter, and they’re just there to watch. Then he jumped in the episode with us and helped us conquer the steak. He said, ‘Call me the Buddha. We will finish the steak.’ He made us rub his belly.”

Sugarland’s Kristian Bush

“When we first came to town in Sugarland, we got a record deal but we didn’t take any advances for our record, so we didn’t really have a lot of money. We had to survive through the making of the record. And Vince gave us a gig opening for him for four or five weeks during that time. And I’ll never forget it, because we kept looking at him going ‘Well, you know, we’re good for nothing here! We can help you sell no tickets. Nobody knows who we are.’ And he goes ‘Yeah, but I love your music.’ So I try to carry that forward. I’ll take out opening acts that I’ve never heard of that I just like… I was so nervous when we first went out on the tour, because he would come out and sit at the soundcheck and watch us, and I was like ‘Look, this is where I’m supposed to make my mistakes, at soundcheck, and get it right during the show.’ But I just learned that a man like that listens to everything. And a man like that also puts his money where his mouth is. He was able to help us when we needed it most, and that’s exactly who that guy is.”

Rodney Atkins

“I still remember trying to learn how he sang those licks on ‘Pocketful of Gold.’ But o one of the first times I was in town, over at Masterfonics, I was in the studio recording and my son was tiny. I heard somebody saying ‘Hey little buddy,’ and I thought, ‘Somebody’s being really nice to Elijah.’ I walked around the corner and it was Vince, and he was just over-the-top friendly. I hadn’t been in town very long and that made such an impression. That’s what you hope for when you get to Nashville.”

Scotty McCreery

“Obviously ‘Go Rest High on That Mountain’ is a classic that will go on forever and ever and is timeless. One of the songs I’ve dug of his lately is a song he put out just in the last couple of years, ‘Threaten Me With Heaven.’ I have that on repeat on my iPod and play it all the time.”

Josh Turner

“I’ve known Vince for a long time, because when I got signed to MCA, he had already been with MCA for a long time. I’ve been able to call him up on several occasions and ask him for his advice on the business side of things. He inducted me into the Grand Ole Opry, so that’s my favorite Vince Gill moment.”

Thomas Rhett

“I think everybody’s a Vince Gill fan. I went to Lipscomb University down the road for college, and obviously Vince went to Belmont. We used to yell Vince’s name at Lipscomb-versus-Belmont basketball games, because he would always be there sitting in the front row.”

Chris Young

“I could literally talk about him all day. I saw him back at Starwood, and he kicked his whole band off and played a song and sounded better than his record, and I thought, ‘I want to make people feel what this dude is doing to this crowd right now. I want to do that.’… My best story I have about him, on the Opry one night, they were doing a bunch of Hank Sr. songs, and I sang my couple songs and came off, and Vince was like, ‘We need (to fill) more time. Do you want to sing a Hank Sr. song together?’ I’m like ‘Uh, yeah,’ and he walks out and goes ‘Hey, I was just talking to my friend backstage…’ And the whole band is looking at me going, ‘What song? Key?’ So I was having to yell at ‘em on the side of the Opry, but I went out and sang ‘Hey, Good Lookin’’ with Vince Gill.”

Holly Williams

“He saw me play at the Opry and said ‘I’m really a fan and love your lyrics and song subjects; let’s write some time.’ I called him and said ‘I’m back from babyland [Williams recently had her first child], so let’s get together and do this.’ We’ll have at least one song on my new album that we wrote together. What I love about him besides his brilliant songwriting is what a fan he is of artists. He’ll call on your phone and say ‘Hey, come use my studio’ or ‘Let’s write a song today.’ He latches onto people that he loves, and puts me on shows, so he’s just been a huge blessing. I adore him. I don’t know how to pick a favorite — probably ‘I Still Believe in You.’”

Frankie Ballard

“I’m a guitar player, so whenever I think of Vince, I think of guitar. He’s been one of my guitar heroes. Obviously he’s a singer, and songwriter, with a beautiful wife — the guy’s got everything going for him. But he shreds the guitar. He’s bad-ass.”

Gloriana’s Rachel Reinert

“The first song that we ever covered as a band was ‘Aimee’ by Pure Prairie League. And we sang ‘Go Rest High on That Mountain’ at a friend’s funeral. It’s an incredible song and it speaks the most perfect message for that type of situation. That’s why we do what we do as songwriters.”

Backstage at the Country Awards: Luke On His First CMA; Kacey"s Secret Wardrobe Malfunction; Blake On His and Miranda"s 4-to-1 Trophy Ratio

The winners at the CMAs really open up backstage, whereas words sometimes fail them while they’re at the podium accepting their trophies. As Entertainer of the Year winner Luke Bryan put it: “To get the respect of the CMA board and all of its voters and win this is a ginormous deal, something that I could not express out on stage when I was winning it.”

You can also be sure that Kacey Musgraves waited till she was safely offstage to talk about her wardrobe malfunction, or how Little Big Town almost came up a technician too short when it came to pulling off their lighted outfits. Here are some highlights from last night’s meet-the-press moments:

LUKE BRYAN, Entertainer of the Year

“To try to understand that you would win your first CMA award and it’s the Entertainer of the Year… I have longed and sought after many years to get one of these in my hands… I can’t help but in the back of my mind want some of that respect from this body of people… I’m really just so blessed that this is from the CMA, and I will never take a second of it for granted. Honestly, from the bottom of my heart, I go out on stage every night and try to sing it and perform it and entertain it like it’s my last. Now it’s like, whoo! It’s hard to describe. “

BLAKE SHELTON, Best Male Vocalist

“To be where I’m at in my career this far into it — I’m not going to say the later part of my career, because f—- that! I hope this is like the second quarter right now — but to put it in more recent times is that much more exciting to me… I can’t express enough how excited and shocked and surprised and overwhelmed I am that this is happening for me in my life in my late 30s… To know I’m still hanging around and still have a home here, it’s hard to explain.

"It’s easy for me to [say] a lot of this stuff that’s happened for me is definitely because of the show, because of The Voice. But on the other hand The Voice is because of the music. They’ve kind of gone hand in hand. It’s just been the perfect recipe… I could not be a happier human being with the way this night has gone. For me to be standing here with this is awesome. And I told my wife, as we were walking off the stage, I go, ‘Man, sorry you only won four CMAs tonight [out of nine nominations]. I’m really sorry!’ So for me and for my family, this is maybe the biggest night of our lives, as far as the music industry goes.”

KACEY MUSGRAVES, BRANDY CLARK, and SHANE McANALLY, Song of the Year, for “Follow Your Arrow”

Musgraves: “When I got the news that singing with Loretta Lynn was a possibility, I absolutely freaked out. She’s been so sweet and loving and encouraging, and it’s really cool to see her in a sense pass the torch to me that I will gladly take… Just so y’all know, right before I sang with her, my panties totally came off. I haven’t even told them [her co-writers] this. They were the stick-on kind. Look at this dress—there’s not much to work with. So they were stuck on, and then they weren’t stuck on, and the curtain was about to come up, so I literally had to rip ‘em off and throw ‘em to the side. They’re somewhere around here. So in case you see ‘em, they’re mine.”

Clark: “We felt really fortunate after we wrote this song that Kacey had the guts not just to record it but make it be a single.”

McAnally: “I think it was a big chance that she took. She probably doesn’t even know that because she just speaks from her heart… I don’t think that any of us go in any day to be controversial. That word seems so big. Button-pushing? I don’t think it was intentional… Kacey came in and said I just want to write a song that says follow your arrow wherever it points. I don’t think you can recreate that by going in and saying ‘we’re going to go further.’ It’s going in and saying, what’s on your heart?”

Musgraves: “It’s funny because people always try to bring up the rebel card with me. And I just think it’s kind of hilarious and, not to be rude, but cheap. Because if you go back in time to the people who founded this genre, like Hank Williams and George Jones, Willie Nelson, and Loretta, who I got to sing with tonight, they were singing about things that impacted every single person in real life – and not doing it to push buttons. So I’m nothing new. I’m just carrying on the tradition of telling the truth.”

LITTLE BIG TOWN, Vocal Group of the Year

Karen Fairchild: “We didn’t expect to win at all. Lucy Hale, I was looking at her beautiful red dress, and I didn’t understand what she said.”

Kimberly Schlapman, on performing “Bang Bang” with Grande: “So many people and so many wires in all kinds of places. It was a fragile and delicate situation. We couldn’t bend over and we couldn’t really turn to the side or it would short out.”

Fairchild: “You don’t just sew lights into a costume. It takes a lot of planning… We had tech people and extra tech people, and after the rehearsal last night they flew another tech person in.”

Schlapman on their career: “There have been plenty of low points, but some amazing highs. We’ve just been riding it out, and as long as it’ll go, we’ll stay on this cowboy. Or what is it?” Much nervous laughter from the press and fellow band members. “We’ll stay on the horse and keep a-riding!”

MIRANDA LAMBERT, Album of the Year, Female Vocalist, Single of the Year (“Automatic”), Vocal Event (“We Were Us”)

“Recording this album Platinum, I was the most nervous I’ve ever been in my recording career… I feel that it won the award because it just talks about things you’re going through as a female and people relate… Everything goes through phases. A certain topic is popular. It was a group phase, then the girls were on top, then the guys took over. But either way, right now, country music is the most popular music. Everybody wants a piece of it… We’re all doing this together. But I do feel like girls do have a lot to say. Kacey won song of the year, and girls represented really well tonight. And I know that country music appreciates women, and they always have, so I feel it’s about to come back to the forefront.”

BRETT ELDREDGE, New Artist

“Going toward the Frank Sinatra route? I just always loved Frank Sinatra; I loved the way he delivered a song, the way he was smooth. I mean, I’m wearing a tux right now because I love Frank Sinatra. I want to wear something Frank would wear. I try to take from different influences and different people I listened to rowing up, and throw it into my music. I’m so glad that country music has let me call it home…. I would go nowhere else.”

#featured #News

Chart Watch: Nashville Salutes…Motley Crue?!!

Well, here’s something I’d never thought I’d see: A tribute album to veteran hard-rockers Motley Crue enters Billboard's Top Country Albums chart at #2. The album, Nashville Outlaws: A Tribute To Motley Crue, also enters the all-genre Billboard 200 at #5 (31K). The album features such top country acts as Rascal Flatts, Florida Georgia Line, LeAnn Rimes and Brantley Gilbert performing Motley Crue songs.

Country music has changed a lot in the past 30 years, making the success of a project like A Tribute To Motley Crue possible. The week that Motley Crue landed its first chart album (Oct. 15, 1983), the top five albums on the country chart were by Alabama, Kenny Rogers, Merle Haggard & Willie Nelson, Lee Greenwood and Ronnie Milsap. I can’t see any of them on a Crue tribute.

Garth Brooks helped kick off this genre-bending trend in 1994 when he appeared on the KISS tribute album, Kiss My Ass: Classic Kiss Regrooved. He sang “Hard Luck Woman,” which became his first hit on the Hot 100 Airplay chart. Brooks was the only country artist on that album, which also featured Lenny Kravitz, Anthrax and Gin Blossoms, among others.

In 2006, Bon Jovi chipped away at the wall separating rock and country from the opposite direction. The band hit #1 on Hot Country Songs that May with “Who Says You Can’t Go Home,” a duet with Jennifer Nettles of Sugarland.

The Crue tribute album includes two similar rock/country pairings. The single from the album is Justin Moore's cover of “Home Sweet Home,” which features Crue lead singer Vince Neil. The song was a Hot 100 hit for Motley Crue twice, in 1985 and 1991. The album also includes Cassadee Pope, Season 3 winner of The Voice, teaming with Robin Zander, lead singer of Cheap Trick, on Crue’s 2008 album track “The Animal In Me.”

The album also includes two tracks by country artists who first achieved prominence in rock bands. Darius Rucker, who rose to fame fronting Hootie & The Blowfish, has amassed six #1 country hits since 2008. He performs Crue’s 1989 album track “Time For Change.” Aaron Lewis, lead singer of the hard rock band Staind, has had a sideline career as a country artist since 2011. He sings Crue’s 1997 album track “Afraid.”

Nashville Outlaws: A Tribute To Motley Crue isn’t the first tribute album to a non-country act to hit big in country music. Common Thread: The Songs Of The Eagles topped the country chart for 13 weeks in 1993-‘94. And Lionel Richie's Tuskegee, on which he sang duet versions of his greatest hits with top country stars, had four weeks on top in 2012. But both of those acts had a far stronger connection to country music than Motley Crue does. Eagles had a top 10 country hit in 1975 with their classic “Lyin’ Eyes.” Richie had a top 10 country hit in 1987, “Deep River Woman,” which featured Alabama.

The tribute album to Motley Crue has more in common with earlier country tributes to two other acts who have little obvious connection to country music: the Beatles (1995’s Come Together: America Salutes The Beatles) and ZZ Top (2002’s Sharp Dressed Men: A Tribute To ZZ Top). The Beatles tribute reached #13 on Top Country Albums. The ZZ Top tribute reached #7.

Follow Paul on Google+

Chart Watch: Tom Petty"s Record-Setting American Band

Nearly 37 years after first cracking The Billboard 200 with their eponymous debut album, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers finally land their first #1 album with Hypnotic Eye. This constitutes a new record for an American band. That’s fitting, because Petty and the Heartbreakers, which formed in Florida and found their footing in Los Angeles, are a quintessential American band. Their debut album included the classic “American Girl.”

Among all acts, Petty and the Heartbreakers arein fourth place for the longest wait between first chart album and first #1, behind Tony Bennett (54 years and eight months), Black Sabbath (42 years and 10 months) and Neil Diamond (41 years and seven months). (Black Sabbath, of course, is English.)

Petty and his band had climbed as high as #2 twice, with Damn The Torpedoes (which logged seven weeks in the runner-up spot in 1980) and Mojo (one week at #2 in 2010).

Hypnotic Eye sold 131K copies in its first week. The album was boosted by a Ticketmaster ticket bundle. About half of this week’s sales were linked to ticket purchases for the band’s current tour. (Mojo was also boosted by a album/ticket bundle.) Other veteran acts to have benefitted from such bundles include Cher and Bon Jovi.

This is the 15th top 10 album of Petty’s career. That tally that includes nine albums with the Heartbreakers, three solo albums, two albums as a member of Traveling Wilburys and one as a member of Mudcrutch.

Petty is also featured on Eric Clapton & Friends’s The Breeze—An Appreciation Of J.J. Cale, a tribute album which debuts at #2 (61K). Clapton co-produced and is featured on the album, which also features John Mayer, Mark Knopfler and Willie Nelson, among others.

Follow Paul on Google+

Sinead O’Connor Plans Miley-Mocking Video to Promote New Album

Often controversial singer Sinead O'Connor is back with a new album, I'm Not Bossy, I'm the Boss, due Aug. 12 from Nettwerk Records. O'Connor has already blown minds with the glam girl cover photo for the album, released a few weeks ago. When we recently chatted with her, she also revealed that she has plans for a Miley Cyrus-mocking video to draw attention to her 10th album, a collection of guitar-driven love songs, which is her best work in years.

O'Connor admitted that she knew the photos of her wearing a wig and a tight dress would get attention. "I was aware if I were to produce a couple of photo wherein I had hair, everybody would run them and would have to mention the album title," she explains. "They weren't done originally for the album cover. They were supposed to be fun publicity shots that would get some publicity and someone would mention the name of the record, and it f--king worked."

She added that previously the record company issued a release about plans for her new album and it failed to gain much notice. After the glammed out photos were released, O'Connor says the label decided to use one of those photos as the album's cover. "The album was already in print, but they pulled it back," she says. "It wasn't a calculated move, like I'm changing my image."

Prior to our chat, O'Connor's handlers asked us not to bring up her open letter to Miley Cyrus and the Twtter war with Cyrus that spun out of it. We honored that request, but it was O'Connor who made reference to Cyrus, although she never mentioned her by name.

The artist, who initially shaved her head early in her career to prevent her label from marketing her as a sex symbol, says that she has no problem with women showing off their feminine sides. "I've never said that women shouldn't dress like women; what I've said is that you don't have to be naked on a wrecking ball and licking a sledge hammer. You can be very, very sexy without actually taking any of your clothes off or twerking. That's what I'm interested in showing and when you look at the shot, that's what you see. There's nothing in those photographs, but a little leg showing, but here you have a hot women, which isn't actually me -- it is me, but I don't really look like that. I'm not going to go around trying to look like that."

A second photo with O'Connor wearing a reddish-brown wig, a shorter skirt and strumming an electric guitar was released in conjunction with the track "Take Me to Church" from the album.

The Irish singer, who rose to prominence in 1990 with her stunning version of the Prince-penned "Nothing Compares 2 U," promises that she'll have further explanation about the photos in the liner notes of the album. She also dropped a bombshell. "Myself and my producer are going to make a video at some point that is kind of like a piss-take of the 'Wrecking Ball' video. We're going to get a granny suit, so it looks like a naked fat old granny. Me in a video as a fat granny crawling around with a sludge hammer. I'm not sure what song we're going to do it for yet."

Until then, O'Connor has released the track "Take Me to Church" as a teaser for the album. Following her infamous 1992 stunt on Saturday Night Live in which she ripped up a photo of Pope John Paul II in protest of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, we're not sure she's allowed in mass, but maybe this song will sway the powers that be. After all, O'Connor confesses, "I've done so many bad things it hurts."

Look for a full feature on I'm Not Bossy, I'm the Boss around the time of its Aug. 12 release.

Follow Craig Rosen on Twitter.

Jackson Browne Produces for Change in Cuba on ‘Playing for Change 3: Songs Around the World’

With a catalog of songs that includes such classics as "Doctor My Eyes," "Running on Empty," and "These Days," Jackson Browne is primarily known as a singer and songwriter. Yet for Playing for Change 3: Songs Around the World — a CD/DVD set out June 17, featuring performances by Keith Richards, Sara Bareilles, and more — he opted to take on the role as a producer.

Browne got into the project through Mark Johnson, who co-founded the Songs Around the World concept that evolved into Playing for Change with Whitney Kroenke back in 2005. Since its launch in 2009, the collective has united hundreds of musicians around the world while raising money and promoting music in developing countries. Johnson had met Browne back when he was a recording engineer and worked at Browne's studio in Los Angeles.

For his contribution, Browne was invited to visit Cuba, which was appealing to veteran singer-songwriter because he'd previously visited the country and has a deep and passionate interest in Cuba. Yet Browne didn't want to merely record Cuban artists in Cuba, rather he wanted to feature Cuban musicians from all over the world. He's called the journey "one of the most rewarding and inspiring musical experiences of my life."

"There's this diaspora of Cubans all over the world, and they're Cuban no matter where they go," Browne says. "And no matter what side of the political debate they come down on, whether they're living in Cuba and for or against the present regime, or if they're living outside of Cuba."

The song those musicians perform is "Guantanamera," which is perhaps the most popular Cuban song ever written and a song that Browne has loved since he was a child. A version arranged by late, legendary folk singer Pete Seeger by the Sandpipers became an international hit in 1966. The song's original lyrics were written by famed Cuban songwriter Jose Fernandez Diaz, also known as Joseito Fernandez, who was also a key figure in Cuba revolution that earned the country independence from Spain.

"His writings are considered sacred by anybody that believes in Cuba's independence," Browne says. "He was like a father of the country, like [Thomas] Jefferson." Browne translates and recites some of the song's lyrics for us. "Don't put me in a dungeon like a traitor/I'm good/And like the good, I will die with my face to the sun."

Prior to the adoption of those politically charged lyrics, the song had a life as a drinking song in the '20s and '30s, Browne says. "They would make words for it. It was like a neighborhood barroom song. It just has this beautiful melody. 'Guantanamera' means 'girl from Guantanamo,' almost like 'Girl from Ipanema.'"

As Browne says, "Guantanamera" is such a universally loved song, it crosses political divides. "I thought if we could get all these people singing this song, we'd get quite a portrait of the [Cuban] people," he explains. "And that's exactly what happened."

Although the version of the song included on Songs Around the World is primarily credited to Carlos Varella and Manuel Galban, more than a dozen musicians and vocalists are featured on the track, plus a string section of Cuban women, who wrote their own chart for the recording.

Accompanying Browne on the trip was another old friend, Cuban percussionist Luis Conte, who ended up playing bongos on the track. "He wanted to go," Browne says, "but he was worried about going because he'd been told by so many expatriate Cuban friends, 'You go down there and they're going to keep you,' or 'They won't let you leave,' 'They won't let you in,' or 'They're going to follow you everywhere.' There's a lot of misinformation out there present-day Cuba that is put out there by the right, which of course is a little out of touch with the central fact that 50 years have passed and this country has gone on and has grown in so many important ways."

Because of those fears and misinformation, Browne initially thought it would be nearly impossible to even get Cuban musicians who had relocated to Miami to play on the record, but was pleasantly surprised when they embraced the project with open arms.

"One of the guys from Playing for Change, Enzo [Buono], was working with these Cubans in Miami, shooting something there and he showed them the project, and they said, 'Absolutely, we want to play,'" Browne says.

The result of those sessions had a deep impact on Browne. "It's the most emotional thing when you see these horn players, lined up in front of the skyline of Miami and they're playing the horn line of 'Guantanamera,' the same song that is being sung by people in the street and the artist collectives in Cuba," he says. "First and foremost, they're all Cuban and they feel a connection with the people and the music. They don't all adhere to those strictly political views."

After visiting Cuba, Browne came home with some strong feelings about relations between Cuba and the U.S. "In the case of the United States' embargo with Cuba that's been going on for 50 years, it's not productive," he says. "It's really not. It's a relic of the Cold War and the East-West struggle with Russia and it's really out of date. I think most people of this generation feel that very strongly, especially in Cuba. They want to rejoin the world."

With this contribution, Browne is hopeful it will do a small part to help that change come to Cuba and the world. Until then, he and his many collaborators on this project plan to continue playing for change.

Follow Craig Rosen on Twitter.

Chromeo Discuss Post-Modern Melange of Frustration and Funk

There’s a classic moment in the 1974 Mel Brooks film Blazing Saddles, in which Gene Wilder (Jim) and the sheriff Cleavon Little (Bart) are trying to infiltrate a racist group dressed in Ku Klux Klan outfits. So, Little cries out to two men in full Klan regalia: "Hey, where are the white women at?" In the next scene, the two heroes beat up the Klansmen and steal their hoods and robes.

Considering how offbeat and ironic electronic pop act Chromeo are, it might seem natural to assume the title of their fourth album, White Women, is a reference to the scene. As is often the case with Chromeo, the obvious isn't so obvious.

"The name comes from the first book by photographer Hemut Newton [published in 1976]," guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter David Macklovitch told Yahoo Music 20 minutes before his band performed on the eighth floor of a converted nine-story garage on the Upper West Side for an exclusive American Express promotional event. "Newton has always been a big influence on us, visually. He has had an impact on our album covers and our whole aesthetic. So we thought it would be a funny, irreverent, and potentially slightly controversial title."

"Funny, irreverent, and slightly controversial" are key words for Chromeo, a duo of Montreal natives who moved to Brooklyn and started writing music equally influenced by Hall & Oates and Daft Punk. To be clear, Chromeo are absolutely serious about the songs they create, so much so that Macklovitch recently gave up a career of academia teaching French Literature at Barnard College to focus on the band full-time. But Chromeo are all too aware that the idea of an academic frontman and his sidekick, the sober-minded keyboardist/programmer/talkbox vocalist Patrick Gemayel, performing hedonistic dance music is a little ludicrous. That's one reason a recent reviewer from Wondering Sound wrote, "Knocking the Canadian electrofunk revivalist duo for being cheesy is missing the point."

"Everything we do is open to interpretation in a very post-modern kind of way," Macklovitch said. "Are we serious, are we joking, is it cheesy, is it sincere? I think it’s all of those things.”

For White Women, Macklovitch moved back to Brooklyn and he and Gemayel tirelessly worked to craft an album that was commercially palatable to pop fans who don’t necessarily love electronic music. So far, they've succeeded. The album debuted at number 11 on the Billboard 200, and hit No. 6 in Canada and No. 42 in the UK. Credit that in part to the single, "Jealous (I Ain't With It)," which has received almost 2.5 million views to date on YouTube. The song, an upbeat number inspired by '80s disco-pop, is a radiant hybrid of Chic, Rick Springfield, and Justin Timberlake. As bouncy as the soundbed for the song is, the lyrics were motivated by soul-wrenching insecurity and unrequited love: "I wish she'd care to see, but she only cares when she's got the time/I care so much about her lovin'/I wish she'd let me be but our destinies got us intertwined."

"Jealous (I Ain't With It)" explains on its own why Chromeo have called their music "Larry David funk." As J. Geils put in in "Love Stinks," to stick to the decade that moves Chromeo: "He loves her, but she loves him/And he loves somebody else/You jus' can’t win."

"Relationships are tricky things, so there's a lot of neurosis in our music juxtaposed with really funky, carefree dance grooves," Macklovitch explained. "To say the lyrics are introspective is a euphemism. It’s all about scorn, insecurity, self-deprecation, strife, rancor – really tortured, self-conscious stuff. It would be amazing to be seen as the Woody Allen of electronic music. I love that whole axis. To us, there is something very post-modern with juxtaposing that with what some people would call decadent Studio 54 disco. And it's something that feels fresh and new to us."

To spice up the studio vibe for White Women, Chromeo invited a handful of guest vocalists to join them. The first one they reached out to was Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig, who had performed with them for their 2010 album Business Casual. Unlike last time, when Chromeo already had a song for Koenig to work on, Koenig wrote "Ezra’s Interlude" and played all the instruments. "It was his demo and he sent it to me and we loved it so we turned it into a song," Macklovitch said. "He came into the studio to work with us on it and we just took it from there, like two old friends having fun."

Also making a second appearance with Chromeo was Solange Knowles on the song "Lost on the Way Home." Knowles previously sang on the Business Casual number "When the Night Falls."

"'She is a friend from a long while back," said Macklovitch. "We spent the night with her and co-wrote the song together. It was pretty cool and easy."

The last collaboration on the album is for the song "Come Alive," which Chromeo wrote with producer Chazwick Bradley Bundick (aka. Toro y Moi). A video for the song has already accrued 1.2 million views on YouTube.

"We had the demo ready," explained Gemayel. "So he just came in and wrote his lyrics and his verse. It was really natural. Whenever we work with someone we always make we're there when they record it. We have a no flying [tracks in via computer] policy."

If YouTube stats and Billboard numbers are any indication, Chromeo are on a hot streak that'll probably last well through the summer, if not longer. They plan to capitalize on the opportunity by playing as many shows in as many countries as possible. "We’re used to traveling around the world and playing all over Europe," Macklovitch said. "Europe and South America has always been huge for us. We had to cut our teeth on that before we had radio in the U.S. But now that we're getting accepted more at home, doors are opening up and we have more dimensions to spread our funk crusade. Hopefully we can keep at it and keep it interesting for a good two years, before it’s time to get back in the studio and work on the next album."

Old 97′s Frontman Rhett Miller Shares His Musical Memories

Old 97's recently released Most Messed Up, their 11th and possibly their best studio effort. It features the band's trademark mix of country roots and a rocking attitude, with an assist from Tommy Stinson from the Replacements and Guns N' Roses. When we had frontman Rhett Miller on the phone to discuss the album, we also asked him to share some of his favorite musical memories with us. Read on; you're bound to learn something new about Miller and his checkered past. Old 97's are on tour in the U.S. right now, so catch them while you can.

What is the first album you bought with your own money, and where did you buy it from?

I bought ZZ Top's Degüello at a grocery store on Mockingbird in Dallas, Texas. I was probably 7. They had this song "Cheap Sunglasses" that some kids were singing I thought sounded really cool, so I bought Degüello and I went home and played it and it was awesome. To this day that record holds up for me. I got to meet [ZZ Top guitarist] Billy Gibbons over the years. A couple of years ago he taught me how to play dice, which is a terrible idea to play dice with Billy Gibbons, but it was pretty fun.

What was the first concert you attended, and where?

The first concert I went to with my parents was going to see the Kingston Trio at a little dinner theater in Dallas, I think it was called Mama's or something. And it was great. That was a huge experience for me. I remember thinking, "Whoa, these are just standing are just standing there with acoustic guitars and singing. This is not rocket science. I could do this." I was probably 6 when that happened. The first concert that I went to on my own was the Cars at Reunion Arena. I remember thinking it was pretty cool, but I was a little put off by all the production, all the bells and whistles and neon, especially the opening act Wang Chung. The drummer played electronic drums that were on a stick. The whole thing just seemed so schmaltzy to me. I appreciated that Cars, but I wish they would have stood there and played their guitars instead of riding around in neon pods.

You kind of answered this talking about the Kingston Trio, but what was the artist/song/video/album/concert that made you go, "Wow, making music is what I want to do too"?

I had a moment where I went to see David Bowie on Serious Moonlight tour. Bowie had already become my favorite musician and artist. Something about him always spoke to me. He was so much an outsider and he played up the alien aspect of his persona. In my early teens, I really related to that. I thought I could be an alien, the way everybody else seemed so different. I went and saw him and there were a moment when he came off the stage after the set, before the encore, and someone handed him a towel, someone handed him a lit cigarette and someone handed him a tumbler filled with brown liquid. I was seated toward the side of the stage. I was about 15 rows up from where he was and I could see him taking this deep breath, mopping his forehead, smoking his cigarette, and really finding this moment of peace while 15,000 people chanted his name. There was something about the dichotomy of the peace he found at the moment and the frenzy that the audience was creating really spoke to me about what this job entails and how beautiful it was. What you have to give to the audience in order to make the show successful and what they give back to you and how that becomes fuel to give back to them. I just really love the transaction that is the rock show. The act of creation. I recently heard Rain Wilson, the actor, talk about creation as prayer, acting and music, and when you make something it's no different than prayer. I know I'm not curing cancer and I know this isn't some noble thing necessarily that I'm doing, but I really do believe that there is inherent value and beauty in the creation of art and music. And I really feel like when I make it we are giving something to the world that fuels the good things in the world.

What song by another artist makes you go, "Man, I really wish I'd written or recorded that"?

Yeah, [I feel that way] all the time. I guess the song that is number one on the songs that I wish I'd written is Kris Kristofferson's "Sunday Morning Coming Down." For some reason, that song has always stood out to me as being a perfect song to me, so I wish I'd written that one.

If you could duet with any recording artist, living or dead, who would your dream duet partner be?

I love singing with women and I've been lucky enough to sing with some really amazing women. I'll go weird here and say Francoise Hardy, the French chanteuse, who had some hits in the '60s. She's still alive and still gorgeous.

What has been your unfortunate onstage mishap?

We played a New Year's Eve gig in Chicago that was televised and when the camera was on me, I fell down pretty hard on my back. And then I was trying to get up without using my hands so I could continue to play guitar, and the floundering while trying to get up with incredibly embarrassing. And the best thing was that [Old 97's guitarist] Ken [Bethea] was standing right next to me, not offering any help, just laughing. That was pretty bad. It wouldn't have been so bad if it hadn't been caught on film, but something being captured for eternity makes it worse.

What's the weirdest thing a fan has ever done for you or said to you?

I've gotten some pretty creepy mail and emails, but I'll stay positive with my response... Sometimes I'll bring people up to sing "Fireflies" with me in my solo acoustic shows and in San Francisco recently, a young woman came up and sang it with me. I'd never met her, and she did a great job, and when it was over some dad pushed his way to the front of the stage with this 7-year-old girl and said, "She can sing that song, too." And I said, "Well, we just finished singing it." And he was really adamant. I felt pressured and she was such a cute little kid, so I brought her up and sang "Fireflies" again with this 7-year-old girl. She completely nailed it, but I'm breaking the rule of repeating a song during a set singing it back-to-back with a 7-year-old girl. It was really sweet. She totally nailed it, but it make me kind of realize that I had to back off of bringing up strangers from the audience because it can really derail a show. The potential for disaster is pretty great.

That's pretty funny and weird.

Yeah, singing a love song with a 7-year-old.

Do you have a special pre-show ritual?

I usually spend one-to-two hours making a setlist. I'm allowed to have a beer two hours before the gig. One hour before the gig, I'm allowed to drink a whiskey. I've learned these rules from trial and error over the last quarter-century. Any more than that and I'm risking the quality of the performance. Usually, I just jump up and down a few seconds and walk out onstage. I try not to get too precious about my pre-show ritual, because frequently I'm not afforded the luxury of doing yoga or vocal warm-ups or anything like that. A lot of times I just have run into a club and jump up onstage and get it going.

What's the most unusual thing on your tour rider?

Our tour manager Mike Dalke is a very funny guy. Every once in a while he'll throw something on the tour rider just to make the promoter laugh. For a long time, on the long list of stuff we had it would say one case of bottled water, one bottle of Jameson, six-pack of Stella, one Gary Coleman... So "one Gary Coleman" was on our rider for a while. We never got it. I don't know if they thought we were joke or what, but we never got our Gary Coleman.

What is your on-the-road must-have?

I guess I'm a Jameson Whiskey drinker, but I hate to say I must have it, because that sounds so unhealthy. I drink a ton of water on the road, so the unglamorous response is the truest one. My must-have is water. I try to do yoga in a lot of places when I can, but that's a luxury. The Jameson is something I like to have, but I don't have to have it. The only real must-have is water.

What's the one genre of music you'd never try to do yourself, and why not?

I don't think I would be well-suited for electronic dance music. I'm not very good at running electronic devices. Lyrics are de-emphasized in that genre. I think I would be a real massive failure in EDM. I know there's a lot of money in that s---, but it's not for me.

Do you do karaoke? If so, what's your go-to karaoke song?

I haven't done a lot of karaoke and it drives me crazy, because the couple times I tried to do karaoke, they've had the wrong lyrics. Like "Pump It Up" by Elvis Costello is a favorite song of mine, and invariably the lyrics they have on the karaoke are wrong. The song that I go to if I'm just in a random place surrounded by strangers, is I'll do "(You Make Me Feel Like a) Natural Woman" by Carole King just because that's funny.

What's the most surprising song/artist on your iPod?

What I listen to unapologetically is the first two Mötley Crüe records. It's sort of hard to beat those songs and the energy. They're just so punk-rock.

What's the most recent album you've purchased?

I got the new Margot & the Nuclear So and So's record called Slingshot to Heaven. There's nepotism involved because I'm friends with Richard [Edwards], their singer, but it's such an amazing, all-time great record. I'm really proud he pulled it off. It's kickass.

Most recent concert you attended?

When we did our record release party in Dallas, I handpicked the for support slot, which was Austin's Black Joe Lewis because I wanted to see them, and I never get out to go out to gigs, so if I hired them to come play, then I could see them. They're such a great band. I was a little worried because they're such a great live show and we'd have to follow them. I needn't had been, because it our crowd and they were really excited to see us. I was really happy that we got to turn 2,000-plus people in Dallas to Black Joe Lewis, because they're a great band.

Who do you prefer, the Beatles or Rolling Stones?

Beatles, because that's been my answer since I was 6 years old. These if I was going to put on Beatles or Stones, I might gravitate towards the Stones because I didn't overplay them when I was growing up, whereas the Beatles songs are all just in my head to the point where I don't really need to listen to them anymore. They're just there in complete form already in my brain. I really love the early Stones stuff, especially when they were pretty garage-y, but the Beatles... John Lennon songs were my jam when I was a kid. That was what I sang along to before I sang along to anything else. One of my earliest memories, I think I was 3 years old and I was laying in the bathtub singing "Nowhere Man" and my mom walked in and I asked if that song was about my dad, not realizing that song existed on a much larger scale than a record in my house.

Why did you think it was about your dad?

Oh, I don't know. That's a question for a therapist, probably.

Was he not around?

He was. He worked a lot. He was a kind dad. My kids might say the same thing about me. Judge not lest I be judged.

Elvis or Buddy Holly?

Costello or Presley? I'll take Buddy Holly over both of them. My family used to go to this restaurant called Roscoe's Easy Way, although we called it Roscoe's Greasy Way. I'd eat chicken-fried steak as a kid. They had the little jukebox at every table, so you could pick out whatever song you wanted to listen to at your own table. I used to play Buddy Holly extensively when we would go there. Some of the earliest songs I learned were Buddy Holly songs. The fact that he was a Texan... I love Elvis Presley and Elvis Costello, but Buddy Holly was more seminal during my early years.

Follow Craig Rosen on Twitter.

With ‘Ska Crazy!’ Neville Staple Shows He’s Still Pretty Special

With ailing health and discouraged by inter-band strife, Neville Staples left the Specials for the second time in the fall of 2012, as the reunited ska legends had just completed a victory lap. While the band went on to stage a successful subsequent tour without the toaster/vocalist, Staple has re-emerged with Ska Crazy!, his latest solo effort that shows that he's still pretty special in his own right, with or without the band that brought him his greatest success.

The 59-year-old Jamaican-born vocalist was in a serious car accident in 2011 and subsequently suffered a few minor strokes. Still, he felt well enough to resume touring with the Specials, but during a show in Copenhagen, he began to feel strange while on stage.

"As I reached the side to go off, I must have collapsed in a heap and I went into a seizure with severe epileptic convulsions," he says. "This had never happened to me before and I guess with the pressures of the strict regime, the behind the scenes back-biting and the lack of band support for each other, that was the moment I knew I had to get out." The following day, Staple became even more ill, suffering additional seizures. "I was in a really terrible state and knew that if I stayed in the band, I would probably end up dead," he says.

Instead of becoming another rock 'n' roll casualty, Staple left the Specials, with the band issuing a notice on of its website that said, "We are very sad Neville cannot join us on The Specials U.K. tour in May 2013 or indeed on the future projects we have planned. He has made a huge contribution to the fantastic time and reception we have received since we started and reformed in 2009. However, he missed a number of key shows last year due to ill health, and his health is obviously much more important. We wish him the very best for the future."

Staple isn't as diplomatic, revealing that his time with the band the second time around was not always pleasant. "The behind the scenes squabbling, back-biting and certain members being two-faced was worse than ever," he says. "There was no equality about amongst us all and it was no longer about the music or the message."

Interestingly, Staple dedicated Ska Crazy! to Specials' founder Jerry Dammers, who wasn't part of the reunion. "Jerry first had the idea to get the band reunited and unfortunately after sharing that idea with [guitarist/vocalist] Lynval [Golding], it was taken out of his hands and he was never invited to be part of it. Business politics, I’m afraid," he says.

It seems that Staple also has some ill will towards Specials frontman Terry Hall, who went public several years ago with the admission that he's been battling severe depression. "I didn’t know about his depression as such but he has always been very moody and unfriendly," he says. "I guess that’s just the way he is as I have friends who have severe depression but they are still nice to be around."

The first time the Specials split in 1981, Staple, Hall and Golding formed the Fun Boy Three, the combo who helped introduce the world to their female counterparts Bananarama and recorded their own version of "Our Lips Are Sealed," a song Hall co-wrote with the Go-Go's Jane Wiedlin, which became a top 10 hit in the U.K.

"After the Specials split, it seemed like the right move at the time," Staple says now of the Fun Boy Three. "But to be honest, it was just a bit of fun." Given his animosity toward Hall and Golding, it isn't too surprising that when asked if there's any chance of a Fun Boy Three reunion, Staple asks, "Is that a joke?"

Yet on Ska Crazy! he does tip his porkpie hat to the trio by serving up a new version of the band's "The Farmyard Connection," first heard on the Fun Boy Three's second and final album, 1983's Waiting. "I had always thought that track could have been done better with a more reggae feel to it," Staple says. "So working solo with my band gave me the chance to do it the way I wanted."

The grow-your-own saga also seems timely now, especially in the U.S., with some states legalizing marijuana, something Staple is in favor of. "I believe there are a lot of health benefits in marijuana and these seem to be proven a lot more these days," he says. "I have never felt that the law should be so strict on it and think the legalization is a good thing, if done properly."

Elsewhere on Ska Crazy!, Staple pays homage to some of his musical heroes by serving up covers of Prince Buster's "Time Longer Than Rope," the Slickers' "Johnny Too Bad" and Max Romeo's "Wet Dream" as well as his own songs "Rude Boy Returns," "Girl" and "Roadblock," the album's first single and video.

Thematically, Ska Crazy! offers a mix of songs with topics ranging from sexual relations to politics. "I like to mix it up because we have major issues regarding gang crime, sex issues and a lot of politics around the young people of today," he says. "Things seem to be getting worse again like they were during the Two-Tone years. The relationship songs were to put a lighter air on the album amongst the more serious stuff."

Lending a hand on those songs about relationships is Staple's wife, a singer he does enjoy working with. "It was great," he says. "It was my turn to be the bossy one and tell her what to do! But on a serious note, my wife Christine is great to work with and helps me so much with my career in and out of the studio. She’s my rock."

Musically, rocksteady and ska remain Staple's go-to genre. It's a sound that has managed to transcend being just a trend, time and time again. I am not really surprised because when you think about it that’s what we did with the Specials, we used old-time ska and modernized it. This led to young people looking back to where it came from. This has happened again and again with the different waves of ska. I am hearing lots more young bands now also putting their own spin on ska – some with dance music and some with a rock beat. It's all good," he says. "The music just makes you want to dance. Even when singing about tough times, every day things or bad things, the beat and the rhythm makes you want to move!"

Follow Craig Rosen on Twitter.

Trending Blogs

Recently Viewed Blogs

Rock In Rio