During his momentous rise to musical stardom, Elvis Presley had the kind of Midas touch befitting of a man dubbed ‘The King’, amassing a then-unprecedented plethora of chart-topping hits and transforming countless otherwise obscure songs into essential parts of the rock and roll canon. There was a time, however, during which that power started to […]
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What’s the wildest rock and roll injury story you can remember? Bob Dylan crashing his motorbike, Patti Smith breaking her neck onstage in 1977, Pete Townshend impaling his hand on his whammy bar during The Who’s reunion tour in 1989 (which they obviously should have called their re-Whonion tour) or the time that Keith Richards […]
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Elvis‘ cultural reach was broad and far, and The King influenced just about every rock band during the 1960s. While many of them might have turned against him in due course, it would be wrong to forget how much he moved them in the first place. With his swinging hips, greased hair, and sultry sound, […]
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Having spent numerous years performing alongside John Bonham, one of the greatest rock and roll drummers to ever grace the airwaves with his presence, it is fair to say that former Led Zeppelin frontman Robert Plant knows a gifted percussionist when he hears one, even if his own output has always been further towards the […]
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Night did not arrive with spectacle. It came quietly, settling into the room like a held breath. Five names long carried by history stepped into the same space and allowed silence to lead. Julian Lennon. Sean Lennon. Dhani Harrison. Zak Starkey. James McCartney. Each arrived not as a symbol, not as a headline, but as […]
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Every artist has their muse; whether it’s Andy Warhol’s obsession with Edie Sedgwick or David Hockney’s lifelong love of smoking. Few people can claim to have been quite such an inspiring muse as Pattie Boyd, though, whose beauty spawned a litany of legendary love songs from a multitude of songwriters, spanning the spectrum from Ron […]
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When it was released on his 2012 album Kisses on the Bottom, the track ‘My Valentine’ immediately stood out as one of the better original Paul McCartney compositions of the past few decades. Since most of the selections from that terribly titled album were covers of time-tested jazz and pop standards, Macca put himself into […]
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While sex, drugs and rock and roll wasn’t just an apt catchphrase for the lifestyle that the stars of past decades indulged in, it seemed as though it was more of a motto that they lived by, and the likes of Robert Plant will no doubt be able to attest to the fact that it […]
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Nothing that Bob Dylan ever wrote has been known for being the simplest thing in the world. When he went electric for the first time, Dylan wanted to challenge the perception of what rock and roll lyricism could be, and after spending his time as a folk artist, his verbiage was unlike anything that you […]
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Eric Clapton didn’t sign up for rock and roll simply to have hits. He was a brilliant guitarist and songwriter when the time called for it, but when he got the first itch to play guitar, it was more about trying to find the best blues licks that he could to put on record whenever […]
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