July 27th, 2012 | 11:54 pm by Mark Graham (@unclegrambo)

The Top 29 British Musical Acts That Got Snubbed During The 2012 Summer Olympics Opening Ceremony

The 2012 Summer Olympics officially kicked off with an opening ceremony conceived by the Academy Award winning British film director Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire,
Trainspotting, 28 Days Later). One of the sections of tonight’s broadcast bore the unusual name Frankie And June Say Thanks Tim, a love story that contained what NBC’s Matt Lauer described as “a tribute to the best British musical acts of the last 40 years.” Well, although Boyle and his musical supervisors managed to include a decent selection of bands that could be considered canon-worthy, we’d like to call your attention to this (quite undefinitive!) list of 29 highly respected bands that got royally snubbed (in alpha order*):

Adele
Black Sabbath
Coldplay
Culture Club
The Cure
Def Leppard
Depeche Mode
Dire Straits
Duran Duran
Elton John (!!!)
Read more…

July 12th, 2012 | 5:59 pm by Bené Viera

It’s In The Plans For Fleetwood Mac To Reunite For An Album And Tour

Fleetwood Mac To Reunite

Good news about Fleetwood Mac after the tragic suicide of former band member Bob Welch last month. During an appearance on CBS This Morning, Stevie Nicks said it’s in the plan for the group to reunite for an album and tour in 2013. Nothing is set in stone as of yet, but the possibility sounds promising. Last year Lindsey Buckingham did and interview with Rolling Stone and said, “Nothing is on the books right now. With Fleetwood Mac, there’s a lot of landmines out there politically and it’s hard to get everybody on the same page at the same time–but I think this might be one of those years where everyone will want to do the same thing.” Yesterday when Nicks was asked if everyone was on board she gave a definite, “Oh, yeah.” Read more…

April 13th, 2012 | 4:54 pm by Mark Graham (@unclegrambo)

More RRHOF Drama: Rod Stewart Calls In Sick To The Faces Reunion

What started out as a SUPER promising Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Class of 2012 induction ceremony is turning out to be littered with disappointment. First off, Hall organizers announced that this year’s ceremony would take place on the same weekend as Coachella, forcing many people to make a difficult decision as to which event they would ultimately attend. Next, the Beastie Boys announced that they would not be performing at the ceremony this year as Adam “MCA” Yauch continues to recover from cancer (but they WILL be attending). Then, Axl Rose dropped a bombshell on Tuesday night when he penned an open letter to the Hall wherein he refused to be inducted alongside his former GNR bandmates (a decision that That Metal Show host Eddie Trunk applauded). Now, in a late breaking story, it appears that the eternally spiky-haired rocker Rod Stewart will be skipping out on the ceremony, too!

You see, Rod “The Bod” was supposed to join a reunion of the seminal sixties Brit rockers Faces, a band that also includes guitarist Ronnie Wood (Rolling Stones), drummer Kenney Jones, and keyboardist Ian McLagan. However, at a press conference in Cleveland earlier today, Wood announced that “Unfortunately Rod is complaining of a sore throat,” and told a group of reporters that Stewart will not be attending the ceremony this weekend. Fortunately for fans of Faces, they have a backup: Mick Hucknall, the lead singer from Simply Red, will be taking Rod’s place. Now that we think of it, Slash, Duff and the rest of the guys in Guns N’ Roses might want to ask Mick if he knows any GNR tunes, too…

Rod Stewart To Skip Faces Reunion At Rock Hall Induction Due To Illness

August 1st, 2011 | 10:15 am by Mark Graham (@unclegrambo)

MTV Memories: The First 30 Videos Ever Played On MTV

While it’s hard for some of us (*cough*) older (*cough*) folk to believe that it’s been thirty whole years since MTV launched, in a lot of ways, it’s hard to remember a time when MTV wasn’t around. Of course, for people who consider themselves either Gen Y or a Millenial, MTV is something that is generally taken for granted because it’s always been there, but for those of us who are Gen X or older, the launch of MTV on August 1, 1981 was something that we now recognize as having impacted our culture in ways too numerous to count.

As we look back at 30 years of MTV—highlights of which have been playing all weekend long on VH1 Classic—we thought we’d take this opportunity to throw you back to the beginning of an era, days that even predated visionary video artists like Michael Jackson and Madonna. Of course, every trivia nut worth their salt knows that “Video Killed The Radio Star” was the first video ever played on MTV, but what about the next 29? Take a gander at our list below of the first 30 videos ever played on Music Television, filled with some artists that were later inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame (Rod Stewart, The Pretenders, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers) and some that we had never even HEARD of before today (PH.D, Robin Lane and the Chartbusters).

1) Buggles – “Video Killed the Radio Star”

2) Pat Benatar – “You Better Run”

Read more…

June 27th, 2011 | 5:30 pm by VH1

Hard Rock Turns 40 with a Massive Celebration in London’s Hyde Park

The Hard Rock brand, which encompasses restaurants, hotels and casinos, turned 40 years young over the weekend. In honor of the momentous anniversary, tens of thousands of fans turned out for the three-day Hard Rock Calling festival, held in London’s famed Hyde Park. In addition to headliners Rod Stewart, Bon Jovi and The Killers (the latter of which was witnessed by none other than Prince Harry), VH1 faves Train and You Oughta Know artist Lissie also appeared on the bill. Our VH1 news team was on hand and got some backstage time with some of the artists on the bill; take a gander above to get Train, Lissie and Pete Wentz’s thoughts on the occasion.

November 26th, 2007 | 10:36 am by Jim Macnie

NGAB: Bye-Bye Bluegrass, Hello Satan

nextgreatband.jpg

We?ll never get to hear the banjo?d-out version of ?No Expectations? or ?Honky Tonk Women? or whatever Stones song Cliff Wagner & the Old #7 were plotting before they got deep-sixed last Friday night. Americans with money and phones have voted, and bluegrass ain?t part of Next Great American Band?s agenda.

That?s okay, it?s a pop and rock world we live in, especially when you?re selling blocks of commercial time in a talent contest, so we?re now down to six outfits that are going to take us through the start of ’08. I?ve still got my fingers crossed for Tres Bien, who did the shimmy-shimmy-shake on ?Get Off My Cloud? (with a ?Satisfaction? guitar riff thrown in for you dudes who miss mash-ups) and conjured a vibe out of That Thing You Do.

All in all, it was a surprisingly fun romp through the Jagger-Richards songbook, with no one ? except for the big-band nimrods ? embarrassing themselves. The metal rugrats should have told Dicko to sticko and come out sans shirts for their ?Jumping Jack Flash? romp. Something very odd about seeing an 11-year-old from the San Diego suburbs singing that he was ?born in a cross-fire hurricane,? but the Light of Doom kid swings his hair around really well; I believed him for a sec or two. And the praying pickers in the Clark Brothers summoned the dangers of the devil quite convincingly with their judge-pleasing ?Gimme Shelter.?

Read more…