Talk About Rock Music

It’s about time we did a blog on Serj Tankian, the amazing and extremely talented frontman from System of a Down and currently working on solo projects.

He was born in August, 1967 in Beirut, Lebanon.  His family emigrated to to Los Angeles, USA when he was 8 years old.  He is an incredibly talented and clever man, earning a degree in Business and Marketing and then starting his own company in the software industry before he embarked on his music career.

Serj met Daron Malakian back in 1993 when they were in different bands using the same rehearsal studio.  Serj was playing keyboard at the time and Daron was lead vocalist.  They formed their own band called Soil with Serj on vocals and keyboards and Daron on guitar.  When Soil broke up, Serj and Daron formed System of a Down, which was actually named from a poem that Daron had previously written titled “Victims of the Down” and the rest, as they say, is history.  The band are all working on solo projects at the moment but haven’t ruled out a reunion at some point.

When the band were still together, Serj recorded vocals for other bands such as Deftones, Buckethead and Dog Fashion Disco.  He started System so he could put across his political views but felt he wasn’t being heard and not getting the right message across.  His solo career has been far more political with his views on President George Bush and the war in Iraq being sounded.

Currently, he is working on his second Album which is due to be released in 2009 and also co-writing a musical with Steven Sater, said to be based  on Prometheus Bound, the ancient Greek tragedy.  He has stated that eight of the songs have already been completed and there will be a record released from it.

For the last eight months, he has been on the road and has talked about releasing a DVD of his experiences.

We know this for sure, we have not seen or heard the last from Serj Tankian and I am sure we can expect more great things from him.  You can keep up to date by checking out the official webiste.

To keep us going, here’s my favourite song and video from his solo career so far, Empty Walls.

Heard of Roadrunner Records?  Of course you have.  Every one worth their salt in the music industry and even us small time music fans know who Roadrunner Records are.  The likes of Slipknot, Staind, Black Stone Cherry and Cradle of Filth are among the bands currently signed to them.

The record label decided to release an album by mixing the musicians together from the last 25 years and recording “Roadrunner United: The All-Star Sessions”

So what happened next.  Well, 3 years ago, Roadrunner United had a concert at the Nokia theatre which was in Times Square in New York.  Well for thise of us who were unfortunate to not get a ticket for that even are in for a bit of a treat.  The label are releasing the concert on a double disc dvd and is going to be available from the 9th of December so get your copy reserved now!

Want to know what kind of music is on it?  Have a look at the Roadrunner Records site for more information, but here is a little snippet to get your mouth watering!

“Roadrunner United The Concert captures the festive intensity of the evening. A house band, featuring members of core Roadrunner acts such as Slipknot, Sepultura and Machine Head, performed hits and classics culled from the entirety of the Roadrunner catalog. Some of the highlights included Slipknot/Stone Sour vocalist Corey Taylor performing “Bother” with Life of Agony’s Keith Caputo; former Killswitch Engage singer Jesse Leach dueting with current vocalist Howard Jones for KsE’s “My Last Serenade”; an assortment of frontmen handling vocals for staple songs like Slipknot’s “(Sic)” and “Surfacing,” Machine Head’s “Davidian,” King Diamond’s “Abigail,” Sepultura’s “Refuse/Resist,” Type O Negative’s “Black No. 1,” Soulfly’s “Eye For an Eye” as well as four songs from the Roadrunner United: The All-Star Sessions album. The double disc set also includes a 75-minute documentary, complete with interviews and behind-the-scenes footage, making it an even more intimate, fan-friendly experience!”

Here’s a video of one of my favourites that have been released.

Roadrunner United - The End

Bono, rock super star and front man for the legendary Irish rock band U2, has recently been to New York for the Millenium Goals Summit or the MGS for short.

What is the MGS?  It is where decisions are made and goals are set to help change the planet for the better and help millions of people in poverty.  They have given themselves 15 years to complete their goals and so far they are halfway though that timescale.  There were three goals that Bono wanted to achieve.  They were to discuss how strong the poor are and how the rich nned to understand how fragile life is, release €1 billion in cash from the European Union Common Agricultural Policy.  The British farmers will not qualify for it this year which is down to the high cost of produce in the UK but the farmers in Africa will certainly benefit from it. He finally wants to show to people what has worked and what hasn’t.

So what have they achieved so far?  They have put money into the countries that have proved they want help and will do what it takes to improve their lives.  This helps towards setting up busimess, getting farmers started and has even helped over 29 million children start school and get the education they want, need and deserve.

Bono has had various meetings with world leaders, politicians, NGOs and faith leaders like Gordon Brown and President Jakaya Kikwete of Tanzania, to help stamp out poverty and raise more and more awareness on the issues that are affecting not just the under developed countries but across the entire planet.

Bono was interviewed before all the meetings started by Alan Beatty of the Financial Times.  You can read the full interview at the Financial Times web site.

So what can you do to help?  Today is International Blog Action day and it’s all about poverty.  You can register your blog and add to the thousands of people writing on this topic today.  You can help raise donations or just educate yourself on issues related to world poverty.  The more people that are aware, the more people there is to help do something about it.

Visit the Blog Action site and take a look for yourself.  Get as involved as you can and together we can all do our bit for our planet.

In a bid to keep their music in album form rather than individual single sales and to prevent illegal downloads, AC/DC have refused to sell their new album, Black Ice,  online.  So what has happened?  Someone has managed to get a copy of the album, load it to BitTorrent and share the album online with over 400,000 illegal downloads.

The Sony super legal team have managed to pull the album off the unlawful site and removed it from YouTube but the copies are already out there.

The strategy that AC/DC have put in place for all their music to be sold in store only seems to have had a good effect with their album sales increasing over the last 5 years.

The band still have a smile on their face though.  Sony flooded the illegal peer to peer sites with fake songs when the news was released but studies show that the public are more likely to buy the album if they have heard songs from it than people who have not heard anything from it at all.

So who knows what the future holds about music downloads.  Maybe bands should release the songs on their own websites as sample tracks so fans can hear what they are buying or maybe nothing at all will happen but the authorities are clamping down on all the people breaking the law so be warned!!

2006 saw the fall of The Darkness who burst into the charts back in 2003 with “I Believe In A Thing Called Love”.  They had a total of 5 singles in top ten of the UK chart, won three Brit Awards and the Ivor Norvello Award for songwriting.  The debut album, titled “Permission to Land” sold over 1.4 million in the UK.

When the follow up to the debut was released in 2005, titled “One Way Ticket To Hell…And Back” it failed to achieve the same success and the band parted ways.

But Justin, not one to be kept down for long, even after his Eurovision attempt in 2007, has bounced back with a new band, a new single and a new album!

The new band, Hot Leg, have signed with Barbeque Rock Records and have Justin Hawkins on vocals and guitar, Pete Rinaldi on guitar and backing vocals, Samuel SJ Stokes on bass and backing vocals and Darby Todd on drums and backing vocals.

The band will be touring this year and even supporting Alterbridge and Extreme.  Check out the Hot Leg site for more details.  You can also check Bebo and Myspace for tour dates and ticket information.

The debut single, Trojan Guitar, is due to be released on October the 20th and the album will follow in January.

Hawkins commented on the new band and album:

“Some people are going to dismiss it because of the Darkness thing, but that’s just the way it is”.

Here’s some snippets of the video!!

Here we go again.  A new release date for the latest Guns N’ Roses album, title “Chinese Democracy”,  has been set for the 23rd of November 2008, nearly ten years after it was originally planned.  Fans have been waiting for this album and promised its release every year with various dates only to be left dissappointed.

Fans have been commenting on various website forums about the release and also about the band and frontman Axl Rose.  They are basically saying that they’ll believe the albums release when they can actually buy it.  A lot of fans are just getting annoyed and have stated that it’s not the same band with the other members now in Velvet Revolver, Guns N’ Roses is now just a cover band with Axl Rose singing.  His antics and attitude towards music and fans has put a lot of them off the band and have moved over to Velvet Revolver as that is where the talent lies anyway.

I’ll beleive it when I see it.  I must admit, I agree with the fans comments and Axl has really shot himself in the foot over the years.  Appetite for Destruction is one of the all time best ever rock albums and hasn’t been able to come back from the debut album with anything better.  Only time will tell but the new Guns N’ Roses have a lot to live up to and a lot of opinions to turn around.

British rock band The Answer are about to tour with rock legends AC/DC staring on October the 28th.  The Answer, who formed in 2000 are four british lads who hail from Newcastle and Downpatrick, County Down in Northern Ireland.  They have already had success worldwide with their debut album, The Rise, selling over 100,000 albums.

They have been working on their new album, set to be released next year and had not yet been titled.

The band is made up of Cormac Neeson on vocals, Paul Mahon on guitar, Micky Waters on Bass and James Heatley on drums.

When responding to their success and the future tour, Cormac Neeson said,

“It’s a dream come true.  It’s been agony keeping it to myself, I just told my family, and that’s it. It felt like we’d won the lottery or something. There’s the potential to do even more over here if it goes well!”

If you want to know more about the band, check out their official web site, but here are a few bits of trivia that we have found out about the up and coming band.

• James Heatley stood in for the live drummer of Ash in 1993.

• Classic Rock Magazine voted them Best New Band in 2005.

• They have supported some HUGE names already including Whitesnake, Paul Rodgers, Deep Purple, The Who and the incredible Rolling Stones.

• Micky Waters has played Phil Lynotts black bass guitar when the band played at the Phil Lynott memorial gig and is the first person to play on it since Lynotts untimely death.

• Joe Elliot, lead singer of Def Leppard, is a massive fan and has been quoted saying they are amazing and could be the new Free.

• Jimmy Page, former Led Zeppelin guitarist, is also a huge fan and has been to several of their gigs.

Linkin Park fans in the eastern part of the world will be dissappointed.  The band have been forced to cancel the China tour as lead singer, Chester Bennington has injured his back.  We don’t know how he has injured it as an official statement has not yet been released - lets hope it wasn’t anything too embarassing like jumping on the bed having a pillow fight or learning to juggle on a unicycle whilst blindfolded.

The set of concerts was actually a fundraiser for the unfortunate victims of the earthquake in Sichuan which happened in May of this year.  The band still have a heart of gold though as they are still making a donation to help towards the recontruction of the area.  The Chinese concerts promoter will also be adding to the donations and the World Bank will match the band’s contributions so there should be a fair amount of cash heading their way to help people rebuild their lives.

There is a statement posted on the official site about the cancelled gigs.

“Linkin Park has been forced to cancel their upcoming Music For Relief Concerts in Mainland China, Macau and Taipei as lead vocalist Chester Bennington has sustained a back injury and is under doctor’s orders to refrain from traveling or any physical activities. Linkin Park sincerely regrets this unavoidable cancellation and apologizes to fans for any disappointment caused. Tickets will be refunded at point of purchase.“

The cancelled shows are listed below:

Shanghai Stadium - Shanghai, China - 12th October
Xinhua Stadium - Wuhan, China - 15th October
Taipei Stadium - Taipei , Taiwan - 17th October
Beijing Workers Stadium - Beijing, China - 19th October
The Venetian - Macau, China Cotai Arena - 21st October

What do The Kaiser Chiefs, Billy Bragg, Craig David, Iron Maiden, Robbie Williams, The Verve, David Gilmour and Radiohead all have in common?  No, they are not collabotrating for this years Christmas number one!  The have teamed together as part of the Featured Artist’s Coalition, or AFC for short.

The FAC was launched in Manchester over the weekend with the hope that it will help give artists more control with their material and obviously, more cash.

It will have its own independant chairman with 6 artists, 3 managers and representatives all from the Musicians Union and Equity and will have a “use it or lose it” movement on copyright which basically means if the record label doesn’t release the song, then it can’t hold it back from the artists.

They are also going to push that transfers of copyright will be by license as opposed to assignment.  This, for the likes of you and me who don’t understand gibberish, means that artists will keep the ownership of their copyright.

If you want more information on the FAC, visit the official website.

The new Weezer video has actually broken records!  The new video “Troublemaker” has broken 5 world records and is from the the band’s latest album “The Red Album”.  The band and their friends all got together to perform the song to set and break the Guiness World Records whilst shooting the video.  An official from the Guiness Book of World Records, Stuart Claxton,  was at the shoot monitoring all the attempts in the video which only took a day to shoot.

Although they have already submitted 5 records, they are rallying for a sixth as Pat Wilson is in the video playing the worlds smallest drum kit but they haven’t had any confirmation yet.

The video went live at Yahoo Music yesterday which you can view at the Yahoo Music site for 24 hours.

The band started its first tour in 3 years on September the 23rd and will be continuing for a few more weeks.  They have had some great reviews so far and you can find out more information at the band’s official site.

The records so far in the Guiness Book of World Records are as follows:

Longest Guitar Hero World Tour Marathon
Most People in a Custard Pie Fight
Most People Riding on a Skateboard
Largest Air Guitar Ensemble
Largest Game of Dodgeball

Check out the video below