A Night At Church
Mood:  cool
Now Playing: Heavy metal... at a Canadian church. I like it.
Topic: Misc.
Canada's CTV News reports that high school metalheads gathered in a Moncton, New Brunswick church this week — not to pray, but to fight it out in a deafening battle of the bands.

Organizers at the Moncton Wesleyan Church hoped to reach out to youth who would normally stay far away from the place of worship, by mixing in a brief sermon with the heavy metal concert.

But it didn't go exactly as planned. About 800 screaming teens packed into the church, vandalizing and knocking over pews that hadn't been removed beforehand.

One person was even slightly injured. Still, organizers called the concert a success.

"A church pew can be replaced," youth pastor Mark Moore told CTV News.

"It's not something we're worried about and in the big scheme of things — in God's eye's — I think it's more important that 800 kids experienced last night."

Some teens admitted they would never have entered the church if not for the concert, and were thankful for the venue.

"It's just that they'd let us come here, for like, a free show," said one teen during the show. "We don't have to do anything. Everything's here for us."

Moore said he has no regrets about the concert, because he was able to reach out to youth by creating an environment they found comfortable.

"It's easy to be an arm-chair critic and sit at home if you're 40 or 50, and say, 'I can't believe this is happening,'" said Moore. "But I challenge you to consider."

During the concert, Moore gave the teens a sermon that highlighted the church's relaxed approach.

"Jesus Christ loves you. He does not care what you've done," he told the crowd. "I'm not trying to convert you to my religion. I'm not trying to tell you to put on a suit, get a bad comb-over, and send you off to the Christian factory."

It's unclear how many of the youth cared about — or even listened to — the sermon. But the church's senior pastor, L. D. Buckingham, said it was important to take a chance.

He admitted the approach was unconventional, but argued that was necessary to make the church relevant to a younger community.

"We're never going to do in this church what I like. We're going to do what connects with the culture and the people outside the church," said Buckingham.

www.blabbermouth.net

Chinese Democracy Out On "A Tuesday"
Mood:  a-ok
Now Playing: It's Coming. "There are ten Tuesdays left before January ? it will come out on one of them."
Topic: Hair Metal
In the new issue of Rolling Stone Magazine, writer Brian Hiatt reveals what he's discovered about the long-awaited Guns N' Roses album "Chinese Democracy."

The article begins with this elusive quote from the band's manager Merck Mercuriadis, in which he essentially retreads stuff we already know: "The album will come out this year. There are ten Tuesdays left before January — it will come out on one of them."

Following the band's headlining show in San Bernadino, California, on September 23rd, frontman Axl Rose threw a party at his mansion and played the full album in his poolroom for visitors, including his friend Sebastian Bach, former singer of Skid Row.

"It was mind-blowing," says Bach, who is opening for Guns N' Roses on their upcoming North American arena tour. "It's a very cool album — it's badass with killer screams, killer guitar riffs, but it's got a totally modern sound. The word for it is 'grand.' It’s fucking epic. He's reinvented himself yet again."

The album includes some tracks that have been played live or leaked onto the Internet, including the poppy "Better" and the hard-hitting "I.R.S."

"There's this one song called 'Sorry' that's almost like doom metal with Axl singing really clean over this grinding, slow beat that is fucking mean," says Bach. "I cannot get it out of my head."

Veteran engineer Andy Wallace, who mixed Nirvana's "Nevermind," is working on the project, according to a source close to the band. "We're absolutely delighted with the mixes," the source told Rolling Stone.

On October 2th4, the band will begin its North American tour in Miami. Two dates — November 10th in New York and November 2th0 in Halifax, Nova Scotia — are already sold out, according to Mercuriadis. Additional U.S. dates will be added in early 2007, and the band will return to the States in the summer as well, he says.

Though a source told Rolling Stone that the album is due November 21st, Mercuriadis declined to confirm this. "I don't know that we will announce a release date," he says. "You just might walk into your record shop one Tuesday and find it there."

Kirk Hammet Becomes A Father
Mood:  bright
Now Playing: It's a boy!
Topic: Thrash
METALLICA guitarist Kirk Hammett and his wife Lani recently welcomed their first child, a son named Angel Ray Keala Hammett.

Kirk and Lani got married on January 31, 1998 in Kailua, Hawaii after his first marriage (to Rebecca) ended in 1990 during the recording of the band's "black" album.

As previously reported, Spanish METALLICA fan site CyberMETALLICA has uploaded several new photos taken during METALLICA's songwriting sessions for their upcoming album, tentatively due next summer/fall.

METALLICA's follow-up to 2003's "St. Anger" is being produced by Rick Rubin, who has previously worked with AUDIOSLAVE, SLAYER, SLIPKNOT, SYSTEM OF A DOWN, and RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS.

www.Blabbermouth.net

The Death Of An Era
Mood:  blue
Now Playing: Tower Records has gone out business. Blame iTunes.
Topic: Misc.
Tower Records, the 46-year-old music retailer, has been sold to a liquidator that will close all the stores.

"I feel very sad about it," Ladd Fraternale, shopping in the country section at Tower's East Village store in Manhattan, said Wednesday. "I think they have a great selection here and the service is good."

On Oct. 6th, a federal bankruptcy judge in Wilmington, Del., approved the sale of Tower to Los Angeles-based liquidator Great American Group for $134.3 million.

While no firm date has been set for the stores to close, "Going Out of Business" signs went up this week at Tower's 89 stores in 20 states and the chain's 3,000 employees have been told they will be laid off.

The company owes creditors about $200 million and filed for Chapter 11 reorganization in August. In its filing, Tower said it has been hurt by an industrywide decline in music sales, downloading of online music and competition from big-box stores such as Wal-Mart.

CDs were 10 percent off this week, still not a bargain. At 10 percent off the list price of $18.99, Beyonce's "B'day" was selling for $17.09, compared with $9.99 on Amazon. Great American President Andy Gumaer said the discount will increase over the six to eight weeks it takes to close the stores.

At the New York store, Larry Kirwan, lead singer of the Irish band Black 47, was scouring the rock bins and mourning Tower's imminent loss.

"It's a bad day for music," Kirwan said. "It's a bad day for independent bands. ... Right from the beginning, even before we were signed with labels they carried us. They've been good to musicians."

Kirwan said taking music off the Internet is not the same as buying a vinyl LP or even a CD.

An LP or CD is "something real that's not virtual," he said. "It's like music itself. I'm not sure music is virtual. It's real and it's powerful, and I don't think you quite get the same thing from downloading."

Russ Solomon founded Tower in Sacramento, Calif., in 1960 and opened the company's landmark store on Hollywood's Sunset Boulevard in 1969. As part of the bankruptcy auction, the Sunset property will be sold for $12 million.

Outside the Sunset Boulevard store, a marquee with a message and REM lyrics said it all: "It's the end of the world as we know it. Thanks for your loyalty." A mock gravestone and Halloween decoration had a single word scratched into it: "Tower."

Norman Labby, who for 20 years drove across town to go to Tower for jazz and classical albums, said he was "frustrated, angry and depressed" that Tower was closing.

"I don't own a computer, I don't know how to work one and don't plan to buy one," he said, holding a bag full of CD's and tapes. "I'm disenfranchised for the umpteenth time."

News of Tower's sale to Great American plunged workers into "immediate sadness," said Ramsey Jones, manning the third-floor cash register at the New York store.

"Business hasn't been great," Jones said. "Downloading, competition from Virgin and your Best Buys and your Wal-Marts. But the thing that people will miss is the deep catalog that Tower has. They can come here and find anything they want."

Jones, a 15-year Tower employee who also plays the drums and has worked with musicians including Vernon Reid of Living Colour, said he has made connections at Tower and met famous customers like Carlos Santana and jazz great Ornette Coleman.

"Customers are going to miss walking into a store and speaking to someone that is knowledgeable," he said. "It's like losing a family member, working here for so long."

Rock critic Robert Christgau said Thursday that Tower often attracted workers who knew about music because they were musicians themselves.

"It doesn't make me happy to see places like Best Buy and Circuit City selling records," he said in a telephone interview. "I'd much rather records were sold at a music store."

source: Karen Matthews of the Associated Press

Weekly Look Published
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Only-Rock News
Only-Rock's Weekly Look has been published. Read it at https://only-rock.tripod.com/wl . It has release dates, tour news, editorials, O-R News, and much more.

GN'R Collector's Box
Mood:  cool
Topic: Hair Metal
This DVD Collectors Box is a 2 disc set which tells the complete and extraordinary story of Guns N Roses using never-before-seen performance and interview footage, interviews with close friends, fellow band mates, family members, music biz colleagues, and close collaborators who know them best. It features numerous location shoots, unpublished photographs and a whole host of other features. Extras include digital interactive discography, interactive quiz and did you know section. Guns N Roses created a unique sound and image that nobody has matched since. This DVD goes behind that legendary story. It's a Guns N Roses collectors item of the highest order.



SKU#: DVDIS005
UPC: 823564508092
SRP: $24.95
BOX LOT: 30
RUN TIME: 120mins
LABEL: CHROME DREAMS
STREET DATE: 2007-01-30



Courtesy of mvdb2b.com

Iron Maiden Lacks Energy?
Mood:  d'oh
Now Playing: A concert review from SleazeRoxx.com
Topic: Heavy Metal
IRON MAIDEN - DEAD OR ALIVE?

Skid Row Prepares For Release
Mood:  happy
Now Playing: Tour dates from Skid Row w/o Bach.
Topic: Hair Metal
Two decades into their impressive rock 'n' roll career, SKID ROW are proud to announce their first ever CD release party for the album "Revolutions Per Minute" due out October 24th on SPV / Steamhammer. Presented by True Music & Eddie Trunk, the HARD ROCK HALLOWEEN BASH featuring SKID ROW will be held at the all new Hard Rock Cafe, Times Square NYC on October 29th. Doors open at 7PM, music starts at 8. There will be special surprise guests, a costume contest with killer prizes and much more. This is event is FREE to all listeners of Friday Night Rocks with Eddie Trunk! Just listen to Eddie Trunk Friday night's 11pm - 2am eastern on Q104.3 to reserve your spot on the guest list. You can hear this show anywhere in the world by going to www.q1043.com and clicking on "Listen Live".

Only two other bands have had the honor of breaking in the new HARD ROCK CAFɠwith a live performance; VELVET REVOLVER and MOTLEY CRUE.

The CD release party is also the launching pad for the "Revolutions Per Minute" tour, with special guests KINGS X, presented by VH1 Classic and Gibson guitars. The tour, which will also have NASHVILLE PUSSY on select dates, officially kicks off on Halloween night. A full list of confirmed dates can be found at www.skidrow.com

SKID ROW "Revolutions Per Minute" Tour

10/20 Pensecola, FL - Interstate Fair
10/21 Daytona, FL - Biketoberfest- Broken Spoke
10/27 Jim Thorpe, PA - Penn's Peak
10/28 Burgettstown, PA - Pepsi Cola Roadhouse
10/29 New York, NY - Hard Rock Cafe Times Square
Record Release Party! Presented By Budweiser True Music & Eddie Trunk

Skid Row "Revolutions Per Minute" Tour w/ Kings X
11/01 St. Petersburg, FL - The State Theater
11/03 Atlanta, GA - Centerstage Atlanta
11/10 Poughkeepsie, NY - The Chance
11/11 Sayreville, NJ - Starland Ballroom
11/12 Bedford, NH - Marks Showplace
11/16 Glendale Heights, IL - Double Vision
11/18 Warren, MI - The Ritz
11/22 Dallas, TX - Galaxy

***more dates to come, visit www.skidrow.com for updates***

Courtesy of www.skidrow.com

Breaking News!! Breaking News!!
Mood:  vegas lucky
Now Playing: Can it be that GN'R will release Chinese Democracy... Late November?
Topic: Hair Metal

Hate to be a rumor-spreader, but we can all hope, right?:

RollingStone.com reports: "From the annals of We'll Believe It When We See It: A friend of ours with a retail source has told us that the long awaited Guns N' Roses album, 'Chinese Democracy,' has gotten a firm release date of November 21st.

Under normal circumstances we'd laugh at such an assertion — after all, this album has reportedly cost more than $13 million and has been 'due out' since 1998. But whenever somebody has actually managed to get Axl to speak in the past few months, he's said it's coming out before the end of the year. Plus, there was that GN'R tour announcement the other day that alluded to a release date some time in the next two months. Dare to dream, folks. Dare to dream."

Gun N' Roses' "Greatest Hits" collection, which was originally issued in March of 2004, was certified triple-platinum on April 11th, 2006 by the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) for shipments in excess of three million copies. The CD sold 12,000 copies in the United States last week alone (week ending October 1), bringing the total number of copies sold since its release to 3.19 million, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Sebastian Bach, Damnocracy... And Chinese Democracy
Mood:  a-ok
Now Playing: An interview with Sebastian Bach
Topic: Hair Metal
After reconnecting with Axl Rose this past spring, Sebastian Bach will be the opening act for the upcoming Guns N' Roses stateside tour that gets started Oct. 20th in Jacksonville, Fla. Bach tells Billboard.com it's been one wild ride ever since.

"Just like the rest of the world, I had not been in touch with him in a long, long time and there was a point five years ago [when] I wondered if I'd ever see him again in my life," Bach says. "I was really good friends with him."

After jumping on stage with Rose to join in on the GNR classic "My Michelle" three times during the band's New York run in May, Bach says he approached the reclusive singer about opening for his band on a few of its European dates.

"I said, 'I love doing "My Michelle" with you but if you really, really, really want to help me out, can my band, like, open for you?'" Bach says. "He's not really super-effusive. He doesn't gush like I do. My emotions are pretty upfront. But I could tell in some way he was trying to help me out and the phone was silent. Then he said, 'If we could work something out, we'll do it. That would be a lot of fun.'"

That fun carried over to the European summer dates, which even found Bach filling in for an ailing Rose on "Nightrain" and "Paradise City" at Guns N' Roses' last London show in July.

As for his erstwhile band Skid Row, from which he was dismissed nearly a decade ago, Bach says there is absolutely no communication between him and his former bandmates. While he has no regrets about what happened with the '80s rock outfit, the New Jersey resident admits he'd like to see the band's platinum-selling VHS videos (1991's "Oh Say Can You Scream" and 1993's "No Frills Video" and "Roadkill") released on DVD at some point.

Bach says his experience this past year with Damnocracy, the all-star hard rock band formed on the VH1 reality show "Supergroup" with Ted Nugent, Scott Ian, Evan Seinfeld and Jason Bonham, reminded him why it's best to be a solo act. "I'm going to control this one," Bach says. "This is working because I don't have to wait around for the Foreigner tour or some hunting expedition."

While a new album, tentatively titled "Angel Down," already written, Bach, who recently split from Artemis Records, is currently shopping the album with some "major labels," he says. He hopes to have the project out next year.

Among the new tracks that could get stage time for Bach's GNR sets are "Stuck Inside" and "Take You Down With Me." Naturally, he'll also be performing his Skid Row hits, as well as the track "Blade," which he recorded as a member of progressive metal band Frameshift for its 2005 album "Absence of Empathy." And with news that Guns N' Roses' Nov. 10th show at Madison Square Garden has sold out, Bach can hardly hide his enthusiasm.

"I've been waiting to do this and it's just an unbelievable feeling for me to do 36 dates with Guns N' Roses now as a solo artist," he says. "And selling out the Garden is just blowing my mind."

source: John Benson of billboard.com