Journey. Known in the UK almost exclusively for “Don’t Stop Believin’” – a song about a girl and a boy from a place – South Detroit – that weirdly doesn’t exist. A song recorded in 1981 that didn’t make the… Read More ›
Hard Rock
Hard Rock’s “Yesterday”: The Story of Goldilox by Kings X
“Goldilox is the song that people just missed out on… one of the greatest songs that I had ever heard”
Stone The Crowes!: It’s The Magpie Salute
The Black Crowes are long gone. It has been three years since they split, ten years since their last album Warpaint and more than twenty years since their commercial peak when despite everyone else playing grunge or Britpop The Black… Read More ›
Blues For The Red Sun: The Story of Josh Homme and Kyuss
Chris Goss was driving through the Palm Desert in 1988, a couple of hours drive from LA, on his way to launching the career of one of rock’s most important figures of the next century. He just didn’t know it… Read More ›
Not Good Enough or Not Pretty Enough? Why David Coverdale Sacked His Band…
Extra bonus within!: A Playlist of Whitesnake songs that aren’t sexist! It’s 1979. Tonight, Whitesnake’s new drummer Ian Paice is making his debut at London’s Hammersmith Odeon. Lead singer David Coverdale is onstage, slaying the audience with a typically… Read More ›
Axl/DC?: Five Reasons Why Axl Rose Fronting AC/DC is Great News For Fans
Axl Rose is to replace Brian Johnston as AC/DC’s chief shouter in a move that has caused the sort of Earth-shattering consternation amongst the chattering classes not witnessed since the producers of “Call The Midwife” controversially staged a scene… Read More ›
When Rock Got Real: $hake Your Money Maker…
In 1990 rock music was having what football commentators euphemistically call “a transitional season”. You know, “Chelsea are one point off relegation and have sacked their manager, they’re having a transitional season…” We were still a year away from… Read More ›
Operation: Mindcrime – live at Chinnerys, Southend on Sea
The best concept album ever? There’s no contest. *plays the theme tune to Hong Kong Phooey* Is it “The Wall”? No. is it “Tommy”? No. Is it “Operation: Mindcrime” by the mild mannered Queensryche? “….Could be…” I realise that… Read More ›
Reading Festival, Bad News and Dumpy’s Rusty Nuts…
As one of the UK’s most established festivals, The Reading Festival is not, as some overseas observers may assume, a place where noted authors gather with their literary chums to swap notes on the trickier passages of Ulysses and enjoy… Read More ›
The Search For Authenticity in Rock: Here’s A Cinderella Story…
One band’s quest for authenticity in the unlikliest place – the genre of glam metal: The Story of Tom Keifer’s Cinderella
An Alternative Best of…Journey
Take A Midnight Train Going Anywhere With This Alternative Best of Playlist For AOR Kings: Journey… The idea that Journey might be pretty cool is clearly a difficult one to get your head around, but back in the eighties, Journey… Read More ›
Strangeways Here We Come: The Story of Scotland’s Greatest American Rock Band
I think the moment that I realised that the beard-and-brown-brogue-infested East London was no longer the hotbed of cooldom (yes, that is a word) I had always assumed it to be was when a friend told me he had been… Read More ›
Is This Skynyrd? It’s Pretty Cool: The Strange Tale of Raging Slab
In some respects, the Wikipedia entry for New York’s Best Southern Rock band (yes, you read that correctly) Raging Slab is as (unintentionally) funny and as interesting as any band. Raging Slab had a career blighted by incredibly poor luck,… Read More ›
Classic Lost Tracks: The Black Crowes: Feathers
You know when you hear a song that stops you in your tracks? Let me tell you about The Black Crowes’ track “Feathers”….. This was a song I had only ever read about. It was referred to in hushed tones… Read More ›
Faith No More: Live at BST Hyde Park
It is 25 years almost to the day that one of the best rock albums of the eighties was released. Faith No More’s “The Real Thing” sprang from nowhere and won huge critical praise at the time, finishing in Kerrang!’s… Read More ›
