Joe Bonamassa's triumphant London Hammersmith Apollo gig paves the way for Black Country Communion

Joe Bonamassa played his biggest concert ever at the London Hammersmith Apollo on Friday May 28th. 5,000 people were in awe.

The guitar slinger from Utica, New York, started playing Stevie Ray Vaughan and Jimi Hendrix licks at the ripe age of eight, opened shows in the US for B.B. King at the age of 12, and John Lee Hooker at the age of 14. Now, at the age of 33, and having won Breakthrough Artist of the Year at last year's Classic Rock Awards, Bonamassa is championed by the likes of Eric Clapton, and makes Jeff Beck sound almost prehistoric.

Joe kicked off the festivities with The Ballad of John Henry, and continued to slay the audience song after song including Last Kiss, So Many Roads, So It's Like That, If Heartaches Were Nickels, Further Up the Road and Sloe Gin.

Last year, Slow Hand guested at Joe's Royal Albert Hall gig, but this year, Joe invited Jethro Tull's pied piper, Ian Anderson, to the stage to perform to Tull classics - New Day Yesterday and Locomotive Breath. The audience went wild.

Next up, Joe dipped back into the Ballad of John Henry album and performed Lonesome Road Blues and Happier Times, plus the Zepplinesque Jimmy Page dazzler Blue and Evil (the latter from Bonamassa's stunning new album Black Rock).

In 2009, Bonamassa played the London Royal Albert Hall to great critical acclaim, however, was was noticibly apparent at Friday's Hammersmith Apollo gig was that Joe has definitely veered into a heavier blues rock style that leaned more towards Jimmy Page than Clapton or Beck.

SET LIST:

Ballad of John John Henry
Last Kiss
So Many Roads
So It's Like That
If Heartaches Were Nickels
Further On Up the Road
Sloe Gin
New Day Yesterday (feat - Ian Anderson)
Locomotive Breath (feat - Ian Anderson)
Lonesome Road Blues
Happier Times
Blue And Evil
Three Times A Fool (part VIDEO)
Blues Deluxe
Young Man Blues
Woke Up Dreaming
Django/ Mountain Time
-----------
Bird On A Wire
Just Got Paid

One wonders if Bonamassa's energetic and trippy heavy blues rock guitar direction will lead to Joe's next chapter in rock and roll history books with his new rock supergroup Black Country Communion with Jason Bonham, Derek Sherinian and Glenn Hughes.

http://twitter.com/bccommunion, http://www.bccommunion.com/, www.myspace.com/bccommunion. Photo Credit: (c) Christie Goodwin

Heaven 17 celebrate 30th Anniversary of Penthouse And Pavement

Sheffield-bred electronic pop group Heaven 17 recently announced they would embark on a nationwide UK tour in November to celebrate the 30th anniversary of their seminal 1980 debut album Penthouse And Pavement.

The band consisting of original founding members Martyn Ware (keyboards, vocals) and Glenn Gregory (lead vocals) recently performed a studio session with LaRoux for BBC 6 Music.

With a recent sold out tour of Germany earlier this year, and rave reviews of a recent H17 documentary that aired on BBC 2 Television entitled Heaven 17: The Making of Penthouse And Pavement, the band that was a spin off from the Human League, has suddenly re-captured the attention of the general public.

They were one of the first British electronic bands to mix synthesizer music with bass guitars, horns and strings. Although Penthouse And Pavement wasn't a commercial success in terms of sales, what it did generate was intense critical acclaim from the music press, in particular with the songs (We Don' Need) That Fascist Groove Thing and Let's All Make A Bomb.

Penthouse And Pavement was one of the first electronic music albums to combine political left wing lyrics with synthesized dance music. When Fascist Groove Thang was released, it was banned from British radio for having lyrics that were deemed too controversial. Now, thirty years later, the band's anti Thatcher sentiments seem to be relevant again, now that the conservative government is back in power.

What is interesting about the album is the consistency of the songs in both the lyrics and music. The album veers between electronic funk in the title track Penthouse And Pavement to radiant electronic synth classics like Geisha Boys and Temple Girls, Play To Win and I'm Your Money.

The recent BBC 2 documentary also revealed how Martyn Ware was kicked out of the band that he originally founded (the Human League), only to be awarded with a record contract of his own which led him to quickly form Heaven 17 (the name of the band was taken from the Anthony Burgess novel A Clockwork Orange... a band that was formed in 1980). If that's not ironic, what is?

Heaven 17 - November UK Tour: http://tinyurl.com/3ynehwe

The Story of Penthouse And Pavement: http://tinyurl.com/2968xsj

DEVO confirms track listing for new album "Something For Everybody"

Akron, Ohio's finest "DEVO" just confirmed the track listing for “Something For Everybody” – their first album of new material in 20 years. Stop the train, I'm coming!!!

The track listing was a result of an innovative online Official Song Study that DEVO recently ran on their official website - www.clubdevo.com. Fans from around the world were asked to listen to sixteen new DEVO songs, and select their favorite twelve. The twelve songs that received the most votes made it to the final cut of the album.

The album, which includes the single “Fresh,” is released by Warner Bros. Records in UK on June 14th, followed by a US release on June 15th. The album will be available on CD, Vinyl and as a digital download.

CD Track listing is as follows:

1) Fresh
2) What We Do
3) Please Baby Please
4) Don't Shoot, I'm a Man
5) Mind Games
6) Human Rocket
7) Sumthin'
8) Step Up
9) Cameo
10) Later Is Now
11) No Place Like Home
12) March On

Joan Jett Kicks Ass in London with Sold Out London Show

Things are cyclical, and when you're talking about the rock and roll world, people like Joan Jett get what's coming to them.

Earlier this year the Runaways biopic was released to much fanfare in America, but the real starts that burned brightly weren't the key actresses (Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning) but Joan Jett, the black leather clad rock warrior chic that was the blueprint for the sound, the look and the style.

But it’s been a long ride since Cherry Bomb and I Love Rock N Roll, and along the way there were casualties, Cherie Currie's breakdown and then the passing of drummer Sandy West.

Over the years, Joan Jett's been a trooper, and she's possibly the only rock and roller who can still perform Gary Glitter songs (and get away with it). Do You Wanna Touch Me (Oh Yeah) is a perfect example of how you can make a dumb song sound so dead cool.

Earlier this week it was announced that Joan Jett and the Blackhearts were going to play what was described as "an intimate concert at the legendary punk rock music venue 'The 100 Club' in London, England.

Tickets went on sale this morning and sold out in a matter of minutes. Ebay is selling tickets for £500 a pop. A few days after the 100 Club gig Jett will support Green Day at Wembley Stadium.

This is a rags to riches story about the hardest working woman in the rock and roll business, far more significant than KISS, much more potent than the Sex Pistols, and ten times more meaningful than the Bangles or the Go-Go's.

The point is, you either rock or you don't rock. Joan Jett is in a completely different ballpark. Stick another dime in the jukebox, baby. http://tinyurl.com/39sgr2j

DEVO Gets Ready With Something For Everybody

Interesting news from http://www.clubdevo.com/ in theat the Akron, Ohio funsters will release their first studio album in 20 years on June 14th (UK) and June 15th (US). Entitled Something For Everybody, the album includes the songs Fresh and Don't Shoot (I'm Alive).

The boys have opted for blue energy domes instead of red, but they are drawing the line at eating Frankenberry,

"Thirty years ago, people said that we were cynical, that we had a bad attitude," says Devo's Mark Mothersbaugh. "But now, when you ask people if de-evolution is real, they understand that there was something to what we were saying. It’s not the kind of thing you want to see proven right, but it does make it easier to talk about."

More than three decades after the release of their visionary debut, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo, and a full 20 years since their last studio album, Devo is back with the aptly titled Something for Everybody.

The highly anticipated album (which was launched with a memorable performance in Vancouver at the Winter Olympics) features the band's classic line-up - Mark and Bob Mothersbaugh, Gerald and Bob Casale—joined by drummer Josh Freese (Nine Inch Nails, Guns n' Roses).

Produced by Greg Kurstin (The Bird & The Bee), the album also includes contributions from John Hill and Santi White (better known as rising hip-hop star Santigold), John King of the Dust Brothers, and the Teddybears.

Though the 12 songs on Something for Everybody are built on Devo's signature mechanized swing, the recording and presentation of the album saw the band experimenting with an entirely new approach. Greg Scholl was brought in to serve as COO for Devo, Inc., and - working with the advertising agency Mother LA - conducted a series of studies through the www.clubdevo.com site to help the band with its creative decisions, from color selection to song mixes.

Gerald Casale adds that Devo really was looking at today’s world when writing the new songs. “The tautology of a line like ‘What we do is what we do' is taken straight from hip-hop,” he says. “And words like 'bro’ and 'dude'—we're surrounded by it all the time, 20-year-olds don’t even see any irony in it anymore.”

A Devo for our times. A band that evolves, even as the world around them confirms the decay they have long suspected. With Something for Everybody, Devo has gained from experience, honed its attack, and stands ready to sound the alarm for another generation.

“As angry young men who have been validated, we have the possibility to do something that resonates like it did back in the early days,” says Mark Mothersbaugh. “It’s the same car, just now with air bags, power brakes, and steering.”

“We're inspired by reality,” says Gerald Casale, “because the world is so ridiculous and stupid. DE-EVOLUTION IS REAL.”

Duty Now!

http://www.clubdevo.com/

Smokin' Joe Bonamassa brings Black Rock tour to the UK

Following the critically acclaimed release of his latest studio album Black Rock featuring the great B.B. King, Joe Bonamassa will embark on a UK tour on May 28th.

Dates include London Hammersmith Apollo (May 28), Rotherham Magna Centre, South Yorkshire (May 29), Bournemouth BIC (May 30) and Birmingham NIA (May 31).

Last year Bonamassa scooped the Breakthrough Artist of the Year at the Classic Rock Awards, and in 2009's Live From the Royal Albert Hall DVD, Joe was joined onstage by Eric Clapton.

Only 32 years of age, Bonamassa has to be the hottest blues rock guitarist around at the moment. Legend has it that when he was twelve he opened for B.B. King on one of the blues legend's American tours. Now thirty-two, Bonamassa has B.B. King performing guitar Night Life - a track from the new Black Rock album.

"Right now, there's no better blues rock guitarist than Bonamassa," hails Gibson.com. If Joe's new Black Rock album is anything to go by, the UK concerts are gonna to be smokin' hot.

Box office: 0871 230 1101, http://www.seetickets.com/, http://www.jbonamassa.com/

Iggy and the Stooges to release Raw Power "Live" on USB stick and MP3 Download

Fans of Iggy and the Stooges and their 1973 seminal punkfest garage rock and roll album RAW POWER will hit the decks when they hear that the London Hammersmith Apollo concert on Sunday May 2nd will be recorded live on USB stick and MP3 download.

Thanks to the latest in digital live recording technology, Iggy diehards will be able to but the USB flashdrive directly after the concert at the merch stand.

For those Stoogeheads who won't be attending the show, don't fret because they'll be able to order the USB sitcks and the MP3 downloads online from www.simfylive.com/iggypop.

There's also a UK site that details more information about the Raw Power "Live" USB concert sticks via the following link - http://tinyurl.com/3x85ncd.

Your Pretty Face is Going To Hell, Shake Appeal, Search and Destroy, Gimmie Danger - all the hits and more.