Posts by Leslie Michele Derrough

He is on his way to Pittsburgh to play a show. He is smoking cigarettes and telling me exactly how he feels about the music business. He does not hold back. If you haven’t heard of Livan yet, you need to check him out. He spent some time recently opening for Alice Cooper yet he is not metal nor alternative nor straight-ahead punk.

What a difference a year makes. When Gregg Allman brought his band to Biloxi last year he was fully recovered from a 2010 liver transplant and with a brand new rip-roaring blues album hot off the presses. And his guitar player Scott Sharrard was his secret weapon. One year later, Gregg and his band are smoking hot, playing with a youthful vitality that was just a wee-bit lacking before, and Sharrard is no longer a secret.

As children, we all rode bicycles and climbed trees and had a jolly good time just being a kid. Seether’s frontman Shaun Morgan wasn’t that different from you and me … except he grew up in a turbulent South Africa. Calling in before a show in northern Mississippi, Morgan talked at length about his childhood, his influences, his band’s latest CD Holding Onto Strings Better Left To Fray, and how it was actually a song in a movie that showed him the power of music.

Five bands, one ticket price: Now that is the way to enjoy a Friday night; especially in today’s messed-up economy. And on this night a quinary of bands from the harder-rocking sector of music came out to play for a house full of fans, young and old. It is always good to see music not having an age limit and I’d like to think when I am 60, bands will still lure me into the bowels of a mosh pit. As Todd Kerns told me last year, "we are just now experiencing our rock & roll idols growing older, and as they age so does the majority of their long-time fans. And those fans are the ones bringing not only their children but their grandchildren to concerts now. With this kind of die-hard loyalty, rock & roll will never die."

JD DeServio is a fun guy. He loves to talk and he loves to laugh and when he gets a big ole nasty looking blister on his finger from playing his bass, he just has to show it to you. Black Label Society had just played a sweaty kick ass show in New Orleans when DeServio comes up to me outside the venue to show me his war wound with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.

Formed in 2001 by Connolly and his neighborhood buddies in British Columbia, Canada, Theory Of A Deadman is one of those bands that can rock & sock you one moment and then touch a raw nerve the next. Where does all this mixture of Tabasco rock come from? Try the early days of Connolly, an admitted bad boy from day one.

“Who said we were wild? Did people say that? Oh no, I didn’t know we had a reputation”. Tavis Stanley is stretched out in the back lounge of the tour bus, relaxing before the start of the Art Of Dying concert at a little hole-in-the-wall club in Jackson, Mississippi. I seem to have caught him off guard when I ask if he and his bandmates were as wild as some rumors going around insinuate. “We have a lot of fun, we like to drink our beers and just party and have a good time like everybody else but I wouldn’t say we’re too wild”.

Playing at least twenty songs from their career, they covered all their favored albums: Stained Glass, Screaming For Vengeance, Point Of Entry, Defenders Of The Faith and Rocka Rolla. With the medieval growling of Black Sabbath’s “War Pigs” echoing from the speakers, prepping the already highly eager fans, the curtain dropped and the gods began rumbling through “Rapid Fire”, “Metal Gods”, “Heading Out To The Highway” and “Judas Rising”.

Ewan Currie is a very down-to-earth young man. Even though his band made the cover of Rolling Stone as winners of a recent contest, he appears to be unfazed by all of the hullabaloo. He is soft-spoken, witty and devoted to the band he has called home since 2005: The Sheepdogs, a Canadian rock and roll band with deep 70’s southern roots.

Steppenwolf may have famously sang that we were born to be wild, but on a hot late November night in New Orleans the band sitting with me upstairs at the House Of Blues looks just a little frayed around the edges, as if they could stretch out on the couches and go soundly asleep. It is the official last show of their long tour and Jonathan Tyler and the Northern Lights are feeling mixed emotions.

Back around 1987, ZakkWylde was a baby-faced, long-legged skinny guitar player in New Jersey when Ozzy Osbourne was sniffing around for a new axeman for his solo band.

On a hot Los Angeles afternoon a few months ago, Poison drummer Rikki Rockett called in to talk about his early days in rock & roll. Although Poison has been given much flak over the years for their pop-metal type of music, it cannot be denied they are good at what they do. Beloved by thousands of fans world-wide, their records sales are in the millions and they sell out concerts wherever they play.

Coming out in a red-hot Porter Wagoner-styled ensemble, upon spying cameras in the hands of a few, he coaxed them into taking as many photos as they wanted: “I didn’t put this suit on for nothing”, he quipped. He would make a disco ball-like re-entrance for the encore in a mini-mirror-plated suit shooting bolts of reflected light throughout the intimate theatre. Getting everyone in a good-time mood, his opening repertoire included “Beautiful Homes”, “Dancing”, “Somebody’s Crying” and “I Want Your Love” which had Yatovitz doing his “dance of love”. “If you enjoy him, you can take him home,” deadpanned  Isaak.

There are some musicians who wear their rock star status like a golden crown twenty-four/seven. And then there are musicians who walk down the street and you’d never know they were in a superstar band. They chat with you while in line at the supermarket and wear the same old ripped-up jeans they’ve had for years. Being a rock star just never crossed their minds. Frank Bello of Anthrax is that kind of rock star.

Mark Tremonti needs no introduction. His reputation as one of the most respected guitar players of the current century has been solidified by his unique talent, something that he says has taken years to accomplish. He is humble, he is smart, he is genuine. And on a hot and humid Florida morning last month, he called to talk about his past, his present and his future.

Welcome to the world of the Black Label Society. They may look like something out of Sons Of Anarchy but their hearts are pure rock and they are fiercely loyal to their fans, many of whom travel to witness as many shows as possible; one lady in attendance , admitted before the show that she came from Tennessee just to see the band one more time. “It’s like a big family,” bass player JD DeServio told me about the rapport between the band and their fans. Meet & Greets are always friend-making soirees, enabling everyone to get to know each other before the band comes in to mingle.

If you thought last week’s musician Myles Kennedy was a busy man, then you haven’t heard everything guitar player Joel Hoekstra has on his plate. Not only has he been touring with Night Ranger on a major outing with Journey and Foreigner, but in between those dates he performs in Rock Of Ages and travels with the Trans Siberian Orchestra in the fall and winter.

Other cities have big festivals but New Orleans is New Orleans. “I don’t know what you’re stepping in when you’re down there on Bourbon Street,” joked Stone Foxes singer Aaron Mort, “but it’s been a fun time … And then the festival today was awesome."

Myles Kennedy is certainly a man in demand. When he's not on the road or recording with his band Alter Bridge, then he's typically on the road or recording with Slash.

Playing on a Thursday night as a make-up date due to the passing of Joe Elliott’s father, the electricity was humming through the crowd when Def Leppard hit the stage. “Mighty big noise you’re making out there,” Elliott said to their very vocal legion of fans. “We like that”.