2006

Vince Welnick, who took over as the Grateful Dead’s keyboard player in 1990 after a succession of predecessors met untimely deaths, has died at the age of 55, according to an announcement on his Web site.

“Vince passed from this earth on June 2, 2006 … after a decade of battling tragedy while creating beauty and light around him,” the announcement said. It did not give a cause of death.

The San Jose Mercury News said he died in a hospital on Friday after being taken from his home in Forestville, California, and it quoted a person at his home as saying “it looks like he took his own life.”

Welnick had previously spoken of a deep depression after Jerry Garcia, founding guitarist of the iconic psychedelic rock band, died in 1995 and the group disbanded.

Welnick is the fourth keyboard player for the band to have died, and his Web site referred to the position as a “particularly doomed spot.”

He once told an interviewer, “A lot of people ask about that and my stock answer is that I am aware of the fact that you could die doing this job, but I was somewhat dying of boredom before the job came up so I thought I’d take my chances.”

Originally a member of the 1970s rock band “The Tubes,” Welnick joined the Grateful Dead after longest-serving keyboard player Brent Mydland died in 1990 of a drug overdose.

Previously, pianist Keith Godchaux died in a car accident in 1980, a year after he left the band, and founding vocalist and keyboard player Ron “Pigpen” McKernan died in 1973 of a gastrointestinal hemorrhage.

After the Grateful Dead broke up and ended its 30-year run as one of America’s biggest touring acts, Welnick formed his own group, Missing Man Formation. He also toured with other groups including Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart’s band.

He did not take part in various reunions of the Dead’s other surviving members.

“His service to and love for the Grateful Dead were heartfelt and essential. He had a loving soul and a joy in music that we were lucky to share,” the band said in a statement.

In an extension of the band’s “curse of the keyboard player,” Scott Larned, cofounder and keyboard player for the nationally-touring Grateful Dead tribute band Dark Star Orchestra, died last year of a heart attack.

Source yahoo.com.

Paul Simon, B.B King, Tony Bennett, Elvis Costello and Etta James are among the stars slated to perform at the 27th Annual Festival International de Jazz de Montreal.

The event

Twice The Black Crowes have recorded albums that were never officially released: ‘Tall’ in 1993 and ‘Band’ in 1997. While a few songs from these lost albums were rerecorded and released on studio albums, many have emerged only through the band’s legendary live shows. The Black Crowes recently went into the vault, collecting the best moments from those abandoned sessions for a special treat for their longtime fans. Titled ‘THE LOST CROWES,’ it is a two-disc set of unreleased music that has been remixed for its public debut on Rhino. The compilation will be available August 29 at all retail outlets and at www.rhino.com. The same day, the band’s 1992 home video, ‘WHO KILLED THAT BIRD OUT ON YOUR WINDOW SILL,’ will make its DVD debut on Rhino Home Video.

In fall of 1993 vocalist Chris Robinson, guitarists Rich Robinson and Marc Ford, drummer Steve Gorman, bassist Johnny Colt, and keyboardist Ed Harsch recorded more than 30 songs at Conway Studios in Los Angeles. Working on the follow-up to ‘Southern Harmony And Musical Companion,’ the band descended into an emotional, startlingly heavy creative patch that became a stepping-stone to the 1994 album, *amorica*.

Named after an old jazz term for getting high, the ‘Tall’ sessions contain a total of 16 unreleased tracks that offer an unflinching glimpse into rough and beautiful music born from turmoil and tension. ‘THE LOST CROWES’ includes early versions of seven ‘amorica’ songs such as “A Conspiracy,” “Descending,” “Wiser Time” and “Cursed Diamond.” The collection also features the undiscovered classics “Tied Up And Swallowed,” “Feathers,” “Thunderstorm 654” and “Lowdown,” a sad lost anthem that became “Ballad In Urgency.”

Four years later, the band came off the road after headlining the Furthur Festival and went into a Nashville studio to record songs for a planned follow-up to 1996’s acclaimed *Three Snakes & One Charm*. Where ‘Tall’ thrives on the mayhem of their young Los Angeles days, *Band* confidently probes some of The Black Crowes’ most mature, thoughtful work.

The ‘Band’ sessions contain 10 songs including a different version of the B-side “Peace Anyway,” plus “If It Ever Stops Raining,” a song that would become the title-track to the 1999 album ‘By Your Side.’ The compilation also spotlights the taut riff rock of “Paint An 8,” the windblown ache of “Wyoming & Me” along with the freaky-longhaired-Mother Earth grooves of “Another Roadside Tragedy,” “Grinnin” and “Life Vest.”

Paul Stacey has remixed all of the music on ‘THE LOST CROWES,’ which also includes liner notes spotlighting the stories behind these legendary lost sessions as told by the Robinsons.

The Black Crowes released its first home video, ‘WHO KILLED THAT BIRD OUT ON YOUR WINDOW SILL,’ in 1992 while touring for the band’s sophomore album. Rhino Home Video will release a remastered and expanded version of the video on DVD that features live performances, interviews, backstage and studio footage, videos from the group’s first two albums, and additional bonus features.

Del McCoury Band will be releasing The Promised Land on June 13th. This is the first all gospel release for Del after a 40+ year recording career and comes on the heels of the Del McCoury Band’s first Grammy win for The Company We Keep.

Hip-hop outfit Jurassic 5 will release its first album in four years, “Feedback,” July 25 via Interscope. The set is led by the single “Work It Out,” which features the Dave Matthews Band, while “Where We At” boasts a guest turn by Mos Def.

Production was supplied primarily by DJ/producer Nu-Mark on tracks like “Red Hot” and “Future Sound,” although Scott Storch contributed “Brown Girl” and Salaam Remi” was behind the boards for “Get It Together” and “Radio.”

Source billboard.com.

Country legends George Jones and Merle Haggard will hit the studio this summer to record their first album since 1982’s “A Taste of Yesterday’s Wine.” Due in October via Bandit Records, “Kickin’ Out the Footlights … Again” will feature the Haggard-penned title cut.

The track list will be comprised of the 74-year-old Jones recording five of his favorite Haggard songs and vice versa, with a handful of duets sprinkled in. “Jones and I can’t help but be competitive and we’ll make each other work even harder in the studio,” says Haggard, who turned 69 in April.

Among the tunes already tipped for inclusion are Jones’ “She Thinks I Still Care” and “The Window Up Above” plus Haggard’s “Silver Wings” and “The Way I Am.”

Both artist remain touring mainstays; Jones has 40 dates on tap through the end of the year, including a show tonight (June 1) in Chattanooga, Tenn. Haggard will hit the road beginning July 27 in Mt. Pleasant, Mich.

Source billboard.com.

This year

While indie singer/songwriter M. Ward paid homage to pre-World War II American music and history on his 2004 album “Transistor Radio,” his upcoming set explores the human toll of warfare in the modern age.

Due Aug. 22 via Merge, “Post-War” is Ward’s first “full band” record. The artist recruited percussionists Rachel Blumberg (formerly of the Decemberists) and Jordan Hudson (formerly of the Thermals), who toured with him over the past year and a half, to fill out the record. Multi-instrumentalist Mike Coykendall, singer Neko Case and My Morning Jacket frontman Jim James also contributed their talents.

Source billboard.com.