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The Eric Clapton we loved, whose new album is as good as anything he’s ever done, is dead to us, basically. Clapton has doubled down on his anti-vaccine madness and thrown in with Robert K. Kennedy, Jr. Kennedy, a misery to his family– they’ve all criticized him– maintains a loud anti-vaccine campaign himself. Despite suffering from Parkinson’s Disease, Kennedy is anti-public health. His dead uncle, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, who fought for decades for universal health insurance, must be throwing up in heaven. Clapton has now allowed himself to be interviewed by Kennedy and featured on his website. Clapton tells...

Hide your classic rock LP’s. The thought police at the New York Times are coming for them. The New York Times opinion section has run a column advocating for classic rock songs like Don McLean’s “American Pie” to be reconsidered and maybe even “toppled” like historic Confederate statues, arguing that reevaluating beloved songs will help create a world that is “inclusive and more just.” Other rock singers ripe for cancellation include Eric Clapton, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and even Elvis Presley. Jennifer Finney Boylan, who is a male-to-female transgender, laid out the case in the op-ed titled “Should Classic...

Leslie West, co-founder and guitarist of pioneering hard rock band Mountain, has died at age 75. The Los Angeles Times confirmed his death through a publicist. Rolling Stone and Variety are also reporting that West has passed. The news was initially shared by West's long-time associates at Dean Guitars, though no other details were given. The Times report mentioned heart issues, while Rolling Stone said West went into cardiac arrest on Monday at his home near Daytona, Fla., and "never regained consciousness" after being taken to the hospital. Dean Guitars CEO Evan Rubinson also offered personal condolences, describing West as...

The 80's were an absolute haven for great music from all different genres. Whether it was pop, rock, or even new wave, music was progressing by leaps and bounds in terms of new sounds and general hookiness. Though many musicians would need a Casio synthesizer to get their songs on the air, these bands stuck to their guns with letter-perfect rock and roll. Though many of these songs fall under the domain of rock in name, none of them seem to fit neatly in a single category. While many artists were still following in the bluesy tradition of bands like...

Singers tend to receive a bad reputation when it comes to rock and roll. Many people think that these guys just have a lucky break by making a living screaming into a microphone. On the other side, there have been many vocalists that have really shown the time and effort that goes into singing rock and roll. A lot of people tend to forget that the voice is an instrument unto itself, and all of these singers utilize that instrument to its fullest potential. These songs not only showcase the intensity of the person's singing, but also the unique control...

Dear Fellow FReepers, I'm probably the only person in America who still faithfully listens to Classic Rock on terrestrial radio, specifically a Washington, DC-based station - BIG 100.3 FM. This morning, I noticed that they took away my favorite DJ, El Duave, and in his place put on a national show titled "The Real Deal", which mixes automotive, music, politics, etc. I'm upset about this because I tune to BIG 100 to escape from politics and all that stuff, and to listen to my favorite tunes as I run my errands, cook and do housework on weekends. During the week...

According to a statement released on Balin's Facebook page Friday, the singer died on Thursday with his wife, Susan Joy Balin, “by his side." The cause of death was not announced. "Marty and I shared the deepest of love — he often called it Nirvana — and it was," Susan said in the statement. "But really, we were all touched by his love. His presence will be within my entire being forever."

Ann and Nancy Wilson from Heart perform a triumphant "Stairway to Heaven" as a tribute to 2012 Kennedy Center Honorees Led Zeppelin.

Some of the music industry’s biggest players are betting that a new sound is ready to catch on. It’s called classic rock. The genre is being reinvented by young musicians, some of whom are barely out of high school, who are channeling bands their mothers and fathers grew up with. Greta Van Fleet is a rarity in today’s music business: An old-fashioned rock band that could, some music executives say, break into the pop world. The Frankenmuth, Mich., group is made up of 21-year-old twins Jake Kiszka, the band’s guitarist, and Josh Kiszka, its singer; their brother and bassist Sam...

Did you know your tax dollars support articles that all but label President Donald Trump racist? And suggest the same of your favorite singers, too? Consider a new pop culture “think piece” from NPR. The headline alone is all you need to read: “White Nostalgia Didn't Start With Trump — Just Look At Classic Rock” Suddenly, the soundtrack to our lives has been thrown under the bus, and we helped fund it. It begins, of course, with calling Trump’s signature appeal racist. For more than a year, Donald Trump has harped on white nostalgia. A hearkening back to a rosy,...

Linda Ronstadt - Poor Poor Pitiful Me "Poor Poor Pitiful Me" is a rock song written and originally recorded by Warren Zevon in 1976. It is best known as one of Linda Ronstadt's signature hits from 1978. Country music singer Terri Clark scored a hit in 1996 with her own cover of the song. There have also been many other versions of this song. In keeping with Warren Zevon's sardonic lyrical style, the song's verses deal with a failed suicide, domestic abuse, and a brush with sadomasochism. The song first appeared on Zevon's 1976 self-titled solo album. It is reputed...

The folks over at Ultimate Classic Rock published their ranking of the Beatles’ albums a couple of weeks ago. God bless them, they tried, but they got it all wrong. So I’m here to set them straight with my ranking. Enjoy!13. Yellow Submarine (1969) #13 on UCR‘s listYellow Submarine is really only half a Beatles album — the other side is George Martin’s score for the lackluster animated film. Even the half that belongs to the Fab Four contains only four original songs joined by two tunes that appeared earlier. The Yellow Submarine soundtrack really only has value to hardcore...

The '70s nearly had their own Blue Ivy Carter, Stevie Nicks has confirmed. The Fleetwood Mac singer/songwriter recently talked with Billboard about her upcoming 24 Karat Gold LP, and was asked about a comment made by her ex-paramour (and fellow '70s megastar) Don Henley of the Eagles. Henley had said that Nicks had gotten pregnant with his baby, and that Sara (later the name of a Mac top-ten hit) was the name she had given the unborn child. Nicks corroborated the important part of that story: Had I married Don and had that baby, and had she been a girl,...

While rock 'n' roll is necessarily classified as a form of pop music, it is actually an idiom whose radical, destructive primitivism established a new type of socio-cultural disorder. It's about rejection of the status quo and celebration of the dis-imprisonment it instills. Always exploited for profit, rock's unmanageable aspects have been steadily diluted by a sinister, commercially driven course of revisionist myth-making. There is no acceptable role in the marketplace for radicals like Charlie Feathers, Poly Styrene, Lux Interior or Roky Erickson, but there's always room for the homogeneous, money-hungry, play-it-safe phonies on this list. These douchebags all have...

And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.(Genesis 6:5-6) We have been looking at the universal conditions that led directly to the flood , in the “days of Noah”, because Jesus told us that this same state of affairs will be duplicated in some way at the time of the Parousia, and the final judgment of this world. “As in the...

Iron Maiden mainman Steve Harris thinks his band may have give more years left in them – but they’ll be gone within ten. His comments come just days after Rush admitted they were aware they’re likely to retire in the foreseeable future. And Harris reveals he has doubts about whether to take his solo album British Lion on the club tour he’d previously said he was thinking about. Maiden released their fifteenth studio album, The Final Frontier, in 2010. That led to speculation the band was winding down, based on comments Harris had made years earlier saying they’d make fifteen...

Forty years ago an incredible classic rock band hit their creative peak when they released Led Zeppelin lV. I remember at age fourteen being handed this record for the first time, and being awe struck by stunning song-craftsmanship and lyrical prowess. The album itself which was released November 8th 1971 was a major success and sold 23 million copies alone in the United States, but only peaked at number 2 on the charts. Many Zeppelin Fans know this album as the one that contains Stairway to Heaven, but among rock critics and fanatics of Zeppelin the whole album is a...

On November 3, Sub Pop will reissue Nirvana's classic 1989 debut Bleach. The 20th anniversary deluxe edition, which will be available on CD and 180 gram white vinyl, will include a complete live recording of a 1990 gig at Portland's Pine Street Theatre. Bleach producer Jack Endino mixed the previously unreleased show from the original tapes. Now, we've got one track from it. Endino really did a hell of a job on "Scoff", which sounds about a million percent crispier than your average live recording. Kurt Cobain's voice here is even more ragged than on the Bleach version, if that's...

Ann and Nancy Wilson are p*ssed at the Republican Party and have fired off a cease and desist letter to the McCain/Palin campaign. Specifically, the Heart women are upset that the GOP has used their classic "Barracuda" as a theme song for Sarah Palin. TMZ obtained a statement from Heart's rep, who says "The Republican campaign did not ask for permission to use the song, nor would they have been granted that permission." The statement goes on: "We have asked the Republican campaign publicly not to use our music. We hope our wishes will be honored."

The "Musicians Who Turn 50", "Musicians Who Turn 60", "Favorite Drummer" and "Favorite Guitarist" were such hit threads on FR, I've decided to do this one. Who is your favorite SONGWRITING DUO? We all know that Lennon-McCartney were amazing together and possibly the best songwriting duo ever. They might be mentioned several times on this thread. If you choose John & Paul, be specific about which song and lyric(s).