Classic Hits

KISS fans hoping to see a reunion with original members Ace Frehley and Peter Criss during their final shows at Madison Square Garden will be sorely disappointed, according to Gene Simmons.

In an interview with Linea Rock, Simmons reveals he asked them several times if they’d like to show up for an encore, or to just play a song, but they both turned him down. “So, I don’t know what to say about that…But it’s always welcome,” he says.

Simmons insists that only some fans will be disappointed by their absence from the final shows.

“For the fans — the older, older fans — the ones who’ve been around for 50 years, they’re old, and some of them wanna see Ace and Peter,” he says. “The newer fans never saw them, and they don’t know. But the older fans wonder about Ace and Peter.”

Simmons does say there will be surprises during the final concerts, but he also doesn’t think they are needed.

“There are many other big stars, superstars, who wanna jump up onstage and play a song. But we’re not sure about that,” Simmons explains. “Maybe the best thing to do is to end the way we started: four guys with guitars. No keyboards, no synthesizers — nothing. Just playing.”

KISS’ End of the Road tour hits Tuscany, Italy, on June 29. It returns to the U.S. on October 19 in Cincinnati, Ohio, with their final two shows set for December 1 and 2 at New York’s Madison Square Garden. A complete list of dates can be found at kissonline.com.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

On This Day, June 29, 1984…

During a Bruce Springsteen concert in St. Paul, Minnesota, director Brian De Palma shot the video for The Boss’ Born in the U.S.A. single “Dancing in the Dark.”

The performance clip ends with Springsteen pulling a fan to the stage to dance with him. In reality, the woman, a then unknown actress named Courteney Cox, was placed in the front row so Bruce could pull her onstage to dance.

The video became a huge MTV hit and the song became Bruce’s biggest-ever single, spending four weeks at #1 and selling over a million copies.

Cox went on to become a huge star, thanks to the successful NBC series Friends, the Scream movie franchise and more.

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Rosie O’Donnell has posted to Instagram an update on the condition of her longtime pal and former A League of Their Own co-star Madonna, following the superstar’s hospitalization for what her manager Guy Oseary called a “serious bacterial infection.”

Rosie posted a throwback photo of the pair on the floor doing yoga, shot on the set of Rosie’s old talk show, noting in the caption, “shes feeling good.” O’Donnell followed that with a thumbs-up emoji, and the hashtag #madonna #love.

The update received more than 13,000 likes in a matter of hours, and scores of supportive comments from relieved fans.

As reported, Madonna’s health scare led her to postpone her upcoming The Celebration Tour.

Oseary explained, “On Saturday June 24, Madonna developed a serious bacterial infection which led to a several day stay in the ICU. Her health is improving, however she is still under medical care.” He noted, “A full recovery is expected.”

Oseary also informed fans the tour would be on hold, explaining, “We will share more details with you as soon as we have them, including a new start date for the tour and for rescheduled shows.”

Madonna: The Celebration Tour was meant to start in Vancouver on July 15, with plans to hit 43 cities globally and run through January 2024. The show is billed as the singer’s first retrospective tour, highlighting over four decades of her music career.

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The Guess Who will drop their new album, Plein D’Amour, on Friday, June 30. The album title translates to “full of love,” and lead singer Derek Sharp tells ABC Audio it just made sense to give it that name. 

“That’s really what the whole album is about,” he shares. “The whole album is really about, you know, coming together.”

Sharp says the band was inspired to get back in the studio after having a year off due to COVID-19. “We had a new member in the band that really loved the songs that we had,” he says, referring to guitarist Michael Staertow. Sharp says he and original member Garry Peterson had always planned to keep “the new music going,” sharing, “I think the fact that everybody was into it was part of the reason” they made the album.

For Garry, one of the best parts of making Plein D’Amour was being able to get back into the studio with all his bandmates. “It was a great experience to get back to the old way that we used to record, and I think that’s reflective in the sound of the album and just the whole feel,” he says.

In addition to the new music, The Guess Who are still on the road. After almost 60 years with the band, seeing fans enjoy their music is exactly what keeps Peterson motivated to continue.

“You know, we’re musicians, we play for people,” he says. “And that’s really what keeps you wanting to do this … I’ve always said it’s like a drug to be able to make people feel good and feel happy.” 

Plein D’Amour is available for preorder now. A complete list of The Guess Who tour dates can be found at theguesswho.com.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Madonna has postponed her upcoming The Celebration Tour due to health reasons.

The announcement comes from the superstar’s manager, Guy Oseary, who confirmed the news on his Instagram.

“On Saturday June 24, Madonna developed a serious bacterial infection which led to a several day stay in the ICU. Her health is improving, however she is still under medical care. A full recovery is expected,” Oseary’s post reads.

“At this time we will need to pause all commitments, which includes the tour,” the post continues. “We will share more details with you as soon as we have them, including a new start date for the tour and for rescheduled shows.”

Madonna: The Celebration Tour was meant to start in Vancouver on July 15, with plans to hit 43 cities globally and run through January 2024. The show is billed as the singer’s first retrospective tour, highlighting over four decades of her music career.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Melissa Etheridge recounts a strange experience with an obsessive fan in the new episode of U Discover Music’s animated video series Beyond The Bus.

The incident took place early in Etheridge’s career, when she finally had some money to upgrade to “the fancier bus.” She said the bus, which was black and white, “looked like a late ’80s disco inside.” It was driven by a man named Oreo, who she describes as “a white boy from the South – all he needed was a six-pack of cola and a pack of cookies to drive.”

The encounter happened after a show, and Etheridge said it was important to note it was 1989, before she came out as a lesbian. After everyone left and the bus was getting ready to pull out, there was one young man in the parking lot who stood in front of the bus.

“He was clean-shaven, with kind of long hair, but without too much of a mullet,” Etheridge recalls. “He was going ‘Melissa, Melissa, I love you!’ And I believe he’d had a couple of drinks. He basically stood in front of the bus and wouldn’t move, even though Oreo was about to start driving.”

Etheridge says after Oreo grabbed the bat he had on the bus and threatened to hit him, he ran away.

Something like that never happened to Melissa again, with the rocker noting, “After I came out I didn’t have any more young men jumping on my bus … a few young women, but not very many young men.”

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Billy Joel’s hit song “We Didn’t Start The Fire” has been updated by rockers Fall Out Boy. While Billy’s song covered current events from 1949 to 1989, the new take recounts the years 1989 to 2023.  

For example, where Billy’s hit gave shoutouts to Buddy Holly, Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley, Fall Out Boy name drops Kurt Cobain, Pokémon and “Tom DeLonge and aliens,” referring to the Blink 182 frontman. The new song also references a number of political figures and world events, including 9/11, Columbine and our former president, with the line, “[Donald] Trump gets impeached twice.”

Interestingly, both versions mention Egypt’s Suez Canal: Joel sang, “Trouble in the Suez,” in reference to the 1956 Suez Crisis, while Fall Out Boy’s rendition goes “Ever Given Suez,” referring to the ship that infamously got stuck in the canal in 2021.

“So much has happened in the span of the last 34 years — we felt like a little system update might be fun,” Fall Out Boy says of the cover. “Hope you like our take on it.”

Joel’s “We Didn’t Start The Fire” appeared on his 11th studio album, Storm Front. The track became the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer’s third #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and earned him a Grammy nomination for Record of the Year.

You can listen to Fall Out Boy’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire” now via digital outlets and follow along with its lyric video streaming now on YouTube.

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Wham! said goodbye to fans with one show, dubbed The Final, at London’s Wembley Stadium 36 years ago on June 28, 1986, but Andrew Ridgeley now says he wishes he and bandmate George Michael had more time to say farewell.  

“I would have liked to tour The Final to be honest,” he tells BBC. “I felt a final tour to say goodbye to our fans around the world would have been a generous gesture. I felt it was a courtesy to them to have done that. The least we could have done, to be honest with you. But I also understood [Michael’s] essential ideology behind having just one show.” 

The new documentary Wham! — about the band’s journey to superstardom — is set to premiere July 5 on Netflix. While the group was still loved when they said goodbye, Ridgeley says he always knew they wouldn’t last forever. 

“It was so much about us as friends and our lives together as youngsters [that] it would have restricted George’s growth as a songwriter to keep writing within the parameters that Wham! set,” he says. “We’d both outgrown Wham!.”

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Brian Setzer is ready to hit the road again. The Stray Cats frontman just announced dates for the Rockabilly Riot tour, marking Setzer’s first live shows in over four years.

“I’ve had a pretty long break, and I needed it,” Setzer shares. “I’m renewed and really want to play live again. I want to just get out on the road with this kick-a** little 3-piece band and start playing.” 

The 12-date tour kicks off September 27 in Red Bank, New Jersey, wrapping October 13 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Tickets go on sale Friday, June 30, at 10 a.m. local time. A complete list of dates can be found at briansetzer.com.

The new tour will coincide with a brand new solo album from Setzer. Details of the album have yet to be announced.

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Jimmy Buffett postponed a show in South Carolina back in May after he was admitted to the hospital to “address some issues that needed immediate attention.” Now, he’s missing another show.

Milwaukee Summerfest just announced that Buffett’s July 6 concert with the Coral Reefer Band at the American Family Insurance Amphitheater will not go on as planned. Tickets for the show had never actually gone on sale, but Summerfest had announced he’d be headlining that date.

While Buffett hasn’t commented on the canceled Summerfest show, a post on Facebook blamed the cancellation on “circumstances out of our control.”

The July 6 date will now be headlined by AJR.

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