Classic Hits

March 1 marks the 50th anniversary of Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon, which was their eighth studio release and to this day is one of their most commercially successful releases ever.

The album, which features such songs as “Money” and “Brain Damage,” spent only one week at number one. But it went on to spend 741 weeks on the Billboard Album chart between 1973 and 1988, and has since gone on to spend a total of 972 weeks on the chart. As of 1998, the album had been certified 15-times Platinum by the RIAA.

“Dark Side of the Moon is not only one of the great Pink Floyd albums, but I think it’s one of the greatest rock ‘n’ roll albums of all time,” Jason Hanley, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s VP of education and visitor engagement, tells ABC Audio. “It really is a record that is so revolutionary at the time when it comes out in 1973, it’s revolutionary even for the band.”

He adds, “The songs are fantastic, the album was on the charts almost longer than I think any other album in history, sold so many copies, and still continues to be part of pop culture today.” 

To celebrate the 50th anniversary, Pink Floyd has a lot of goodies in store for fans. 

They are releasing a newly remastered version of the album on March 24, along with a Blu-ray and DVD audio with the original mix and remastered stereo versions. There will also be a new Blu-ray disc and CD of the classic concert The Dark Side of the Moon — Live at Wembley Empire Pool, London, 1974 and a new book, Pink Floyd: The Dark Side of the Moon: 50th Anniversary.

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John Mellencamp is continuing his very public support of farmers. The Farm Aid co-founder and board member is set to join farmers, ranchers and farmworkers in Washington, D.C., on March 7 at the Rally for Resilience: Farmers for Climate Action.

Mellencamp, who is currently on his Live and In Person tour, is expected to perform and offer some remarks at the rally, which kicks off at Freedom Plaza at 11 a.m. ET. 

The rally comes as Congress begins work on the 2023 Farm Bill. It is part of a three-day gathering starting March 6, which also includes cultural events and a demonstration of climate-friendly farming practices.

“As a Farm Aid board member, I’ve been to Washington a few times to ask for farmer voices to be heard. I hope on March 7, members of Congress hear farmers and ranchers loud and clear,” Mellencamp shares. “If we want a better world, it starts with us.”

He adds, “Farmers know this. They have the tools and know-how to better our climate future, but they can’t do it alone. Policymakers — and all of us — need to support the solutions they can deliver.”

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A new documentary is setting out to answer the question What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears? Directed by John Scheinfeld, who directed The U.S. vs. John Lennon and more, the documentary is set to hit theaters March 24. 

According to the description, the film explores how the band “was unknowingly embroiled in a political rat’s nest involving the U.S. State Department, the Nixon White House and a controversial concert tour of Yugoslavia, Romania and Poland, countries that were behind what was then known as the Iron Curtain.”

It continues, “As a result, they found themselves in the crossfire of a polarized America, as divided then as it is now.” 

Blood, Sweat & Tears is known for such hit songs as “Spinning Wheel” and “You’ve Made Me So Very Happy.” Their self-titled sophomore release won the Grammy for Album of the Year in 1970, beating out such iconic records as The Beatles’ Abbey Road, Johnny Cash’s Johnny Cash at San Quentin and Crosby, Stills & Nash’s self-titled release.

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Def Leppard’s Joe Elliott recently teamed up with Ghost for a new version of “Spillways,” a track from the Swedish rockers’ 2022 album, Impera. Well, it sounds like this may not be the last time we see Elliott and Ghost’s Tobias Forge collaborate.

“It has come up in the last while, and I’d be more than happy to,” Elliott tells NME. “Next time though, when we’ve both got some time off, I want us to actually find some neutral place where we can get together in a room with a little recorder, a couple of guitars, pen, paper, our brains, a bottle of wine and see what we come up with.” 

Elliott says it would be fun to write a song with Forge, noting, “I don’t want to do it for a job, I just want to write together to see what we’d get. I want to play around and see where it goes.”

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John Fogerty regained control of the worldwide publishing rights to his music with Creedence Clearwater Revival last month and he couldn’t be happier.

“Finally getting ownership of my songs now, you can see it’s correcting something that has been wrong in my life for most of my life — you know, since my early twenties,” he tells Variety in a new interview in which he delves into his 55-year fight to get those rights back.

The news comes as many of Fogerty’s peers are actually selling their publishing rights, and the irony isn’t lost on him.

“It is ironic, certainly, that everybody else is selling and I end up buying my songs, but of course it makes perfect sense,” he says. “It has been such a wrong use of music business law, all these years. To finally own ‘Proud Mary’ is a big deal.” Fogerty adds, “I understand other people, especially older people, wanting to sell. But that’s not my frame of mind, certainly at the moment, anyway.”

How he got the rights back is long and involved, and at one point had him refusing to perform any CCR songs. But now that it’s over, he isn’t dwelling on what he’s been through.

“I am now, at this point in my life, looking to all the positiveness of this blessing, and I’m not turning around and looking at the horror that was the past,” the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer shares. “It is a blessing, for sure — it could have been a situation that never changed, but it did change, and I’m really happy.”

He adds, “I don’t know what simple phrase would work here. ‘Good things come to those who wait’ — maybe that’s one.”

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Dead & Company are set to play Chicago’s Wrigley Field June 9 and 10, and since it’s their final tour, it will be their final shows at the home of the Chicago Cubs. To mark the occasion, the team has announced a Grateful Dead night at the ballpark.

The special event will take place May 23 as the Cubs play the New York Mets, and each ticket comes with one of five Dead-inspired bobbleheads, each in a different color. 

A portion of the proceeds from Grateful Dead night will go to The Dead’s nonprofit, the Rex Foundation, which “provides extensive community support to small organizations making an impact in the arts, sciences, education, the environment, and social justice.”

Tickets to the game can be purchased at mlb.com.

And if you’re still hoping to see Dead & Company at Wrigley Field, there’s still time to win tickets to the sold-out shows. The band is running a contest through fandiem, with the grand prize being premium reserved seats to both shows, along with a lot of other goodies. To enter, folks need to make a donation, which will go Reverb and Headcount, by March 14. More info can be found at fandiem.com.

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Leon Russell’s 2001 album, Signature Songs, is getting a reissue next month. The long out-of-print release, containing a collection of solo piano and vocal recordings of some of Russell’s classic tunes, is being released digitally and on CD, and on vinyl for the first time, on March 17.

The album, being released by Dhani Harrison and David Zonshine’s Dark Horse Records, features recordings of such songs as “A Song For You,” “Tight Rope,” “The Masquerade” and “Lady Blue.”

It is available for preorder now. 

Here’s the track list for Signature Songs:

“A Song for You”
“One More Love Song”
“Tight Rope”
“Stranger in a Strange Land”
“Hummingbird”
“Back to the Island”
“Out in the Woods”
“Lady Blue”
“Delta Lady”
“Magic Mirror”
“This Masquerade”

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Def Leppard is currently on the next leg of their joint world tour with Mötley Crüe, and their guitarist, Phil Collen, seems to be having a blast with them.

“It’s great. We’ve known ’em for years,” Collen shares in an interview with Radioacktiva Colombia. “It’s like being at school with all of your best friends. It’s really fun. We’ve got this airplane that all of us are on there. And it’s great.” 

Collen says the fact that both bands are still rocking “means more as you get older.” He explains, “There’s this thing being young … but there’s something about really doing it still later on that makes you — I don’t know — appreciate it more.” 

The Mötley Crüe/Def Leppard tour hits Lima, Peru, on Tuesday.

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Def Leppard is currently on the next leg of their joint world tour with Mötley Crüe, and their guitarist, Phil Collen, seems to be having a blast with them.

“It’s great. We’ve known ’em for years,” Collen shares in an interview with Radioacktiva Colombia. “It’s like being at school with all of your best friends. It’s really fun. We’ve got this airplane that all of us are on there. And it’s great.” 

Collen says the fact that both bands are still rocking “means more as you get older.” He explains, “There’s this thing being young … but there’s something about really doing it still later on that makes you — I don’t know — appreciate it more.” 

The Mötley Crüe/Def Leppard tour hits Lima, Peru, on Tuesday.

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On this day, February 28, 1983…

U2 released their third studio album War, produced by Steve Lillywhite. The album, which is considered the band’s first overtly political record,  featured two future U2 classics, “Sunday Bloody Sunday” and “New Year’s Day,” which became the band’s first single to chart on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.

The album became the band’s first U.K. number one, knocking Michael Jackson’s Thriller out of the top spot. In the U.S., it peaked at 12 on the Billboard 200 album chart, and went on to become the band’s first album to be certified Gold by the RIAA.

A remastered version of the album was released in July of 2008, including a deluxe version that featured a bonus CD made up of B-sides, live tracks and rarities.

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