Classic Hits

Paul McCartney just announced a 2022 U.S. tour today, which should help him offset the big loss he recently took on the sale of a New York City penthouse he owned with his wife, Nancy Shevell.

The Wall Street Journal reports the the former Beatles star and his spouse sold their luxury apartment on Fifth Avenue overlooking the Big Apple’s Central Park for $8.5 million, which is $7 million less than they purchased the residence for in 2015.

According to the newspaper, the duplex apartment initially was listed at $12 million in June of 2021, then was reduced to $10.5 million in September.

McCartney and his wife bought the apartment, located at at 1045 Fifth Ave., for $15.5 million, which is about 40% less than they sold it for.

As reported by the Street Easy real-estate website in 2015, the co-op residence boasts wraparound balconies, a living room, library, master bedroom, and master sitting room that all face Central Park above the Jacqueline Onassis Reservoir, plus a formal dining room and “a double height gallery.” The duplex also boasts floor-to-ceiling windows that are 40 feet high.

The New York Post reports that the building was built in 1967 by late developer Manny Duell, who created the duplex for his wife. She lived there until her death in 2014.

McCartney’s upcoming trek, dubbed the Got Back Tour, is scheduled to run from an April 28 concert in Spokane, Washington, through a June 16 show in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

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Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers guitarist Mike Campbell and his current band, The Dirty Knobs, have released a second advance single from their forthcoming sophomore album, External Combustion, due out on March 4.

The new tune, “Electric Gypsy,” is available now via digital formats, while a music video for the song has debuted on Campbell’s official YouTube channel.

The clip begins with Campbell hitchhiking in the desert, where he’s picked up by RV driven by a tattooed woman. Inside the motor home are The Dirty Knobs’ members and some female friends. The vehicle soon stops, and the musicians and their friends get out, and band proceeds to play the song out in the desert around a fire pit.

In a recent Facebook post, Campbell writes, “‘Electric Gypsy’ is one of my favorite songs on the new record. The song came to me in a moment of inspiration before a session with the band — and we recorded it that day in one take, guitar solo and all.”

As previously reported, External Combustion is an 11-track collection that features guest appearances by Ian Hunter of Mott the Hoople fame, Heartbreakers keyboardist Benmont Tench and alt-country artist Margo Price.

Campbell wrote most of the songs on External Combustion during the past year, although two tunes date back to the 1990s and were recently rediscovered by Mike in his vault of unreleased tracks.

Prior to “Electric Gypsy,” Campbell and the group also released the album’s lead track, “Wicked Mind,” as an advance digital single, along with a companion music video.

External Combustion can be pre-ordered now, and is available on CD, on vinyl and via digital formats.

Campbell and The Dirty Knobs kick off a U.S. tour on March 9 in Tampa, Florida. Visit TheDirtyKnobs.com for the band’s full schedule.

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Everyone knows that Billy Joel is from Long Island, New York, but if you’ve ever wanted to get a better sense of the places that he sings about in his songs, you can now do it online.

The Billy Joel “New York State of Mind” Landmarks website has just launched, featuring an interactive map of 50 locations in New York that are either connected to Billy’s life, or are mentioned in his songs. You can navigate to places he’s played, like Madison Square Garden or Yankee Stadium, or see, for example, exactly where the “Miracle Mile” is that Billy sings about cruising in “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me” is located.

In keeping with this theme, a new digital five-track EP called Places is out on all streaming platforms, showcasing some of the locations on the map.  The songs include “Movin’ Out (Anthony’s Song),” “New York State of Mind,” “Big Man on Mulberry Street,” “Everybody Loves You Now” and “Miami 2017 (See the Lights Go Out on Broadway).” It’s just the first in what will be a series of thematic EPs.

And if you want even more Billy, Walmart is now selling exclusive collectors’ editions of six of his albums, pressed on 12-inch colored vinyl with photo inserts.  Piano Man, The Stranger, 52nd Street, Glass Houses, An Innocent Man and Storm Front are all available, in different colors.

Both the website, the EP and the vinyl discs are part of the #50YearsofBilly celebration, recognizing 50 years since the release of his debut solo album, 1971’s Cold Spring Harbor.

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After being canceled in 2021 due to the pandemic, the Cincinnati Music Festival is returning July 21-23 with a lineup that includes Janet Jackson and The O’Jays.

Janet will headline the festival’s final night, and she’ll be preceded by The O’Jays, Tank, After 7, and saxophonist Kirk Whalum. Former Gap Band lead singer Charlie Wilson will be the headliner on Friday, July 22, while that bill also features Anthony Hamilton, Tony! Toni! Tone! and guitarist Jonathan Butler. BJ The Chicago Kid will open the festival on Thursday, July 21.

Tickets are now on sale on the festival website.

Jackson is enjoying a resurgence in her music sales and streams following the January 28 premiere her self-titled documentary on A&E and Lifetime. on January 28. As previously reported, her streams skyrocketed by 109 percent after the four-part documentary debuted.

According to Nielsen, 2.8 million people tuned in to watch part one of the documentary, and it amassed an additional 1.2 million views via digital download or on-demand. Parts two through four were seen by 4.3 million, 3.7 million and 3.8 million people,respectively, when they aired for the first time.

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If watching Get Back has made you crave more Beatles, then we’ve got good news: Paul McCartney‘s hitting the road for what he’s calling the Got Back tour.

“I said at the end of the last tour that I’d see you next time. I said I was going to get back to you. Well, I got back!” says Paul in a statement. 

The 13-city trek, the first since his Freshen Up tour wrapped in 2019, launches April 28 in Spokane, WA and is set to wrap up June 16 in East Rutherford, NJ.

The tour marks McCartney’s first-ever show in Spokane, as well as his live debuts in Hollywood, FL, Knoxville, TN and Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and his first show in Baltimore, MD since 1964 with The Beatles.

Tickets go on sale February 25 at 10 a.m. local time. American Express® Card Members can get tickets starting Tuesday, February 22 at 10 a.m. local time through Thursday, February 24 at 10 p.m. local time. For all the details, visit PaulMcCartneyGotBack.com.

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Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons are hitting the road once again for a tour of the U.S. and U.K.

The group, whose 1967 song “Beggin'” became a huge hit last year thanks to a cover by the Italian rock band Måneskin, will kick off the tour March 4 in Boston. They’ll be on the road through January of 2023, stopping for a run of dates in June in the U.K.

“I’m so excited to go back on the road,” says Valli, 87, in a statement. “I’ve missed performing for our wonderful fans.”

Old hits by The Four Seasons and Valli have been reintroduced to a whole new generation over the past two years. In addition to last year’s revival of “Beggin’,” 2020 saw Valli’s 1967 solo hit “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” reworked into two separate hits. 

An artist called Surf Mesa‘s interpolated the song as “ily (i love you baby),” and made it a global smash. Meanwhile, a Spanish interpolation called “Te Quiero Baby (I Love You Baby)” by Chesca and Pitbull was a hit on the Latin charts.  Even pop superstar Shawn Mendes performed the song on BBC Radio One’s Live Lounge.

Meanwhile, another pop superstar, Nick Jonas, is playing Valli in a new streaming version of the musical Jersey Boys, though it’s not clear when and on which platform it’ll debut.

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Last month, Dead & Company was forced to call off its two-weekend Playing in the Sand destination festival due the Omicron surge of COVID-19.  But the band’s Bob Weir is planning to hit the road next month with his other band, and tells USA Today that, “God willing,” Dead & Company will be on the road this summer.

Weir’s Wolf Bros, which Weir formed in 2018 with Don Was and Jay Lane, are scheduled to launch a 13-city tour March 9 in Nashville, TN.  “It’s looking like, knock on wood, the Omicron effect will be in the rearview mirror,” Weir tells USA Today. “Here’s hoping something else doesn’t pop up.”

If you can’t make the tour, Friday sees the release of the first-ever vinyl Wolf Bros LP, Bobby Weir & Wolf Bros: Live in Colorado, recorded in June of 2021. Released on Third Man Records, it’s the first volume of a two-volume collection, due out later this year.

Asked to reflect on his musical legacy, Weir — whose resume also includes Ratdog and Furthur in addition to The Grateful Dead, Dead & Company and Wolf Bros — refuses to be pinned down to being famous for just one thing.

“There are great musical cultures and great music to be found. But there is nothing quite as magical as the American songbook. I spent 60 years or so delving as deep into it and as intently as I can,” he says. “I just love the stuff so much…be it country, blues, R&B…I try to play it all.”

Weir adds, “I guess in years to come, when people listen to me they’ll make note of the fact that he tried to play it all. We’ll see how successful people think I got.”

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Many unseen photos of the late Joe Strummer — plus some well-known pictures, like the cover of his 1989 album, Earthquake Weather — have been compiled in a new book called Joe Strummer: Print the Myth.

The book is the work of photographer and creative director Josh Cheuse, who first met Strummer in 1981, when he called Electric Ladyland Studios from a payphone at his high school and asked The Clash if he could photograph them. Their creative partnership and friendship lasted until Strummer’s death in 2002.

In addition to photos of Strummer, the book includes sketches, handwritten notes and collages, as well as Cheuse’s personal stories about Strummer. Among the images included are a photo of The Clash performing in 1981 at Bond’s International Casino in New York, as well as a photo taken outside Buckingham Palace in 1988. You can see those images at RollingStone.com.

You can now sign up at JoeStrummerBook.com to get a discount when pre-order begins, and get the chance to have your name in the book.

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Men at Work frontman Colin Hay, who’s also a member of Ringo Starr’s All Starr Band, has released a new track from his upcoming solo album Now and the Evermore.

The song “Love Is Everywhere,” and it comes with a trippy, partially animated video.  Even if you don’t like the song, you’ll want to watch the video for the adorable footage of different animal species expressing love for one another. C’mon, who doesn’t want to see a puppy snuggle with a rooster,  or a dog frolicking with a baby deer?

Speaking about the song, Hay says, “I think what this song is attempting to counter, by at least some measure, is the end result of the continued tragic global catastrophe of separation. The colossal calamity of believing yourself to be separate from everything and everybody else. Refusing to consider the possibility that we all are part of this planet’s structural fabric. Every day I feel love, and I’m happy that I do.”

Now and the Evermore, the title track of which features Ringo on drums, will be out March 18. Hay will launch a solo tour that same day that will keep him on the road through May 12.  Starting June 2 in Boston, he’ll join Ringo for the All Starr Band’s summer tour.

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The breakup of Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham fueled many of Fleetwood Mac‘s most famous songs.  But Stevie now says that if they’d split when they really wanted to, Fleetwood Mac wouldn’t have been around for them to record those songs.

In a new interview in The New Yorker, Stevie explains, “I broke up with Lindsey in 1976. We’d only been in Fleetwood Mac for a year and a half, and we were breaking up when we joined Fleetwood Mac. So we just put our relationship kind of back together, because I was smart enough to know that, if we had broken up the second month of being in Fleetwood Mac, it would have blown the whole thing.”

“I just bided my time, and tried to make everything as easy as possible, tried to be as sweet and as nice to Lindsey as I could be,” Stevie continues. “He wasn’t happy, either. Then something happened that was, y’know, ‘We’re done’…it was time.”

“The band was solid, by that time, so I could walk away knowing that he was safe. And that the band was safe. And that we could work it out,” she concludes.

Speaking about two classic songs inspired by the breakup, Stevie says, “I always laugh because Lindsey’s ‘Go Your Own Way’ and my [song] ‘Dreams’ are, like, counter songs to each other. I’m, like, ‘When the rain washes you clean, you’ll know,’ and he’s, like, ‘Packing up, shacking up’s all you want to do.’”

She notes, “He’s looking at it from a very unpleasant, angry way, and I’m saying, in my more airy-fairy way, we’re gonna be all right. We’ll get through this.”

Stevie has several festival performances booked for this year, while Buckingham has a slew of tour dates lined up for the month of April.

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