Music

It may still be summer, but Duran Duran wants to get you in the mood for Halloween: they’ve released their new single, “Danse Macabre,” which is the title track off their new album, dropping October 27.  

The album will feature three new songs, along with covers and new takes on old Duran Duran tracks. The new single features former Duran Duran guitarist Warren Cuccurullo collaborating with the band for the first time since 2001.

The album also sees the band reuniting with original guitarist Andy Taylor, as well as collaborating with producer Nile Rodgers.

Danse Macabre was inspired by the band’s Las Vegas Halloween show in 2022, with keyboardist Nick Rhodes explaining, “We had decided to seize the moment to create a unique, special event. … The temptation of using glorious gothic visuals set to a dark soundtrack of horror and humor was simply irresistible.”

To keep with the spooky mood, the album features the band’s take on such songs as Talking Heads‘ “Psycho Killer,” featuring Måneskin’s Victoria De Angelis; The Rolling Stones’ “Paint It Black”; the Rick James-inspired “Super Lonely Freak”; and Billie Eilish‘s “Bury a Friend.”

“It’s about a crazy Halloween party,” frontman Simon LeBon says of the record. “It’s supposed to be fun!”

Bassist John Taylor says the new album is an “interesting insight into the personality of the band,” with drummer Roger Taylor adding, “Maybe, you’ll leave with a deeper understanding of how Duran Duran got to this moment in time.”

Danse Macabre is available for preorder now.

Here is the track list for Danse Macabre:

“Nightboat”
“Black Moonlight”
“Love Voudou”
“Bury A Friend”
“Supernature”
“Danse Macabre”
“Secret Oktober 31st”
“Ghost Town”
“Paint It Black”
“Super Lonely Freak”
“Spellbound”
“Psycho Killer (feat. Victoria De Angelis)”
“Confession in the Afterlife”

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

It may still be summer, but Duran Duran wants to get you in the mood for Halloween: they’ve released their new single, “Danse Macabre,” which is the title track off their new album, dropping October 27.  

The album will feature three new songs, along with covers and new takes on old Duran Duran tracks. The new single features former Duran Duran guitarist Warren Cuccurullo collaborating with the band for the first time since 2001.

The album also sees the band reuniting with original guitarist Andy Taylor, as well as collaborating with producer Nile Rodgers.

Danse Macabre was inspired by the band’s Las Vegas Halloween show in 2022, with keyboardist Nick Rhodes explaining, “We had decided to seize the moment to create a unique, special event. … The temptation of using glorious gothic visuals set to a dark soundtrack of horror and humor was simply irresistible.”

To keep with the spooky mood, the album features the band’s take on such songs as Talking Heads‘ “Psycho Killer,” featuring Måneskin’s Victoria De Angelis; The Rolling Stones’ “Paint It Black”; the Rick James-inspired “Super Lonely Freak”; and Billie Eilish‘s “Bury a Friend.”

“It’s about a crazy Halloween party,” frontman Simon LeBon says of the record. “It’s supposed to be fun!”

Bassist John Taylor says the new album is an “interesting insight into the personality of the band,” with drummer Roger Taylor adding, “Maybe, you’ll leave with a deeper understanding of how Duran Duran got to this moment in time.”

Danse Macabre is available for preorder now.

Here is the track list for Danse Macabre:

“Nightboat”
“Black Moonlight”
“Love Voudou”
“Bury A Friend”
“Supernature”
“Danse Macabre”
“Secret Oktober 31st”
“Ghost Town”
“Paint It Black”
“Super Lonely Freak”
“Spellbound”
“Psycho Killer (feat. Victoria De Angelis)”
“Confession in the Afterlife”

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

On This Day, August 30, 1986 …

Steve Winwood landed his first Billboard Hot 100 #1 with “Higher Love,” from his fourth solo album, Back in the High Life.

The song, featuring backing vocals by Chaka Khan, spent one week on top of the chart. It went on to win Grammy Awards for Record of the Year and Best Male Vocal Performance.

Winwood’s second and only other #1 single came less than two years later when “Roll With It” topped the chart in July 1988.

Whitney Houston covered “Higher Love” in 1990, which was released on the Japanese version of her hit album I’m Your Baby Tonight. In 2019, Norwegian DJ Kygo released a remix of that version, which hit #1 on the Dance Club Songs chart.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

The special guests who join Billy Joel onstage during his Madison Square Garden residency shows tend to be fellow rock stars like Bruce Springsteen, Sting, Jon Bon Jovi or John Mellencamp. But at Billy’s August 29 show, he welcomed a guy who’s better known as an actor: Kevin Bacon.

In addition to starring in classics like Footloose, A Few Good Men and Diner, Bacon is an accomplished musician who’s recorded nine albums with his band The Bacon Brothers, so perhaps it wasn’t surprising to see him stroll onstage with a guitar in hand to join Billy for a rendition of his 1974 track “The Entertainer.” He and Billy also duetted on Billy’s 1980 classic “You May Be Right.”

Billy’s next Madison Square Garden show is September 10. He also has a handful of stadium shows with Stevie Nicks throughout the fall. Their final date together — so far — will be March 9 in Arlington, Texas. That show is a rescheduled date; the original show was canceled due to an illness in Stevie’s band.

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It looks like fans of The Rolling Stones won’t have to wait much longer for news on their upcoming album.

The Rock & Roll Hall of Famers continue to tease the album, which looks to be called Hackney Diamonds. They’ve launched a new website, which just reads “Welcome to Hackney Diamonds,” along with the caution “warning weak glass” and a picture of a hammer. 

After clicking on the site a few times, The Stones’ lips logo, all broken up like glass, appears, along with a countdown that ends Wednesday, September 6. 

On social media, the band also posted a series of photos of the cracked lips logo projected onto several iconic locations in New York, Paris, Madrid and Berlin.

The Stones first started teasing a new album earlier this month with a cryptic newspaper ad in the British paper the Hackney Gazette. Although they didn’t confirm they were behind it, many fans picked up on the connection because the band’s hits, “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” “Gimme Shelter” and “Shattered” were mentioned in the text. The “I” in Diamonds was also dotted with the lips logo. 

And there’s no doubt fans have been waiting a long time for an album from The Stones. It will be their first record since 2016’s Blue and Lonesome, which was an album of blues covers. Their last album of original songs was 2005’s A Bigger Bang.

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