The multi-platinum British rock group THE DARKNESS have announced they’ll return to the U.S. for two one-night-only shows Sunday, October 21 in New York City at Terminal 5 and Wednesday, October 24 in Los Angeles at Club Nokia. Although the above dates mark the only remaining U.S. shows for 2012, on Wednesday, October 24 fans nationwide will get a glimpse of the thunderous power of the band when their Club Nokia concert will be broadcast as an exclusive television event on AXS TV.
The Darkness are on tour with Lady Gaga, and it doesn't get more glam than that! Here's the dates:
Tue
10/2
Milan, Italy
Mediolanum Forum
Thu
10/4
Nice, France
Stade Charles-Ehrmann
Sat
10/6
Barcelona, Spain
Palau St Jordi
*Sun
10/21
New York, NY
Terminal 5 *HEADLINING
*Wed
10/24
Los Angeles, CA
Club Nokia *HEADLINING
Fri
10/26
Mexico City, Mexico
Foro Sol
Tue
10/30
San Juan, Puerto Rico
José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum
Fri
11/9
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Parque dos Atletas
Sun
11/11
Sao Paulo, Brazil
Estádio do Morumbi
Fri
11/16
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Estadio River Plate
Tue
11/20
Santiago, Chile
Estadio Nacional de Santiago
Randomly, The Darkness just released a new app too. It looks sort of fun.
Kix, one of my favorite bands of all time, released the CD/DVD combo Live in Baltimore on Sept. 25 via Frontiers. The combo is full of our favorite Kix songs and great live footage. In short, you want this package! The band sent me two copies: one to review and one to share! So, the review will be up here early next week (probably Monday!) and for now, we'll give away one copy of Live in Baltimore to a very lucky BBG! reader.
If you would like to win a free copy of Live In Baltimore all you have to do is send an email to allyson@bringbackglam.com. You must put "KIX CD" in the subject line to be considered. In the body of your email, please include your legal name and mailing address. Entries without this information will be discarded. Anyone in the world is welcome to enter. Please enter by Tuesday, Oct. 2 by 11:59 p.m ET. I'll choose one winner at random.
Everyone knows the story. There was the Big 4, and then those bands who seemed just outside that group, but still there from the start. Bands like Exodus and Testament. Alex Skolnick was always more than a "metal guitarist," and in fact left Testament to play in a jazz trio that, realistically, got most of it's sales from metal fans and through doing metal covers. I am not qualified to comment on his abilities as a jazz player (although I have some CDs), but he was always a hyper melodic guitarist, with his solo on "Electric Crown" being perhaps my favorite solo of all time.
Fast forward to 2012 and Testament, after years of diminishing returns and sub-standard work, have reunited with most of their original line up, Alex included, and released two albums, the most recent of which is Dark Roots of Earth. Let me say from the outset, I buy a LOT of CDs and it's rare for a CD to stay in my rotation list for long. This CD has been a constant for me since I got it. Imagine if Metallica had stayed a metal band, and James Hetfield had continued to drink, so that his voice got a little rougher instead of cleaner through the years. That's pretty much what you get here. I hate to belabor the Metallica comparison, because it's not perfect at all, but, the riffs here really would not be out of place on Master of Puppets, even though they certainly have their own character. The same is true of the complexity of the songs overall, the harmony leads, the melodic soloing, basically everything you love about metal is on this album in spades.
Even the artwork is awesome.
After a couple of faster tracks, the title track is a slower song, but bone crushingly heavy. 'A day in the death' starts with a bass riff, and then the guitars take over. "Cold Embrace" slows things right down with a ballad. I've read reviews that state that this is the one song that makes this CD less than the one before, but, let's not forget that Testament didn't just record a ballad back in the day, they CALLED it "The Ballad." This is nothing new, and it's a great piece of music, and a good break around the middle of the CD. It also shows that Chuck can really sing, as well as his customary bark. In any case, it doesn't sound like a Neil Young song, it has it's share of heavy guitars and solos.
The rest of the album rounds out in suitably heavy fashion, with only "Throne of Thorns" starting soft before kicking in. I have the bonus edition which includes covers of "Dragon Attack" (Queen), "Animal Magnetism" (Scorpions) and "Powerslave" (Iron Maiden). The "Powerslave" cover sticks to the original pretty much until the solos, which are much better than the original. There's also an extended version of "Throne of Thorns" (nearly eight minutes as opposed to seven). There's also a DVD with some live tracks and a making of documentary.
Testament joins a growing rank of bands (Metallica is not one of them) whose later work is so good that I'd be happy to go to a show where next to no older songs are played. That has to be good for metal as a whole, as well as hugely satisfying for the bands in question. If you like metal, buy this CD.
Vince Neil Performs "Girls, Girls, Girls" with teen group Going Dark and porn star Lisa Ann... for a bunch of kids.
This all happened last weekend at a Motley Crue after party in New Jersey. I'm not saying the performance was right or wrong... but I bet there were some ticked off parents in the crowd! At any rate, it's very cool that the kids got to perform on stage with Vince.
Do you know the band Vintage Trouble? I had never heard of them until The Who announced them as the support act for their upcoming North American tour. Note: Vintage Trouble are not a glam band. They are not even a hard rock band. They are definitely a Motown-esque rock act. And they plain rock. I am just stunned at their quality.
Vintage Trouble formed in California in 2010. They have one album out called The Bomb Shelter Sessions. We need more bands like this: real talent, with real songs.
Avenged Sevenfold releases the song "Carry On" today via iTunes. The song is for the video game Call of Duty: Black Ops II. I don't know if the song is an outtake or if the band got together to record it specifically for the game, but it sort of seems that way. I don't know much about video games, but it seems like the song is telling a story that would go along the Call of Duty. Maybe one of you gamers can fill me in?
For whatever reason, I missed picking up the new Shinedown album Amaryllis on the day it was released. Usually I pre-order things on Amazon way in advance so I never have to think about it again, but this one just slipped through my fingers.
So anyway, Amaryllis came out at the end of March and the band has been doing the requisite promotions. This includes creating an awesome video for the song "Enemies." The video is so well done... and probably really true to life. Sometimes it's nice to have a video tell a real story without anyone extra -- just the actual guys in the band.
Sunday, September 30, 2012 at 12:03AM 
