Morrissey, Jake Bugg Added to Nobel Peace Prize Concert

Morrissey and Jake Bugg are among a new batch of artists scheduled to perform at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert happening December 11th in Oslo, Norway. Syrian musician Omar Souleyman and Swedish rapper Timbuktu will also take part in the 20th annual event, joining previously announced performers Mary J. Blige, James Blunt, Swedish singer Zara Larsson and Norwegian hip-hop duo Envy. Claire Danes will host the concert.

The concert will come as part of a ceremony honoring this year's Nobel Peace Prize recipient, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, for the Netherlands-based group's efforts to eliminate chemical weapons – an especially resonant issue this year, in light of evidence that forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad have used chemical weapons in the ongoing conflict there.

Morrissey will sing three songs at the concert, according to a notice on the fan site True to You. It's been a busy year for the singer, who has canceled other concerts over recurring health problems. He also recently published an autobiography, which will be read by Walking Dead star David Morrissey in audio-book form.

Bugg, the 19-year-old English singer and songwriter, recently released his second album this year, Shangri La, which he recorded with Rick Rubin. "Might as well keep up the momentum, you know?" Bugg told Rolling Stone over the summer. "In this time that I've been touring and traveling the world I had a lot of new experiences and opportunity. Why not write about it?"

The Nobel Peace Prize Concert will air in the U.S. on AXS TV on December 11th from 8-9:30 p.m. EST.

RollingStone

Muse Get Dramatic on 'Live at Rome Olympic Stadium'

Muse's new live album/concert film, Live at Rome Olympic Stadium, was recorded on July 6th of this year and finds the band in highly polished form, yet also demonstrates impressive range. "Resistance," taken from The Resistance, starts with front man Matthew Bellamy yelling, "Let me hear you scream!" and ends with him storming across the stage while holding his guitar in the air like a scepter. By contrast, "Explorers," off last year’s The 2nd Law starts with just Bellamy sitting in front of the keys —immediately the entire stadium goes from full roar to absolute silence, fixated on the slow burning song.

Listening to the concert is one thing, but watching it reveals the band's thoughts on modern-day capitalism, in dramatic ways. A high powered investor stomps onto the stage, screaming and throwing money at the audience, only to have a heart attack amongst a literal explosion of money and at another turn, an oil executive struts out on stage and willingly douses herself with gasoline before she dies of self-inflicted poisoning.

Although Muse played some big shows in 2013, next year they'll likely slow the live show down to work on their next album. Live at Rome Olympic Stadium will be released on CD/DVD and Blu-ray formats on December 2nd.

RollingStone

Foster the People: Second Album 'Not the Record People Will Expect'

After breaking out in 2011 with "Pumped Up Kicks," Foster the People slowed down considerably this year. They played just one show, and Mark Foster became a self-described "studio rat," where he started working on the band's follow-up to Torches, as well as scoring his first feature film. But 2014 should see a resurgence of Foster the People, starting this January, if all goes well. Rolling Stone recently spoke backstage with Foster at the HARD Day of the Dead Festival in L.A., where he teased some details about the new album, his film score and more.

What was your experience scoring a film for the first time like?
It's called Little Boy. It's going to come out this next year. It's a period piece and the first feature film I've scored. This guy Alejandro Monteverde – he directed a film called Bella that won the Toronto Film Festival, and this is his next film. It's Tom Wilkinson and Emily Watson, some really good actors. It's a good movie, but a ton of music. I think there's only nine minutes in the film that didn't have music, so it was, like, five months of work. But it was cool – I went to Prague and recorded the orchestra there for all the classical stuff. It was definitely an experience, but I'm really excited about the new Foster the People record. It's guitar-driven. I haven't played this much guitar in a long time, so it's going to be really fun to play live, because it's much more organic and more in the vein of the Pixies and Clash and stuff.

Did scoring Little Boy influence the Foster record?
For me, they live in different worlds. I think scoring the film is going to influence our third record because it kind of brought me back around to classical music, which is what I grew up on. I've been thinking a lot about the third record, even though our second record is not out yet, which is really funny to say out loud. For that record, I think it's going to be much more orchestral, and definitely working on the film and going to Prague and recording the orchestra, which I'd never done before – I'd never written a piece and then watched 50 musicians bring it to life – it's one of the most powerful things I've ever been a part of, to see an orchestra construct an original piece of music. I want to do that again. It was fun.

Is there a timeline for when the album comes out?
Beginning of next year. We're going to have a song at radio in January.

Is there a first single?
I shouldn't say that. This is the first interview I've even done about the next record so I've spilled a lot. I've spilled the beans.

Top 10: Never-Before-Seen Beatles Photos

Take a look at never-before-seen photos of The Beatles with intimate snapshots spanning the band's U.S. arrival, the filming of 'Help' and more key moments from the Sixties:

The Beatles arriving at JFK airport in New York in 1964. 

John Lennon during the filming of Help! in the Bahamas in 1965.

Ringo Starr during the filming of Help! in the Bahamas in 1965. 

Ringo Starr during the filming of Help! in the Bahamas in 1965. 

George Harrison and John Lennon on the set of Help! in the Bahamas in 1965.

George Harrison and John Lennon on the set of Help! in the Bahamas in 1965. 

 

The Beatles on the set of Help! in the Bahamas in 1965.

John Lennon during the filming of Help! in the Swiss Alps in 1965.

 

George Harrison during the filming of Help! in the Bahamas in 1965. 

Paul McCartney on the set of ‘Help!’ in the Swiss Alps in 1965.

RollingStones

Black Sabbath Adds 2014 Tour Dates

Reunited metal legends Black Sabbath aren’t done touring yet, as the band has announced a new string of concert dates that extend into the new year… but only two of those are stateside.

While a majority of the North American shows will take place in Canada, the dates on this continent start and end right here in the United States, with Sabbath set to perform at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center on March 31, then hit Los Angeles’ Hollywood Bowl on April 26.

The tour will also take the band all around the world, with shows scheduled across Europe and Russia.

This new tour leg is in continued support of the most recent Black Sabbath album, 13, their first with original frontman Ozzy Osbourne since 1978′s Never Say Die! 

Bob Dylan Goes Interactive in 'Like a Rolling Stone' Clip

Bob Dylan's 1965 classic "Like a Rolling Stone," which Rolling Stone named the greatest song of all time, finally has an official video. Created by the digital agency Interlude, the video is interactive, allowing viewers to flip through 16 television channels as a variety of television personalities lip-sync the lyrics. Check it out below.

"I'm using the medium of television to look back right at us," director Vania Heymann told Mashable. "You're flipping yourself to death with switching channels [in real life]." Adds Interlude CEO Yoni Bloch: "You'll always miss something because you can't watch everything at the same time."

The stations you can flip through include a cooking show, The Price Is Right, Pawn Stars, local news, a tennis match, a children's cartoon, BBC News and a live video of Dylan and the Hawks playing "Like a Rolling Stone" in 1966.

Dylan is currently in the middle of an extensive European tour, which wraps up later this month with a three-night stand at the Royal Albert Hall in London. It will be his first time at the historic venue since the final show of his 1966 tour, which marked his last performance before the motorcycle crash that ultimately kept him off the road for eight years.

He recently released the massive box set The Complete Album Collection Volume 1. It contains his 35 official albums, including 14 that weren't previously remastered. There are also six live albums and two CDs of rare material.

RollingStone

Queens of the Stone Age Go Macabre in New Interactive Video

Queens of the Stone Age take a surreal approach in their new video for "The Vampyre of Time and Memory." The project is more an art installation than a traditional music video, allowing fans to navigate through an interactive website full of macabre visuals, disorienting graphics and a slow-motion performance of the band's psychedelic ballad.

The unconventional video (co-directed by Kii Arens and Jason Trucco) was created and developed by Darknet in collaboration with the Creators Project. In a press release, the two directors commented on the project, calling it the "ultimate artistic joyide."

"Joshua Homme and company gave us the creative keys to the car from word 'go,'" they said. "And Josh has a badass car. . . On the technology side, Darknet was the perfect forward-thinking company to push the boundaries of music video presentation. All art is technology, technology that shares an experience or an idea. 'Vampyre' uses all the tools available to us today to share a meaningful common experience."

Queens of the Stone released their sixth studio album, ...Like Clockwork, back in June, and they've remained very active since. The band is currently in the middle of their largest tour to date (which was recently extended into 2014), and last month, they joined bands like Arcade Fire and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young to perform at the 2013 Bridge School Benefit.

Tomorrow, the band will release the Spotify-exclusive ...Like Cologne EP, which features three live tracks recorded on September 4th in Cologne, Germany. On November 29th, as part of Record Store Day's Black Friday event, they're releasing a limited edition vinyl pressing of their latest LP.

RollingStone

Musician Pulled Trigger in Brooklyn Murder-Suicide

An Iranian musician allegedly killed two members of the dance-punk group the Yellow Dogs, a third man and himself early Monday morning in what the police are calling a murder-suicide in the East Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, The New York Times reports.

The assailant, identified by the The Wall Street Journal as 29-year-old Ali Akbar Mohammadi Raffie, reportedly used a semi-automatic rifle to fatally shoot brothers Soroush Farazmand, a guitarist, and Arash Farazmand, a drummer, as well as a friend of theirs, Ali Eskandarian, according to Yellow Dogs' manager, Ali Salehezadeh. Another man, Sasan Sadeghpourosko, was wounded in the shooting and treated and released from a local hospital.

Although the alleged shooter was initially reported to have been a disgruntled ex-member of the Yellow Dogs, the band's manager said Ahkbar was in fact an acquaintance who had played in another group. While members of the two bands once had a relationhip, Salehezadeh said the camps had a falling out in 2012. The Yellow Dogs had emigrated from Tehran, the Iranian capital, to the U.S. in 2011.

Two other members of the Yellow Dogs, guitarist Siavash Karampour and bassist Koory Mirz, were not injured.

"They were always together and they were always friendly," Martin Greenman, who lives a few doors down from where the shooting happened, told The Times. He added, "They looked like rockers."

The group appeared in the 2009 movie No One Knows About Persian Cats, which won a prize at the Cannes Film Festival. The band's song "New Century" appeared on its soundtrack. The group was also featured in a CNN piece on artists in the Middle East. "They think I'm an anarchist," guitarist Karampour told the interviewer. Later he said, "They're like my brothers. They're more close than my brothers." The report said that musicians who play rock music, which is deemed "un-Islamic" in the country, could be jailed and beaten.

In a tweet-length review of the band's gig at SXSW in 2010, Rolling Stone wrote, " Iranian post-punkers ride spidery bass lines, galloping hi-hats & garage-fucked guitar. Small crowd, great sound."

RollingStone

Five Things PBS Could Teach You About Jimi Hendrix

Guitar god Jimi Hendrix got the PBS treatment last night in the American Masters broadcast of the two-hour documentary Jimi Hendrix – Hear My Train a Comin'. In other words: a thorough, serious-minded consideration of his career that soft-pedals some aspects of his personal life, such as his drug use. While the high priests of Hendrixology will be familiar with most of it, the film has some previously unseen treasures, such as his performance at the 1968 Miami Pop Festival, and smart commentary from the likes of Rolling Stone's David Fricke. Even viewers moderately familiar with Hendrix's legend could enrich their understanding of his life. Five examples:

Hendrix looked good in a uniform.
Although he later became famous for peacock fashion – hats with feathers, aquamarine chemises – Hendrix looked sharp in a uniform. The documentary has a great vintage photo of him in the military (his unit was the 101st Airborne, and he lasted as a paratrooper until he got an honorable discharge). And although he may have chafed at the musical limitations of backing up Wilson Pickett and the Isley Brothers at the beginning of his career, he could look arresting in a matching leopard-print jacket.

Hendrix had his guitar with him at all times.
Although Hendrix was blessed with abundant musical talent, he honed it by playing the guitar pretty much every waking moment, which meant that he always had an instrument with him wherever he went. (It also served the purpose of deflecting conversation – offstage, he was rather shy.) Various friends and girlfriends testify to how he always carried a six-string: for example, in the morning, he'd strap it on before walking into the kitchen for breakfast.

Moving to London in 1966 was even better for Hendrix than he could have hoped for.
When he got to town, under the wing of manager and producer Chas Chandler (formerly of the Animals), he needed a place to stay. In the early days, that place was Ringo Starr's apartment.

Hendrix didn't think much of his singing voice.
While his vocals obviously aren't as virtuosic as his guitar playing, they're more than capable – but Hendrix was intensely self-conscious about them. "We had a constant row in the studio," Chandler remembers, about "where his voice should be in the mix. He always wanted to have his voice buried and I always wanted to bring it forward. He was saying, 'I've got a terrible voice, I've got a terrible voice.' I'd say, 'You may have a terrible voice, but you've got great rhythm in your voice.'"

The Jimi Hendrix Experience got their career-altering Monterey Pop appearance on the recommendation of Paul McCartney.
The Beatle saw Hendrix at an early London gig and became huge supporters. You may have heard about Hendrix kicking off a 1967 show with the title track to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, only days after the album came out – but this film has great footage of McCartney, in Pepper garb, rocking out at the show. When McCartney was asked if the Beatles would play the Monterey International Pop Music Festival, he declined, but suggested Hendrix instead. Given the opportunity, Hendrix blew the crowd away, lit his guitar on fire and launched his American career.

RollingStone