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Wolfgang Van Halen considers his group Mammoth to be “still very much a new band” — which makes The End seem an odd title for its third album.
“It is,” Van Halen — who plays all the instruments and sings all the vocals on the Mammoth recordings — acknowledges to Billboard via Zoom. “That’s not the meaning, obviously, but it gets people thinking. When they first see it, they’re like, ‘What?!’
“The main reason is I found, lyrically, I was working through a lot in the respect of just exploring what the end could mean in many different possibilities. That was on top of the fact that this is that we dropped the WVH from our name, finally, so it feels like the end of the old and the beginning of the new. It ties together thematically but is also where the band is right now, so (The End) just felt like the perfect, encapsulating title.”
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The band was, of course, known as Mammoth WVH from the time Van Halen began working on his own music in 2015 — eight years after he first toured as bassist in Van Halen with his father, Eddie Van Halen, and uncle Alex Van Halen — until last year, when Van Halen was able to acquire the Mammoth copyright after years of trying. Now, he explains, “It’s exactly where I wanted it to be. I love bands that have a self-titled album and a song named after the band; so now on the very first album (from 2021) we have ‘Mammoth’ by Mammoth, on Mammoth, just like Iron Maiden and Bad Company, It’s a quirky little thing, but I like to be in that club.”
He adds that shedding the WVH also removes some of the baggage that is a frustrating part and parcel of his musical career.
“I’ve wanted to be (Mammoth) from the beginning,” Van Halen says. “There’s a much higher chance of organic discovery when it’s just Mammoth. People have a lot of complicated feelings about me because of my family and how I started out, and I think a lot of people decided how they feel about me and my music before they even heard it. So I think now it’s a nice opportunity to get in that window of people just hearing something and get that unbiased reaction — and then they’ll see who it is and get pissed off, but before that it might be, ‘Hey, it’s actually good, but I still don’t like him,’” he says with a laugh.
Like its two predecessors, The End was recorded by Van Halen and Michael “Elvis” Baskette at the 5150 studio built by Van Halen’s father. The 10 tracks come in at a relatively austere 39 minutes, and Van Halen says that compactness was both organic and intentional.
“I’m all about efficiency, in every aspect,” he notes. “I was definitely trying to not overthink anything. I think you’re always trying for all killer, not filler, and I like the idea you can have something that doesn’t last too long, and if you really enjoyed it you can just throw it on again and keep enjoying it.
“I feel like there’s enough flavor, but nothing overstays its welcome. The longest song is ‘One of a Kind,’ and it’s only just over five minutes. Everything else is pretty short in comparison. There’s nothing like ‘Take a Bow,’ which is almost seven minutes, and ‘Better Than You,’ which is over six minutes, on the last record. It was just about not trying to over-simplify but make sure I didn’t over-complicate.”
The End has already spawned a No. 1 Mainstream Rock Airplay chart hit in the title track, while “The Spell” has climbed into the top 20 in front of the album’s release. On the former and the track “I Really Wanna,” fans have been intrigued to hear Van Halen tapping on his guitar, something that was his father’s trademark but that he’s largely avoided before now. “I was maybe worried about too many comparisons,” he says, “but at the end of the day I’ve realized that’s going to happen either way, so I might as well just have fun and enjoy myself. I think it’s fun to tap; I think it’s just a fun, cool sounding thing for solos. So I don’t care what anybody says, ’cause this is what makes me happy, and I’m having a good time.”
Van Halen — who also heads the EVH Gear instrument company — adds that he found the tapping pattern for “The End” on a 2014 demo, which had been set aside. “I was like, ‘Y’know what; why don’t we write a song around this and see what happens?,’ and this time it worked,” he says. The songs “Something New” and “Selfish,” meanwhile, hail from ideas he hatched while making the first album; the latter, in fact, came from jamming with his father during December of 2014, which Van Halen even has on video.
“It’s just me and him jamming,” he recalls. “I had my camera sitting by my high hat (cymbal), so that’s all you hear. It’s just a complete mess, audio-wise, but it’s nice to see.”
“The End” has also drawn attention for its video, directed by Robert Rodriguez and Greg Nicotero and based on Rodriguez’s 1996 Quentin Tarantino-written horror classic From Dusk till Dawn. In addition to Mammoth’s live lineup it features cameos from Slash, Myles Kennedy, actor Danny Trejo and Van Halen’s mother Valerie Bertinelli, along with plenty of prosthetics and special effects. “It’s important not to take yourself too seriously and just have a good time,” Van Halen says. “That’s what I always love about the Foo Fighters and their videos; I’ve never been shy about how inspired I am by the Foos, and I think the way we do our videos is very much a reflection of that.”
The latest clip, for “Same Old Song,” drops on Friday and is intended as a sequel to “The End,” although admittedly a more modest proposition. “It sort of wraps up the story, so to speak,” Van Halen says. “Obviously a baby band like us only has enough in the album budget for one Robert Rodriguez-directed video, but I think this one sort of ties it up nicely and allows us to move forward into the future.”
As The End comes out, Mammoth’s immediate future is on the road. Van Halen and company — Jon Jourdan, Frank Sidoris, Ronnie Ficarro and Garrett Whitlock — spent the summer opening for Creed, which sadly meant the group had to bow out of the Black Sabbath/Ozzy Osbourne Back to the Beginning concert during July. “I was so bummed,” says Van Halen, who was part of the performances honoring Osbourne at his Rock And Roll Hall of Fame induction as a solo artist a year ago in Cleveland.
“I was happy I was able to do that,” Van Halen remembers. “I was able to sit and talk with him a little bit and bond with him a little bit before he left. So I’m happy I got to see him there. What an unbelievable loss it is.” He adds that Sharon Osbourne “was very sweet and understanding” about Mammoth having to drop out of Back to the Beginning. “There was stuff in the news where she said somebody was rude to them — it was not us. Sharon has been nothing but wonderful to us, and my heart goes out to her and the whole family.”
Mammoth begins a headlining run on Oct. 31 in Rancho Mirage, Calif., with cross-country dates through Dec. 12. Van Halen says he’s sketched out a preliminary long-term schedule that won’t have him back in the studio until the spring of 2027, although he’ll be accumulating ideas along the way.
“I still have so many ideas that need work — they’re missing a vocal hook here or a guitar part here or a drum part here — so in moments of inspiration I’ll maybe just sit there and listen to those old ideas and see what I can do,” Van Halen says. “I think the biggest thing with (The End) compared to the last two is…I was a lot more comfortable and confident in the process, and in who I am as my own artist and what I have to offer. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter what people think I should be doing as long as I’m true to myself, and what I think the purest distillation of Mammoth is.
“I’m proud of the way that I’ve handled myself in this business,” he adds. “I’m not sitting there playing Van Halen songs and trying to shack up in the legacy of my father. I’m trying to set out and do it on my own. Whether I’m successful at that is a subjective opinion, but I’m at least proud that I’m not sitting here going, like, ‘Hey, the only place you can hear a Van Halen play ‘Panama’ is over here.’ I would rather fail on my own thing than succeed on my dad’s legacy.”
Trending on Billboard Iron Maiden have announced the dates for the North American leg of their Run For Your Lives World Tour, and they’re bringing Megadeth and Anthrax along for the ride. Explore See latest videos, charts and news Starting on Aug. 29, 2026, Iron Maiden will kick off their North American leg at Toronto’s […]
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Dion DiMucci considers his new album, The Rock ‘N’ Roll Philosopher, to be “like a concert” experience.
“I thought I would just let it run like a concert,” the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and proud son of the Bronx tells Billboard via Zoom, sporting a New York Yankees baseball cap shortly after the team was eliminated from the playoffs. “That was my vision; if I had to do a set with a band, I’m gonna do these 16 songs, in this order. It’s the perfect concert.”
The Rock ‘N’ Roll Philosopher — Dion’s fourth album released within the last five years with Joe Bonamassa’s Keeping The Blues Alive (KTBA) Records label — is not simply a compilation, however. As Dion notes, “some of (the songs) are new, some of them are redos that I felt I could do better versions of.” Based on his January book of the same name, it includes six fresh recordings — some of older favorites such as Tom Waits’ “Serenade” and his own “Abraham, Martin and John,” for which Dion recently released a video — along with previously released collaborations with Bonamassa, Eric Clapton (who wrote a foreword in the liner notes), Mark Knopfler and Sonny Landreth, plus signature Billboard Hot 100 hits “Runaround Sue” (No. 1), “The Wanderer” and “Ruby Baby” (both No. 2).
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Dion penned the brand-new songs — “New York Minute,” released in January, and “Mother and Son,” inspired by Michelangelo’s Pietà — with good friend Mike Aquilina, an author who specializes in Catholic Church history and has been writing with Dion since Tank Full of Blues in 2012; he co-wrote Dion’s 2023 book, Dion: The Wanderer Talks Truth (Stories, Humor & Music). Dion also salutes his late Little Kings bandmate Scott Kempner, also of the Dictators and Del-Lords, via new recordings of “New York Is My Home” and “In a Heartbeat of Time,” which Kempner co-wrote; the former, from the 2016 album of the same name, is a version of the track before Paul Simon added his guest vocal to the recording.
“When I get down into it, I really love that blues thing,” Dion, 86, explains. “That John Lee Hooker thing, just that groan. I love expressing myself with those three chords, even two chords; it doesn’t have to be very fancy. I just love the thing grooving. The beauty of rock ‘n’ roll is repetition, the beauty of repetition and the groan and the groove and the communication of the words. It’s very simple.”
The Rock ‘N’ Roll Philosopher album is an outgrowth of the book project, Dion’s third. Co-authored with Adam Jablin and sub-titled Conversations on Life, Recovery, Faith and Music, it’s a loose collection of stories and concepts, housing high-minded concepts, anecdotes and lists of favorite books and performers.
“The book was events in my life that I’m reflecting on, all these little stories I have, and it comes with a life lesson,” says Dion, whose first memoir, The Wanderer: Dion’s Story, was published in 1988. “So then Bonamassa and (KTBA) co-founder Roy Weisman said, ‘Let’s get an album, something compatible with the book.’ At the time I was doing the audiobook, and I just had a ball doing that ’cause you could have songs (play) in the stories, just coloring or complementing. (The album) developed out of that.”
One of the most striking inclusions is “Abraham, Martin and John,” an elegy written by Dick Holler about the legacies of Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy during 1968. Dion’s recording reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 that year and was certified gold. It went on to be covered by a number of other performers, including Smokey Robinson & the Miracles, Marvin Gaye, Ray Charles and Bob Dylan.
The Rock ‘N’ Roll Philosopher re-recording of it is a more intimate treatment with just Dion, a guitar and strings along with atmospheric backing vocals arranged and performed by Robert Florczak. “I wanted it in the set,” Dion explains, referring to the album’s setlist concept. “If I do a set, then ‘Abraham, Martin, and John’ has to be there, so I did it for that reason. And when I gave it to Roy Weisman he said it really struck a chord in him; he said, ‘Dion, this song is 57 years old. There are people who never heard it. I would like to release it as a single.’ And we had David Niles do the video, which is my favorite video I’ve ever done. Now, I tell ya, it seems almost timely for this song, ’cause it’s troubled times. But I didn’t even think of that when we were putting it together. It was never meant to be a political song…. It’s about a state of love and it plays so much into that speech Bobby Kennedy gave back then; he was saying love conquers all if we could understand rather than be understood, or if we could love rather than be loved, all that high-minded stuff. You can’t have cable news thinking like that, because then there’d be no shows.”
He’s also pleased that The Rock ‘N’ Roll Philosopher gives him a chance to revisit guitarist collaborations, which appeared on previous albums.
“I did ‘Cryin’ Shame’ with Sonny Landreth,” Dion says, “and that guy, man, kills me every time. He’s ridiculous. It’s just thrilling. ‘Dancing Girl’ with Mark Knopfler, I love his sound; he just hurls me into a higher reality, another dimension, and it’s just all in his hands. And ‘If You Wanna Rock and Roll’ I did with Eric Clapton. I was totally surprised when I called him to play on his; he wrote me emails telling me how he grew up with my music, and I was like, ‘Wow.’ We became friends and he did this and it was so great; I called him and said, ‘Eric, you sound like you’re 19 on this song.’ He said, ‘I stood up. I wanted to do a good job in the studio.’”
In the meantime, Dion is looking at a proposed documentary that he says might involve a couple of performances back in New York, and he’s keeping tabs on The Wanderer jukebox stage musical, which debuted during 2022 and is now working on further financing to take it to Broadway.
As for another album, Dion says, “I’m always working on something. Like I said, I do like the blues thing; it’s in my head that it grooves and it has a mantra to it. I like that. But when I get my guitar and get in there, whether it’s a Phil Spector or Michael Omartian production, or Wayne Hood or myself, it’s all Dion music. When I did gospel music, it’s all Dion music. If it’s just me and the guitar, without the window trimmings, it’s just Dion music. So whatever I do, that’s what it’ll be — Dion music.”
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The Foo Fighters are gearing up for their next era. After teasing a typically hard-hitting new song earlier this month with a brief fist-pumping instrumental snippet, the veteran Dave Grohl-led band dropped the blistering “Asking For a Friend” single on Thursday morning (Oct. 23).
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The song opens with a gentle guitar figure and Grohl singing, “Save your promises until we meet again/ You can save all your promises until the bitter end/ What is real, I’m asking for a friend/ What is real, I’m asking for a friend.” Then, as is their wont, the loud-quiet-even-louder band explodes into a giant riff mania, with Grohl howling, “Or is this the end?” as the song picks up steam.
Over pounding drums and layers of guitar, Grohl pleads, “Lay your worry down/ Save your promises til we meet again/ Save all your promises until the bitter end,” later wondering, “when you’re alone, am I a part of you?/ Am I a part of you?,” before assuring, “You’re not alone/ I am a part of you/ When I’m apart from you.” The four-and-a-half-minute song’s see-saw journey explodes at the three-minute mark, picking up the pace and launching into a blitz of howling Grohl vocals and a barrage of speed-metal-like riffs as it sprints to a close.
At press time a spokesperson for the band had not returned Billboard‘s request for confirmation that former Nine Inch Nails drummer Ilan Rubin plays on the track, though artwork for the song posted by the band on their Instagram on Wednesday (Oct. 22) included Rubin’s photo alongside the other members.
The dark rocker is a follow-up to the more upbeat previous one-off single, the emotional “Today’s Song,” and, after playing a series of intimate club shows with Rubin, the group also announced the first dates of their 2026 Take Cover stadium tour, their first run of stadium gigs since the 2023-2024 Everything or Nothing at All run.
The tour is slated to kick off on Aug. 4 at Rogers Stadium in Toronto and then hit Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Nashville, Washington, D.C., Fargo, N.D., Regina, Saskatchewan, Edmonton and Vancouver before wrapping up at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. Queens of the Stone Age will open all the dates except for the Fargo stop, with Mannequin Pussy and Gouge Away also lined up to perform on select dates. A release announcing the shows suggested that “many more shows” are on the horizon.
A general on-sale for all shows will launch on Friday (Oct.31) at 10 a.m. local time, with details available here. Fans can sign up for an artist pre-sale now through Sunday (Oct. 26) at 11:59 PT.
In a lengthy Substack post announcing the shows and the new song, Grohl wrote about finding inspiration for the track while in Japan staring at the majestic, cloud-shrouded Mt. Fuji. “As the clouds slowly clear and life comes into view, there are many reasons to be grateful. And humbled. I know this and I feel this everyday,” he wrote.
“Since our return to the stage in San Luis Obispo five weeks ago, we have been reminded of why we love and are forever devoted to doing this Foo Fighters thing,” he continued. “From reconnecting as a band and staring at a list of 30 years worth of songs to brush off, to reimagining versions with the incredible blessing of the one and only Ilan Rubin behind the drums, to reuniting with our amazing fans and blasting them with everything we’ve got (no matter the size of the venue) because we would not be here without them, we have the most solid core. And the sun is finally rising over the horizon.”
The post also touched on his long friendship with QOTSA singer/guitarist Josh Homme and the many special moments they’ve had together over the past 33 years as they gear up to rock stages together again. “I have shared some of my life’s most rewarding musical moments with my dear friend, Josh. A lifelong bond that goes far beyond the sound we’ve made together,” Grohl wrote. “So it is with great happiness that we can share this next chapter together with his almighty Queens of the Stone Age.”
Then, seemingly teasing that the band has follow up to their 2023 album But Here We Are in the works, Grohl warned fans to “take cover,” adding, “But none of this would be complete without new music to share from Pat [Smear], Nate [Mendel], Chris [Shiflett], Rami {Jaffee], Ilan and I. ‘Asking for a Friend’ is a song for those who have waited patiently in the cold, relying on hope and faith for their horizon to appear. Searching for ‘proof’ when hanging by a wish until the sun shines again. One of many songs to come.”
Check out the Take Cover Tour poster and listen to “Asking for a Friend” below.
Billboard’s Live Music Summit will be held in Los Angeles on Nov. 3. For tickets and more information, click here.
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Following the death of founding KISS guitarist Ace Frehley last Thursday at age 74, the Morris County, New Jersey medical examiner’s office is conducting a series of exams to determine the rocker’s cause of death. According to TMZ, a rep for the examiner’s office said that though an autopsy was not performed on Frehley’s body, the guitarist know for his on-stage Spaceman persona is undergoing a toxicology screening as well as an external body examination to determine how he died; the final cause of death will not be announced until after the toxicology report is completed, which could take several weeks.
At press time a spokesperson for the medical examiner’s office had not returned Billboard‘s request for confirmation on the TMZ report.
Frehley’s family announced his death last week in a statement, writing, “We are completely devastated and heartbroken. In his last moments, we were fortunate enough to have been able to surround him with loving, caring, peaceful words, thoughts, prayers and intentions as he left this earth. We cherish all of his finest memories, his laughter, and celebrate his strengths and kindness that he bestowed upon others. The magnitude of his passing is of epic proportions, and beyond comprehension. Reflecting on all of his incredible life achievements, Ace’s memory will continue to live on forever!”
At the time, TMZ reported that Frehley had been on life support after suffering a brain bleed following a fall at home several weeks earlier. The rock star had canceled a planned performance at the Antelope Valley Fair in Lancaster, California, after suffering what at the time was described as a “minor fall … resulting in a trip to the hospital.” A statement on his Instagram at the time said Frehley was “fine, but against his wishes, his doctor insists that he refrain from travel at this time.”
Less than two weeks later, Frehley’s team announced that he would be canceling all of his remaining appearances for this year “due to some ongoing medical issues.”
Frehley co-founded KISS in 1973 in New York along with singer/guitarist Paul Stanley, basist/singer Gene Simmons and drummer/singer Peter Criss. He remained a core member of the greasepaint rockers’ lineup through 1982 and later returned for the band’s blockbuster reunion tour in 1996, staying on through 2002.
The group known for their elaborate, glittery costumes, character makeup and bombastic rock anthems released some of its most successful albums during Frehley’s tenure, including 1977’s Love Gun and Alive II, both of which charted in the top 10 of the Billboard 200.
“We are devastated by the passing of Ace Frehley,” read a post from the band following Frehley’s death. “He was an essential and irreplaceable rock soldier during some of the most formative foundational chapters of the band and its history. He is and will always be a part of KISS’s legacy. Our thoughts are with Jeanette, Monique and all those who loved him, including our fans around the world.”
KISS will be honored at the 2025 Kennedy Center Honors taping on Dec. 7 — and airing Dec. 23 on CBS — with Frehley becoming be just the third person to receive the honor posthumously.
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Courtney Barnett is back on our screens and behind the wheel once again with “Stay In Your Lane.”
The celebrated Australian singer and songwriter was the musical guest Wednesday (Oct. 22) on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where she roused night owls with her new single.
“Stay In Your Lane” (via Mom+Pop Music) is a blast of ‘90s-leaning indie rock, and is Barnett’s first new material since the 2023 instrument LP End Of The Day and her first new lyrical piece since the 2021 album Things Take Time, Take Time, which cracked the Billboard 200 chart, debuted in the top 40 on the Official U.K. Chart, and impacted the top 10 in her homeland.
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“Gotta get this off my chest” she chants in the chorus, leading a full band. “This never would’ve happened if I stayed in my lane, stayed the same way.”
Watch Barnett’s late night performance of “Stay In Your Lane” below.
The Grammy Award-nominated Melbourne artist has been quietly revving up her full-scale return to the stage with a string of intimate shows at Levon Helm Studios and in Joshua Tree, and a date booked next month at Odeon Theatre in Hobart, Tasmania.
Barnett emerged in the 2010s as one of Australia’s finest indie exports. Her debut full-length album from 2015, Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit, peaked at No. 4 in Australia, and blasted into the top 20 in the United Kingdom and the United States, and won the Australian Music Prize, awarded to the best Australian album, regardless of critical success; along with a trio of ARIA Awards and a nomination for best international female at the BRIT Awards. Then, her solo follow-up from 2018, Tell Me How You Really Feel, cracked the top 10 in the United Kingdom, led several Billboard charts and peaked at No. 22 on the Billboard 200.
A collaborative project with Kurt Vile, 2017’s Lotta Sea Lice, was another success story, reaching No. 5 in Australia, No. 11 in the U.K., and No. 51 in the U.S.
There’s no word yet on when that next, fourth solo studio album will see the light of day.
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The Cult have announced that they will be taking a hiatus following the conclusion of their current North American tour.
In a statement shared with Billboard by frontman Ian Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, the band announced that they’d be taking a long break from touring to focus on other creative endeavors.
“Mother Nature has a cycle of change and evolution that is inevitable,” the statement began. “The moon’s phases change, tides rise and fall. Change is necessary for creation and rebirth. It is with this in mind that, following the remaining dates on our current North American The Cult/Death Cult 8525 Tour, we have decided to step away from touring for an undetermined amount of time. We have toured extensively over the last few years and we shall now shift our focus to writing, recording new music, and exploring other projects that shall be revealed over time. It is a time for us to turn inward to recharge our spiritual batteries.”
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The Cult went on to add that they have five more shows left in their tour, and that they look forward to celebrating them with their fans.
“When we return to the stage, it shall be with an even stronger fire and energy that we will share with all of you. Ours is a communal bond, and it will not be broken, simply paused. Until then, we have five remaining shows on this current tour, culminating at The Shrine in Los Angeles on Oct 30. Please join us for what has been an incredible celebration of 40 years of The Cult and Death Cult.”
Additionally, Astbury and Duffy shared their own individual comments at the end of the statement.
“It’s been a beautiful three years celebrating our music with The Cult family around the world. Now it’s time to go home and spend time with our own families, and create some new music,” Billy wrote.
Meanwhile, Ian added, “My deepest gratitude to all who attended and immersed themselves in our world. I am deeply grateful to be connected to our Cult family as we ready ourselves for our final five shows for some time, and we take the opportunity to dive deeper into our next creative adventures. More shall be revealed. Blessings to you all.”
Founded in 1983 under the name Death Cult, the British group shortened their name to The Cult in January 1984. The British rock group have dropped 11 studio albums, with their most recent, Under the Midnight Sun, arriving back in 2022.
Read the full statement on their Instagram below.
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Just days after the death of Limp Bizkit co-founder bassist Sam Rivers at age 48 of undisclosed causes, TMZ is reporting that a spokesperson for St. Johns County, Florida Fire Rescue said they responded to a call on Saturday (Oct. 18) for a “nonresponsive person in cardiac arrest.”
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At press time no official cause of death had been announced and the gossip site added that a spokesperson for the St. Johns County Sheriff’s office said that deputies responded to what is referred to as an “attended death” at Rivers’ address, meaning a call in which the deceased was a patient under medical care for a serious or life-threatening illness likely to result in a near-term death.
Billboard reached out to the St. Johns Country Fire Rescue and Sheriff’s offices — as well as Limp Bizkit’s spokesperson — for comment, but had not heard back at press time.
Rivers, 48, was diagnosed with liver disease in 2011 due to excessive drinking and received a liver transplant in 2017 after taking a temporary leave from the nu-metal band in 2015, before returning in 2018.
Singer Fred Durst posted an emotional tribute to Rivers on Monday saying, “it’s so tragic he’s not here now” and admitting that he’d gone through “gallons and gallons of tears since yesterday and I’m thinking, ‘my God, Sam’s a legend,’ you know? He did it. He lived it.” Earlier, the band — which also features guitarist Wes Borland, DJ Lethal and drummer John Otto — released a joint statement paying tribute to their beloved compatriot.
“Sam Rivers wasn’t just our bass player — he was pure magic,” the group said. “The pulse beneath every song, the calm in the chaos, the soul in the sound. From the first note we ever played together, Sam brought a light and a rhythm that could never be replaced. His talent was effortless, his presence unforgettable, his heart enormous.”
At press time it appeared the band planned to carry on with its planned late 2025 Gringo Papi South American tour dates, which will resume on Nov. 29 at Explanada del Estadio Banorte in Mexico City before moving on to Costa Rica, Colombia, Peru, Chile and Argentina before winding down on Dec. 20 in Sao Paulo, Brazil; no replacement for Rivers has been announced yet.
Billboard’s Live Music Summit will be held in Los Angeles on Nov. 3. For tickets and more information click here.
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The government has been shut down for more than three weeks, the president just took a wrecking ball to the White House and more than 40 million Americans are potentially a month away from losing their food assistance unless Congress acts soon. Those scenarios, and many more, are why frequent Donald Trump antagonist and punk prodder Ken Casey says we need to focus on the real problems in the country, not who is performing the halftime show at next year’s Super Bowl.
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The Dropkick Murphys lead singer is the latest artist to fully back Bad Bunny‘s booking for what is traditionally one of the most-watched televised musical performances of the year, telling Rolling Stone that he hadn’t really listened to the global superstar’s music, but became a fan after watching Benito chew up the scenery in Happy Gilmore 2.
“I will go to the mat for that guy,” Casey said of his support for Bad Bunny in the wake of his hilarious turn in the cameo-packed Adam Sandler sequel. “God bless his heart. He is a true, true American” he added of the Puerto Rican singer who is an American citizen. The latter comment was a pointed asterisk seemingly aimed at the many MAGA supporters and Trump administration figures who have bashed the Benito booking, including Sec. of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, who has threatened a heavy ICE presence at the Feb. 8 game in Santa Clara, Calif.
“[This administration] just wants to control everything, every narrative,” Casey said of Trump 2.0. “There’s way bigger problems in the world than who is at the halftime show at the Super Bowl,” warning that, “if you don’t get involved now, you might lose your chance to get involved.” The latter comment came after an estimated seven million Americans turned out over the weekend for massive “No Kings” protests across the country decrying the authoritarian actions of the current administration.
Casey was also speaking out to shine a light on his drive to mobilize the punk community to join him in supporting Home of the Brave, a nonprofit founded by former Republicans to speak out against the Trump administration and lend a voice to those whose lives have “been directly harmed” by its actions.
The singer will join the org’s advisory board, taking his place alongside board members including frequent Trump antagonist George Conway, former Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn and D.C. Metro Police Dept. officer Michael Fanone (who was injured in the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the Capitol by Trump supporters), former Obama National Security Advisor Susan Rice and former Trump 1.0 deputy press secretary Sarah Matthews.
In a video announcing his board membership, Casey says, “I’m so outspoken about what Trump’s doing to America because I have a platform, the band has a platform,” noting that the Murphys’ message of support for worker’s rights and social injustice has been consistent over 30 years. “If we’ve been outspoken even in times nowhere near as drastic as this, why would we not step up our level of activism as the stakes raise?”
Casey admits that speaking out against Trump has probably cost the band fans, but expressed hope that maybe things will “come around” some day, adding that he’s not afraid to call out the silence from other bands because if the Murphys can influence one band, or 10 fans, or 100 fans, to change their minds the movement could gain critical mass.
The Murphys have definitely not been shy about their feelings about their dislike for Trump, dedicating their single “First Class Loser” to the former reality star in July during a Warped Tour show in Long Beach, Calif. where they played videos tying the President to teen sex trafficker Jeffery Epstein. Earlier this year the singer also called out a fan for waving around a “true Nazi edition” MAGA hat at one of their St. Patrick’s Day shows in Boston in March, then slamming “rat and a coward” Trump against just weeks later.
The right-wing mediasphere and the Trump White House have been lashing out about the Bunny booking, with former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski calling the pick “shameful,” and Trump dubbing it “absolutely ridiculous.” Amidst the ongoing government shutdown, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson took time to say that tapping Benito was a “terrible decision,” while claiming that the reggaeton megastar who is tied with Taylor Swift for having the most No. 1s on the Billboard Global 200 of any solo artist as lacking appeal to a “broader audience.”
Jim Kerr and Charlie Burchill have been playing music together for some 48 years, most of them in Simple Minds. Kerr assures us that familiarity has bred fondness; he even says the “parallel story” in the band’s 2023 documentary Everything Is Possible is “the friendship of Charlie and I, which is quite remarkable because usually in long-working relationships in music people hate each other after 20 years. But Charlie and I still go on. There’s a great friendship there.”
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Despite that, Kerr tells Billboard that it’s not always a lovefest between frontman and guitarist, either, as Simple Minds is in the midst of its first full-scale North American tour in seven years. “We’re still able to have our rows and our fights. We’re not always on the same page,” Kerr acknowledges, adding with a laugh that, “We had a screaming match last week and everyone around us…. First of all they said, ‘I’ve never heard such a f–kin’ intense screaming match,’ so afterwards Charlie and I felt embarrassed. Y’know, usually it’s not even (about) a thing. You’re not on the same page, and it’s frustrating. Someone will just say the wrong word, and it triggers.
“But here’s the good news; at the end of the day there’s no scars, no wounds. We get up the next day and everything is fine. How amazing that we’re still so passionate about it. How amazing that we still care. How amazing we’re in the rehearsal room, trying to make it as great as it can be for our audience, and how amazing the next day we go to breakfast with each other.”
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During its current trek, whose U.S. leg wraps up Saturday (June 22 in Noblesville, Ind.), Kerr, Churchill and the latest incarnation of Simple Minds have been supporting their new concert album — Live in the City of Diamonds, which came out in April — and the 40th anniversary of an eventful 1985 that included: the Billboard Hot 100-topping single “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” from the hit film The Breakfast Club; a performance at Live Aid that summer; and the band’s best-selling studio album, Once Upon a Time, which came out that fall.
“It was beautiful,” Kerr recalls. “It was so unexpected in a sense. You had the movie, you had the song, Live Aid, MTV, ‘Alive & Kicking’ [a No. 3 Hot 100 hit], the Once Upon a Time album itself…and lo and behold, 40 years later we’re still here talking about it. That’s what 1985 felt like to us.”
Simple Minds was famously ambivalent about recording “Don’t You (Forget About Me),” which was written by producer Keith Forsey and Steve Schiff for the John Hughes-directed film. The group had already planned to make an aggressive assault on the U.S. market in the wake of its 1984 album Sparkle in the Rain and was confident “we had songs up our sleeve” for what would become Once Upon a Time.
“Then out of nowhere these phone calls start to come in about this movie, and the record company thinks it would be a good thing to bridge to the next album,” Kerr recalls. “We were like, ‘Yeah, we want to do it,’ then ‘Oh, hang on a minute. They want us to record someone else’s song? That’s not what we do; we’re credible artists. We write our own songs, and we’ve got some good ones in the pipeline, so we’re not sure about that.’ But after meeting the people involved we decided to do it.”
The key, Kerr adds, was that his band found a way to make the song its own. “I’m not taking anything away from the song and Keith and the guys who came up with the music. You can find the demo of the song online; it’s a good little song. But Simple Minds, what we brought to it was 10 years of playing live, and we put our heart and soul into it and we put our lifeblood into the record. It would’ve been a different song if OMD did it, or the Psychedelic Furs — it would’ve been a different record, rather. So it’s not our song, but it is our record.”
Simple Minds will follow the North American tour with a jaunt through Europe, starting June 27 at home in Glasgow, where the band plans to play Once Upon a Time in its entirety. That trek wraps up July 27 in Italy, after which Simple Minds plans to return to working on a new studio album — the follow-up to 2022’s Direction of the Heart — which Kerr, Burchill and company began working on before hitting the road.
“We’ve got a whole bunch of songs up our sleeves,” Kerr says. “They’re not finished yet, but the backing tracks are down, the rough mixes. So we’re excited. People might say, ‘What’s the impetus?’ because obviously records don’t sell like they used to and there’s a limited appeal for new stuff no matter whether you’re Bruce Springsteen or whoever you are. But this is who we are. This is what we do. It just goes on. It’s all about creativity and you have it in you and you’ve got to get it out. That’s the same now as it’s ever been, and for us every time you do something new you’re still using those muscles. It’s like a chapter to a book; it seems to refresh the rest of the story and stops you from calcifying.”
