Speed .

The post Speed Stroke’s fourth album ‘Damage Control’ available on August 21st first appeared on Sleaze Roxx.

KINGDOM OF GIANTS return with the video for new single RESPAWN. Buckle up because you are about to get throttled. The track boasts thick grooves, buzzsaw riffs, and pulses with kind of raw kinetic energy that could power an entire continent. The song marks the start of a thrilling new chapter for the California band, […]

Brisbane emo rock outfit Bad Neighbour today unveil their sophomore album, Burns From The X-rays, out everywhere today via Ninth Life Records. For vocalist Cooper Riley, the band’s second album reflects a season of change and the uneasy territory between youth and adulthood: “In general, the album is one big love song. The good parts […]

Warren Haynes has released a new live recording of “Shakedown Street,” offering fans another preview of his upcoming symphonic album, Dreams & Songs.

The track, a reimagined orchestral version of the Grateful Dead classic, follows the recent release of Gov’t Mule’s “Banks of the Deep End” from the same project. An official release date and pre-order information for Dreams & Songs have not yet been announced.

Recorded in 2019 at the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium in Haynes’ hometown of Asheville, North Carolina, Dreams & Songs captures the debut performance of his Dreams & Songs symphonic show. The concert featured Haynes alongside the 64-piece Asheville Symphony Orchestra and a backing band that included bassist Oteil Burbridge, keyboardist John Medeski, drummer Jeff Sipe, saxophonist Greg Osby, and background vocalists Edwin McCain and Jasmine Muhammad.

“‘Shakedown Street’ is a really powerful orchestrated arrangement that enhances the power of the original, which I played and sang a ton of times with those guys through the years, especially with Phil Lesh and Friends, but with The Dead as well,” shares Haynes. “It’s a very danceable song. A lot of people just focus on the groove and get lost in the rhythmic quality of it. The orchestra forces you to pay attention to it in a different way. It’s very dark and powerful and, I think, very effective. This song goes back to the Jerry Garcia Symphonic Celebration, which was my first experience with an orchestra. That’s kind of what started this whole journey for me, which is still going on.”

The 16-track collection spans Haynes’ extensive career, featuring material from Gov’t Mule, the Allman Brothers Band, The Dead, his solo catalog, and more.

Haynes will bring his Dreams & Songs Symphonic Experience to Nashville’s Schermerhorn Symphony Center for two performances on March 11 and 12, 2027. Presented by Lightning 100, the concerts will feature John Medeski, Kevin Scott, Terence Higgins, Greg Osby, vocalists Saundra Williams and Mayteana Morales, and conductor Rich Daniels of the Chicago City Lights Orchestra.

In the meantime, Haynes remains active with Gov’t Mule. The band is currently preparing for its summer Kicking In Your Stall Tour, followed by a co-headlining run with Joe Bonamassa from July 22 through August 23. Gov’t Mule will also embark on the newly announced Dreaming The Same Dream Tour with Ziggy Marley this fall. The 16-date outing begins September 23 in New York City and concludes October 17 in Dallas.

Additionally, Haynes is scheduled to perform a special set at the Hudson River Music Festival in Croton-on-Hudson, New York, on June 21 alongside Grahame Lesh and Daniel Donato.

Dreams & Songs Track Listing

Dreams and Songs (Part One)
Dreams
Banks of the Deep End
Spots of Time
Broken Promised Land
Thorazine Shuffle
Makes No Difference
Terrapin Station
Raven Black Night
Just Another Rider
Black Peter
Instrumental Illness
One
Shakedown Street
Whipping Post
Dreams and Songs (Reprise)

The post Warren Haynes reveals “Shakedown Street” orchestra arrangement appeared first on Blues Rock Review.

It’s an intergalactic endeavor

The marriage of metal and symphonic music has come a long way since Celtic Frost’s Into The Pandemonium set the blueprint that would give rise to an entire mass movement in the late 90s. Many might point to the famed 1999 collaboration of Metallica and the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra known affectionately as S&M as the pinnacle of this phenomenon in the public’s consciousness, though it would still be the tip of a gargantuan ice berg that is continually seeming new acts and seasoned veterans alike getting in on the action.

Case in point, French Canadian thrash metal innovators turned progressive metal trailblazers Voivod, who have struck pure sonic pay dirt with their own take on mixing their avant-garde take on riff-driven aggression to the classical concert hall. Interestingly enough, the brilliant synchronicity established between the quartet and the Quebec Symphony Orchestra, aptly titled Symphonique, offers up a sonic tapestry of cinematic brilliance that runs mostly parallel to the stylistic character of what Celtic Frost accomplished nearly 40 years prior, if not functions as the logical conclusion of it.

The selection of material adapted for this endeavor from Voivod’s extensive catalog touches upon each of their various incarnations, going all the way back to their 1984 thrash debut War And Pain, itself a far cry from where their sound would be even before the conclusion of the same decade. Yet the entire 72-minute performance is an exercise in pure cohesion and seamless transitions from one auditory chapter to the next, almost as if the band had been gradually composing a soundtrack for the same elaborate space drama that has finally seen its premiere after more than 40 years.

It speaks to a band that was pushing the envelope from the very beginning, well before 1989’s Nothingface saw them progressing to the point of finding themselves in a different stylistic galaxy, and the combined efforts of founding members Snake and Away with that of newer fellow travelers Chewy and Rocky reveal a band that works as a singular, precision-based unit even while in the midst of a sea of symphonic add-ons.

The integration of a full symphonic orchestra into the equation is no mere peripheral gimmick, but a highly consequential hybridization of color and timbre that takes the original versions of each song and morphs them into something far more epic in scope. The dense layers of singing strings and woodwinds, thunderous percussion, and blaring brass do not fight with Chewy’s thrashing riffs or Away’s double-kick happy drumming for prominence, but wrap around them like a magical cloak and bring the implicit science fiction and philosophical themes behind Snake’s gruff vocalizations into full focus.

Whether it be the transitional progressive thrashing power of offerings off 1988’s Dimension Haltross like the opening fanfare of “Experiment” and the speeding fury of “Cosmic Drama”, or the more old school mid-80s aggression of “Nuclear War” off the debut and “Forgotten Space” off of 1987’s Killing Technology, the arrangement acts as one world-conquering juggernaut, though it is curious to note that the latter two early era anthems see the orchestra accenting the impact of the riffs like a collective second guitarist much of the time, while the atmosphere of the more progressive material has a denser and more cosmic demeanor.

In much the same fashion as the original studio run of this outfit in the 80s would suggest, the most overtly ambitious arrangements of this performance have been reserved for the material off of their revolutionary stylistic pivot, Nothingface. Be it the melodically consonant and rhythmically multifaceted up-tempo triumph of “The Unknown Knows” or the spacey and atmospherically rich mini-epic entry “Into My Hypercube”, the latter being one of bassist Rocky’s moments to step up to the foreground, the orchestral element functions far less as a bolstering element and more as a partner in weaving a truly spellbinding collection of otherworldly tales.

By the same token, the dissonant mishmash entry “Pre-Ignition” and Voivod’s signature cover of Pink Floyd’s “Astronomy Domine” really underscore the unique, avant-garde character of where this band was pushing things at around the same time that Dream Theater and Fates Warning were starting to make waves. This is reflected in the few newer songs to make this performance like the long-winded intergalactic slough “The End Of Dormancy” and the technically charged fit of interstellar chaos “Holographic Thinking”, which definitely go the furthest in exploiting the orchestra’s sonic possibilities while also seeing the core band at their more virtuosic.

Symphonique is far from a typical live album, so much so that one might almost think it a collection of studio re-recordings were it not for the intermittent crowd sounds. It is built upon tight, precision-based, and powerful performances that reveal a passion for the craft that is still a rarity even as the ranks of progressive metal have continued to swell, largely in response to the very same astounding compositional feats that broke the mold decades ago and have since found their way to this present form.

The experience that it offers is, if nothing else, an immersive one that will surely conjure up grand battle scenes among the stars that parallel every feat of Sci-Fi cinema and television since the days of the original Star Trek series. Some live albums can transport the listener directly into the concert hall where the performance originally occurred, but Symphonique is the sort that will take them to a place beyond the confines of this world.

Release Date: June 5th, 2026
Record Label: Century Media Records
Genre: Progressive Metal

Musicians:

• Snake / Vocals
• Away / Drums
• Rocky / Bass
• Chewy / Guitars

Symphonique Track-list:

1. Experiment (Symphonique Live)
2. Holographic Thinking (Symphonique Live)
3. The Unknown Knows (Symphonique Live)
4. The End of Dormancy (Symphonique Live)
5. Into My Hypercube (Symphonique Live)
6. Forgotten in Space (Symphonique Live)
7. Cosmic Drama (Symphonique Live)
8. Pre-Ignition (Symphonique Live)
9. Nuclear War (Symphonique Live)
10. Fall (Symphonique Live)
11. Tribal Convictions (Symphonique Live)
12. Astronomy Domine (Symphonique Live) (Pink Floyd Cover)

Order the album here.

The post VOIVOD – Symphonique (Album Review) appeared first on Sonic Perspectives.

Even on a struggling Las Vegas Raiders team that finished 2025 with the league’s worst record, Crosby kept showing up like a problem offensive coordinators couldn’t solve.

The post Maxx Crosby Trade Proposal Pairs Him With Longtime Raiders Rival appeared first on Audio Ink Radio.

Albert Castiglia has announced the release of his new studio album, Grits & Glory, due out via Gulf Coast Records on July 31. The album was recorded at the legendary Abbey Road Studios in London and marks another chapter in the multiple Blues Music Award winner and Billboard No. 1 artist’s career.

According to Castiglia, the project represents a return to some of the earliest influences that shaped his musical journey.

“Coming up playing in Chicago and down the East Coast defined my playing style and my take on the blues. But at the same time, I love the back and forth within the blues from America to the UK and back again, both places have had their own impact,” Castiglia said.

The idea for the album began during a 2023 European tour when Castiglia and Gulf Coast Records’ Olly Overton discussed the possibility of recording in the United Kingdom. The concept eventually evolved into a project that reflects both Castiglia’s musical influences and his personal reflections on the world around him.

“There is a lot of noise in America right now,” said Castiglia. “I wanted to step out of all that, give myself room for contemplation. Cutting this record in England allowed me to do that.”

Castiglia recorded the album with his touring band, bassist Cliff Moore and drummer Ray Hangen, marking the first studio recording from the current lineup of the Albert Castiglia Band. Longtime collaborator Dave Gross produced the album after previously working with Castiglia on Solid Ground.

Before entering Abbey Road Studios, Castiglia spent time exploring locations that influenced many of his musical heroes, including a visit to Birmingham, England, where he walked the streets associated with Black Sabbath and guitarist Tony Iommi. The visit took on added significance following the recent passing of Ozzy Osbourne.

The resulting album features 11 tracks and showcases what Castiglia describes as a blend of his American blues roots and the British blues tradition that helped shape generations of guitarists. The record closes with a version of the Beatles classic “Yer Blues.”

TRACK LISTING

In My America
I’m Afraid to Fall Asleep
Uncertainty
Michigan Avenue
Sack The Juggler
Slumlord Billionaire
The Milk Is Still Good
Don’t Burn Down The Bridge
When The Coin Came Callin’
Afro Blue
Yer Blues

The post Albert Castiglia announces “Grits & Glory” appeared first on Blues Rock Review.

Alternative metal and hard rock fusion outfit Storage 24 are gearing up to release their emotionally charged new single, “No Surrender”, which is set to drop on all major streaming platforms on 11th June. The upcoming track delivers an authentic blend of explosive guitar work, driving rhythms, and deeply personal lyricism. At its core, “No … Continue reading Storage 24 strike back with powerful new rock anthem “No Surrender”

The post Every Other Weekend Resolution Review appeared first on Edgar Allan Poets – Noir Rock Band.

July 3 sees the release of one of the most anticipated live albums of the metal year, a full all-format release for Live From The Guild Theatre, recorded almost exactly one year earlier at the onstage launch of L.A. Guns’ most acclaimed album in years, the mighty Leopard Skin.

Rockpit.net described Leopard Skin as “a hook-filled, melody-drenched delight—perfectly mixed and balanced from start to finish. If you’re a diehard rocker who still worships the ’80s glory days, this one’s for you. But don’t get it twisted: this isn’t some nostalgic retread. L.A. Guns aren’t stuck in the past—they’ve evolved naturally, delivering a record that feels fresh while staying true to their roots.”

MetalPlanetMusic.com said the Guns are “still churning out bangers,” and Maximumvolumemusic.com applauded them for still having “a way of sounding filthy.”  In fact, that review continued, “The best thing about L.A. Guns is how unapologetic they are, and ‘Hit and Run’ nails it. ‘We’re just having fun,’ sneers [vocalist Phil Lewis], as only he can.”

It nails it here, too, sliding in between “Hellraisers Ball” and “Like A Drug,” but Live From The Guild Theatre is explosive from start to finish, the Gunners firing off killer versions of fan favorites tracing as far back as the band’s debut album – “Sex Action,” for example, probably hasn’t featured in the repertoire since the eighties, but it’s alive and kickin’ here.

Sophomore set Cocked and Loaded, meanwhile, spits out some of the most powerful shotgun blasts in the band’s entire arsenal – “I Wanna Be Your Man,” “The Ballad of Jayne,” “Rip and Tear,” and the set-ender, “Never Enough.”  And Leopard Skin gets both a triumphant airing and a delirious response.

In fact, longtime vocalist Phil Lewis and the man who put the Guns in L.A. Guns, Tracii Guns, have never sounded better – quite an achievement for a band that’s been tearing up the stages of the world since 1983!  Ace Von Johnson (guitar), Johnny Martin (bass) and Shawn Duncan (drums) complete the line-up.

The first single from the album, “Electric Gypsy” which is now available to stream and download HERE, is another from the self-titled debut, and it sounds as fresh now as it did way back then…drop it into your streaming playlist and it won’t simply wake up the neighbors, it’ll have them hammering on your door, demanding to know what you’re listening to.

Yes, you’ll tell them it’s L.A. Guns – who else could it be?  But you can also tell them that it’s not only coming out on CD and vinyl, but there’s a DVD and a cassette.

 

CD/DVD/VINYL/CASSETTE: https://cleorecs.com/search?q=l.a.+guns+live+from+the+guild+theatre

DIGITAL: https://orcd.co/laguns_livefromtheguildtheatre

Here’s the track listing for LIVE FROM THE GUILD THEATRE:

1. Intro – Taste It
2. Cannonball
3. Electric Gypsy
4. Sex Action
5. Hellraisers Ball
6. Hit and Run
7. Like a Drug
8. Speed
9. One More Reason
10. Theremin Jam
11. Over the Edge
12. Guitar Solo
13. I Wanna Be Your Man
14. Lucky Motherfucker
15. Never Enough
16. The Ballad of Jayne
17. Rip and Tear

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The post L.A. GUNS Bring The “Electric Gypsy” Back From The Guild Theatre With New ‘Live From The Guild Theatre’ Album Out July 3 appeared first on The Rockpit.