Glenn Hughes has announced his first album in nine years. The former Trapeze/Deep Purple/Black Sabbath/Hughes-Thrall/Gary Moore/California Breed/Dead Daisies singer and bassist and current Black Country Communion frontman will release his 14th solo album Chosen on September 5 via Frontiers Music.
“Songwriting is deeply personal to me, and l generally write and record when I have something to say,” says Hughes. “It’s been nine years since I recorded my last solo album, Resonate. There have been recordings and collaborations with other artists since 2016”.
“When writing Chosen, I went back to my life drawing board, writing about the human condition, love, hope, faith and acceptance. I write about how I feel on the inside and not externally. My life is lived from within, in the present moment. It’s an album of soul food, and I’ve never been so grateful, right here, on planet Earth. Music is the healer!”
Hughes has also released a video for the album’s title track, which is embedded below. Joining Hughes on Chosen are guitarist Soren Andersen, drummer Ash Sheehan, and Bob Fridzema on keyboards.
Hughes will embark on The Chosen Years Tour on September 2 at De Boerderij in Zoetermeer, The Netherlands. The run of shows reaches the UK in mid-October and wraps up in South America in November. Full dates below.
Hughes is currently on the road in Europe with Black Country Communion. The band also play France’s Hellfest in July, where Hughes has been invited to join the SatchVai Band onstage,
Glenn Hughes – “Chosen” – Official Video – YouTube
Voice In My Head My Alibi Chosen Heal In The Golden The Lost Parade Hot Damn Thing Black Cat Moan Come And Go Into The Fade
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(Image credit: Frontiers Music)
Glenn Hughes: The Chosen Years Tour 2025
Sep 02: Zoetermeer De Boerderij, The Netherlands Sep 04: Hamburg Fabrik, Germany Sep 06: Neuruppin Kulturhaus Stadtgarten, Germany Sep 08: Krakow Klub Studio, Poland Sep 10: Warsaw Progresja, Poland Sep 12: Dresden Alter Schlachthof, Germany Sep 14: Lindau Club Vaudeville, Germany Sep 16: Nuremberg Hirsch, Germany Sep 17: Augsburg Spectrum, Germany Sep 19: Maastricht Muziekgieterij, Netherlands Sep 20: Nijmegen Doornroosje, Netherlands Sep 22: Mannheim Capitol, Germany Sep 24: Pratteln Z7, Switzerland Sep 26: Hamar Festiviteten Bar & Scene, Norway Sep 28: Trondheim Byscenen, Norway Sep 30: Hyvinkää Hyvinkääsali, Finland Oct 01: Tampere Tampere-Talo, Finland Oct 03: Helsinki Kulttuuritalo, Finland Oct 04: Oulu Madetojansali, Finland Oct 14: Bristol O2 Academy, UK Oct 15: Portsmouth Guildhall, UK Oct 17: Wolverhampton KK’s Steel Mill, UK Oct 18: London O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, UK Oct 21: Manchester O2 Ritz, UK Oct 22: Newcastle Boiler Shop, UK Oct 24: Nottingham Rock City, UK Oct 25: Glasgow The Garage, UK Nov 11: Porto Alegre Opinião, Brazil Nov 13: Belo Horizonte Mister Rock, Brazil Nov 14: Rio De Janeiro Circo Voador, Brazil Nov 16: São Paulo Vip Station, Brazil Nov 18: Curitiba Tork n’ Roll, Brazil Nov 20: Mar Del Plata Abbey Road, Argentina Nov 21: Buenos Aires Arena Sur, Argentina Nov 23: Córdoba Club Paraguay, Argentina Nov 25: Salta Teatro del Huerto, Argentina Nov 27: Santiago Teatro Coliseo, Chile Nov 29: Bogota Teatro C.E.G, Colombia
Online Editor at Louder/Classic Rock magazinesince 2014. 39 years in music industry, online for 26. Also bylines for: Metal Hammer, Prog Magazine, The Word Magazine, The Guardian, The New Statesman, Saga, Music365. Former Head of Music at Xfm Radio, A&R at Fiction Records, early blogger, ex-roadie, published author. Once appeared in a Cure video dressed as a cowboy, and thinks any situation can be improved by the introduction of cats. Favourite Serbian trumpeter: Dejan Petrović.
It’s Prog‘s brand new Tracks Of The Week! Six brand new and diverse slices of progressively inclined music for you to enjoy.
A massive well done to young UK prog rockers Ihlo whose brand new single, Empire, won a very close run race last week. They beat off competition from Nad Sylvan and with Prog‘s own Grace Hayhurst coming in third.
The premise for Tracks Of The Week is simple – we’ve collated a batch of new releases by bands falling under the progressive umbrella, and collated them together in one post for you – makes it so much easier than having to dip in and out of various individual posts, doesn’t it?
The idea is to watch the videos (or listen if it’s a stream), enjoy (or not) and also to vote for your favourite in the voting form at the bottom of this post. Couldn’t be easier, could it?
We’ll be bringing you Tracks Of The Week, as the title implies, each week. Next week we’ll update you with this week’s winner and present a host of new prog music for you to enjoy.
If you’re a band and you want to be featured in Prog‘s Tracks Of The Week, send your video (as a YouTube link) or track embed, band photo and biog to us here.
WE LOST THE SEA – EVERYTHING HERE IS BLACK AND BLINDING
Kicking this week off with something cheery! Seven minutes plus of dark Australian post-rock from Sydney sextet We Lost The Sea. Taken from A Single Flower, the band’s first new album for six years, which is released through Dunk Records in Europe on July 4. The accompanying video for Everything Here Is Black And Blinding is actually the band’s first-ever music video.
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“This is technically We Lost The Sea’s first proper music video,” the band say. “It’s always been a challenge to try and make videos for songs as long as we write. So when we landed on this seven-minute banger, we decided to go for it. We enlisted the help of our friend, and fellow Bird’s Robe band dad, Simeon (SEIMS, Birdman), who is a TV guy by trade, to help us put this together.
“He and the team did an incredible job and made it look like a million bucks (definitely did not cost a million bucks). The video follows a sole protagonist (the very talented Emma Dunstan) who dances and writhes her way around a cursed space to outrun her inner demons, only to embrace the darkness in the end. To tie it in to the wider theme of the album, it references inspiration from Frida Kahlo, a revolutionary, artist and somewhat cursed individual herself.
“This song is meant to be a protest, a war cry against evil. It has two distinct halves that transition from dark to light, which brings it into the world that we’ve created for the new record.”
We Lost The Sea – Everything Here is Black and Blinding (official video) – YouTube
The King Crimson guitraist and vocalist gets all introspective with his latest single, I Told You So, from his upcoming solo album, Son Of Glen, which he releases through InsideOut Music on June 27. The album serves as a companion piece of sorts to his acclaimed memoir Who’s The Boy With The Lovely Hair, which was released in October 2024, and explores many of the themes and the subjects that the book touches upon.
“The song is about confronting and understanding childhood trauma does not, necessarily, make the innate feeling those events created disappear,” Jakko explains. “I finally discovered who my father was after decades of fruitless searching.
“This was only 3 years ago. Turns out he was a US airman stationed in England in the 50’s who went back to the States and that he died when I would have been 14.”
Jakko M. Jakszyk – I Told You So (OFFICIAL AUDIO) – YouTube
Canadian cellist Raphael Weinroth-Brown gets all moody and atmospheric with his new video for Lifeblood. Probably best known to proggers for his work with Leprous. He follows his previous single, Speed Of Light, with the epic, slightly Eastern vibe of Lifeblood. Expect news of an album soon.
“Lifeblood is dark, yet uplifting; it evokes a sense of fierce determination and bold empowerment,” says Weinroth-Browne. “With this piece I wanted to convey the feeling of abandon and inspiration that artists experience in a flow state, whether during the creative process or on stage. I’ve spent my life chasing these fleeting moments where the music seems to play itself and have attempted to capture this in my performance on Lifeblood.
“I had an absolute blast shooting the music video for this track with Grupa13. As a long-time fan of their work, it was a dream come true to collaborate with them on this project. Despite being on set for 12 hours inside a freezing cold monastery, I thoroughly enjoyed the process, particularly the anvil scenes and the heavy breakdown section at the end. I love the way it all turned out and feel that the video truly encapsulates the overarching theme of this song.”
Trilingual art rocker Gwenno is back with a delightful slice of whimsical psychedelia in Y Gath, the third track thus far to be culled from her upcoming album, Utopia, which she releases through Heavenly Recordings on July 11. Altjhoguh she sings in English for the first time on the new record, here it’s Welsh (she also sings in Cornish too), and Y Gath features a guest appearance from fellow art rocker Cate Le Bon. One for all feline psych fans…
“Y Gath means The Cat,” Gwenno explains. “I just don’t know how I feel about cats, you know? But I also think it’s because I am a cat in many ways. I see myself in these creatures and I’m part envious, part disgusted by them. So it’s a song about cats and birds nodding at you, and the style of the song evolved quite naturally into something very familiar and Welsh. And then when I asked Huw (H Hawkline) and Cate (Le Bon) to be on it, it just made complete sense. We all knew what it needed to be, because we’ve all grown up on S4C and 70s psychedelic rock music, and Welsh language music. So we didn’t need to have a big conversation, we just know what this is about.”
SCHRODINGER – BIRDS AREN’T REAL
French prog metal quartet Schrodinger have enlisted the help of Kin (Nik Barker), vocalist with Australian prog metallers Twelve Foot Ninja for their new track Birds Aren’t Real. The song, inspired by an Internet conspiracy theory as you will glean from the accompanying video, is taken from the band’s upcoming studio album, Starseeidiot, which is due in October.
“It’s a musically intricate piece inspired by the bizarre internet conspiracy theory that claims birds are actually government surveillance drones,” the band say. “Somewhere between metal fusion, groove-laden riffs and eccentric storytelling, the track reflects both our progressive DNA and Kin’s unmistakable charisma.
“This track was just a perfect match for Kin’s voice, so we thought we had to make it happen with Adnane (our singer). We reached out to him, and he was immediately on board. The result is far beyond our expectations.”
Schrodinger – Birds Aren’t Real ft. Nik Barker – YouTube
US prog septet Rocking Horse Music Club, a band unafraid to wear their Genesis influences on their sleeves, go the full hog this time and enlist Genesis royalty in the form of Tony Banks to guest on their new single, The Haunted Life. The song is from the band’s latest album, The Last Pink Glow, an interpretation of Jack Kerouac’s unfinished novella, The Haunted Life, on which the band worked directly with Jim Sampras, the Literary Executor from the Jack Kerouac Estate.
“The video, which is more of a short film than a traditional music video, follows a young writer coming of age in the summer of 1941, as portrayed in Jack Kerouac’s novella, The Haunted Life,” explains RHC’s Brian Coombes. “The video, which stars Alden Harvey as a young Jack Kerouac, was directed by the immensely talented duo of Matt Michaud and Nathan Richer. It was filmed on location in Lowell, Massachusetts.”
Rocking Horse Music Club – The Haunted Life (featuring Tony Banks) (Official Music Video) – YouTube
Lancastrian God-fearing, white-clad rockers Wytch Hazel might not be regulars in Prog, but occasionally they release something that hits the right note. New single Elements is just that. An infectious slice of rock that sounds like Blue Öyster Cult have been jamming with Kansas! It’s taken from Wytch Hazel V: Lamentations, released through Bad Omen Records on July 4.
“Elements is a nod to both 70’s FM radio rock and bands who experimented with interesting and progressive ideas such as BÖC and Kansas,” says vocalist/guitarist Colin Hendra. “Lyrically, I really enjoyed playing around with the concept of weather and how powerful and beyond the control of man it is. It felt like a challenge at the time, and a little out of my comfort zone, but I’m extremely happy with the song as a whole. It feels cohesive now the time has been spent on it”.
Writer and broadcaster Jerry Ewing is the Editor of Prog Magazine which he founded for Future Publishing in 2009. He grew up in Sydney and began his writing career in London for Metal Forces magazine in 1989. He has since written for Metal Hammer, Maxim, Vox, Stuff and Bizarre magazines, among others. He created and edited Classic Rock Magazine for Dennis Publishing in 1998 and is the author of a variety of books on both music and sport, including Wonderous Stories; A Journey Through The Landscape Of Progressive Rock.
(Image credit: The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon)
Turnstile‘s new album, Never Enough, is released today, June 6, and earlier this week the Baltimore hardcore band premiered two songs from the record on The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon.
No strangers to the iconic NBC show, having performed Blackout from Glow On for Fallon in May 2022, Turnstile played I Care and Dull from their new album for the audience gathered in Studio 6B of New York’s Rockefeller Center.
Watch the performance below.
Turnstile: I Care / Dull | The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon – YouTube
Turnstile have received rave reviews for their new record. Writing in Metal Hammer, Stephen Hill predicted, “Turnstile could be sitting on a landmark record, the likes of which this genre has never seen: hardcore’s answer to Nirvana’s Nevermind. If that doesn’t happen with this fourth full-length, then forget it: it never will.
“Never Enough is not just a brilliant album, it’s that rarest of things: an album that feels like it’s going to move the needle and reshape both the perceptions and the ceiling of a genre.”
The quintet begin a tour of Europe tomorrow, June 7, opening the trek with an appearance at the Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona. They will also headline Outbreak fest in London on June 13, and perform at Glastonbury festival on June 29 before returning home to the US. For details of their headline shows in Europe, go here.
Speaking to The Independent recently, Brendan Yates said, “The fact that the band can exist for this long and everyone still deeply loves each other – it feels like a miracle sometimes.”
The latest news, features and interviews direct to your inbox, from the global home of alternative music.
A music writer since 1993, formerly Editor of Kerrang! and Planet Rock magazine (RIP), Paul Brannigan is a Contributing Editor to Louder. Having previously written books on Lemmy, Dave Grohl (the Sunday Times best-seller This Is A Call) and Metallica (Birth School Metallica Death, co-authored with Ian Winwood), his Eddie Van Halen biography (Eruption in the UK, Unchained in the US) emerged in 2021. He has written for Rolling Stone, Mojo and Q, hung out with Fugazi at Dischord House, flown on Ozzy Osbourne’s private jet, played Angus Young’s Gibson SG, and interviewed everyone from Aerosmith and Beastie Boys to Young Gods and ZZ Top. Born in the North of Ireland, Brannigan lives in North London and supports The Arsenal.
Yungblud has announced arena shows in the UK and Ireland for 2026.
The Doncaster-born star, who releases his new album Idols on June 20, will kick off the tour in Dublin on April 15 next year, and visit Leeds, Cardiff, Glasgow, Birmingham and London, before closing out the run at Manchester’s AO Arena on April 25.
“UK. It’s been two years!” the star, aka Dominic Harrison says. “I’m so excited to announce our biggest shows yet.”
Yungblud Idols arena tour 2026
Apr 15: Dublin 3Arena, Ireland Apr 17: Leeds First Direct Arena, UK Apr 18: Cardiff Utilita Arena, UK Apr 20: Glasgow OVO Hydro, UK Apr 23: Birmingtham Utilita Arena, UK Apr 24: London The O2, UK Apr 25: Manchester AO Arena, UK
Tickets for the tour will go on sale on June 13, here.
Fans who pre-order Idols from the Yungblud UK store by 10am on June 10 will receive a pre-sale code for the tour.
Harrison is also set to to stage the second edition of his bespoke Bludfest all-dayer on June 21 at the Milton Keynes Bowl.
The singer is currently gracing his first Louder cover. Speaking about his plans for upcoming shows he says, “My vibe is I’m going to play the album from start to finish with an orchestra, have an interval, then come on and play some hits.
“It’s gonna be an adventure when you see it live. One minute you‘re going mental, one minute you’re crying, one minute you’re turning to your mate and telling them you love them, one minute you’re moshing. I want it to be like a religious experience.”
The latest news, features and interviews direct to your inbox, from the global home of alternative music.
Talking about Idols, the singer adds, “It’s about self-reclamation. It’s a concept album about relinquishing your idols and finding the answers to your own life. You look at a photograph on a wall, you want to be that photograph. In my case, you end up as that photograph. But then you realise the photograph never had any answers, it’s me who had the answers all the time.”
Go to the official Louder store to buy a world exclusive Yungblud T-shirt featuring his hand-drawn lyrics.
(Image credit: Future)
A music writer since 1993, formerly Editor of Kerrang! and Planet Rock magazine (RIP), Paul Brannigan is a Contributing Editor to Louder. Having previously written books on Lemmy, Dave Grohl (the Sunday Times best-seller This Is A Call) and Metallica (Birth School Metallica Death, co-authored with Ian Winwood), his Eddie Van Halen biography (Eruption in the UK, Unchained in the US) emerged in 2021. He has written for Rolling Stone, Mojo and Q, hung out with Fugazi at Dischord House, flown on Ozzy Osbourne’s private jet, played Angus Young’s Gibson SG, and interviewed everyone from Aerosmith and Beastie Boys to Young Gods and ZZ Top. Born in the North of Ireland, Brannigan lives in North London and supports The Arsenal.
In the landscape of heavy metal, few bands have embodied the concept of a supergroup as genuinely as Hellyeah. Founded in Dallas, Texas in 2006, the band brought together established musicians from some of metal’s most respected acts, creating a powerhouse ensemble that would leave its mark on the genre for over a decade. The seeds for Hellyeah were planted back in 2000 during the Tattoo the Earth tour, where Nothingface guitarist Tom Maxwell and Mudvayne vocalist Chad Gray struck up a friendship and discussed the possibility of forming a collaboration. While initial plans were repeatedly delayed due to scheduling conflicts with their primary bands, the dream remained alive.
The summer of 2006 finally provided the opportunity for these metal veterans to commit to the project, resulting in their self-titled debut album that would enter the Billboard 200 at an impressive number 9, selling 45,000 copies in its first week. Recorded at the “Chasin’ Jason” studio located in the backyard of late Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell’s home, the album established Hellyeah as more than just a side project. Over the next thirteen years, the band would release a total of six studio albums, maintaining a dedicated following despite several lineup changes.
Throughout their career, Hellyeah blended elements of groove metal, southern metal, and alternative metal to create a distinctive sound that honored the members’ roots while forging a new identity. The band’s journey was marked by both triumph and tragedy, particularly with the death of legendary drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott in 2018. After releasing their final album “Welcome Home” in 2019, which featured Paul’s last recordings, and touring with Stone Sour drummer Roy Mayorga, Hellyeah entered a hiatus in 2021, leaving behind a legacy of powerful performances and a discography that showcased the immense talents of all involved.
Chad Gray
Chad Gray, born October 16, 1971, served as Hellyeah’s lead vocalist from the band’s inception in 2006 until they went on hiatus in 2021. As one of the founding members and primary creative forces behind the group, Gray’s distinctive vocal style and energetic stage presence became defining characteristics of Hellyeah’s sound and identity.
Before forming Hellyeah, Gray had already established himself as one of metal’s most recognizable voices as the frontman for Mudvayne, a band he helped form after leaving behind a $40,000-a-year factory job to pursue his musical ambitions. His success with Mudvayne, particularly with albums like “L.D. 50” (2000) and “The End of All Things to Come” (2002), made him a natural leader for the Hellyeah project.
Gray’s vocal approach in Hellyeah differed somewhat from his work with Mudvayne, often embracing a more straightforward heavy metal style that complemented the band’s groove-oriented sound. Throughout Hellyeah’s six studio albums, he demonstrated impressive versatility, delivering aggressive screams, powerful clean vocals, and even showing southern rock influences on tracks like “Alcohaulin’ Ass.” His lyrics explored themes of personal struggle, rebellion, and resilience, resonating with the band’s growing fan base.
Following Vinnie Paul’s death in 2018, Gray took on an even more significant leadership role within Hellyeah, helping to complete their final album “Welcome Home” and guiding the band through this difficult transition. In interviews, he spoke movingly about how Paul had taught him “how to continue to allow a legacy to live even after a passing,” a lesson he applied to Hellyeah’s final chapter.
When Hellyeah went on hiatus in 2021, Gray returned to Mudvayne for a reunion that had been years in the making. Throughout his career with both bands, he has been praised for his technical skill, emotional delivery, and commitment to creating authentic heavy music.
Vinnie Paul Abbott
Vinnie Paul Abbott, born March 11, 1964, in Abilene, Texas, was Hellyeah’s drummer from 2006 until his death on June 22, 2018. As a founding member of Pantera and Damageplan, Paul was already a legendary figure in metal when he joined Hellyeah, bringing with him decades of experience and a distinctive, powerful drumming style that had influenced a generation of musicians.
Paul’s journey to Hellyeah came after profound personal tragedy. His brother, guitarist “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott, was murdered onstage during a Damageplan performance in December 2004. Following this devastating loss, Paul took an 18-month hiatus from music, unsure if he would ever return to performing. When approached to join Hellyeah, he initially declined, but after hearing the band’s demos, he changed his mind, later describing the decision as a healing experience.
As Hellyeah’s drummer, Paul brought his signature double-bass power and precision groove that had defined Pantera’s sound. He also served as the producer for several of the band’s albums, including their self-titled debut, “Stampede,” and “Band of Brothers,” recording much of this material at his home studio in Arlington, Texas. His production expertise and decades of industry knowledge made him an invaluable mentor to his bandmates.
Paul appeared on five Hellyeah albums, with the posthumously released “Welcome Home” (2019) featuring his final recordings. Throughout his time with the band, he remained a beloved figure in the metal community, known for his generosity, enthusiasm for life, and unwavering dedication to his craft. Many fans viewed Hellyeah as a triumphant comeback following the tragedy he had endured.
Paul died at age 54 from dilated cardiomyopathy and coronary artery disease at his home in Las Vegas. His impact on Hellyeah and the broader metal scene cannot be overstated, with tributes pouring in from across the music world following his death. The band’s decision to complete “Welcome Home” and tour with a new drummer was explicitly framed as honoring his legacy.
Tom Maxwell
Tom Maxwell has been Hellyeah’s rhythm guitarist since the band’s formation in 2006, making him one of only two members (along with Chad Gray) to appear on all six of the band’s studio albums. As a founding member, Maxwell played a crucial role in establishing the band’s musical direction and has been a primary songwriter throughout their career.
Before Hellyeah, Maxwell was best known as the guitarist for Nothingface, an alternative metal band that gained recognition in the late 1990s and early 2000s with albums like “Violence” (2000). His friendship with Mudvayne vocalist Chad Gray, which began during the Tattoo the Earth tour in 2000, laid the groundwork for what would eventually become Hellyeah.
Maxwell’s guitar work in Hellyeah combines crushing rhythm parts with elements of groove metal and southern rock, creating the foundation for the band’s distinctive sound. His riff-writing abilities are showcased throughout the band’s catalog, from the southern-tinged debut album to the heavier approach of later releases like “Blood for Blood” (2014) and “Unden!able” (2016).
Following Vinnie Paul’s death in 2018, Maxwell became increasingly vocal about the band’s legacy and future direction. He played a key role in completing their final album “Welcome Home” and participated in the subsequent memorial tour with new drummer Roy Mayorga. In interviews, Maxwell has spoken candidly about the emotional challenges of continuing without Paul and the band’s determination to honor his memory through their music.
Throughout Hellyeah’s existence, Maxwell has remained a steadfast presence, helping navigate lineup changes and evolving the band’s sound while maintaining their core identity. His commitment to the project has been instrumental in the band’s longevity and artistic growth over their six-album career.
Greg Tribbett
Greg Tribbett served as Hellyeah’s lead guitarist from the band’s formation in 2006 until his departure in 2014, appearing on their first three studio albums: “Hellyeah” (2007), “Stampede” (2010), and “Band of Brothers” (2012). His technical skill and creative input were instrumental in shaping the band’s early sound and establishing their presence in the metal scene.
Before joining Hellyeah, Tribbett was best known as a founding member and guitarist for Mudvayne, where he had achieved significant commercial and critical success. His decision to join Hellyeah came somewhat spontaneously, with bandmate Tom Maxwell describing how Tribbett approached him “out of the blue” expressing interest in the project that Maxwell and Chad Gray had been discussing.
During his time with Hellyeah, Tribbett’s guitar work complemented Maxwell’s rhythm playing, adding technical solos and melodic elements that enhanced the band’s groove-oriented sound. He was also an important contributor to the songwriting process, helping craft many of the tracks that appeared on the band’s first three albums. His playing style brought elements of Mudvayne’s technical approach while adapting to Hellyeah’s more straightforward heavy metal sound.
Tribbett’s departure from Hellyeah in 2014 came during a period of internal tension within the band. Guitarist Tom Maxwell later described the situation as “toxic” and stated that certain members “had a lot of other stuff going on in their life that just took the focus of the band away.” Following his exit from Hellyeah, Tribbett reportedly signed a deal with Strong Management as a producer and songwriter.
Despite the circumstances of his departure, Tribbett’s contributions to Hellyeah’s first three albums remain an important part of the band’s legacy, helping establish them as more than just a side project and setting the foundation for their continued evolution after his exit.
Bob Zilla (Bob Kakaha)
Bob “Zilla” Kakaha served as Hellyeah’s bassist from 2007 to 2014, joining shortly after the release of the band’s self-titled debut album and appearing on their second and third studio albums, “Stampede” (2010) and “Band of Brothers” (2012). His history with drummer Vinnie Paul made him a natural addition to the lineup following the departure of original bassist Jerry Montano.
Before joining Hellyeah, Kakaha was best known for his work with Damageplan, the band formed by Vinnie Paul and his brother “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott after the dissolution of Pantera. This existing relationship with Paul played a significant role in his recruitment to Hellyeah, with Paul stating it was “kind of hard to go ahead and commit to this band without Bob being part of it.”
As Hellyeah’s bassist, Kakaha provided a solid rhythmic foundation that complemented Paul’s powerful drumming, contributing to the groove-heavy sound that became one of the band’s trademarks. While not extensively involved in the songwriting process, his playing style and chemistry with Paul helped maintain continuity with their shared musical past while exploring new territory with Hellyeah.
Kakaha left Hellyeah in 2014 alongside guitarist Greg Tribbett during what was described by remaining members as a difficult period for the band. Guitarist Tom Maxwell later commented that Kakaha “never really was as passionate about this band” and “never became a full member,” suggesting there may have been differences in commitment or creative vision.
After his departure from Hellyeah, Kakaha maintained a relatively low profile in the music industry compared to his higher-profile bandmates. However, his contributions to Hellyeah’s middle period, particularly on the commercially successful “Stampede” album, remain an important part of the band’s discography and development.
Jerry Montano
Jerry Montano was Hellyeah’s original bassist, serving as a founding member in 2006 and playing on the band’s self-titled debut album released in 2007. His tenure with the band was brief but significant, as he was part of the initial lineup that established Hellyeah as a legitimate supergroup rather than just a side project.
Before Hellyeah, Montano was best known as the bassist for Nothingface, where he played alongside guitarist Tom Maxwell. This existing working relationship with Maxwell played a crucial role in the formation of Hellyeah, as Maxwell and Mudvayne vocalist Chad Gray began discussions about forming a supergroup during tours their bands did together.
As a founding member, Montano contributed to the writing and recording of Hellyeah’s debut album, which successfully blended elements of groove metal with southern rock influences. The album debuted at an impressive #9 on the Billboard 200 chart, selling 45,000 copies in its first week and establishing the band as a commercial force in the metal scene.
Montano’s departure from Hellyeah came shortly after the release party for their debut album in 2007. While the band’s publicist stated the split was due to “personal reasons on both sides,” reports indicated that Montano had assaulted guitarist Tom Maxwell and made gun threats while heavily intoxicated during the event. This incident led to his immediate dismissal from the band.
Following his exit from Hellyeah, Montano has maintained a lower profile in the music industry compared to his former bandmates. He was replaced by Bob “Zilla” Kakaha, who had previously worked with drummer Vinnie Paul in Damageplan. Despite his brief tenure, Montano’s contributions to Hellyeah’s formation and debut album remain part of the band’s origin story and early success.
Kyle Sanders
Kyle Sanders joined Hellyeah as bassist in 2014, replacing Bob “Zilla” Kakaha, and remained with the band until they went on hiatus in 2021. His addition to the lineup coincided with a significant stylistic shift for Hellyeah, as the band moved toward a heavier, more aggressive sound with their fourth album, “Blood for Blood” (2014).
Before joining Hellyeah, Sanders had established himself in the metal scene through his work with bands like Bloodsimple, MonstrO, and Skrew. Notably, he is the brother of Troy Sanders, bassist and vocalist for the acclaimed metal band Mastodon, coming from a family with deep musical roots.
Sanders’ first album with Hellyeah, “Blood for Blood,” marked a critical turning point for the band. Released after the departure of original members Greg Tribbett and Bob Kakaha, the album featured a more focused, aggressive approach that garnered positive reviews and commercial success, debuting at #1 on Billboard’s Hard Rock Albums chart. His powerful, precise bass playing complemented this new direction, providing a solid foundation for the band’s increasingly heavy sound.
Throughout his tenure with Hellyeah, Sanders appeared on three studio albums: “Blood for Blood” (2014), “Unden!able” (2016), and “Welcome Home” (2019). Following Vinnie Paul’s death in 2018, Sanders was part of the difficult decision to complete their final album and tour with new drummer Roy Mayorga, honoring Paul’s legacy. In interviews, he emphasized that Paul “would be extremely disappointed in us if we didn’t promote this record properly.”
Sanders’ role in Hellyeah’s later period was crucial to the band’s evolution and ability to overcome significant challenges, including the loss of their legendary drummer. His technical skill, stage presence, and commitment to preserving the band’s legacy made him an essential member during some of Hellyeah’s most critically acclaimed and emotionally significant years.
Christian Brady
Christian Brady joined Hellyeah as lead guitarist in 2014, replacing Greg Tribbett, and remained with the band until they went on hiatus in 2021. His addition to the lineup coincided with a significant musical shift for Hellyeah, as the band moved toward a heavier, more aggressive sound beginning with their fourth album, “Blood for Blood” (2014).
Before joining Hellyeah, Brady had built his reputation through work with bands like Magna-Fi, Überschall, and as a member of Franky Perez & The Truth. Based in Las Vegas, Brady had a connection to drummer Vinnie Paul, who had been living and performing in the city for years and had become familiar with Brady’s guitar work.
Brady’s technical skill and versatile playing style complemented Tom Maxwell’s rhythm guitar, adding new dimensions to Hellyeah’s sound across three studio albums: “Blood for Blood” (2014), “Unden!able” (2016), and “Welcome Home” (2019). His addition to the band coincided with what many critics considered a creative resurgence for Hellyeah, with “Blood for Blood” receiving particularly strong reviews for its focused intensity and musical cohesion.
Following Vinnie Paul’s death in 2018, Brady was part of the band’s difficult decision to complete their final album and tour with new drummer Roy Mayorga. In interviews during this period, Brady spoke about the emotional challenge of continuing without Paul, noting that “Vinnie was such a huge part of everything that was Hellyeah” while emphasizing that his “energy and spirit is always with us.”
Throughout his tenure, Brady’s contributions helped Hellyeah evolve their sound while honoring their roots, playing a crucial role in the band’s final chapter. His technically proficient yet emotionally expressive guitar work became an integral part of Hellyeah’s mature sound, particularly on their final album “Welcome Home,” which served as a tribute to Paul’s legacy.
Roy Mayorga
Roy Mayorga joined Hellyeah as drummer in 2019, following the death of founding member Vinnie Paul Abbott. While not appearing on any of Hellyeah’s studio albums, Mayorga played a crucial role in the band’s final chapter, allowing them to tour in support of their last album “Welcome Home” and honor Paul’s legacy through live performances.
Before joining Hellyeah, Mayorga had established himself as a respected drummer through his work with Stone Sour, Soulfly, Amebix, and Nausea, among others. His technical skill, powerful playing style, and versatility across different metal subgenres made him a fitting choice to take on the challenging task of following one of metal’s most iconic drummers.
Mayorga’s history with Vinnie Paul dated back years before joining Hellyeah, as he had toured with Paul during his time with Soulfly, and Stone Sour had performed with Hellyeah on numerous occasions. This existing relationship and mutual respect helped smooth the transition during an emotionally difficult time for the band. Guitarist Tom Maxwell noted that Mayorga is “a very powerful hard hitter, which Vinnie was” and praised his ability to honor Paul’s style while bringing his own approach.
Mayorga’s debut with Hellyeah came at a special concert on May 11, 2019, billed as “Celebrating the Life and Legacy of Vinnie Paul.” The emotionally charged performance served as both a tribute to their fallen bandmate and the beginning of the band’s final chapter. The success of this show led to a full tour supporting the “Welcome Home” album, with Mayorga’s drumming helping bring Paul’s final recorded works to life on stage.
While Hellyeah went on hiatus in 2021 without recording new material with Mayorga, his contributions allowed the band to complete their journey on their own terms, properly honoring Paul’s memory through live performances that celebrated his musical legacy. Mayorga’s respectful approach to this difficult situation earned him praise from both fans and his bandmates.
Tommy Sickles
Tommy Sickles was briefly associated with Hellyeah during the band’s formative period in 2006, serving as drummer during early demo recordings. While never officially becoming a member of the band’s recording lineup, his involvement represents an important chapter in Hellyeah’s origin story.
Before his connection with Hellyeah, Sickles was best known as the drummer for Nothingface, where he performed alongside guitarist Tom Maxwell and bassist Jerry Montano, both of whom would become founding members of Hellyeah. When discussions about forming a supergroup began between Maxwell and Mudvayne vocalist Chad Gray, Sickles was a natural consideration for the drum position given his existing working relationship with Maxwell.
Sickles recorded demo material with the early Hellyeah lineup, but according to band members, “things did not work out” during this preliminary phase. The specific reasons for his departure from the project have never been extensively discussed in interviews, but it ultimately led to the band seeking a new drummer, eventually approaching Vinnie Paul Abbott.
Following his brief involvement with Hellyeah, Sickles maintained a relatively low profile in the music industry compared to his former bandmates. His legacy within the Hellyeah story remains primarily as a transitional figure whose departure created the opportunity for Vinnie Paul to join, fundamentally changing the band’s trajectory and profile within the metal scene.
While Sickles doesn’t appear on any of Hellyeah’s official releases, his early involvement with the project represents an interesting “what if” scenario in the band’s history and demonstrates how lineup changes, even during a group’s formation, can significantly impact their ultimate direction and success.
Kim Petras was raised in Cologne, Germany, where her passion for music became evident at an early age. Before releasing any music professionally, she gained public attention in her youth for undergoing gender confirmation surgery as a teenager, which led to widespread media coverage in Germany. But Petras didn’t allow the headlines to define her—she redirected attention toward her true ambition: building a music career on her own terms. After uploading a series of covers and original tracks online, she gradually cultivated a loyal fanbase, thanks to her vocal talent and instinct for crafting hook-heavy pop.
Petras relocated to Los Angeles and began working with producers and songwriters, immersing herself in the American pop music industry. Without major label support early on, she self-released her breakout single “I Don’t Want It at All” in 2017. The track quickly went viral, landing on Spotify’s Global Viral Chart and securing airplay that helped introduce her to a wider audience. The music video, featuring a cameo from Paris Hilton, further showcased Petras’s flair for mixing Y2K aesthetics with modern pop sensibilities. This song marked the beginning of what she called the “Era 1” singles, a string of independently released tracks that included “Heart to Break,” “Hills,” and “Faded.”
Building on that momentum, Petras released her debut mixtape Clarity in 2019. The project received critical acclaim and featured the single “Icy,” which solidified her as a rising force in pop music. Clarity charted on the Billboard 200, an impressive achievement for an independent artist. The same year, she released Turn Off the Light, a Halloween-themed project that embraced dark pop and electronic elements, adding a theatrical edge to her discography. The project blended horror soundscapes with dance beats, reflecting her ability to pivot stylistically without compromising her voice or artistic identity.
Her work caught the attention of major players in the industry, leading to a recording contract with Republic Records and Amigo Records in 2021. Under this new deal, she released Slut Pop, an unapologetically explicit EP that leaned into themes of sexual liberation, empowerment, and nightlife culture. Although polarizing for some, the project affirmed her refusal to play it safe, further endearing her to fans who praised her authenticity and fearlessness. Petras built a reputation for delivering bold content while maintaining strong pop hooks and pristine production.
In 2022, Petras’s career reached a historic turning point when she collaborated with British pop artist Sam Smith on the single “Unholy.” The song became a commercial juggernaut, topping charts in over 20 countries, including the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States. With that achievement, Petras became the first openly transgender solo artist to reach number one on the Billboard Hot 100. The success of “Unholy” was further underscored when it won the Grammy Award for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, making her the first openly transgender artist to win in a major Grammy category. The performance was celebrated as a milestone for LGBTQ+ representation in mainstream music.
Capitalizing on this breakthrough, Petras released her long-awaited debut studio album Feed the Beast in 2023. The album included songs like “Alone” featuring Nicki Minaj, as well as previous hits like “Coconuts” and “Brrr.” Feed the Beast demonstrated her growth as an artist capable of delivering both mainstream pop appeal and experimental flourishes. It solidified her standing as a global pop act and featured collaborations that showcased her versatility, ranging from club anthems to emotionally resonant ballads.
Later in 2023, she surprised fans by releasing Problématique, a long-delayed album that had initially been shelved due to leaks and label complications. When she officially dropped the album, it was met with enthusiasm from her fanbase and media alike, who praised her resilience and ability to overcome industry hurdles. The album included songs that blended French pop influences with dance beats, offering a sonic contrast to Feed the Beast and showing her capacity to reframe challenges into creative opportunity.
Throughout her career, Petras has also been recognized for her contributions to the LGBTQ+ community and her role in pushing boundaries within the music industry. Beyond her groundbreaking Grammy win, she has performed at major LGBTQ+ events around the world, including Pride festivals and benefit concerts. Her visibility and openness have made her a role model for younger LGBTQ+ artists and fans, especially those navigating gender identity and expression in environments that are not always supportive.
Petras’s fashion choices, music videos, and live performances have further elevated her brand, aligning her with the stylistic daring of pop icons like Lady Gaga and Madonna, while still crafting a unique voice of her own. She has been featured in global campaigns for major brands and appeared in fashion publications, becoming known as much for her visual artistry as for her sound.
In addition to her studio work, Petras has toured extensively, headlining across North America and Europe. Her concerts feature high-energy performances and elaborate stage design, combining the spectacle of dance-pop with an emotional undercurrent drawn from her personal story. Her commitment to delivering memorable live shows has earned her a dedicated following and critical praise for her artistry in both studio and stage environments.
Her journey has not been without setbacks—from leaked albums to early struggles for industry recognition—but Petras has continually navigated those challenges with persistence and boldness. She’s proven that commercial success and personal authenticity are not mutually exclusive. Her body of work now spans multiple albums, chart-topping singles, and landmark achievements that have permanently shifted the conversation around who gets to be a pop star.
As of 2025, Kim Petras stands as one of the most distinctive and trailblazing voices in contemporary pop. With a catalog that balances club bangers and vulnerable ballads, and a career defined by both resilience and reinvention, she continues to redefine what is possible in pop music—not just for herself, but for the many who follow in her path.
A brand new Pink Floyd biography, Pink Floyd Shine On: The Definitive Oral History, by noted Floyd biographer Mark Blake, will be published through New Modern on October 9.
It’s the first oral history of Pink Floyd as told by the band, friends and associates through new, exclusive and previously unpublished material, including letters from their late founder member Syd Barrett, written to his girlfriend in 1965/66, which reveal his intimate thoughts on the band, their very first recording session, his worries about leaving art college and much more.
Blake, who has also written for Prog and Classic Rock, and who published the respected and best-selling Pigs Might Fly: The Inside Story Of Pink Floyd in 2007, since updated in 2013 and 2017.
The author also draws upon previously unpublished interviews with Pink Floyd’s past and present surviving members, David Gilmour, Roger Waters and Nick Mason, and their former bandmate, the late Richard Wright.
“I first saw Pink Floyd and their famous wall at Earls Court in 1980,” says Blake. “It was an impressive piece of rock’n’roll theatre, made more impressive by the fact that I was fifteen years old. Over three decades later it’s been a pleasure and a privilege to tell the group’s story in their own words. My hope is that all readers – from the most committed super-fan to someone just discovering Pink Floyd’s music – enjoy a compelling and immediate experience of one of the most important bands in the world.”
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Writer and broadcaster Jerry Ewing is the Editor of Prog Magazine which he founded for Future Publishing in 2009. He grew up in Sydney and began his writing career in London for Metal Forces magazine in 1989. He has since written for Metal Hammer, Maxim, Vox, Stuff and Bizarre magazines, among others. He created and edited Classic Rock Magazine for Dennis Publishing in 1998 and is the author of a variety of books on both music and sport, including Wonderous Stories; A Journey Through The Landscape Of Progressive Rock.
In step: Moving in rhythm. In conformity with one’s environment. In step with the times.
In step: a reference to embarking on the Twelve Steps programme whose tenets include ‘We admitted we were powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable’ and ‘We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.’
In Step. Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble’s last non-posthumous album, released in June 1989.
Six months after In Step came out Vaughan addressed the Aquarius Chapter of Alcoholics Anonymous at the Ritz Hotel in New York and gave them his greatest unscripted message. “I started off my drinking and using career, oh I guess… early 60s, when I was somewhere around seven or eight years old. I grew up in an alcoholic family. My father was an alcoholic, and even though I saw the problems that alcohol caused in our family, I still found it attractive for some reason. I don’t know what that was; I was always a kid who was afraid I was gonna miss something.
“Somewhere along the line, I started trying to find out why my father would go back and continue to drink, even though every time he did I saw what happened, which was, big fights – you know, violence. We were always real scared of him. But he continued to do it anyway. I never… I never did understand what that was, until one day a few years later I realised that I wasn’t doing anything any differently other than making a little bit more money, and I’d added a few drugs to it, you know.
“I guess about seven or eight years old, I started stealing drinks either… well, my parents used to have these, these ‘42’ parties, and quite a few people would come over and they’d be havin’ their Tom Collins or whatever, you know. And when somebody wasn’t looking, I’d take one of the drinks and run to the kitchen, you know, an’ make them a new one. And, refresh their drink, you know. It’s just that I would refresh my memory about what it tasted like a lot of the time. I never really thought that it tasted very good or anything.”
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Maybe now we see why Stevie Ray wasn’t on the dime when he came so close to death after playing the Pfalzbau in Ludwigshafen, September 28, on the German leg of his 1986 European tour. Not just him. Bass player Tommy Shannon was lying on a hotel bed sick with his own excessive cocaine and alcohol usage. He recalls how in the adjoining room Stevie was mumbling incoherently and vomiting blood and bile. Staggering to the phone Shannon pleads that an ambulance be called, and Vaughan is rushed to hospital with IVs in both arms. Miraculously he makes some sort of brief recovery, but by the time SRV and Double Trouble arrive in London to play the Hammersmith Palais on October 2, the group and most of the crew are wandering backstage like dead men.
Dr Vernon Bloom, who specialises in helping addicts withdraw – he’s had plenty of practice on Pete Townshend and Eric Clapton – has been contacted via Eric’s people and administered the relevant meds before Vaughan and company take the stage. The show passes without incident – it is neither great nor tragic – but in the gloom, just before he’s called back to encore, Vaughan slips off a gangplank and starts internal haemorrhaging. For the second time in days he is rushed to hospital. If this is a wake-up call, someone forgot to set the alarm.
The day after the Palais gig is Stevie’s birthday. To paraphrase Bo Diddley’s Who Do You Love – he’s got a tombstone hand and a graveyard mind. Just 32 and he don’t mind dyin’. Stevie’s habit is ridiculous. He’s snorting a quarter ounce of pure, pharmaceutical Merck flake cocaine a day, and necking a quart of Royal Crown scotch – at least. It doesn’t touch the walls. Dr Bloom discovers his patient’s already ruined septum is so corrupted that he’s taken to dissolving the cocaine in the whisky. X-rays reveal Vaughan’s stomach lining is rotting. Cocaine is crystallising in the man’s intestines. Bloom gives Stevie two weeks to live. Or you can stop right now and delay your death warrant. If you’re very lucky. But hey, it is his birthday. Bloom allows him a small plastic cup of champagne to celebrate and to wash down the Phenobarbital.
Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble, June 1986 (Image credit: Paul Natkin/Getty Images)
Stevie calls his mama Martha in Dallas and breaks down: “Ma, I’m real sick. I need help. I got to come home.” This isn’t great news. Martha’s husband Jimmie Lee Vaughan – Big Jim – is barely a month in his grave having succumbed to Parkinson’s disease, his own alcoholism and a working life spent around asbestos. In any case the tour is cancelled – though the press release only states Vaughan is unwell – and the guitarist flies home to enter the Charter Lane rehab centre in Atlanta, Georgia, while Shannon goes into their Austin facility. Drummer Chris ‘Whipper’ Layton is in marginally better shape, though no stranger to the drug and booze frenzy that has insiders comparing Double Trouble to the Allman Brothers Band at their absolute worst.
Indeed, Vaughan’s performances are so erratic in the period covering the Soul to Soul and Live Alive albums that a second guitarist, Derek O’Brien, is hired to supply some lead work on tour as Stevie’s fingers can’t talk the talk, while keyboards player Reese Wynans – ironically an Allman Brothers accomplice from Florida – joins the madhouse, ostensibly to add his 6 feet 6 inches of muscle to the group before they implode. Long tall Wynans is shocked by their business affairs and the amount of money they waste to line dealer pockets. Double trouble. Everyone seems more anxious to hang around expensive studios playing ping pong and waiting for the main man to arrive bearing goodies than actually playing the blues. “The drugging was so bad I was scared for the man’s health” Reese recalls. “Stevie was so worn down he obviously needed to rest, but it’s hard to stop working when you’re in big debt.”
Flash back to autumn 1986. Stevie Ray calls his wife Lenora (aka Lenny) and soul mate for the past 13 years, but she refuses to visit him in rehab. Turns out she’s been running round town with other men and spending her husband’s money on hard dope. Divorce papers go to and fro. Stevie comes home to find she locked the house, cut off the electricity and taken to hanging with ne’er do wells described by local insiders as “police characters, criminals and the scum of the earth”. And she took the dawg.
Stevie Ray Vaughan backstage at the Royal Oak Music Theater during the Soul to Soul world tour on February 14, 1986, in Royal Oak, Michigan (Image credit: Ross Marino/Rock Negatives/MediaPunch)
If there is solace in Stevie Ray’s collapsing world it arrives when he bumps into a beautiful brunette, a 17-year-old Russian émigré called Janna Lapidus. She finds him sitting head bowed on the steps of Wellington Town Hall in New Zealand where Double Trouble are performing in the spring before his final collapse. A rising star in the modelling industry, Janna goes on tour in Australia with the band, and she does visit Stevie in rehab, and they will become an item. Although she’s young, Janna has a wise head. During his London rehab the pair walk arm in arm in Hyde Park and pledge their allegiance to romance and loyalty, having seen an ageing couple holding hands by the Serpentine. Janna’s name is on In Step alongside the band’s saviour John Hammond. Janna is credited with turning Stevie’s life around.
But Vaughan turns out to have a strong constitution. On November 22 1986 the aborted Live Alive tour recommences and for the first time ever he plays clean and sober at Towson Centre in Maryland, with Bonnie Raitt.
It’s December 1988 when producer Jim Gaines gets the call asking does he want to produce the next SRV album? Based in San Francisco, Gaines’s main client is Carlos Santana, and ole Devadip knows Stevie well – they’ve played together. Plus, Gaines is a guitar guy. Vaughan asks him: “How do you feel about recording me when I’ve got 10 amps goin’ at once? Think you could handle that?” Gaines has trudged through the sludge with Carlos and Ronnie Montrose, who both use six or seven amps in the studio, so he agrees. “Why not? It sounds like a nightmare. Let’s do it.”
Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble – I’m Leaving You (Commit A Crime) (Video) – YouTube
Just before Christmas, Double Trouble’s Epic Records man calls Jim and says: “The band wants you to make the new album. Congratulations. You got the job. By the way, I didn’t want you to do it.” Gaines is taken aback but hell, it’s a Texas four-piece blues band, how hard can this really be? “Hard. I was the first person they ever used who wasn’t from the Texas connection,” he says. “It could get tense because I was also the first person to ever tell Stevie: ‘Nope, that’s not good enough. Do it again.’”
On Texas Flood, Couldn’tStand the Weather and Soul To Soul the band had produced themselves, but while Grammy Awards and critical acclaim ensue, there are many who take the line that Vaughan can’t decide whether to be his heroes Albert King and Jimi Hendrix, or locate his own voice. Modern blues acts are beset by this conundrum – who needs the pastiche when we already got Muddy Waters? But there is a difference: SRV is undoubtedly a genius musician, and when the layers of parody fall away he recalls all the well-known cats, but with a fair measure of the forgotten Lonnie Mack – check him out playing bass on The Doors’ Roadhouse Blues – thrown in for whammy punch.
Gaines and the band decamp to the Power Station in New York City to rehearse, but the producer can’t record a note because there is a god-awful hum in the little room they use that sounds like you’re standing underneath a pylon. Vaughan’s none too happy when Gaines pulls the plug because he’s used this studio before to cut Couldn’t StandThe Weather; it’s also where David Bowie made Let’s Dance, which is smeared all over with Stevie licks and is indeed the album from 1983 that made his name.
Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble – Couldn’t Stand the Weather (Video) – YouTube
“I moved us to Kiva Studios in Memphis and that solved the problem,” says Gaines. “They had a big isolation room and it was great, since the band loved the city and the bosses loved him because he’s a big star. Still had the problem with the amplification though, and I’m known as the man who made him play in a chicken coop. We were getting hum because he’s using a single coil Strat, so I wrapped the room in copper wire to form a conduit and put him inside what looks like a baseball-batting cage. That pulled the interference down 70%. I could live with that.”
Gaines also persuaded the boys they had to embrace the emerging digital technology that enabled him to get round the problem of using eight tracks for one guitar feed. “I was in a panic because pretty soon I’m running out of tracks. We sorted out a 32-track at the Power Station and teamed that with an analogue machine and while everyone then is fearful of digital – Stevie hated it – the tube amps were warm and we didn’t have to use any slaving.”
For the first time SRV and Double Trouble will record without the use of any drink or drugs. Stevie has played with his mentor Bonnie Raitt and discovered that being sober is a blessing for once, and he will go on to deliver some of his finest music since the fucked-up era when he was so majestic on Jennifer Warnes’ classic Leonard Cohen tribute album Famous Blue Raincoat (1987), of which he remembers nothing.
“Considering he almost died in London Stevie was in great shape,” says Jim. “One reason why he chose me was because I’m Mr Squeaky Clean, Mr Hillbilly,” Gaines laughs. “I’ve never done a drug in my life. They were all going through the step programme and attending meetings every night and day. They couldn’t have a drink and smokes man around. Stevie told me: ‘This is the first thing I’ve cut with no chemical enhancement. I’m as nervous as hell.’”
If the days of climbing the walls as withdrawal kicked in were gone, that didn’t mean the sessions were easy. Gaines still had to prove himself to gain entrée in to this tight-knit clan. “I trod with care. I’ve never been a ‘world’s gonna-end’ type and we became friends as the recording progressed. Stevie gave me his trust and laid a lot of his life on me in private moments. I was shocked and privileged to hear that. Stevie told me he wanted to make amends and move forward and In Step and the album he made with brother Jimmie (Family Style) right before he died were his way of removing any bitterness and jealousy from his life and letting it rest.
“When the album was finished he gave me a hug and he wouldn’t let go for minutes. Man, I realised he needed a hug real bad. I learnt a bit about his father, those difficult situations, and I heard how his mother had received that, too. I know how much those boys loved their mom. I treated Stevie and the boys like cousins. I loved ’em, but I couldn’t let them get too much into my life because making an album is business.”
Gregg Allman and Stevie Ray Vaughan backstage at The Pier in New York City on August 15, 1987 (Image credit: Ebet Roberts/Redferns)
Bro’ Jimmie Vaughan from the Fabulous Thunderbirds hung out during some sessions on In Step, especially when work moved to Los Angeles, and Gaines noticed that maybe the older man was slightly jealous – and certainly in awe of his kid brother, who had achieved such notoriety by playing with Bowie and Nile Rodgers, and especially on Albert King shows, trading white boy licks with AK’s driven Flying V. Stevie was as shy as Jimmie was ebullient. Says Gaines: “He was a small guy but he had very strong hands, and that’s how he could handle those big brass strings he used, especially on the 1959 Fender Strat (actually a 62/63 mongrel SRV called his “first wife” or “Number One”).
The material that became the In Step album impressed the savvy Gaines. It is often described as SRV’s confessional album, but that isn’t the whole truth. Obviously Crossfire, Tightrope and Wall of Denial, with lyrics that refer to being ‘Afraid of my own shadow in the face of grace’ and ‘demons from the garden of white lies’, deal with addiction and redemption, but Stevie didn’t write those words – they were penned by his long-time friend and accomplice, drummer songwriter Doyle Bramhall, who had trodden a similar path and channelled Vaughan’s misery better than he could have done himself. The deeply personal stuff was dispatched first in early January, to get it out the way.
Wrapped around those epic tunes are startling takes on songs by Chester Burnett (Love Me Darlin’), Buddy Guy (Leave My GirlAlone) and Willie Dixon (Let Me Love You Baby) – these situate Vaughan in his natural milieu, less a Hendrix clone and more an old – well 34-year-old – blues man.
In fact Stevie Ray still didn’t feel willing to bare his own lyrical soul, but he made up for that with the gorgeous TravisWalk and the stupendous Riviera Paradise, Gaines’ favourite moment. “I only heard that as a jam in New York, but they had it worked out in Memphis. To set the scene: It was 1am. I turned all the lights way low. Stevie is head down. Tommy and Chris are in the dark. I knew I only had a few minutes of tape on the reel and they start playing, and Holy Shit! It’s magic. As the tape spins it’s so good I have shivers up my spine, but I’m worried we’ll run out. I have to get his attention but he’s got his back to me, so I motion to Chris Layton: ‘CUT CUT’ and then Stevie looks at Chris and they nod. And as the last seconds of tape spool out they end the song and that’s the only take we ever did.”
Gaines finished the album over three months and regards In Step as a success with a proviso. “Stevie hated doing vocals, like really hated that process. I’d have to line him up with Halls cough drops, honey, tea and lemon – anything to get him in the booth. His attitude was: ‘I’m a guitar player who has to sing.’ The other problem I had was when he couldn’t get hold of Janna on the phone. She was in NYC modelling or at the agency or in the apartment she shared with the other girls. They were so young they had a housemother. Stevie would get incredibly nervous if she didn’t pick up. He was so madly in love with her that the sessions would come to a screeching halt and the other guys got pissed off at me! They’d say: ‘Go get him, make him come back’, and I’d say: ‘Dude, he’s in your band, you go and get him.’”
Vaughan also had a tendency to get bored. At those times he’d go into the studio on his own and play Hendrix songs for hours to himself or change the mood with some Buddy Guy or Lonnie Mack tune from his vast repertoire. Gaines would tape some of those moments, surreptitiously, but when he sent the tapes to Epic they got lost, and that infuriates him because: “At those times, you would swear that Hendrix was in the room.”
Lonnie Mack and Stevie Ray Vaughan backstage at the Orpheum Theater in Memphis, Tennessee on August 26, 1986 (Image credit: Ebet Roberts/Redferns)
Sometimes Albert King dropped by or even sat in, which was a problem because he couldn’t be used for contractual reasons and he was apt to throw in some none-too-helpful comments that had to be politely heard and ignored. But he was also a sweet, somewhat distracted guy. One day a call came through from Jon Bon Jovi asking Stevie – and Albert – if they’d like to guest at the hairy rock god’s LA show. King homes in on this request and asks SRV over the playback: “Hey Stevie. These Jim Bon Jovis: are they pretty big?” Learning, yes they are, King’s eyes lit up, but in the event he didn’t go and chose to go and play cards with a lady friend.
Tenor sax man Joe Sublett and trumpeter Darrell Leonard made their debut as the Texicali Horns on InStep. Gaines wanted them to emulate the Oakland East Bay funk and swagger of his beloved Tower of Power horns, but they stuck to their Texan/Oklahoma blues and shuffles instead. Joe and Darrell were tight together, but Joe had known SRV since 1973 when he was playing alongside the great Marc Benno in The Nightcrawlers, then Paul Ray and the Cobras, and thus to Triple Threat and Double Trouble. They’d been roommates off and on, swapping riffs on Bobby Bland and Ray Charles tunes, or shooting the breeze while listening to King Curtis and David ‘Fathead’ Newman albums, or marvelling at the silky musicianship of Lee Allen and Wes Montgomery.
Sublett was aware that his old colleague had been through major changes in the interim, because SRV’s heavy partying went way back to the mid-70s when he and Bramhall raised it high on the hog in Dallas and Austin.
Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble – The House Is Rockin’ (Official Video) – YouTube
“I saw In Step as a new birth, although he – all of them – were definitely into the AA book and there was a lot of Christian and higher power talk going on, which comes with that territory,” says Joe now. “I figured Stevie had always had some Christian elements, even in the bad craziness and party all night days he had a spiritual interest. I wasn’t too concerned at the mood in the camp, because even when he hadn’t played at his best he was still great, and now suddenly he was even better. We had a lot of discussions in his car between breaks and he off-loaded. Stevie Ray was very enlightened about playing sober, and very scared.”
Sublett didn’t see him when he’d gone through the terrible stages of his withdrawal – he saw a man who was moving into a kind of Band of Gypsys phase. “Funk meets blues. Maybe with a bit of Kenny Burrell jazz thrown in. Stevie was an ear player; he didn’t read charts. But he could learn a riff in a second and instinctively knew the changes and the octaves – all the little flavours.”
Joe was knocked out by what he saw and heard. He’d played on Soul To Soul in 1985, and seen the other side of Stevie; now it was like regular folks. The horn parts were cut in Los Angeles, but with mutual schedules starting to mount up there was little time to reminisce. Double Trouble were itching to get back on the road long before InStep’s June ’89 release, and the Texicali boys were finishing off an album with Bruce Willis, If It Don’t Kill You, It JustMakes You Stronger, so in the event they cut Crossfire, which became a huge radio hit, and Love Me Darlin’ before they hooked up for some West Coast dates with the Trouble, augmenting their section with David Woodford’s baritone.
Stevie Ray Vaughan – Crossfire (Official Video) – YouTube
“It was fun playing the album tracks live because that record was different sonically; more centred. Before there was this thing of having a guitarist who is incredibly loud but are you hearing the rhythm section? Now you could hear Tommy’s bass and it was better balanced. It was about more than Stevie’s virtuosity, and yet his singing is more confident. That was down to Gaines who was an incredible diplomat, who could tell him: ‘Hey look, let’s hear you sing and back off a bit on the guitar.’ He was worthy of respect, whereas another guy might have been met with: ‘Who the hell are you to tell me with my track record, how I should sound?’ Gaines knew the times were changing and it wasn’t enough just to sound like a blues player on the radio – you had to have something else. And Stevie? I guess he figured, hell I might just learn something to my advantage.”
In the old days Stevie and Joe were like young punks, everything was about the music and the guitar and Stevie would say: “Every time I play a solo, it’s like I’m breakin’ outta jail.” On a personal note Sublett recalls SRV’s “huge hands, like Howlin’ Wolf’s big ol’ paws”, and his pleasant nature. “For years he lived in the house he bought for his mom in Dallas. He never owned any big cars and could care less about possessions. The best thing for him was Janna, because he’d had a lot of turbulence in his marriage. I remember his smile, and if there was a hang up in a session he’d have a goofy grin and say: ‘This too shall pass’.
“He was a hilarious guy really, with a rubber face. He liked pulling stupid expressions. He told me he busted his nose seven or eight times falling out of trees or off cars, but he wasn’t just a simple soul. He was very intelligent. I never saw him as the guy in the hat or the badass guitar slinger or the Spaghetti Western character. He was never a hard-arsed mean guy. His only ego trip was that when he played, he would never want to give you less than 100%. He wasn’t trying to be better than you; he was just trying to be his best. If people told him: ‘Hey man, you’re great,” he’d make a joke out of it.”
Stevie Ray Vaughan onstage at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in New Orleans, Louisiana on May 3, 1986 (Image credit: David Redfern/Redferns)
While SRV had an image – the hats, the Native American silver, the poncho and soft suede Cheyenne warrior boots, even that was no big deal to him. “He had that look which is what people expected of him and he knew they liked to see him dressing up. But he never took himself so seriously. When I first met him I gave him a flat brown hat, because those Stetsons he wore got so funky.”
Darrell Leonard wasn’t one of the inner circle, but he was impressed with the man from the outset. “As a brass player you think, ‘Oh everyone plays guitar. I’ll just emulate what he does.’ It was harder to do that with him. He didn’t show me any clichés. He didn’t play the obvious. He took the language of the black blues guys and turned it into his voice.”
The Texicali boys were overdubbed in LA just before the In Step resumed. In the period after his collapse and before he died Vaughan would play some 300 shows, including The Fire meets The Fury bash with Jeff Beck. Leonard suddenly got the SRV trip. “His connection was all about the audience and letting them know he’d changed. He talked about it directly every night. His thing was: ‘You don’t have be the last person to leave the party.’ He made it a positive. Now there was no party. No pot. No beer. No crazy men out of control with powders and needles. I’d seen all that. Don’t forget Stevie came out of the Austin scene when it was stay up all night. Get high. Repeat. That’s how the blues movement started there. It wasn’t the rinky-dink state capital it is today.”
If Vaughan hadn’t taken that fateful helicopter ride, Leonard believes they’d have worked together again. “He didn’t have any big star vibe. He was regular. I spent one night with him on the bus driving from Northern California to LA for the Greek concert, and he told me about all the shitty stuff. He had hidden depths. But he was cool. I never loaned him money. He never didn’t show up. He was clean and sober. I saw the best SRV possible. I’ve been lucky enough to play with both him and with Duane Allman and I can hear them on the air.”
In early 1990 the Vaughan bothers cut their long-mooted Family Style album that reunited Stevie with Nile Rodgers and some of the cast from Bowie’s Let’s Dance. Rodgers hadn’t wanted him to play on that, telling Bowie: “He’s just an Albert King wannabe.” But Bowie had been knocked out by Double Trouble when they were an unsigned act playing the Montreux jazz festival and told Rodgers: “You’re wrong. He’s a unique artist.”
The producer changed his mind soon afterwards. “He was like a child who was a genius. He was amazed when I sampled his guitar through a Synclavier. ‘What the fuck is that?’ ‘That’s your guitar!’ ‘Holy crap I can play a note and move it from here to here?’ For a person of his virtuosity you never met a more humble person. He wasn’t fake humble. He really was charming and sweet.”
(Image credit: Robert Knight Archive / Getty Images)
Jimmie Vaughan regarded Family Style as a clean slate for their relationship. “We wanted to do a record that showed everything that we could do on the guitar. The record’s got all of the licks that our favourite guitar players did, plus other stuff. It’s got Albert King, B.B. King, Johnny Watson, T-Bone Walker, Lonnie Mack, Hubert Sumlin and Freddie King. It’s like a short history of who we listened to.”
Yet in many ways it was still like the old days. “One of the first things we cut was Brothers, where we used the same guitar, pulling it out of each other’s hands. People are always asking us questions about what it was like when we were kids, and they probably think that it was just like that, us fighting over the same guitar. So I thought, well, hell, let’s give it to ’em! It was just for fun. And even though it’s the same guitar and the same rig, the tones sound different. The whole project was just fun, and that sort of set the tone.”
Summer of 1990, Double Trouble went on the road with Joe Cocker before their piéce de résistance – two nights with Eric Clapton, Jimmy, Buddy Guy and Robert Cray at Alpine Valley, Wisconsin. After the second show, which climaxed with an encore of Sweet Home Chicago, most of the entourage headed to board four chartered helicopters to take them back to the Windy City and a good night’s rest. Clapton recalls how foggy the early morning of August 27 was.
“I didn’t want to fly at all. I was wiping condensation off the windows and thinking: ‘We’re all gonna die.’” Then they took off and above the weather was clear sky and starlight.”
Vaughan was on a flight with three of Clapton’s crew. In the early hours it was reported they never landed in Chicago. In fact their pilot had taken off and crashed into a ski run on the side of a mountain after 42 seconds. When Jimmie Vaughan went to identify Stevie’s body he had to so by recognising his distinctive silver jewellery.”
Shannon and Layton sat in their hotel room and wept. They’d gone into Stevie’s room hoping he’d be there, but the bed was still made with chocolates on the counterpane and the alarm radio was playing the Eagles’ Peaceful, Easy Feeling.
A strange thing happened at that last gig. Those who knew Stevie said he played with a halo of light around him. His guitar tech Rene Martinez remembered him giving everyone a huge hug and telling them how much he loved them. He had an aura about him, like a premonition.
At Stevie’s funeral the mourners included Stevie Wonder and Dr John, who sang Amazing Grace and Ave Maria while Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Rodgers, Clapton and ZZ Top wept a Texas flood in the Laurel Land Memorial chapel. Stevie’s marble and bronze headstone simply gave his dates, his name and the inscription that says ‘Thank you… For all the love you passed our way.’
Stevie Ray Vaughan onstage at Madison Square Garden, New York, New York, November 11, 1989 (Image credit: Gary Gershoff/Getty Images)
Stevie’s AA speech had spoken of commitment and letting go; of his fears and his desire to help others. He was amazed and grateful to be alive since he’d never believed he’d even make it to 21. His final words to the gathering were heartfelt.
“I thank y’all for letting me be here with you. Whether I know what to say about it or not, it means a lot to me, and I thank you, okay?”
He was back on track. He was in step.
Max Bell worked for the NME during the golden 70s era before running up and down London’s Fleet Street for The Times and all the other hot-metal dailies. A long stint at the Standard and mags like The Face and GQ kept him honest. Later, Record Collector and Classic Rock called.
Revered Swedish prog metal gloom mongers Katatonia sent shockwaves through their fanbase in March when it was announced that founding guitarist Anders Nyström had left the band after 34 years and 12 albums.
It features a new-look line-up with two new guitar players – Nico Elgstrand and Sebastian Svalland – and Renkse is now eyeing new heights. “When I listen to the album, I hear a band that’s still very hungry and wants to do new things and go to new places,” he says. “There’s a drive, a new energy and new ideas.”
He’d previously said Nyström’s departure was “a decision not taken lightly,” but that it allowed “everyone to thrive and move forward with their own creative preferences.”
Things threatened to get ugly when the guitarist retaliated by saying:“Katatonia could and should have been mutually laid to rest,” believing Renkse and co should operate under a new name. He also criticised the band’s recent setlists for ignoring their earlier material.
KATATONIA – Wind of no Change (Official Video) | Napalm Records – YouTube
Renkse confirms to Prog that he’s mourning the end of their “fruitful” partnership – but believes the band’s legacy in in safe hands. “Some relationships go on for a long time, and you maybe don’t realise that you’ve grown apart,” he reflects. “I’m happy we got to live this dream together. What we have created together cannot be taken away from us.”
The new record itself, it sees Renske accompanied by bassist Niklas Sandin, drummer Daniel Moilanen, and the “overwhelming” talents of Elgstrand (Entombed AD) and Svalland (Letters From The Colony). Elgstrand is no stranger to the band, having deputised for live shows in recent years, while Svalland was “the guy that I had my eye on” when the search for a new member began.
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This album is a little bit more guitar-based … I was thinking more as a guitar player than anything else
While 2023’s Sky Void Of Stars found Katatonia sounding uncharacteristically upbeat, Nightmares returns to a darker sonic world. “It’s something I reacted to,” Renkse says. “Perhaps subconsciously because of the last album, but when I got the masters back, I thought, ‘Wow, this record is really dark!’
“I think, for some reason, this album is a little bit more guitar-based. I was picking up the guitar more often than keyboards, and I was thinking more as a guitar player than anything else.” Listeners can expect plenty of guitar solos too.
Nightmares is the third consecutive Katatonia album Renkse has written on his own. He says the new record – which explores “the nightmares we face in life” – is not very different from its predecessors; but he’s afforded himself experimentation with Efter Solen, a fully electronic song sung in Swedish.
“I’m always writing, and it had a very nice vibe to it. I didn’t really want to waste it by just keeping it on a hard drive,” he explains. “I’m very happy to have it as an experiment; it’s still very melancholic and dark; it just has a different kind of clothing.”
He hopes future albums will see the band sharing the weight of songwriting duties. “I always encourage it – but in the last 10 years, no one has really stepped up to the plate. Being the sole songwriter is sometimes very lonely; I would love the bouncing back and forth of ideas.”
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After 34 years of quietly going about their business, Katatonia finally succumbed to the lure of drama earlier this year, when co-founding guitarist Anders Nyström announced his departure.
A respectful but melancholy announcement by the band was followed by a slightly terse statement from Nyström, in which he bemoaned singer and decades-long songwriting partner Jonas Renkse’s reluctance to revisit earlier, heavier parts of their catalogue in the live arena. “That door has been kept shut,” he mused, “and left everything we did pre-millennium in a void.”
Old-school fans may see his point: their ongoing evolution has nudged 90s records like the bleak and doom-laden Brave Murder Day and the icily gothic Discouraged Ones out of the picture.
But as great as it would be to hear songs such as Nerve and Murder in their live sets, the truth is that Katatonia have built a second, much larger fanbase over the last two decades, based almost entirely on the music they’ve made this century, with 2001’s Last Fair Deal Gone Down – and its breakthrough single Teargas, in particular – as an unofficial starting point. The tension between progress and nostalgia is real, folks.
But beyond behind-the-scenes bickering, Katatonia remain in the rudest of health on their first album without any musical contributions from Nyström. As with 2020’s City Burials and 2023’s Sky Void Of Stars, the Swedes’ 13th album was written by Renkse alone. And while some of the dark charisma that their now-former guitarist brought to the table remains intrinsic to the overall sound, the momentum is with the singer’s shape-shifting compositions and the extraordinary melodies he weaves into them.
KATATONIA – Lilac (Official Video) | Napalm Records – YouTube
It begins with Thrice, an elegant encapsulation of Katatonia’s evolving sound circa 2025. A brutal fanfare erupts, vanishes, and is replaced by a delicate wash of guitars and aqueous synths, with Renkse front and centre. A steadily unfolding, dark and stealthy groove pushes the heaviness into the red, then a fabulous vocal melody emerges from the melee and winds around knotty but fluid riffing in several ingenious ways, before reaching a beautifully neat conclusion. Thrice is only five minutes long, but it contains so much.
From then on, Nightmares spirals down another fascinating rabbit hole. Katatonia have become heavier and darker over their last few albums, with an abundance of metal riffs driving the music between oases of calm, and those remain an integral component here.
Wind Of No Change is particularly brutish and grandiose, with monastic bellowing and grinding bass underpinning a cruelly pompous march into the slavering maws of something ghastly, before Renkse’s soothing voice enters to soften the blow.
Similarly, both Lilac and Temporal are heavyweight additions to the canon, although each piece is shrouded in the same ethereal haze that dominates gentler moments like the restless and fragile The Liquid Eye and certified tear-jerker Departure Trails.
The latter’s dewy-eyed yearning is almost certainly not a commentary on the end of Renkse and Nyström’s creative relationship – but it certainly stings with a plausible sense of loss and frustration: ‘I repeat my pledge at your feet / Endless days in a rat race / May this season turn…’
Their gift for the subtly anthemic collides with their equally important, noirish, cinematic sensibilities
Elsewhere, Katatonia delight in the opportunity to experiment. Warden is a sublime cacophony, with elements of post-punk and dub etched into its musty fabric. A final, deeply satisfying explosion of angular riffs and The Light Which I Bleed takes a sparse arrangement and smothers it in atmosphere, as scratchy guitar figures mutate into a big, doomy chorus and a brilliantly pompous fade-out.
The closer, In The Event Of…, is as momentous and tantalising as its title suggests as Katatonia’s gift for the subtly anthemic collides with their equally important, noirish, cinematic sensibilities.
KATATONIA – Wind of no Change (Official Video) | Napalm Records – YouTube
There’s one moment that overshadows all the rest: sung in Swedish, and with a delicacy that seems startling even for Renkse, Efter Solen is a piano ballad set to a distant heartbeat rhythm. It’s also a disorientating indulgence, constructed with amorphous, ambient electronics, stuttering beats, blizzards of synths and static and a lightness of touch that borders on magical.
Like just about everything Katatonia have released in recent times, it’s beautiful, bewildering and quite unlike anything else. Bands change, people move on; but when everything Renkse and Katatonia touch turns to sparkling, fresh gold, the present and future will always outweigh the past.
Nightmares As Extensions Of The Waking State is on sale now via Napalm Records.
Dom Lawson has been writing for Metal Hammer and Prog for over 14 years and is extremely fond of heavy metal, progressive rock, coffee and snooker. He also contributes to The Guardian, Classic Rock, Bravewords and Blabbermouth and has previously written for Kerrang! magazine in the mid-2000s.
