U2. With news U2 have just beaten the Rolling Stones for the highest grossing concert tour of all time, (tipped to pass US $700 million) I felt compelled to go for a stroll around the Lindeman Island golf-course with my iPod set to nothing but Bono, The Edge, Adam and Larry. And Johnny. I’ve always…
Category: Music
Michael Jackson’s Secret Duet With Barry Gibb Finally Revealed – ‘All In Your Name’
For years there has been talk amongst fans of Michael Jackson and the Bee Gees of several unreleased collaborations between these two giants of pop. I can even remember an interview back in the late 90s where the Gibbs were talking about recording an entire album with Michael with Babyface producing. While the album never…
Lionel Richie Back Onstage With His Old Commodores Buddies
Last night Lionel Richie reunited onstage in Auckland at Vector Arena with two former Commodores, Thomas McClary and Ronald LaPread. By all accounts, the concert was phenomenal mixture of the funk, the soul and the balladry that made these men superstars for the first time in the 70s and I’m gutted I couldn’t be there….
The Japanese Earthquake & The Real Origin Of Bruce Springsteen’s My City Of Ruins
Bruce Springsteen from the Born To Run shoot. A great friend of mine named John Budge, the man who got me started in radio back in the late 90s, sent me an email a couple of days ago reminding me of a Bruce Springsteen song I’d somehow forgotten about. It was a song Budgie –…
Enrique Iglesias Is An Idiot – Dropping F-Bombs In Popular Music
Tell me what you really think Enrique. A couple of weeks back a very prim and proper lady of probable Chinese descent came up to me at the Club Med disco and asked if she could request a song. As money dripped off her wrists and fingers, she pointed at my computer screen and commanded: “Tonight…
The Music Star Who Kept All His Tennis Stats Since The 70s – What If I’d Been Doing The Same?
Nadal and Federer. With the Australian Open on and men’s tennis at one of the undoubted peaks of the modern era with the Nadal / Federer rivalry, it’s got me thinking about my own epic tennis rivalries and what if I’d kept all my stats. I’d interviewed the great songwriter Jimmy Webb (MacArthur Park, All I Know, Witchita…
Bee Gee Maurice Gibb 8 Years On – Song Of The Week
Today marks eight years since Maurice Gibb of the Bee Gees died while on the operating table in Miami after suffering from a twisted intestine. He was only 53 and as a lifelong fan of the brothers Gibb, I remember feeling extremely sad but also privileged that I was on the radio and could…
Brandon Flowers’ Ode To The Bee Gees & Vangelis On His Stunning Solo Song ‘Only The Young’
Life at Club Med in the Whitsundays has been a hectic combination of dodging torrential rain (November had five times the average rainfall and well over double the record for this part of Queensland), playing tennis, killing cockroaches, kayaking to tiny islands, dealing with tropical mold, doing the sound for the nightly shows, shooing wild…
The Arcade Fire & My Favourite New Song Of 2010
I’m not going to lie, it’s not a short flight from Vancouver to Auckland, particularly when you’re enroute to Brisbane enroute to Hamilton Island enroute to Lindeman Island. Needless to say, I had a bit of time on my hands and discovered this song by Canadian band (and fellow Springsteen fans) The Arcade Fire called…
Mickey Rourke’s ‘The Wrestler’ & How It Parallels The Life Of Pop Star Andy Gibb
At home yesterday I cracked out some of my old Andy Gibb LPs. I wanted to hear Shadow Dancing again which despite being the biggest hit of 1978 in the US, you hardly hear on the radio anymore. What a great song, what perfect pop albums and as is always the case with Andy, listening…
Whatever Happened To 5 Time Grammy Winner Christopher Cross? (written late 2007)
Holmsey is back, all is forgiven at TVNZ and now that we’ve found out the Bay City Rollers never made any money and that the David Cassidy of 2007 owns an unusually tight forehead, it’s time to turn our attention to another potential Whatever Happened To… guest star. He is a man who won five…
Is Lionel Richie The Nicest Man In Showbiz? Hanging Out With A Couple Of Commodores
The exuberant tale of 26-year old Lionel Richie and Commodores fanboy that gets to meet to his hero – three times… One-time-a-Lionel I knew was going to happen. Universal Records appreciated my daily on-air ravings about the magnificence of all things Lionel Richie and had put my name on the pre-concert meet ‘n’ greet list….
