PowerBlogs: Rumour Mills

The one thing the backstage people must keep in mind with Shinedown: they’re southerners.

The Smoking Gun has posted Shinedown’s backstage rider and their dinner request states, “Remember, we are southern boys. Lamb and duck are welcome, but nothing beats a good ole fried chicken.”

They don’t like pink cups because they’re guys.

They ask for grape Pedialite, which they note is “guaranteed to cure a hangover, or if we find a sick baby.”

They like pulp-free orange juice, because they say, “For every piece of pulp we find, an angry gnome breaks into a good middle class family’s home.”

Shinedown also ask for Skittles, but “absolutely no purple Skittles.

Purple is for terrorists.”

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There were plenty of times when Richie Sambora wanted to ditch school.

Now the street leading up to it bears his name.

Students at Woodbridge High School in Woodbridge, New Jersey, will go to school by walking up Richie Sambora Way.

Sambora paid for a new weight room in the school and named it for his father, Adam, who died of cancer two years ago.

Sambora is also raising funds for Woodbridge teenager Kelly Mahon, who was diagnosed with a brain tumour.

He’s been working on projects to benefit his hometown and he says he’s never taken his success for granted.

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Bon Jovi has filed a copyright-infringement lawsuit against a Minneapolis bar for allegedly playing the band’s songs without paying royalties. Sally’s Saloon and Eatery is being accused of failing to secure proper licensing, and the group is seeking unspecified damages. Bon Jovi performs on the Today show this morning (Wednesday).

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The Recording Academy has decided “California Girls” by the Beach Boys and “Feliz Navidad” by Jose Feliciano are worth keeping for posterity.

The academy is adding 25 recordings to its Grammy Hall of Fame, which preserves recordings of historic or cultural significance.

This year’s batch also includes “Riders on the Storm” by The Doors, Janis Joplin’s “Pearl” album, “It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World” by James Brown, “Mr. Bojangles” by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and The Isley Brothers’ “Twist and Shout.”

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A four-hour highlight reel of last month’s two Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 25th Anniversary Concerts will air Sunday on H-B-O at 5:00 p-m [PT]. The shows at New York’s Madison Square Garden featured Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, U-2, Crosby, Stills and Nash, James Taylor, Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne, Simon & Garfunkel, Paul Simon, Jeff Beck, Metallica, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Mick Jagger, Billy Joel, Ray Davies, John Fogerty, Sting, B-B King, Ozzy Osbourne, Lou Reed, Billy Gibbons and many others. The broadcast will be repeated numerous times throughout December and into January with a D-V-D to be released next year. Net proceeds from the shows will benefit the Rock Hall’s endowment fund.

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Creed will release their first live D-V-D on December 8th. Creed Live was filmed September 25th just outside Houston and is the show the band streamed on the Internet. A deluxe edition of the D-V-D is coming out early next year, packaged with their album Full Circle, a C-D of the concert, a T-shirt, poster and a backstage pass from the Full Circle tour.

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Highlights of concerts from Bruce Springsteen, U-2, Green Day and Creed will air on a new V-H-1 series called Friday Night Alright. The show kicks off on New Year’s Day at 8 p-m [PT]. The Creed episode will air January 29th, Green Day on February 19th, U-2 on March 12th and Springsteen on March 26th.

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Saving Abel were on tour during the US Thanksgiving week last year and are doing it again in 2009. Last year, the band had just played a gig near where most of the members are from, Corinth, Mississippi. Guitarist Scott Bartlett didn’t grow up in the town, so instead he and the Abel crew went to Tupelo, Mississippi, where his parents had built a new home — although his mom and dad were away visiting his brother and sister for the holiday. Bartlett and the crew arrived at the house at 3 a-m to find that there was no turkey in the freezer. With no chance of finding a bird at that time, he and the gang went to Wal-Mart, bought a deep fryer and proceeded to make a great meal out of various “exotic meats” his parents had in their ice box.

Saving Abel are spending this Thanksgiving in Boston, and Bartlett jokes that the group plans to enjoy a more traditional holiday… “We’ll watch football and apologize to our loved ones for everything we did in the past year.”

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Joe Perry’s tour bus was recently involved in a fender-bender with a deer outside Detroit. Perry wasn’t on board and his driver was not hurt, but the deer and the bus weren’t so lucky. The deer was killed and the bus is now in the shop. While it’s being fixed, Perry is using singer Englebert Humperdink’s bus. Perry and The Joe Perry Project are in San Francisco tonight (Wednesday), Mesa, Arizona on Friday and Las Vegas on Saturday.

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The Rolling Stones will take advantage of the publicity surrounding the release of British singing sensation Susan Boyle’s cover of “Wild Horses” by re-releasing the original. The digital release also includes a stripped-down version taken from their 1995 live album, Stripped. It was released on Monday through I-Tunes, along with a video of the Stones performing the song live.

Other artists who have covered “Wild Horses” include Neil Young, Guns n’ Roses, Sheryl Crow and Mazzy Star.

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With Slipknot finally off the road, frontman Corey Taylor is shifting his focus to the next Stone Sour album. The band plans on going into the studio in January to start work on its third album. Taylor tells Noisecreep, “We’ve already got 10 tunes fully written and another 15 we’re kind of working on here and there. When I’m not on the road I’m still working, I never stop. And it’s really good, everything we’re doing is really, really good.”

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The line-up for Warren Haynes’ annual Christmas Jam in Asheville, North Carolina just got a dose of star power with the addition of Aerosmith’s Brad Whitford, Collective Soul frontman Ed Roland and the The Xmas Jam Band, which includes ex-Black Crowes guitarist Audley Freed, The Wallfowers drummer Fred Eltringham and Lynyrd Skynyrd bassist Robert Kearns. They’ll be joined by the already announced Gov’t Mule, Counting Crows and Ani DiFranco at the December 12th show.

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More than two-thousand people were on hand yesterday (Tuesday) in Feltham, England for the unveiling of a Hollywood-style star honoring late Queen singer Freddie Mercury on the 18th anniversary of his death. Queen guitarist Brian May unveiled the commemorative plaque along with Mercury’s 87-year-old mother, Jer Bulsara. Addressing the crowd, May — who also grew up in Feltham — said, “Freddie, we pursued your dream, our dream, and we love you and we always will, and we are very happy to honor you in this way.” Mercury’s mom said of her son, “He grew up to be a man with a big appetite for life and an even bigger talent for music. These things were there in him even as a boy, and coming here to England in 1964 gave him the opportunity to develop his talent and ambition.” The plaque reads, “Freddie Mercury — musician, singer and songwriter,” as well as “1964 and 1968,” denoting the years he resided in Feltham.

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Rush was honored Monday night in Toronto by the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada at its 20th annual awards gala. The Canadian trio was recognized with an international achievement honor for their most recent tour and the release of Snakes and Arrows Live.

Tom Cochrane was honored for having five songs played 100-thousand times on Canadian radio in 2008, including “Lunatic Fringe,” which he recorded with Red Rider.

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The season premiere of Spectacle: Elvis Costello With… on December 9th will feature a conversation with U-2’s Bono and The Edge.

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Dave Navarro will appear at the Need to Feed Thanksgiving Food Drive at Wonderland in Los Angeles tonight (Wednesday).

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Puddle of Mudd will appear on Jimmy Kimmel Live on January 7th.

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Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello produced the debut E-P from New York band Outernational called Eyes on Fire. It’s due out December 8th.

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KISS will tour Europe from May 7th in Dublin, Ireland through June 27th in Belgium. Their North American tour hits Los Angeles tonight (Wednesday), with the show being streamed on their Facebook page.

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Sting’s A Winter’s Night… Live From Durham Cathedral D-V-D, which was released yesterday, will be shown on Great Performances on P-B-S on Thanksgiving night.