Black Sabbath Officially Announce Reunion Tour, Album

On Friday, the members of Black Sabbath held a press conference in Los Angeles amid rabid fan speculation of a reunion. The rumors were confirmed at the conference: The gods of heavy metal have officially gotten back together, and in 2012 they'll embark on an enormous international tour as well as record a brand new album.  read more

Roger Waters Brings The Wall to Stadiums in North America

Former Pink Floyd leader Roger Waters has mellowed considerably with age: In the 1970s he abhorred playing stadium shows, but now he's chosen to bring his colossal production of The Wall to stadiums all across North America.  read more

Jimmy Cliff to Release First New Music in Seven Years

Jamaican ska/reggae pioneer Jimmy Cliff, winner of multiple Grammy Awards and the only living musician to hold Jamaica's Order of Merit, announced today that he will release an EP titled Sacred Fire on Nov. 29, a five-song collection produced by Rancid frontman Tim Armstrong.  read more

Black Sabbath Reunion Looking More Likely to Happen

In a recent interview with Planet Rock, former Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi divulged that a full-band reunion could happen in the future.  read more

Origin of Song: Serge Gainsbourg Meets Bardot and the Barrow Gang

Leave it to a Parisian, Serge Gainsbourg, songwriter and artistic provocateur extraordinaire, to turn Bonnie and Clyde's epic tragedy into a love song for the ages.   read more

New Reissue Label Real Gone Music Will Release Live Grateful Dead Albums, More

It was announced today that a new label has formed under the distribution of Razor & Tie that aims to spotlight the works of obscure artists as well as less celebrated works of famous artists. Its name is Real Gone Music, and it was co-founded by longtime music industry pros Gordon Anderson and Gabby Castellana, founders of (respectively) Collector's Choice Music and Hep Cat Records.  read more

The Brill Building Sound

“There is a rose in Spanish Harlem / A red rose up in Spanish Harlem / It is a special one / It’s never seen the sun / It only comes out / when the moon is on the run / And all the stars are gleaming”  read more

Mickey Hart Forms New Band

Percussionist Mickey Hart, formerly one of the dual drummers in psychedelic rock stalwarts The Grateful Dead, announced Friday that he is forming a new group, The Mickey Hart Band.  read more

The Origin of Song: The Wailers and "Get Up Stand Up"

“How long must I protest the same thing?” asked Bob Marley in 1978 about the song he and Peter Tosh made famous with the Wailers. “I sing ‘Get Up Stand Up’, and up till now, people don’t get up,” he said, according to Bob Marley…In His Own Words. “So must I still sing ‘Get Up Stand Up’?...I want people to live big and have enough.”  read more

When Bad Things Happen To Great Writers

“Very few people have the balls to talk about ‘rock and roll’ anymore.” Paul Williams, Crawdaddy!, May 1967  read more

My Life Is the Road: Owsley “The Bear” Stanley Was a Friend of the Mac

On Monday, December 8, 1969, Fleetwood Mac began a four-night engagement at Steve Paul’s Scene in New York City. After the sound check, Teddy Slatus, the club’s manager, came into the green room looking for Peter Green....  read more

Crawdaddy! Comes to Paste

When we launched Paste in 2002, we were well aware of the long-tradition of music journalism that laid the groundwork for magazines like ours, including early publications like Crawdaddy!, Creem and Rolling Stone. But first among them—“the first magazine of rock journalism”—was Paul Williams’ Crawdaddy....  read more

Hank Williams Tribute Album Gets a Release Date, Track List

Tribute albums seem to be a monthly thing in the music world, but the upcoming Hank Williams tribute album is definitely not your standard batch of cover songs....  read more

Stevie Wonder Collaborates with Drake on New Album

Young Money rapper Drake recently revealed that Stevie Wonder will appear on his sophomore album, Take Care....  read more

Watch Mavis Staples and Colin Meloy Cover The Band

Located at the mouth of Newport Harbor in the pristine Fort Adams, Rhode Island’s Newport Folk Festival has played host to countless legendary acts throughout its 53-year history. And while spontaneous collaborations aren’t out of the ordinary at the music and arts-focused event, it’s always a unique moment when legends share the stage with their younger colleagues....  read more

And So It Began: Remembering the First Issue

From The Crawdaddy! BookIntroduction to First Issue by Paul Williams, reviews by Paul Williams The first issue of the first American rock music magazine was printed on Sunday, January 30, 1966, in a basement in Brooklyn, New York, on the Qwertyuiop Press mimeograph belonging to and operated by Ted White, a science-fiction fan (and writer and editor). The date on the masthead was February 7, because the 17-year-old founder unreasonably intended it to be a weekly magazine, and he knew that magazines are usually dated according to the day they go off sale (one week after the on-sale date, in...  read more

Crate Digger: The Replacements Stink Some More

The Replacements The Shit Hits the Fans (Twin Tone, 1984) It’s a fairly common rock ‘n’ roll tale (I think): kid gets caught bootlegging concert, engineer confiscates tape and delivers it to band, band listens to tape, likes it, and considers releasing it legitimately. That’s basically what happened with the Maxell XL II-S cassette Replacements soundman Bill Mack swiped from some poor schlub at the Bowery in Oklahoma City, OK, on the chilly evening of November 11, 1984. The twist in this version, however, is that the performance in question wasn’t very good—80% of the Replacements’ lethargic, tuneless set that...  read more

Folk, Rock & Other Four-Letter Words

Originally printed in Issue 3 of Crawdaddy! March 28, 1966 There has been a great increase recently in the number of popular artists whose songs are influenced by or taken from American folk music—both traditional and modern. The paranoiac need of modern man for a label for anything that comes near him resulted, in this case, in the term “folk-rock” to signify pop music with strong folk influences. Originally “folk-rock” meant pop music that used actual folk material; later, anything folk-influenced that retained a heavy beat, and still later, anything having anything to do with folk that happened to sell...  read more

Understanding Dylan

My Blonde On Blonde review (“Understanding Dylan”) was a breakthrough for me as a writer, creatively and professionally. It was soon reprinted in Hit Parader magazine, and then used as the introduction to a songbook published by Dylan’s publisher. I began to feel like a “real” writer. Originally published in the Fourth Issue of Crawdaddy! in August of 1966....  read more

Crawdaddy! Founder on His Experience at the Bed-in for Peace

Originally published in Rediscovering Rock and Roll, A Journey: Chapter Six A friend said he saw me on Friday Night Videos last week. Apparently they’ve made an after-the-fact video of John Lennon’s “Give Peace a Chance,” edited from the Canadian TV footage of John & Yoko’s “bed-in” in Montreal, and there I am singing out of tune and clapping my hands with the Hare Krishnas and Tim Leary and everybody. I’ve never seen the footage myself, but it’s nice to be part of history (like the guy who shouted “Whipping Post!” on the Allman Brothers’ Live at the Fillmore album)....  read more