Doug Goldstein, the former manager of Guns N' Roses, has died, aged 65.

Goldstein began working with the Los Angeles hard rock legends as a tour manager, during the Appetite For Destruction touring cycle, before being promoted to the position of co-manager alongside Alan Niven. After Niven parted company with the band, when Axl Rose reportedly refused to continue working on the Use Your Illusion albums while he remained manager, Goldstein took over the role, steering the group through the Use Your Illusion era, and the original group's splintering.

In 2001, Iron Maiden's former management company Sanctuary purchased Doug Goldstein's Big FD Entertainment, and Merck Mercuriadis took after the group's management. A statement at the time declared that while Axl Rose has not fired Doug Goldstein, the pair were "taking a break from each other."

Goldstein's LinkedIn profile reads: "As a veteran in the music industry, Doug has learned that much of one's success depends on equal parts talent, great management, and building core relationships."

Alan Niven has paid tribute to his former friend, saying "It’s very sad. 65 is not old. I will be lighting a candle for him tonight."

Last year, Alan Niven filed a lawsuit against Guns N' Roses, claiming that they've made "repeated threats" against him in order to halt the publication of his memoir, Sound N' Fury: Rock'N'Roll Stories.

The biography, which Classic Rock described as "like Mickey Spillane stubbing cigarettes out on the hard-boiled corpse of James Ellroy," was originally scheduled to be published in July 2025 but has yet to emerge, amid rumours that lawyers for Axl Rose are trying to block publication.

The book is still available to pre-order on Amazon, now with a publishing date of October 29.

Iron Maiden are on the cover of the new Metal Hammer!

As they gear up for Eddfest, their 50th anniversary festival at the legendary Knebworth, we talk to singer Bruce Dickinson and bassist/founder Steve Harris about what we can expect from it – and what the future holds. Plus, we take a tour of some of their classic props and memorabilia!

The issue also comes with an exclusive Iron Maiden water bottle! Order your copy now!

When asked why Maiden are still touring so intensively, Bruce explains that he simply loves performing.

“When I walk out onstage, it’s one of the few moments during my life when the rest of the world can go to hell,” he says. “On a really good night, you completely lose yourself in some weird higher power that takes you over. You inhabit the song, your voice just seems to anticipate everything, and that’s why I do it. Simple as that.”

Elsewhere, we bring you the untold story of System Of A Down’s early years. From Serj Tankian’s first song, to Daron Malakian’s soap opera binges, to Shavo Odadjian’s initial role as the band’s hype man – it’s all here.

We also celebrate 20 years of Bring Me The Horizon’s debut album, Count Your Blessings. It might have been a scrappy set of songs from a MySpace band hated by traditional metalheads, but it marked the beginning of their incredible rise to the top.

Meanwhile, we go inside lost Slipknot album, Look Outside Your Window, recorded alongside 2008’s All Hope Is Gone sessions, and head to Florida for Blood4Blood – the first-ever showcase of metal and bare-knuckle fighting, staged by Slaughter To Prevail’s Alex Terrible.

Taylor Momsen explains how she rose from being a child actor to an AC/DC-approved rock’n’roll singer, A reveal the story behind breakout nu metal hit Nothing, and Blaze Bayley takes your questions on sci-fi epics and whether he’d ever sing with Iron Maiden again.

Plus! Former Arch Enemy singer Alissa White-Gluz introduces us to new band Blue Medusa, and we find out how Dimmu Borgir became black metal’s biggest band – and its most divisive.

All this, along with As Everything Unfolds, Hawxx, Sonic Temple festival, Deserfest, Warning, Devildriver, Quicksand, Karnivool, Frozen Soul, Hashtronaut and much, much more.

Only in the new issue of Metal Hammer, on sale now. Order it online and have it delivered straight to your door!

Awards shows can be a tiresome old thing. We sit for hours on end, watching celebrities be wheeled out one after the other to give carefully scripted introductory speeches, before handing awards to their celebrity mates, who give carefully planned, endlessly long speeches of their own, thanking everyone they've ever met in their decades of existence, before finally walking off with a gong that'll inevitably end up in a draw or on a toilet shelf somewhere.

Alright, maybe that's a little over the top - when done right, awards shows can be a legitimate and emotional way to pay tribute to our heroes - but whether it's an overly sanitised Brit Awards or a Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame that can't seem to go a year without pissing off a fanbase or two, it certainly feels like, for the most part, when it comes to awards, we've just seen it all before.

It's perhaps why legendary Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson decided to take matters into his own hands when Rush were inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 2013. The induction was widely accepted in the rock community as a huge victory for prog music, and a moment of vindication for a band who had often been treated snidely by certain corners of the rock media and fanbase.

This didn't stop Lifeson, however, deciding to undermine the whole shindig in the most hilarious way possible. Following warm, eloquent and heartfelt speeches by his Rush bandmates, bassist/vocalist Geddy Lee and drummer Neil Peart, the guitarist proceeded to spend no less than two and a half minutes 'blah blah blah'-ing into the microphone.

We're not being facetious. He literally spends his entire speech saying 'blah' in more ways that we ever thought possible, from imitating instruments to pretending to have a phone call and, most brilliantly of all, mocking the teary-eyed acceptance speeches of many an awards show gone by.

As it dawns on the star-filled audience that this isn't merely an opening gag, Lifeson's bandmates look on in amusement, and a ludicrous moment of Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame history is born.

Years later, Lifeson would comment on the speech, telling Rolling Stone: "Well, it just seemed like a good idea at the time. I had a speech written and I was trying to memorize it and I couldn't remember it. And I thought I might as well just [go] 'blah blah blah.' And I thought, 'Well, that's a good idea.' And so I thought it would tell the story of our history and how we got to that stage without using any words. And the interesting thing is that everybody remembers my speech."

Watch the iconic moment below.

My Chemical Romance are coming back to the UK and Europe next month as part of their acclaimedThe Black Parade 2026 world tour, and to get the MCRmy in the mood for what promises to be a spectacular return, Future Publishing is releasing a new edition of the Ultimate My Chemical Romance Fan Pack.

Experience the rise and rebirth of My Chemical Romance from punk rock basement shows to sold-out stadiums. in an essential-for-fans bookazine that relives the glory days of Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge, The Black Parade and Danger Days before looking ahead towards the future for Gerard Way and co.

ULTIMATE FAN COLLECTION: Dive into the complete My Chemical Romance biography, following their rise from underground heroes to stadium-filling legends. Relive every iconic moment across 20 years of game-changing music!

ICONIC WALL ART: Showcase two stunning A2 posters and a frameable art piece that capture the raw energy of MCR's most memorable eras, from Three Cheers... to Danger Days.

TREASURED MERCHANDISE: This My Chemical Romance book arrives packed with exclusive photos, behind-the-scenes stories, and rare insights that'll make any MCR fan's heart race.

STYLE YOUR GEAR: Personalise your shirt, hoodie, notebook, laptop, or guitar case with 16 bold stickers featuring the band's most iconic symbols.

COLLECTIBLE GIFTS: Share the love with four striking My Chemical Romance postcards showcasing classic MCR moments. These gifts are brilliant for trading with fellow fans.

Pick up your copy here!

And check out MCR in the UK and Europe at the following shows.

Jun 30: Liverpool Anfield Stadium, UK
Jul 04: Glasgow Bellahouston Park, UK
Jul 08: London Wembley Stadium, UK
Jul 10: London Wembley Stadium, UK
Jul 11: London Wembley Stadium, UK
Jul 15: Florence Visarno Arena, Italy
Jul 18: Madrid Iberdrola Music, Spain

A record collection belonging to English music executive Tony Calder is going under the hammer.

Calder, who promoted the first Beatles single, also co-managed the Rolling Stones with Andrew Loog Oldham, with whom he co-founded the UK's first independent record label, Immediate, in 1965. He died in 2018.

Now his record collection is being auctioned off, and it includes plenty of rare and collectable pieces, including releases by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Pink Floyd and The Who.

Pride of place goes to an original copy of Would You Believe, a 1968 album by songwriter Billy Nicholls. The album was commissioned by Immediate as a British response to the Beach Boys' classic Pet Sounds, and featured all the members of the Small Faces alongside a coterie of familiar session men including Nicky Hopkins, John Paul Jones, Big Jim Sullivan, Jerry Shirley and Dave Greenslade.

Only 100 promotional-only copies of the album were ever pressed, and the album never made it to retail after Immediate went bust.

"People often cite records such as the Sex Pistols' God Save The Queen on A&M Records among the rarest records in the world, and rightly so," says Martin Hughes, vinyl specialist at Wessex Auction Rooms. "Yet in the last six years, I have personally handled and sold five copies of that record, including a world record example.

"I have never handled another copy of Billy Nicholls' Would You Believe, and I know I never will again. For serious record collectors, opportunities to acquire a copy simply do not exist. This is one of those records that most collectors will only ever read about.

"There are certainly rarer one-off artefacts, acetates and unique recordings. But when collectors discuss records that were actually pressed and distributed, Billy Nicholls' Would You Believe is always part of that conversation."

Calder's copy of Would You Believe is estimated to sell for between £6000-£8000. Another original copy of the album, which has been rereleased several times, was sold via Discogs for €5000 in 2023.

Other records in Calder's collection include an acetate of the first side of the Rolling Stones' 1966 live album Have You Seen Your Mother Live!, a previously undocumented press pack for the Stones' Sticky Fingers album, and a 1970 "Spiral Vertigo" copy of the debut album by hard rock power trio May Blitz.

For those with regular-sized wallets, some bargains may be had, including a single lot containing 70 vinyl albums from artists including Buffalo Springfield, The Allman Brothers Band, Stephen Stills, Freddie Mercury, Eric Clapton, David Crosby, The Band, Mountain, Jefferson Starship, It's A Beautiful Day, Joni Mitchell, John Lennon, Eagles, Emerson Lake & Palmer, Walker Brothers, Argent, Cat Stevens and more. The guide price? Just £100-£150.

Calder's collection can be viewed at the EasyAuction website.

In rock history, 1991 is most often seen as The Year Everything Changed. Anecdotally, grunge crashed down like a meteorite to annihilate the hair-metal dinosaurs that had dominated the rock landscape over the previous decade. But in truth there was no instant annihilation event for LA glam (or thrash, or just about any other form of popular guitar music of the 80s). Instead, a procession of landmark releases from August to September 1991 helped transform alt.rock’s steadily growing snowball into an all-enveloping avalanche.

“By the end of the late eighties, the whole scene needed a massive shake-up,” Kerrang! editor at the time Geoff Barton told Classic Rock. “Something was needed to turn the tide in rock, but I don’t think we anticipated the fallout.”

Rock journalists may have grown tired of glam’s increasingly cartoonish hedonism, but it was still big business as far as the record-buying masses were concerned. The summer began inauspiciously. On June 17 Van Halen released their ninth studio album For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge which shot straight to No.1 in both the UK and US. Two weeks later Canadian pop-rocker Bryan Adams began conquering the singles charts with the massive Everything I Do (I Do It For You). The power ballad may have been a slice of 80s rock cheese, but it was an undeniable commercial sensation as it topped international charts, including a record-holding 16 weeks in the UK and a flabbergasting 39 weeks in Canada. And this, in the year that was supposedly all about grunge?

Adams’s success wasn’t anomalous; in January the Scorpions had released Wind Of Change, an international smash that sold more than 10 million copies worldwide. Elsewhere, Extreme’s More Than Words claimed the top spot in the US on June 8, 1991. Neither band was particularly known for exploring their softer side (although Scorpions had certainly dabbled in their 26-year career to that point), but a trip to ballad country proved to be exactly what they needed in order to reach new commercial peaks, revitalising commercial interest in albums that had already been out for 12 months.

“People everywhere were like: ‘You’re out of your fucking minds releasing this,’” Extreme guitarist Nuno Bettencourt told Billboard in 2016. “We fought for it because when we performed it for an audience they told us it was a hit. On stage, before we even got a word out, the whole crowd would be singing it – before it was even a single! So that right there told us: ‘Go for it, take that risk.’ And thank god we did.”

If the bands were worried about being labelled ‘sell-outs’, those accusations were easily drowned out by the sound of cash tills for millions of dollars being exchanged worldwide, proof positive that ballads were still a road to gold (even platinum).

By and large, the music industry was still operating as it had a decade before; the closest sign of any change to the rock landscape being when R.E.M. finally achieved a No.1 with Out Of Time. But considering each of their previous six records had already made it into the top 100 of the Billboard 200, R.E.M.’s achievement seemed to owe more to their longevity (and the popularity of lead single Losing My Religion) than it did to any wider cultural trend in rock music.

But on August 12, 1991 it looked like the tide might have started to change. Metallica had set their sights on becoming the biggest band on the planet. Teaming up with producer Bob Rock, the band traded in the prog-thrash pomp of 1988’s …And Justice For All for arena-metal imperialism and classic rock candour. Collected in a 12-track package titled simply Metallica (now most often referred to as the Black Album), their new album far outstripped even their wildest expectations, selling more than five million copies in its first year alone.

As Bob Rock told Reverb in 2017: “[The Black Album] actually changed something culturally; everybody owned that album. Dentists loved the Black Album! There was a musical transition when the album came out and it changed radio, because that heavy sound was now on the radio… I don’t think I’ve made a record that had done that before. I’m very proud of that.”

Bigger than anything in thrash and harder than just about anything in glam, the Black Album buried the competition and took Metallica from being a beloved, still somewhat underground metal band to being a global rock sensation. Lead-off single Enter Sandman even drew inspiration from the nascent scene brewing in Seattle, priming audiences for the next big thing right as it was about to break.

“I was listening to a lot of stuff out of the Pacific Northwest, and I’d been listening to the first Soundgarden album since 1987,” Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett admitted to Uncut in 2020. “I didn’t think of it as grunge so much as Sabbath-y. That movement changed the look and style of a lot of bands, and how bands should be at the time.”

Pearl Jam weren’t the first grunge band to release an album in 1991, although some of the band’s members were. Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard were still reeling from the death of their Mother Love Bone bandmate Andrew Wood when they were approached by Soundgarden frontman (and Wood’s roommate) Chris Cornell with the idea of recording some songs in tribute to the late vocalist. Recorded under the name Temple Of The Dog (referencing a Wood lyric) with the line-up filled out by Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron and soon-to-be Pearl Jam guitarist Mike McCready, the group had released a self-titled album on April 19. Scarcely four months later, on August 27, Ament and Gossard were unveiling the debut by their new band, Pearl Jam. Neither Temple Of The Dog nor Pearl Jam’s debut album Ten ignited the charts on release, but both records did help set the scene for the grunge explosion that was just around the corner.

The genre remained inert as the summer wore on, however, with Rush’s Roll The Bones, Dire Straits’ On Every Street and even Bob Seger’s The Fire Inside making more of a play for chart positioning. By September the battleground had been set; seemingly every major rock release was crammed into a two-week period that saw newcomers and old giants vie for chart dominance. September 17 saw the old guard rally: Ozzy Osbourne with No More Tears, while Guns N’ Roses unleashed their sprawling double-album Use Your Illusion I and II.

One of the biggest bands on the planet (with some considerable claim on the title itself), GN’R’s achievement of those two records taking the No.1 and No.2 spots on the Billboard 200 (among other international charts) was all but assured. More surprising was that Osbourne had staged a second comeback with No More Tears, his sixth solo album. Having ended the 80s in ignominy, arrested after attacking and strangling his wife Sharon in a drink-and-drug-induced haze after the Moscow Music Peace Festival, many had written Osbourne off by the start of the 90s. But after six months in rehab, a freshly sober (and fitness-obsessed) Osbourne came back with a vengeance, with one of the strongest albums in his solo canon and critical acclaim.

Also released on September 17 was Pretty On The Inside, the debut by Los Angeles band Hole. While not on level pegging with the behemoths that they shared a release date with, Hole would go on to serve as the foundation for another major musical revolution of the early 90s – riot grrrl. Topping the UK independent chart, they were representative that the 90s alt. boom was neither confined purely to Seattle, nor to moody men singing about their drug problems.

On September 24, the match was officially lit on the alt.rock powder keg. Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Blood Sugar Sex Magik represented the nascent funk-rock scene, while grunge had its own champions with Soundgarden’s Badmotorfinger and Nirvana’s Nevermind. Of the three, Nirvana looked to be the weakest commercial proposition. Athough signed to a sub-division of Geffen (the same label that a week before had put out the Illusion pair), they were also the ‘newest’ band of the three and had the least ‘pedigree’ to draw on for sales.

Of those who figured in the illustrious seven weeks, Metallica came away as clear-cut winners, commercially speaking. On October 31, 1991 – just days after their tenth anniversary as a band – the Black Album was awarded triple-platinum status. When they embarked on a US stadium tour alongside Guns N’ Roses the following summer, they even had a cheeky billboard erected outside LA’s Whisky A Go Go club proclaiming: ‘Only one rock band has sold more than 5,000,000 copies of an album in the 90s’.

But while Metallica had won the commercial arms race, they had barely 24 hours to celebrate before being deposed as the most important band in rock. That title went to Nirvana, whose Nevermind reached No.1 in the US on November 1.

As with everything else in the story of grunge and alternative, Nevermind was by no means an overnight smash success. Instead it was the enduring power of lead-off single Smells Like Teen Spirit that truly catapulted Nirvana – and grunge as a whole – into the mainstream. A combination of radio airplay and heavy circulation of the iconic music video on the all-important MTV set up a feeding frenzy that meant the records were selling faster than Nirvana’s label could hope to draw up any marketing strategy. Geffen president Ed Rosenblatt would later tell the New York Times: “We didn’t do anything. Nevermind was just one of those ‘get out of the way and duck’ records.”

Within 12 months most of the albums (Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Ten, Nevermind) released in August-September 1991 had achieved platinum-status sales (ironically, Soundgarden began 1991 as one of the ‘biggest’ names in grunge, but ended up lagging behind as Badmotorfinger didn’t achieve platinum status until January 1993). More importantly, however, the huge successes of those releases signalled the death knell for glam-rock as bands were unceremoniously dumped from their labels while reps went running to the hills in search of backwoods gold.

Janet Billig Rich was an artist manager who worked with Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins and Hole, among others. She also witnessed first-hand labels scrambling to sign Seattle bands. Speaking to NPR in 2018, she said: “You could make up a band, [and] make up a quote about them [that] Kurt Cobain said. The Melvins were the greatest example. Kurt liked The Melvins, so everybody had to go sign The Melvins. Everyone was a little shocked. Everything got really easy because it was this economy – Nirvana became an economy.”

While Britain eagerly consumed the fresh wave of US artists suddenly exploding in popularity, homegrown artists were already seeding their own takeover even as grunge hit. Blur’s unhappy experiences working on (and promoting) their debut Leisure (released on August 26, 1991) prompted a knee-jerk reaction to the widespread American rock, which ultimately helped codify the Britpop movement. Similarly, Primal Scream made their first commercial inroads with the September 23 release of Screamadelica, an album that saw the band shift from their early indie rock roots to a more house-inclined direction that precipitated the rise of bands like Massive Attack and The Prodigy later in the decade.

By the time summer 1992 rolled around, the rock landscape had transformed. Bands that 12 months previously had been star attractions were jettisoned out the back door, while previous commercial no-hopers such as Butthole Surfers and White Zombie were eagerly ushered into the fold of major labels. While there was no great grunge meteorite, the fact remains that in just seven weeks from August to September 1991, alternative music pulled off a cultural coup d’état unlike anything seen before or since, where nothing happened until everything happened.

Clive Davis, the music industry executive who guided Columbia Records through its late-60s/early-70s heyday and went on to have an extraordinarily successful career in pop music, has died at the age of 94.

According to reports, Davis was hospitalised last month, suffering from respiratory problems, but was released shortly after and died today (June 22) at his home in Manhattan.

"Over here on E Street, we mourn the death of the great record man and close friend Clive Davis," posted Bruce Springsteen. "At 22 years old, he changed my life when he signed me to Columbia Records. He treated me with the same respect and kindness as a 22-year-old nobody as he did after all my success. A great man. All our prayers and love."

Davis was born in Brooklyn, New York City, in 1932. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1956, he found his way to Columbia Records, where he was appointed president in 1966.

Fascinated by the growth of folk and rock'n'roll, he would first sign Donovan to the label, before going on to bring Big Brother and the Holding Company, Laura Nyro, The Electric Flag, Santana, The Chambers Brothers, Bruce Springsteen, Chicago, Ten Years After, Billy Joel, Blood, Sweat & Tears, Aerosmith and Pink Floyd to Columbia.

Fired by Columbia in 1975 amid allegations of financial impropriety, he went on to found Arista Records, where he created a home for Aretha Franklin, Patti Smith, Ministry, the Alan Parsons Project, The Outlaws, Air Supply, Carly Simon, Grateful Dead, The Kinks, Lou Reed, Enuff Z’Nuff and many more.

More success came at R&B label LaFace, which he founded with producers L.A. Reid and Babyface, where Whitney Houston, TLC, Usher, Outkast, Pink and Toni Braxton would all enjoy multi-platinum album sales.

Davis left Arista in 2000 and started J Records, where D'Angelo, Luther Vandross, Jamie Foxx, and Monica all achieved major success, before ending his career as Chief Creative Officer of Sony Music Entertainment.

Davis's track record wasn't perfect – he told Meat Loaf that Jim Steinman was incapable of writing songs and said Yes's Owner Of A Lonely Heart was "too strange" to be a hit – but it's estimated that Davis worked with artists who cumulatively sold more than a billion albums over the course of his sixty-year career.

Carlos Santana, who was signed by Davis to Columbia in 1968 and to Arista in 1999 – where his Supernatural album sold an estimated 30 million copies worldwide – has paid tribute.

“Clive understood that music is more than entertainment,” Santana wrote. "Music is a healing force. It brings people together beyond fear, beyond separation, beyond borders. He dedicated his life to championing artists and helping them share their gifts with the world.

"Clive recognised the light in people. He encouraged artists to trust their own voice and step into their destiny. Because of his vision, countless musicians were able to reach hearts across the planet."

"To this very day, I listen to the newest records as they reach, let’s say, the top 20 of each genre," Davis told Variety in 2022. "I’ve always made sure that I didn’t listen only to what we were doing, and that I was aware and studying and totally cognizant.

"I found that many of my peers get stuck in what they’re doing, and weren’t prepared for how music was changing. And you’ve gotta know it. It was so tough, over the years, to tell an artist who’d had hit after hit after hit that the next record has to be different, because music has changed.

"You’ve got to be astute. I did it, and I still do it, because I love music."

It has been announced that the iconic throne from Ozzy Osbourne's final ever performance is going on display in his hometown. The impressive and extremely metal-looking chair, which was crafted especially for Ozzy and was last seen at the epic Back To The Beginning show in Birmingham last July, will be added to the Ozzy Osbourne: Working Class Hero exhibition at the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery.

Fans will be able to get an up close and personal look at the throne for free after Ozzy's wife and manager Sharon Osbourne donated it to the exhibition, which has proven extremely popular and is currently set to run until September this year.

"As we approach the one-year anniversary of Back to the Beginning, it feels fitting that Ozzy’s throne, which has now become synonymous with his final performance, would be placed in the museum, where it can be seen by the fans who loved him," says Sharon.

“We are delighted to be able to display Ozzy’s throne at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery," add Sara Wajid and Zak Mensah, co-chief executives at Birmingham Museums Trust. "This extraordinary object is instantly recognisable to fans around the world and represents a powerful final chapter in Ozzy’s remarkable career.

"As we mark the first anniversary of his passing, it offers visitors a special opportunity to come together, remember Ozzy and celebrate the legacy of a true Birmingham legend.”

“Since the momentous Back to the Beginning gig last year, Central BID has been working closely with the Osbourne family to bring Ozzy’s throne back to Birmingham, so fans can see it up close and feel the spirit of Ozzy is still with everyone," says Sam Watson, chair of Central BID Birmingham

“We were determined to bring this iconic throne back to Ozzy’s home city first, a place he loved so much and for his fans to be able to visit, and we are grateful to Sharon and her family for allowing us to make this happen.”

Birmingham City Council member Deborah Harries adds: “Ozzy Osbourne is one of Birmingham’s most foremost cultural figures, and it is only right that we continue to honour his extraordinary legacy here in the city where his journey began.

“The return of his iconic throne to Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery gives fans and visitors a powerful new way to connect with his story at what is an emotional moment, marking a year since his passing.

"This exhibition has already welcomed hundreds of thousands of visitors and demonstrates the global pull of Birmingham’s musical heritage. We’re proud to support this collaboration with Birmingham Museums Trust and partners, which not only celebrates Ozzy’s life but also brings people into the heart of our city.

Harries also notes: "Working closely with partners we will be promoting other Sabbath-related activity to experience in the city over the summer.”

The Back To The Beginning event, which took place at Villa Park in Aston on July 5, just up the road from where Osbourne and his Black Sabbath bandmates Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward grew up, served as Ozzy Osbourne's final show, with the heavy metal legend passing away just over two weeks later. Over 640,000 people are estimated to have visited the Ozzy Osbourne: Working Class Hero since it first opened one month before the show.

Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson is on the cover of the new, gift-packed issue of Prog, which is on sale now!

Issue 171 of Prog comes with a really cool Prog laptop sticker, a Jethro Tull artprint, a newly updated 148-page Tull eBook and a 15-track sampler from Prog For Peart festival featuring all the bands appearing this July.

Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull graces the cover and is the first-ever interviewee of Prog's brand-new All-New All-Star Interview. We got a host of Ian's famous friends, fans and peers to ask him that burning, Tull-related question that they’ve always wanted to ask. The likes of Rick Wakeman, Derek Shulman, Carl Palmer, Roy Harper, Gavin Esler, Mikael Åkerfeldt and loads more to give Ian a good grilling. The result is one of the funniest interviews you'll read with Ian. Plus, on the back of new reissues, we explore the band's journey with new technology that led them to Ian's solo album Walk Into Light and Tull's own Under Wraps.

At the same time Marillion frontman Steve Hogarth tells us about trying to avoid being punched while running around South Yorkshire in a bathrobe, yellow clogs and lots of beads as he looks back over his career in The Prog Interview; Yes tell us all about making their 24th studio album, Aurora; and we celebrate 25 years of everyone’s favourite online prog store Burning Shed.

Elsewhere, Exploring Birdsong, A.A. Williams, MONO, Tarja, Liminal Sky, The Paradox Twin, Franck Carducci, Jonas Lindberg and more tell us all about their latest releases.

Prog 171. Get it today!

Also in Prog 171...

Yes - Steve Howe and Jon Davison talk us through Yes’s 24th studio album, Aurora.

A.A. Williams - atmospheric post-rocker on balancing crippling shyness with playing arenas, and her new album, Solstice.

Burning Shed - celebrating 25 years of everyone’s favourite online prog store.

Exploring Birdsong - it’s been seven years in the making and the band’s debut album, Every House We Built, has finally arrived. We find out more.

Liminal Sky - missing Anathema and Messenger? Check out the beautiful but gloom-laden Liminal Sky.

Tarja - the Finnish prog metal soprano gets heavier and proggier on Frisson Noir.

MONO - the Japanese post-rockers ruminate on loss and grief on new album Snowdrop.

The Paradox Twin - UK proggers return with the deeply personal A Romance Of Many Dimensions.

Franck Carducci - the French rocker tackles some weighty themes on his fourth LP, Sheeple.

Shane Embury - Napalm Death’s Shane Embury tells us all about his very proggy new solo album.

Steve Hogarth - from running around Doncaster in a robe and yellow clogs to tales of the new Marillion album and a solo reissue.

Jonas Lindberg - the Swedish prog rocker on a world full of Bo Hansen, David Gilmour, Spock’s Beard and The Corrs.

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Exploring Birdsong, Pink Floyd, Chris Squire, Supertramp, Hawkwind, Kristoffer GildenlÖw, MONO, Prince Of Failure, Liminal Sky, Anekdoten, Tom Penaguin, Lifesigns, Nektar and loads more!

And reviews of gigs by Jon Anderson, Jethro Tull, The Gathering, Karnivool, Magenta, Angine de Poitrine, Claire Hamill, Stick Men and more.

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

* You can use our store finder to find your nearest stockist. Go to Prog on the alphabetical pull-down menu and enter your postcode.

* The easiest option for everyone would be to go digital. You can get single digital issues from the Apple Store, from Zinio and all manner of digital magazine retailers.

* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

They’ve sold more than 120 million albums and had a revolving door of official members. But in 2026, almost 60 years after their original incarnation, Deep Purple (Mark IX, if anyone really is counting) are back and firing on all cylinders. They’re about to unleash a brand new album – Splat! – on the world and have tour dates that’ll keep them busy for the rest of the year. It seems that rumours of their demise were very much exaggerated.

After all, it was back in 2016 that they announced their Long Goodbye tour, and since then, they’ve been nothing less than a hotbed of activity. And for that, we’re grateful!

This issue, we sit down with the Purps to discuss their current – pun unintended – purple patch of creativity, and to see what the future holds for them.

We've also created two Deep Purple X Classic Rock bundle editions, which pair the magazine with a collection of three postcards and a numbered (/250) art print. One edition also includes a copy of Splat! on yellow vinyl with limited edition cover art. They're both available from the Louder Store.

This issue, we also catch up with George Thorogood to look back at his storied career; travel back 40 years to explore the making of the album that turned Peter Gabriel from prog god to mainstream superstar; collar Phil from Def Leppard and Nuno from Extreme to discuss the two bands’ upcoming tour together; and so much more.

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Features

Deep Purple
Raising the stakes: how they went all-in on their latest, 24th studio gamble and came out with a winning hand.

Sevendust
They had gold albums and were shit-hot live, but almost went bankrupt and almost quit. But they refused to be knocked down.

George Thorogood
Mister Bad To The Bone explains how he “clawed my way to the middle”, and why he’s at peace with where he landed.

Ashley McBryde
She's been through the wringer, and her new album is steeped in the people, places and things that shaped her.

A
Britrock’s cheekiest chaps return older, wiser and with their first new album in more than 20 years.

Peter Frampton
Music is the best medicine. Always sit up straight. A good curry makes life worth living. Artists should take a stand politically… These and more bits of wisdom he’s picked up in life.

Peter Gabriel
How a Grammy-nominated album and a groundbreaking, multi-award-winning video briefly turned a cult solo artist into a global superstar.

Cronos
From black metal to birdwatching and teaching aerobics. The former Venom frontman opens up about his double life.

Regulars

The Dirt
Pink Floyd celebrated on Royal Mint coin; Ritchie Blackmore confirms he was once subbed in Purple; new Soundgarden album will feature Chris Cornell; Welcome back Armored Saint and The Sideshows; Say hello to Maebe and Des Rocs; Say goodbye to Jack Douglas, Dennis Locorriere and Beverley Martyn.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Fairport Convention
The first song that Richard Thompson wrote on his own and used to think was “immature, juvenile”, Meet On The Ledge became a stirring, emotive anthem.

Q&A: Rachel Bolan
The Skid Row bassist and solo artist on the need for speed, his solo debut, Skid’s new singer, digging punk and Oasis.

The Hot List

We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include De’Wayne feat Lenny Kravitz, King Kraken, Kip Moore,
The Hu, Jared James Nichols, The Heavy Eyes and more…

Reviews
New albums from Deep Purple, The Rolling Stones, Neil Young & The Chrome Hearts, The Karma Effect, Joe Bonamassa, Placebo, Savatage, Dead Pioneers, Samantha Fish, Midge Ure and more. Reissues from Metallica, Cream, Pink Floyd, Judas Priest, Def Leppard, Slayer, Yes, Down, Hawkwind, Marillion, Nazareth and more. DVDs, films and books on The Clash, Ozzy Osbourne, Love, MC5, Pete Townshend and more. Live reviews of The Prodigy, Joe Bonamassa, Bonfest, David Bowie, Sugar, Paul Simon, Forged In Sound and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Van Morrison
He forged a singular blend of Celtic mysticism, soul and R&B that produced some of the most revered albums of the rock era.

Lives

We preview tours by Def Leppard & Extreme and Garbage. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Eric Johnson
Texan virtuoso guitarist Eric Johnson picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in the UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

It has become one of the most surprising and iconic images to have emerged from the Grammys in recent years: James Hetfield, barrel-chested and iron-lunged Metallica frontman, screaming into a microphone he's sharing with generational pop superstar, Lady Gaga.

The duo, backed by the rest of Metallica, pillars of pyro and a gaggle of backing dancers as they rip through Moth Into Flame, have had to improvise after an almighty technical hiccup threatened to throw the entire performance into parody. Luckily, it all only serves to make an historic collaboration both more intimate and, somehow, more epic. Disaster averted, basically.

The unlikely team-up took place at the 59th edition of the music industry's most prestigious awards show, which was held on February 12, 2017 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

On a night also marked by appearances by pop heavyweights such as Adele, Beyoncé, The Weeknd, Daft Punk, Bruno Mars and Katy Perry, Metallica's one-song set promised to inject the evening with some much needed energy and heaviness, not to mention the fact that it'd involve one of the wildest partnerships in Grammys history.

Amazingly, the whole thing came together over just a matter of weeks, following a chance meeting between Metallica's drummer and honorary motormouth, Lars Ulrich, and Gaga herself. "We were asked whether we would come and join the Grammys again," Ulrich explained to Access Hollywood ahead of the performance.

"They encourage you to consider, 'Is there some collaboration that you think would be cool?' We said, 'Let's think about it.' And so, I was at a dinner party [with Gaga], and we were sitting next to each other, and we were just basically talking, and I thought, 'Wait a minute, this would be cool.' So I said, 'We're doing the Grammys in a couple of months, do you wanna join us?' and she was just, 'Yeah, that would be great!'"

The dinner party in question was held at the residence of none other than Hollywood A-lister Bradley Cooper, who was in pre-production with Gaga for the film they were both starring in (and that Cooper was directing), A Star Is Born. "I was at Bradley's house with Lars and we were just hanging out," Gaga confirmed to Apple Music's Zane Lowe later that year.

The singer was also full of superlatives for Ulrich and his band, adding: "He's amazing! I went to see them live, I've seen them a couple times live, but I saw them recently… and we were watching the show and I'll tell you something, those guys play better than they've played in their whole lives."

And so, a rehearsal studio in LA was booked for the weekend leading up to the big event, and Gaga and Metallica set about reimagining Moth Into Flame in a way that'd both suit its heavy roots while making the most of Gaga's powerful, unique vocals and flamboyant sense of creativity.

"She was in there for two hours before we even got there, working on her moves and thinking stuff up," James Hetfield told Howard Stern in 2020. "She's extremely creative, and she's a fearless artist."

"She was telling me that Metal Militia, which is this deep cut on our first album Kill 'Em All, was her favourite song back in the day," added Ulrich. "She loves metal, has been very vocal about her love for metal all the time and would show up at Iron Maiden shows and Anthrax shows."

Following a successful on-set dress rehearsal before the show began, the stage was officially set and the 59th annual Grammys were underway. And here, sadly, is where things started to go pear-shaped. On the same night that Megadeth were inexplicably played to the stage pick up their Best Metal Performance award to the sound of the house band playing Metallica's Master Of Puppets, it seemed that Metallica themselves were also destined to be undermined at the Grammys - and not for the first time.

Around halfway through the evening, Orange Is The New Black actress Laverne Cox arrived on stage to introduce Metallica and Lady Gaga's performance...only to forget to mention Metallica at all. Whoops! “I am so sorry to Metallica and all their fans," Cox later stated on Twitter. "I am told I didn’t say their names during the intro. Love you Metallica. You Rock."

The facepalms did by no means end there. As lashings of pyro burst out across the stage and the band kicked into Moth Into Flame, a metalled-up and go-go-dancing Gaga in tow, it soon became obvious that something was wrong.

Namely, James Hetfield's microphone wasn't working. While the band were clearly on top form, as the track's first verse kicked into gear, the frontman's voice was nowhere to be heard as he bellowed into the mic, a quick, confused glance to his side emphasising that he could tell something was up.

Gaga soldiered on, sounding great as she sung her parts, but by the time it came to Moth Into Flames' chorus, it was clear the issue was not getting fixed - almost ninety seconds into the song, and Papa Het was still singing his heart out to absolutely no avail.

"In the heat of the battle, you’re out there, you’re playing," Lars Ulrich told James Corden on The Late Late Show a few weeks later. "When it’s a technical issue, you don’t really know. Is it going to the house? Are the vocals going to the truck? Maybe it’s just the monitor – so you just gotta keep playing."

Thankfully, quick minds prevailed. Gaga, ever the professional, subtly beckoned Hetfield over, and the two sung the track's chorus together on her mic, sharing it for the remainder of the performance. What could have been a total catastrophe ended up being saved at the last minute, and the rest of the song went by without a hitch - and, of course, gave us that iconic shot of the two vocalists side by side.

Sadly, the technical snafu had already done its damage as far as Hetfield's mood was concerned; as soon as the performance finished, Metallica's usually PMA powerhouse could be seen angrily throwing his guitar off stage. He was still fuming by the time the band got back to their dressing room.

“We get off stage, we get back there and I haven’t seen him like that in 20 years," Ulrich revealed on The Late Late Show. "He was livid. He’s aged really well and is a pretty chilled guy – but the first five or 10 minutes in that dressing room was not a lot of fun.”

"I felt embarrassed," Hetfield told the New York Post. "I haven’t been that angry in a long time. When something out of my control goes wrong, I still get wound up. I’m sure it taps into other stuff from my past, but I felt helpless."

TMZ would report that the unfortunate screw-up was down to a stagehand accidentally unplugging a wire under the stage moments before the performance took place. A brutal mistake, but a mistake nonetheless - and one that Metallica, to their credit, were quickly able to put a positive spin on.

"Like they say, the show must go on," said Lars on The Late Late Show. "We fought through it and a lot of people said that it at least made for great television.” "It ended up being a blessing because I ended up singing in a microphone with Lady Gaga - maybe even more than she wanted," Hetfield told the New York Post. "It felt more like a real collaboration because of that."

In hindsight, Metallica's collab with Gaga is far from the biggest disaster the Four Horsemen have put their name to. A victory snatched from the jaws of defeat, it served as an imperfect if riotously entertaining awards performance unlike any other. Like just about everything else Metallica do, it was certainly unforgettable - and at least we have the flawless rehearsal footage to remind exactly how it all should have gone.

Phil Collins has stated that he won't be performing at this year's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony.

Already in the RnRHoF as a member of Genesis, on November 14, at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles, Collins will be inducted into the Rock Hall for his solo work. Other artists set to be inducted on the night include Iron Maiden, Oasis, Billy Idol, Wu-Tang Clan, Joy Division/New Order and Sade.

But as with Iron Maiden (who'll be on tour), and the original members of New Order (who remain bitterly divided), Collins won't be performing on the evening.

"They asked me if I would perform," Collins tells BBC Breakfast, "and I said, No, because you've got to be match fit to do something like that. You can't just go on stage... you have to rehearse, and by that point if you've not been singing, your voice is going to be shot and that's not going to be good. So, I'd rather not do it."

Asked if he thinks he might ever perform again, "I can't really see it happening, but I'm healthier now than I have been for quite a while."

"The last 18 months, say, has been fine," he revealed. "Before that, not so good. Everything health-wise caught up with me at the same time, and whatever could go wrong did go wrong.

"I had problems with my knee," Collins explains, "which I had for a while but I played through it, toured through it. But eventually I had to have a knee operation, and I had to have it five times because it kept either getting infected or it broke. So I was inactive for a long time. But I do physio three times a week with a very stern Australian lady: you've got to have someone that bullies you, and she bullies me!"

Earlier this month, former Joy Division / New Order bassist Peter Hook insisted that that was zero chance that he would reunite with his former bandmates Bernard Sumner, Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert to perform at the ceremony.

"I’d rather die," he told MOJO.

Additionally, no-one knows whether or not Oasis will show up on then night, given the extreme sarcasm that vocalist Liam Gallagher has employed every time he's asked about the honour. "Ever since I was a little kid and singing in the shower I’d dream about 1 day being in the RnR hall of fame," he posted on X earlier this year, with tongue firmly in cheek.

Hotly-tipped Canadian prog duo Crown Lands have a new album out. Apocalypse came out via InsideOutMusic earlier this month, and while the band have shows lined up in Canada, any European fans hoping to see the band in 2026 will be disappointed – and you can blame the cost of touring.

"We had a very difficult discussion about it yesterday," says guitarist/bassist/keyboardist Kevin Comeau, interviewed in the new issue of Classic Rock. "Our management showed us a budget where if we went over to the UK and Europe to play ten shows, we would lose about thirty-five thousand dollars.

"The reality of being a musician means you need to have very rich parents, the willingness to completely financially ruin yourself, or a label with very deep pockets. And unfortunately, we have none of those things."

The pair, whose deal with Universal Music ended before they signed with InsideOut, also revealed how much debt the three-year relationship with the major label saddled them with.

"We owed the label, like, half a million dollars," says Comeau. "There was no way we’re gonna pay that back. We will never see a dime from the self-titled record [2020 album], White Buffalo [2020 EP], Wayward Flyers [2021 EP], Fearless [2023 album]. They own those records in perpetuity, so hopefully they recoup their loss from us, eventually."

Crown Lands are the latest in a long line of critically-acclaimed acts whose ambitions are being thwarted by the cost of doing business.

Earlier this year, Serena Cherry, guitarist and singer with post-hardcore four-piece Svalbard, told the Heavy Stories podcast why her band were calling it quits – and the rising costs of touring were one of the biggest reasons.

“It’s becoming the case where, if you want to tour … and be in a band, you have to be from a privileged background now," said Cherry. "I’ve never had a parent’s place that I could go and live in rent-free. I have to make a living every month to put a roof over my head.

"If I’m not making money touring – because of 25% merch cuts, visa fees, carnet fees, bus fees, petrol, all these massive outgoing costs – I can’t afford to do it. It’s going to become the case where every single voice you hear in metal will be from a place of privilege."

The new issue of Classic Rock is on sale now.

You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave… How many times have you heard (or said) that phrase? I’d wager a fair few over the years. And that’s just testament to how firmly embedded the Eagles’ 1976 song Hotel California is in general popular culture. This year, said song – and the album that shares its name – reaches its 50th birthday.

To celebrate, we tell the story of its genesis and its making in the company of Don Henley and producer Bill Szymczyk. It’s a full-on tale of chainsaws, Mexican reggae, strict drinking hours and much more besides.

Another album that reaches its half-century in 2026 is the fast and furious debut from Ramones. Kris Needs (a man who was in at the beginning) charts its arrival on the scene, and how a record just shy of half an hour in length changed the whole musical landscape – both here and in the US.

In addition, this issue we talk to Shinedown, Blue October, Steve Vai, Bruce Hornsby and many more. We also remember Dave Mason, the Traffic man, who we sadly lost during the making of this issue.

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Features

Eagles
The story of Hotel California, the album that took the already soaring Eagles into the commercial stratosphere and brought them everything that came with that – good and bad.

All Them Witches
After almost packing it in a couple of years ago, they've survived, and are back with House Of Mirrors.

Shinedown
The loss, addiction and rebirth that led to new album EI8HT.

Ramones
How, in one year in the mid-70s, the NYC punks didn't just have a momentous effect on a UK music scene, but also created one.

Blue October
Frontman Justin Furstenfeld reflects on a period of runaway creativity – and personal train wrecks.

Bruce Hornsby
Instead of resting on his laurels, the songwriter, singer and keyboard player forged ahead. That's just the way it is.

Regulars

The Dirt
Limited-edition replica Lemmy statue on sale; new Rolling Stones album announced; possible release for early Sabbath demos. Welcome back Failure and Geoff Tate. Say hello to Jayler and The Scratch. Say goodbye to Dave Mason, Andy Kershaw, Greg Elmore.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Carter The Unstoppable Sex Machine
How After The Watershed (Early Learning The Hard Way)brought them fame for the wrong reason

Q&A: Crown Lands
The rock duo talk 19-minute songs, hanging out with Gollum, and why they’d rather be killed by robots than by zombies.

Ever Meet Lemmy? Russ Ballard
Go-to songwriter, solo artist and former Argent guitarist/singer Russ Ballard hung out with The Beatles, is mates with Roger Daltrey and heard Elvis stories from Robert Plant. Rainbow, Kiss and others had hits with his songs. Ritchie Blackmore, Ozzy and more asked him to write some for them.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include Stainless, Return To Dust, The Zac Schulze Gang, Bruce Soord, Bleeker, High Fade, Alyssa Bonagura and more…

Reviews
New albums from Peter Frampton, All Them Witches, St Agnes, Paul McCartney, Crown Lands, The Scratch, Cactus, Devin Townsend, Robin Beck and more. Reissues from Pink Floyd, Smashing Pumpkins, The Who, Therapy?, Jethro Tull, INXS, Eagles, Blue Öyster Cult and more DVDs, films and books on Jimi Hendrix, The Velvet Underground, Iggy And The Stooges and more. Live reviews of The Damned, Yungblud, The Wildhearts, Massive Wagons, FM, The Prodigy and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Little Feat
Sorting the wheat from the chaff from the self-proclaimed “epitome of American rock’n’roll”.

Lives
We preview tours by Foreigner, BEAT and Warner E Hodges. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Tarja
Former Nightwish singer and solo artist Tarja picks her records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in the UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

Tarja will release her brand-new album Frisson Noir through earMusic on June 12.

And Prog has teamed up with the singer and her label to offer readers an exclusive album bundle that you won't be able to purchase anywhere else! You'll get a copy of Tarja's great new album, Frisson Noir, as well as a ‘Frisson Noir Philosophy’ sheet, signed by Tarja herself, an exclusive Tarja art print and an issue of Prog 171, which is on sale on June 19, with a bespoke Tarja front cover.

Get yours here before they sell out: https://store.loudersound.com/products/issue-171-tarja-magazine-art-card-signed-frisson-noir-sheet-frisson-noir-lp

Frisson Noir is Tarja's first new album of studio material in seven years, since 2019's In The Raw. The album mixes her trademark operatic vocal with some of the proggiest material she's created - look no further than the ten-minute epic At Sea - along with some the heaviest symphonic prog metal of her career. The album also features guest appearances from her former Nightwish pal Marko Hietala, Apocalyptica, Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith and Dani Filth.

“When I’m writing the songs, I’m not really looking at the timer, I’m really letting myself go nowadays, which is a very beautiful feeling," Tarja tells Prog in the next issue, which is on sale on June 19.

Pre-order your exclusive Tarja bundle here.

The metal-inspired MIDI soundtrack to hit 1993 videogame Doom has been added to the US Library Of Congress’ National Recording Registry, alongside music by alt-rock idols Weezer and pop hitmakers Taylor Swift and Beyoncé.

The registry contains more than 700 audio recordings which have been deemed “culturally, historically or aesthetically important, and/or informs or reflects life in the United States”. 25 recordings are added per year, though the only metal album to make the annals so far is Metallica’s 1986 masterpiece Master Of Puppets.

Other recordings to have been inducted include exhibition pieces by Thomas Edison, Dr Martin Luther King Jr’s I Have A Dream speech, Bob Dylan’s second studio album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, the Beatles’ Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and the description of the crash of the Hindenburg blimp by American journalist Herbert Morrison.

Doom, where the player controls nameless protagonist ‘Doomguy’ and kills hordes of demons and the undead on the moons of Mars and in Hell, was a monumental critical and commercial hit upon its release in 1993. The soundtrack, composed by American sound designer Bobby Prince, received particular praise, and in later years was celebrated by many players as a gateway into metal music.

It entered the registry last weekend, as did Weezer’s self-titled debut album (AKA The Blue Album) and Taylor Swift’s 2014 album 1989. Beyoncé’s 2008 single Single Ladies (Put On A Ring On It) was inducted, alongside José Feliciano’s iconic 1970 Christmas single Feliz Navidad and others. See the full list of what was admitted this year via the Library of Congress website.

In 2024, John Romero, co-founder of Doom developer id Software, told Metal Hammer that the game was rooted in his love for metal music.

“We were all total metalheads, and that attitude really started coming through,” he said. “There wasn’t a game that was that violent, the crazy speed… it was genuinely shocking.”

He added: “I used to be in the back of the bus going to high school, and they’d have a giant boombox. I’d crank it all the way up and play Accept until everyone’s head was banging!”

Romero gave Prince, who wasn’t a metal fan, a broad array of metal albums to study before composing Doom’s soundtrack.

“We sat him down and said, ‘Right, let’s talk about metal,’” he explained. “Between us, we had all the bases covered – prog metal, thrash, etc. We gave him CDs from Pantera, Slayer – different groups that had certain sounds that would be really cool to translate to MIDI. Alice In Chains, too. Even though that was kind of grunge, Jerry Cantrell was a badass metal guitarist.”

Bury Tomorrow bassist Davyd Winter-Bates was one of the metal musicians inspired by the soundtrack.

“I played Doom before I was even properly into metal,” he told Hammer. “I was listening to all those 8-bit riffs, like, ‘This isn’t pop music!’ I think a lot of my love of real heavy thrash riffs comes from slaying beasts in Doom.”

Other rock and metal musicians to have reportedly been fans were the members of Gwar and Nine Inch Nails leader Trent Reznor.

The success of Doom spawned a multimedia franchise, including a 2005 film starring Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson and Karl Urban. The eighth and latest instalment in the game series, Doom: The Dark Ages, was released by Bethesda last year.

Genesis are on the cover of the new issue of Prog, which is on sale now!

The band's seventh studio album, A Trick Of The Tail, celebrates its 50th anniversary this year and we chart the making of the album, we look at the stories behind the songs and we talk to album cover designer Colin Elgie about that striking. sleeve as we unearth the story of how Genesis survived the departure of Peter Gabriel and came back even stronger!

Elsewhere, we tell the story of the record that started it all for Hawkwind, their 1970 self-titled debut; Radiohead guitarist Ed O’Brien reveals how making his rather wonderful new album, Blue Morpho, was an exercise in music therapy; Devin Townsend unveils his magnum prog opus, The Moth; and we remember the Clannad singer and harpist Moya Brennan, who sadly passed away in April.

Bruce Soord, Crown Lands, Midge Ure, The Claypool Lennon Delirium, Crippled Black Phoenix, Dennis Atlas and Tusmørke tell us all about their new releases, and we review the new Yes studio album, Aurora, too!

Plus, we have a fantastic free sampler from Karisma Records in Norway and a Genesis art print too.

Also in Prog 170...

Moya Brennan - remembering the Clannad singer and harpist, who died in April, aged 73.

Bruce Soord - the Pineapple Thief frontman ruminates on familial loss on Ghosts In The Park.

Hawkwind - how the space cadets took off with their 1970 self-titled debut.

Elder - Berlin-based US proggers hit gold with new album Through Zero.

Crown Lands - Canadian duo develop their own identity on Apocalypse.

Ed O'Brien - the Radiohead guitarist finds comfort in sound with his second solo album Blue Morpho.

Devin Townsend - Canadian prog polymath unleashes his magnum opus, The Moth!

The Claypool Lennon Delirium - Les Claypool and Sean Ono Lennon tackle AI on their kaleidoscopic concept LP.

Crippled Black Phoenix - genre-busting dark proggers look within on their latest, Sceaduhelm.

Dennis Atlas - current Toto keyboardist and co-vocalist Dennis Atlas reveals a love of prog on solo album Principle.

Midge Ure - looks back over his career with Slik, The Rich Kids, Thin Lizzy, Visage, Ultravox and a little thing called Live Aid, and discusses his latest LP.

Tusmørke - the band's Benediktator on a prog world full of Popol Vuh, Magma, Gentle Giant and birdwatching.

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Yes, Bruce Soord, Pink Floyd, Pallas, Crown Lands, Elder, Jethro Tull, Marillion, Angine de Poitrine, A.A. Williams,
Devin Townsend, Ed O’Brien, Kraftwerk, Adrian Belew and loads more!

And reviews of Winter’s End Festival and gigs by Gazpacho, Oliver Wakeman, Nordic Giants, Soft Machine, Fairport Convention and more.

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Producer Jack Douglas, famous for his work with Aerosmith, Cheap Trick, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Patti Smith, the New York Dolls and many more, has died at the age of 80 as a result of complications from lymphoma.

"He passed away peacefully on Monday night," read a short statement posted on Douglas's Facebook page. "As many of you who follow him know, he produced great music, and lived a colourful life. We know that he touched many of your lives; we would love to hear more about that in the comments. He will be missed."

Douglas was born in New York City in 1945. After moving to the UK in the mid-60s, where he performed as a folk musician, he returned to the US and became the bass player in Privelege, a hard rock band whose sole, self-titled album was produced by the Isley Brothers.

After training as a sound engineer, he joined the staff at the recently opened Record Plant studio in New York, where he worked on recordings by James Gang, Alice Cooper, Montrose, Mountain, Cheap Trick, The Who, John Lennon, Patti Smith, Blue Öyster Cult, New York Dolls, Starz, Aerosmith and many more.

Aerosmith were the band he was most associated with, with Douglas producing the band's 70s classics Get Your Wings, Toys In The Attic, Rocks and Draw the Line. He also worked on 1982's Rock In A Hard Place, before returning to guide 1998's A Little South Of Sanity, 2004's Honkin' On Bobo and 2012's Music From Another Dimension!

Douglas's relationship with Cheap Trick was almost as lengthy, with production credits appearing on various albums from the band's 1977 debut to 2006's RockFord. He also worked with John Lennon and Yoko Ono regularly, from Lennon's 1971 album Imagine to the final album the pair released while Lennon was still alive, Double Fantasy.

"Jack carried decades of success with humility and grace," writes fellow producer Warren Huart, who was mentored by Douglas. "He never acted like a legend, even though he absolutely was one. He treated people with respect. He listened. He cared. He gave so much of himself to the artists, musicians, friends, and family around him.

"There are producers who make hit records. Then there are producers who leave a lasting mark on people’s hearts and lives. Jack did both."

Heard the record(s), read the book(s), got the T-shirt(s), been to the gig(s)… And now you can see the film! Well, from May 7 you can, as that’s the day that the mighty Iron Maiden expand their considerable universe further with a worldwide cinema release of Burning Ambition, a monster documentary chronicling the first five decades of the unrivalled heavy metal juggernaut.

In celebration, we collared Steve Harris, Bruce Dickinson, Adrian Smith and director Malcolm Venville to get the full inside story of the film, look back a little over Maiden’s storied history and look forward to their forthcoming shenanigans at Knebworth with EddFest.

This issue is a premium edition and comes with two gifts: an exclusive official Iron Maiden Movie Poster and an EddFest Sticker. Get yours before they're gone!

In this edition of Classic Rock we also look back at the making of A Trick Of The Tail, the first album Genesis made without Peter Gabriel; we find out what makes the Tedeschi Trucks Band tick; try to get a handle on cosmic pioneers The B-52s; shoot the breeze with Robben Ford; and so much more. On a very sad note, shortly before we went to press, we heard the news of the passing of Motörhead’s Phil Campbell, to whom we pay tribute.

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Features

Iron Maiden
It’s been quite a 50-year ride. Steve Harris, Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith join CR to look back, in the run-up to a huge Knebworth show and the cinema-release documentary.

Jim Jones
For the Jim Jones All Stars frontman, rock’n’roll is way more than just music, it’s something other-worldly, something sacred.

B-52s
How, with an eclectic musical palette and one goal, the unlikely
new-wave eccentrics became massive.

Tedeschi Trucks Band
For this band, life, music and keeping it very real are as intertwined as the husband-and-wife pair who front it.

Genesis
After Peter Gabriel left and Phil Collins stepped up to the mic, they made one of their greatest albums: A Trick Of The Tail.

Phil Campbell
We look back at the life and music of the late Motörhead legend.

Regulars

The Dirt
Ginger Wildheart given “two to three years” to live; Judas Priest announce London show, and new album begun; David Gilmour's Black Strat sells for £11m; Bon Jovi biopic in the works; Welcome back Erik Grönwall and Laura Cox; Say hello to Brass Camel and Earth Tongue; Say goodbye to Ross The Boss, Country Joe McDonald and Keith Altham.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Toto - Africa
Having set out to write a hit in order to get the band’s label off their back, David Paich achieved not only that, but also an AOR classic

Q&A: Tori Amos
The singer-songwriter on her new concept album, the need for social commentary, women in music and covering Slayer.

Six things you need to know about The Karma Effect
They’re rooted in 70s rock, the pandemic helped them, they want gigs to feel like ‘shows’, their frontman played Robert Plant.

Ever Meet Lemmy? Robben Ford
He got high with George Harrison, hit on by Barry Manilow, yelled at by Miles Davis, blanked by Bob Dylan and headhunted by Gene Simmons. He is fusion god and session guitarist extraordinaire Robben Ford, and these are some of his stories.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include Hiss Golden Messenger, Devin Townsend, The Lemon Twigs, Ashley McBryde, The Moon City Masters and more.

Reviews
New albums from Foo Fighters, The Black Keys, Linda Perry, Sepultura, The Lemon Twigs, Crippled Black Phoenix, Richard Barbieri and more. Reissues from Motörhead, Alice Cooper, Gary Moore, UFO, Robin Trower, Peter Gabriel, Michael Schenker Group, Adrian Belew and more. DVDs, films and books on Iron Maiden, Rolling Stones, Skids, Poison Girls and more. Live reviews of Wolf Alice, Manic Street Preachers, Samantha Fish and more.

Buyers Guide: Sepultura
They came from a country where heavy metal barely registered, but eventually they made a huge worldwide impact on the genre.

Lives
We preview tours by John 5, The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown and Colin Blunstone. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Patrick Carney
The Black Keys drummer picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

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The inductees for this year's Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame have been announced. The class of 2026 will include Oasis, Billy Idol, Phil Collins (who was inducted as a member of Genesis in 2010), Wu-Tang Clan, Joy Division/New Order, Sade and Luther Vandross.

Most excitingly, in a will-they-or-won't-they-show-up development, Iron Maiden – whose singer, Bruce Dickinson, has previously called the Hall Of Fame an "utter, complete load of bollocks" – will be inducted.

“We’d like to thank the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame for including us (and former members who were all part of our story) in the 2026 roll call of inductees," says band manager Rod Smallwood. "Iron Maiden have always been about our relationship with our fans above anything else, including awards and industry accolades. However, having said that, it’s always nice to be recognised and honoured for any achievements within the music industry too!

"It also seems appropriate for the band to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame this year as we continue our 50th anniversary celebrations with our Run For Your Lives World Tour visiting the Americas and beyond. We would also like to congratulate our fellow 2026 inductees and extend our gratitude as ever to our fans for their loyalty, perseverance and support for over 50 years now! See you all, somewhere on tour."

"I’ve never been bothered with it," Maiden leader Steve Harris told Metal Hammer in 2023. "We’ve never done music to be in some Hall Of Fame or whatever. And also, if it was a thing that was voted by fans, that’d be ok, but the way it works, it doesn’t matter how many fans vote, it only counts as one vote. So it doesn’t really represent anything. I don’t know how I’d feel about it if we did actually get [inducted]."

"I wanna thank all the people who voted for us," Oasis frontman Liam Gallagher posted. "It’s a real honour. Ever since I was a little kid and singing in the shower, I’d dream about 1 day being in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. It’s true what they say – anything is possible if you have a dream."

Other inductees this year include Gram Parsons, Fela Kuti, Queen Latifah and Celia Cruz in the Early Influence category, as well as Jimmy Miller, Rick Rubin, Linda Creed and Arif Mardin in the Music Excellence category. In addition, TV legend Ed Sullivan will posthumously receive the Ahmet Ertegun Award.

This year's Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame induction ceremony will be held at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles on November 14.

Welsh proggers Magenta release their brand new studio album, Tarot, today. Fans have been waiting for the follow-up to 2020's Masters Of Illusion album for six years, and Prog is happy to report it's been worth the wait.

And Prog has teamed up with the band to offer fans this world-exclusive limited edition bundle, featuring really cool Magenta stuff you can't get anywhere else.

You can get a limited edition Magenta Tarot t-shirt, a signed lyric sheet for the album's title track, signed by Robert Reed, Christina Booth and Chris Fry alongside a special variant version of the latest version of Prog Magazine boasting a unique Magenta front cover.

It's unavailable in shops or on merch stands, numbers are limited and the only place you can get the bundle is here, from the Prog online store! Buy yours here!

"I happened to be playing a Renaissance album in the house, and I thought, this," Reed tells us in the new issue of Prog. "Because I remembered how, when we did the first Magenta album 25 years ago, they were a big inspiration for us, mixing the classical overtones with a female singer and a rock band.

“Over the years, the Magenta sound has deviated, with electronics over there, heavier over there, shorter songs at other times. But with this album, we’re definitely harking back to the original Magenta sound. And I think the record is so much better for it.”

Rush grace the front cover of the new issue of Prog, and as well as Magenta, the new issue also features new interviews with Anthony Phillips, Steve Hillage, Spock's Beard, Richard Barbieri, Einar Solberg, Major Parkinson, Green Carnation and more...

Read about the new issue of Prog here.

Buy your exclusive Magenta bundle here!

Rush are on the cover of the new issue of Prog, which is on sale now!

They’re very much the band of the moment, and when Geddy and Alex hit London on a surprise press trip recently, and Prog was one of the few print magazines to be offered an interview, we knew it was too good an opportunity to pass.

At the heart of our cover feature is the story of a lasting friendship. It’s not just Geddy and Alex, there’s Neil, too and even though he’s no longer around, his presence is felt all too keenly. It’s as moving reading their thoughts and memories as it is exhilarating to hear their excitement for the upcoming live dates with Anika Nilles. And with the new deluxe box set out now, we got the story of Grace Under Pressure out of them, too.

Of course, this issue is about more than Rush. Anthony Phillips talks pianos instead of guitars; Steve Hillage and Miquette Giraudy explain that although System 7’s music is still driven by psych and prog, it occasionally dances to a slightly different beat; Richard Barbieri looks back on his days in Japan and discusses the possibility of new Porcupine Tree music; and Magenta reveal why it was back to basics for new album Tarot.

Einar Solberg, Spock’s Beard, Green Carnation, Long Distance Calling, VLMV and Major Parkinson all bring us up to speed on their new albums. We also speak to Cyrille Verdeaux of French proggers Clearlight about the new box set, being on Virgin Records in the 70s and find out what he’s up to at the moment, and this issue’s free sampler is provided by the excellent Fruits der Mer label.

Also in Prog 169...

Anthony Phillips - the former Genesis six-stringer swaps guitar for piano on his latest album.

Einar Solberg - continuing his mission to become prog’s most cinematic artist with Vox Occulta.

Green Carnation - the Norwegian prog rockers open up chapter two of their epic A Dark Poem triptych.

Magenta - the Norwegian prog rockers open up chapter two of their epic A Dark Poem triptych.

Long Distance Calling - the German post-rock quartet celebrate 25 years of making music.

System 7 - Steve Hillage and Miquette Giraudy are still making psychedelic music. You can dance to it as well, if you want to!

VLMV - Pete Lambrou creates more beautiful ambient prog with the inspired There Will Come Soft Rains.

Major Parkinson - the Norwegians triumph over potential disaster with Valesa – Chapter II:Viva The Apocalypse!.

Spock's Beard - we catch up with the elusive US proggers to chat about their latest studio release.

Cyrille Verdeaux - former mainstay of French proggers Clearlight looks back on their time on Virgin Records and tells us what he’s been up to recently

Richard Barbieri - Porcupine Tree and former Japan sound sculptist Richard Barbieri reflects on his career and admits to watching Millwall with blue hair (but no lip gloss!).

Leon Alvarado - US progger on a prog world full of Yes, King Crimson, Pink Floyd and Earth, Wind & Fire!

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Einar Solberg, Alan Parsons Project, Opeth, Von Hertzen Brothers, Peter Gabriel, Magenta, Nordic Giants, Peter Hammill, Claypool Lennon Delirium, Richard Barbieri, Anthony Phillips, Strawbs, Von Hertzen Brothers, System 7, Ayreon, Darryl Way and loads more…

And reviews of Fusion Festival and gigs by Big Big Train, Cardiacs, Between The Buried And Me, Lazuli, Plantoid, Solstice and Atomic Rooster, among others.

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* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

Well, here’s another one that wasn’t on my bingo card for 2026. Granted, I kinda hoped it might be, given the announcement of North American dates late last year. But as we all know, there are no guarantees in life.

What am I boshing on about? The news that Rush will be returning to the UK next year to play here for the first time since their Clockwork Angels tour of 2013. And for the first time with Anika Nilles occupying the drum stool in place of the late, great Neil Peart, of course.

In our exclusive interview, we sit down with Geddy, Alex and Anika to discuss how Rush (and what is turning into a monster tour) was brought back to life. It's also a premium issue, and comes with an official Rush poster and sticker (Subscriptions, mail order and UK newsstand sales only).

This issue, we also do a spot of globetrotting: we hang out with The Clash on their very first tour of the US; take a trip back to 70s Berlin with David Bowie; go to Scotland and beyond to dissect the live genius of the Sensational Alex Harvey Band; venture to Wales to go record shopping with Skindred; and so much more.

Until next month…

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Features

Rush
In our exclusive interview, Alex Lifeson, Geddy Lee and Anika Nilles talk about how the wholly unexpected but now hugely anticipated reunion tour came about.

The Sensational Alex Harvey Band
With their blend of multi-genre music and theatrical presentation, it was as a live band that they really excited and excelled.

Jeff Scott Soto
“‘Journeyman’ is not an insult”, says the man who's sung on scores of other people's albums, “it’s a badge of honour for me.”

Skindred
Which records did they talk about, and which did they buy, when we took them to a record shop and gave them £50 to spend?

The Clash
A Classic Rock writer recalls being on tour in the US with the band in 1979 when they played play their first shows there.

David Bowie
Holed up in Germany, he released three albums in the late 70s that redefined him. This is the story of Bowie's Berlin Trilogy.

A Thousand Horses
How the US country rockers made “the full-throttle rock album that’s been sleeping in our souls all along”.

Regulars

The Dirt
Iron Maiden for Hall Of Fame? Plus film on the way and 'Eddfest'; Steve Perry nixes Journey reunion. Ozzfest to return in 2027. Welcome back Corrosion Of Conformity and Exodus. Say hello to Soho Dukes and Ty Freeman. Say goodbye to Mike Vernon, Neil Sedaka, Fred Smith and Billy Steinberg.

Ever Meet Lemmy?: Zakk Wylde
He spent years playing guitar for Ozzy, and fronts Black Label Society. Zakk tells us about some of his celebrity encounters.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Jeff Wayne
A decade in the making, Forever Autumn was a standout track on his epic prog sci-fi album The War Of The Worlds.

Q&A: Chris Difford
Squeeze’s guitarist/singer on the band’s great ‘lost’ album, the dicey nightclub that inspired it, his lyrics and more.

Reviews
New albums from Tedeschi Trucks Band, Lou Gramm, Flea, Suzi Quatro, Corrosion Of Conformity, Jim Jones All Stars, Tyketto, Exodus, Lamb Of God and more. Reissues from Queen, Aerosmith, Van Halen, Rush, Peter Gabriel, Small Faces, Opeth, Michael Schenker, Robert Calvert and more. DVDs, films and books on Stuart Adamson, Rush, David Bowie, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Marianne Faithful and more. Live reviews of Foo Fighters, The Molotovs, Anthrax, Royal Republic, Paradise Lost and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Patti Smith
She might be best remembered for helping to kick-start the American punk revolution, but there’s far more to Patti Smith than that.

Lives
We preview tours by Jethro Tull, Spike and Ana Popovic. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Bob Mould
The Hüsker Dü, Sugar and solo artist on the records, artists and gigs that are of lasting significance to him.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in the UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

Pearl Jam guitarist Mike McCready has announced a 'long-lost' rock opera based on the music scene in Seattle between the mid-eighties and the mid-nineties, the era that saw the rise of grunge. Farewell To Seasons will also be published as a graphic novel.

The music for Farewell To Seasons will be released on an album featuring Guns N' Roses bassist Duff McKagan, Stefan Lessard (Dave Matthews Band) and Mike Musburger (Fastbacks, Posies), as well as Chris Friel from Shadow, the band McCready led before being asked to join Temple Of The Dog in 1990.

"I started working on it during covid," McCready tells Spin. "I called [film producer] Cameron Crowe out of the blue and asked him some questions like, hey, I want to work on a rock opera and I’ve got this idea – not thinking that it would turn into a graphic novel or anything like that.

"Originally, it was a musical stage show. Cameron gave me some really good tips and ideas, including the ‘11th hour song’ that is meant to be a big show-stopper near the end of a musical. So, I started writing a script with three characters, almost like historical fiction based around the Seattle music scene from the mid-1980s until about 1995."

"One of the main characters is David Williams, which is based on myself," McCready continues. "There’s a female character named Angela Sunrise and another named Jonathan Alexander, who’s our tragic figure. How this came up was, I was thinking about all the singers that came from the Seattle scene and how many of them had since died. Was it worth it for them?

"That’s a question I’m trying to ask, but I don’t know the answer. Why did people become so interested in this music being made in Seattle?"

The Farewell To Seasons graphic novel is published by Z2, who've previously produced graphic novels based on Dio's Holy Diver, Judas Priest's Screaming For Vengeance, and Iron Maiden's Piece Of Mind, as well as comics based on the work of Pantera, Primus, Type O Negative, Joan Jett, The Grateful Dead, Mötley Crüe, The Doors, Anthrax, Public Enemy and many more.

"Having been in the heart of the NW music scene as a journalist in the 1990s, I’ve wanted for years to work on a project that would reflect what it was actually like for the musicians and the fans when ‘the world came to Seattle'," says Z2 Editor-in-Chief Rantz A. Hoseley. "I can say, without any hyperbole or exaggeration, that I feel like my entire creative life has led to me being involved with this book, and I feel so blessed to be a part of bringing Mike’s beautiful and poignant story to the world.”

In 2017, McCready composed the score for The Glamour & The Squalor, a film about Seattle radio DJ Marco Collins, who helped break the likes of Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Weezer, Garbage and others.

Farewell To Seasons will be released on October 6, and is available to pre-order from Z2 now.

We celebrate Keith Emerson on the cover of the new issue of Prog, which is on sale now!

On March 11 it will be ten years since we lost keyboard maestro Keith Emerson and the progressive music world lost a true figurehead. Keith epitomised the prodigious talent, the far-reaching musical curiosity and the flash and wizardry that makes prog such a thrilling genre. That’s why Prog readers voted him the greatest keyboard player in the genre back in 2018.

But there was much more to Keith Emerson than the musician we all saw onstage, and in our tribute to him this issue, we speak to people from all walks of Keith’s life. To colleagues, family, friends, unlikely neighbours and more to hear all about the man that Keith really was. .

Also in the issue, the mercurial Francis Dunnery talks us through his new solo album, as does jazz-rock guitar luminary Pat Metheny, and Canterbury scenesters Soft Machine and Gong, while Pendragon and Arena keyboard polymath Clive Nolan discusses a distinguished career.

Bill Nelson’s Orchestra Futura, Hawkwind’s Magnus Martin, L.O.E., Godsticks, Ulver and Also Eden tell us about their latest releases, and rising prog rockers The Emerald Dawn have supplied us with this issue’s free sampler.

Also in Prog 168...

Gong - Canterbury legends battle breakdowns and writer’s block to triumph with their latest, Bright Spirit.

L.O.E. - Halifax’s proggy post-rock quartet battle adversity and come out on top on the bold Chiaroscuro.

Francis Dunnery - prog’s Mr Unpredictable looks back on his childhood with a new solo album.

Ulver - the Norwegians reinvent themselves yet again as ambient soundscape artists.

Soft Machine - Thirteen proves lucky for these Canterbury pioneers.

Pat Metheny - the jazz-rock guitar legend on setting up his own label and his great new album.

Also Eden - Anglo-Welsh proggers explain the story behind their new EP series.

Bill Nelson's Orchestra Futura - Be-Bop Deluxe’s Bill Nelson teams up with Gong and Soft Machine alumni for a live improv collection.

Godsticks - Welsh heavy proggers get real angry on new album VOiD!

Magnus Martin - Hawkwind’s Magnus Martin talks us through his new solo album, Everything Is Singing To Me.

Clive Nolan - Pendragon and Arena keyboardist and prog polymath Clive Nolan unpicks his career for us.

Galasphere 347 - MianmanStephen James Bennett on a prog world full of Genesis, Hatfield & The North, Peter Hammill and BBC radio drama.

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Rush, Jon Anderson, Peter Gabriel, Gong, IQ, Frank Zappa, Nick Beggs, Asia, Mostly Autumn, Tangerine Dream, Godsticks, Motorpsycho, Francis Dunnery and loads more!

And reviews of gigs by Asia, Opeth, Pure Reason Revolution, Spock’s Beard, AVKRVST, Spriggan Mist, Jinjer and more…

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

* You can use our store finder to find your nearest stockist. Go to Prog on the alphabetical pull-down menu and enter your postcode.

* The easiest option for everyone would be to go digital. You can get single digital issues from the Apple Store, from Zinio and all manner of digital magazine retailers.

* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

The new issue of Metal Hammer features Lamb Of God on the cover, ahead of the release of their new album, Into Oblivion. Inside, we got Randy Blythe’s friends and peers to ask him any question they wanted.

Artists including Halestorm, Mastodon, Health, Clutch, Killswitch Engage, Ice-T, Max Cavalera, Lacuna Coil, Devildriver, Anthrax, GWAR, Eyehategod and Alien Weaponry grilled Randy on everything from UFOs to cutting his hair off. In answer to a question from Johnny Health about which member of Lamb Of God he’s most afraid to fight, Randy says says no one – because he hopes the band will last forever.

“None of ’em, I’ll fight ’em all at once! But we get along better than we did in the early days,” he explains. “We’ve learned how to function and accept each others’ differences. I don’t want Lamb Of God ever to break up. I want to die in Lamb Of God. Not onstage with those dudes, though. Preferably sitting on my boat or the front porch of my house, at a very advanced age.”

Elsewhere in the mag, we get the inside story of brand new Puscifer album Normal Isn’t, as Maynard James Keenan explains why he’s going to make fart jokes even if the world is burning.

Lzzy Hale remembers shaking off Christianity to write sex-positive anthem I Get Off, Max Cavalera tells us how he took Brazilian metal to the world stage, and Attilla Csihar explains what it was like to front Mayhem before and after they became the most notorious band in black metal.

Meanwhile, we track down the forgotten members of the bands who made it big, shedding light on the early days of Deftones, Papa Roach, Trivium, Opeth and Faith No More.

Malevolence reveal why they’re still pissing off the National Trust, Type O Negative and Crowbar member members unveil new project Sun Don’t Shine, and Testament frontman Chuck Billy gives us his life lessons on Native American healing and… robots?

We also investigate get how Converge changed the hardcore game, go behind the scenes of the new Chris Cornell tribute supergroup, King Ultramega, and meet N0trixx: the ‘bedlamcore’ artist rapping about mental health in three languages.

All this, along with Amaranthe, Igorrr, Gaerea, Black Label Society, Epica, Slaughter To Prevail, Paleface Swiss, Motionless In White and much, much more.

Only in the new issue of Metal Hammer, on sale now. Order it online and have it delivered straight to your door.

Confession time. I was very much a latecomer to the world of Metallica. I was aware of them, of course I was, but back in 1986 my listening habits weren’t of quite such a metallic persuasion. For me (along with many others, I’m sure), it was the Black album that made me really pay attention to the quartet from San Fransisco.

As is often the way when you first get into a band, you venture backwards into their catalogue to discover what other delights you’ve missed out on. And that is how I discovered the masterpiece that is Master Of Puppets, half a decade after its original release.

This month marks the album’s 40th anniversary, so we take a trip back to the 80s to visit its making and look at the impact it had, both on the band and the music world.

We also catch up with The Black Crowes; manage to have a rare sit-down with Brian ‘Robbo’ Robertson for the Classic Rock Interview; run an exclusive extract from our former Ed-In-Chief Scott’s new Big Country book; talk to Blondie about their modern classic Maria; and so much more.

This month, we also have a limited edition Classic Rock x The Black Crowes bundle, which includes a copy of the band’s upcoming album, A Pound Of Feathers, a signed art card and a copy of the new issue of Classic Rock with the band on the cover.

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock
• Get the Classic Rock x Black Crowes Bundle

Features

Metallica
The inside story of the making of the Master Of Puppets album and the two-year whirlwind that took four self-described “alcoholica” outcasts from the El Cerrito garage to the big time.

Big Country
In an exclusive extract from a new book, we look at the inside story of their debut album The Crossing.

The Classic Rock Interview: Brian Robertson
He was part of the classic line-up of Thin Lizzy, lived it loud in Motörhead, rode his own band Wild Horses, has impressive credits as a session musician and producer… and there's more.

The Black Crowes
After decades of feuding and fall-outs, Chris and Rich Robinson have found a groove of brotherly love and rock bravado.

Pulcifier
Driving forces Maynard James Keenan and Carina Round talk about music, rearing chickens and ducks, making gin and more.

Danny Bryant
The British bluesman and bandleader tells us that his new album Nothing Left Behind is just the exorcism he needed.

Also available: The Classic Rock X The Black Crowes Bundle

Regulars

Ever Meet Lemmy?: Suzi Quatro
She shot Alice Cooper, shared a stage with a pre-fame Iggy Pop, sang with Donovan and wrote songs with KT Tunstall, toured and became friends with Noddy Holder and Phil Lynott… She is glam icon Suzi Quatro, and these are just a few of her stories.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include The Karma Effect, Avalanche, Radio Everything, The Gems, The Cold Stares, Spell and more.

Reviews
New albums from The Black Crowes, Megadeth, Mother Vulture, Rob Zombie, Black Stone Cherry, Starbenders, Paul Gilbert, The Sheepdogs and more. Reissues from Rainbow, Jimi Hendrix, Mountain, Creed, Hawkwind, Rose Tattoo, Prince, Sham 69, Warren Haynes and more. DVDs, films and books on Keith Moon, Ramones, Leonard Cohen, Karl Bartos, Stereolab and more. Live reviews of Biffy Clyro, Justin Hawkins, Iggy Pop, Joan Jett and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Buckcherry
California’s sleaziest exports were always gloriously out of step with the times. Here are the cherries on their catalogue cake.

Lives
We preview tours by 10cc, Powerwolf and Dan Byrne. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Big Big Train
Big Big Train co-founder Gregory Spawton picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in the UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

Rick Wakeman is to launch a brand new weekly podcast with television presenter and comedian Griff Rhys Jones.

The Sound Of The Seventy Year Olds is described as a "wander down memory cul-de-sac, because let’s face it, they’re of the generation that invented anything that’s any good", and it begins on February 27.

"From changing TV comedy forever, to achieving world musical domination, Rick and Griff have led the way since the 1960s, and in that time, they’ve seen it all," the show's creators say. "From Thatcher to Glasnost, Moon landings and more, they’ve lived through lofty highs and dramatic lows and managed to remember NONE of it.

"Instead, they’ve gone through life worried, not about impending nuclear disaster, but the length of time it took a TV to warm up. While politicians panicked at the three-day week, this pair was only concerned with who would replace Jon Pertwee as Doctor Who."

"The truth is, that’s what we all tend to do, " the pair add. "The economy may collapse, the political landscape may shift immeasurably, and it doesn’t touch the sides, but change the taste of a leading fizzy drink or confection of the day, however and you have a revolution on your hands.

"If you’ve ever been mortally offended when someone offers you a seat on the train, if you look in the mirror in the morning and don’t recognise the craggy wreck staring back, and if you look at the younger generation and shake your head, THIS is the podcast for YOU!"

The Sound Of The Seventy Year Olds is written and presented by Wakeman and Rhys Jones, produced by Mark Jeeves and is an Adore Audio production.

New episodes will be released weekly from 27th February 2026 and are available on all podcast platforms.

Rick Wakeman released his piano album, Melancholia, last year and is expected to release a follow-up to The Red Planet, his 2020 Mars-themed concept album with The English Rock Ensemble, later this year.

Steve Hackett graces the cover of the new issue of Prog, which is on sale now!

What better way to kick off 2026 than to celebrate those wonderful first three solo albums from the latter half of the 1970s he made, as he carved a niche out for himself away from Genesis? A time of mercurial music created against an ever-shifting backdrop of the times, and music he’ll be celebrating this year on his upcoming Best Of Genesis & Solo Gems Tour.

We also feature the results of the 2025 Reader's Poll, so find out how your favourite proggers fared, while elsewhere in this issue, Darryl Way, Ian Mosley and John Etheridge recall their time in the former’s Wolf, who burned brightly, albeit briefly, in the mid 70s; US proggers Happy The Man discuss their wonderful first two albums, newly remastered, bringing with them the hope of some new music; the ubiquitous Neal Morse casts an eye over his impressive career to date in The Prog Interview; and Big Big Train tell us the story of their new concept album, Woodcut.

Karnivool, Wolverine, Peter Jones of Tiger Moth Tales, Esoterica, Soen, Textures, Brian Willoughby and more tell us all about their latest releases, there's an excellent White Star Records sampler featuring the likes of John Mitchell, Kyros, Voices From The Fuselage, Kepler Ten, The Paradox Twin and more, plus four great Steve Hackett & friends post cards.

Also in Prog 167...

Mick Abraham - Ian Anderson and Martin Barre pay tribute to Jethro Tull’s original guitarist, who died last December.

Reader's Poll - they progged. You voted. Here are the results of the 2025 Readers’ Poll.

Big Big Train - the melodic proggers get conceptual on their new album, Woodcut.

Wolverine - the mournful Swedes return with their first studio LP for a decade.

Darryl Way's Wolf - Darryl Way, John Etheridge and Ian Mosley recall their time together in 70s prog outfit Darryl Way’s Wolf.

Esoterica - young UK prog rockers aim high with their latest album, Ether Metal.

Karnivool - the Aussie proggers literally return from the wilderness with the long-awaited In Verses.

Soen - the Swedish prog metallers give us the inside scoop on Reliance.

Happy The Man - the story of the US band’s first two records and their recent resurrection.

Textures - the Dutch prog metal sextet tell us about their return with the vibrant Genotype.

Neal Morse - Neal gets emotional as he looks back over a career featuring Spock’s Beard, Transatlantic, Flying Colors and so much more.

Brian Willoughby - former Strawb and David Cousins collaborator Brian Willoughby tells his story.

Tiger Moth Tales - Peter Jones of Tiger Moth Tales and Camel on a prog world full of Genesis, Andy Latimer, Dim Gray, Family Guy and Dikajee.

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Neal Morse Band, Yes, Bill Nelson, Steve Hogarth, Hawkwind, Rush, Karnivool, Big Big Train, Tony Banks, Tangerine Dream, Ulver, Archive, Peter Baumann, Nektar and loads more!

And reviews of gigs by IQ, John Mitchell & Friends, Katatonia, Prog The Forest and more...

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

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* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

Long-time readers of Classic Rock may be shocked to learn that this is the first time in nearly five years that we’ve featured Led Zeppelin on our cover.

It seemed fitting, though, to feature one of the biggest rock bands in our world on the 350th edition of our magazine. It also seems fitting that we’re telling the story of the period in 1972 and 1973 when Zeppelin really became all-conquering. Or, as Jimmy Page put it, “the biggest unknown band in the world”.

This issue we also grabbed a chat with Michael Monroe to discuss his life and times, and we've produced a Classic Rock x Michael Monroe bundle edition of the new issue that includes a copy of his forthcoming album, Outerstellar, as well as an exclusive signed lyric card, hand-signed by Michael himself.

We also enjoyed an audience with Ten Years After’s Leo Lyons, the man who calls himself “rock’n’roll’s Forrest Gump”; asked Joan Armatrading to tell us all about the making of her excellent debut album; celebrated the genius of BB King with Joe Bonamassa and so, so much more.

Here’s to the next 350!

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock
• Get the Classic Rock x Michael Monroe Bundle

Features

Led Zeppelin
Band members and associates chronicle the time in the 70s when they became the biggest rock band on the planet.

Joan Armatrading
The singer-songwriter tells the story of her battles to record her uncompromising debut album, 1972's Whatever’s For Us.

The Classic Rock Interview: Michael Monroe
Thrills, spills, triumph, tragedy… You could say he’s really lived the rock’n’roll life, but that would be an understatement.

BB King
The blues legend's classic tracks, hotel bombings, car crashes, conspiracy theories, towering infernos and more…

Danny Francis
Working with some of the rock world’s biggest names, he was more than just a bodyguard.

Smashing Pumpkins
Big. Bold. Bombastic. Billy Corgan looks back at the making of the era-defining Melon Collie And The Infinite Sadness.

Tyketto
How staying true to their style paid off eventually.

Ten Years After
Bassist Leo Lyons explains why he’s “the rock’n’roll Forrest Gump".

Also available: The Michael Monroe Bundle

Regulars

The Dirt
New Black Crowes and Peter Gabriel albums; Nazareth replace their singer; Sharon reveals Ozzy's last words… Welcome back Gluecifer and Marmozets. Say hello to Kashus Culpepper and James Brune. Say goodbye to Bob Weir, Tetsu Yamauchi, Mick Abrahams, Chris Rea, Rob Reiner.

The Stories Behind The Songs: The Boomtown Rats
A controversial song inspired by a tragic school shooting in the US in 1979 (and not, as many thought, about getting back to work after the weekend), it was a UK No.1 the same year.

Q&A: Jay Buchanan
Rival Sons’ frontman on his solo album, songwriting, the call of the wild, storytellers, falling in love, destroying his past and more.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include Mother Vulture, The Sheepdogs, Massive Wagons, Chez Kane, Koyo Bloom, Gazpacho, Dan Byrne and more.

Reviews
New albums from Michael Monroe, Francis Rossi, Jay Buchanan, The Damned, Robin Trower, Big Big Train, Black Swan, Buzzcocks and more. Reissues from The Pineapple Thief, Sid Vicious, McCauley Schenker Group, Alan Vega, The Ruts, Babyshambles, Gary Numan and more. DVDs, films and books on Martin Barre, Paul McCartney, The Rolling Stones, Nelson, AOR and more. Live reviews of Orange Goblin, Phil Lynott tribute, Clutch, Robert Plant Presents Saving Grace, The Wildhearts and more.

Buyer’s Guide: The Mission
Goth’s bleak misanthropy was upcycled and infused with hippiefied glam by the band, who celebrate their 40th this year.

Lives
We preview tours by Smith/Kotzen, Atomic Rooster and Samantha Fish. Plus gig listings.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Peter Capaldi
Singer/guitarist/Time Lord Peter Capaldi picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* NB: Due to some unexpected logistical delays, this issue will be on the UK newsstand from Tuesday

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

The 2026 Grammy Awards are locked in and set to take place at the Crypto.com Arena, Los Angeles, on Sunday, February 1 - and the rock, metal and alternative genres are represented among the 95 total categories.

Trevor Noah will be on hand once again to host the evening’s entertainment, which will be broadcast live on CBS & Paramount+ Premium from 5pm PST, 8pm EST and 1am GMT - and even if you’re going to be out of the country on the night, you’ll still be able to watch by using a VPN.

Paramount+ Essential subscribers won’t be able to watch live, but the good news is that the ceremony will be available to stream on-demand the following day.

How to watch the 2026 Grammy Awards in the US

How to watch the 2026 Grammy Awards anywhere

• Watch via Nord VPN and save 70%

If you're going to be travelling outside the US and don't want to miss out on watching the Grammy Awards 2026, you can watch through a VPN.

Virtual Private Networks are used to change the location of your IP address, enabling you to watch the 2026 Grammy Awards outside of the US. Nord VPN is Louder's service of choice and it's currently available with 70% off the usual price - and there's a 30-day money back guarantee.

How to use a VPN

1. Install a VPN. As we've mentioned above, Nord VPN is Louder's favourite from the many available.

2. Choose the location you wish to connect to in the VPN. If you're currently in the UK on holiday and want to watch this year's Grammys, just select 'US' from the list.

3. Turn the volume up and relax. You're all set to watch the whole evening's entertainment unfold.

What to expect this year

The Grammys cover a huge variety of genres, but I’m interested in what’s going on in the rock, metal and alternative categories, with Best Rock album seeing Deftones going to head-to-head with Turnstile, Linkin Park, Yungblud and HAIM.

Elsewhere, the Best Metal Performance category (won last year by Gojira, Marina Viotti & Victor Le Manse for Mea Culpa (Ah! Ça ira!) during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games opening ceremony) includes Dream Theater, Ghost, Sleep Token, Spiritbox and Turnstile, while The Cure, Turnstile, Wet Leg, Hayley Williams and Bon Iver are in the mix for Best Alternative Music Performance.

As for the artists performing at the Grammys 2026, they’ve been confirmed as Addison Rae, Alex Warren, Katseye, Leon Thomas, Olivia Dean, Sabrina Carpenter, Sombr and The Marias.

It's also been revealed that a group of rock icons, including Slash and Duff McKagan, Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, as well as Post Malone and Andrew Watt, will be taking to the stage to perform a special tribute to the late, great Ozzy Osbourne, who recently passed away.

Find out more below, and for a full list of this year’s categories and nominees, click on the official Grammy Awards website.

Listen to the official Grammy playlist

If you'd like to get to know the nominated artists a little better before the ceremony, you can turn up the volume on the Grammys Official Playlist on Spotify. There's a total of 125 tracks to dive into and should set you up nicely for the main event.

2026 nominations

Grammys 2026 rock, metal and alternative nominations

Best Metal Performance
Dream Theater: Night Terror
Ghost: Lachryma
Sleep Token: Emergence
Spiritbox: Soft Spine
Turnstile: Birds

Best Rock Performance
Amyl And The Sniffers: U Should Not Be Doing That
Linkin Park: The Emptiness Machine
Turnstile: Never Enough
Hayley Williams: Mirtazapine
Yungblud featuring Nuno Bettencourt, Frank Bello, Adam Wakeman: Changes (Live From Villa Park, Back To The Beginning)

Best Rock Song
Nine Inch Nails: As Alive As You Need Me To Be
Sleep Token: Caramel
Hayley Williams: Glum
Turnstile: Never Enough
Yungblud: Zombie

Best Rock Album
Deftones: Private Music
HAIM: I Quit
Linkin Park: From Zero
Turnstile: Never Enough
Yungblud: Idols

Best Alternative Music Performance
Bon Iver: Everything Is Peaceful Love
The Cure: Alone
Turnstile: Seein’ Stars
Wet Leg: Mangetout
Hayley Williams: Parachute

Best Alternative Music Album
Bon Iver: Sable, Fable
The Cure: Songs Of A Lost World
Tyler, The Creator: Don’t Tap The Glass
Wet Leg: Moisturiser
Hayley Williams: Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party

Last year's winners

Best metal performance
Gojira, Marina Viotti & Victor Le Masne: Mea Culpa (Ah! Ça ira!)

Best rock performance
The Beatles: Now And Then"

Best rock song
St Vincent: Broken Man

Best rock album
The Rolling Stones: Hackney Diamonds

Best Alternative Music Performance
St. Vincent: Flea

Best Alternative Music Album
St. Vincent: All Born Screaming

It's the return of the Progcast, for one night only!

The band new issue of Prog, being the magazine's first End-Of-Year issue, which features the Critics' Choice, has just hit newsstands on the very last day of the year.

That issue, of course, features the Prog writers' Albums Of The Year and the Reissues Of The Year, both of which went up on the website over New Year. This year we've done things a bit differently. Instead of a Top 20, we've given readers a big Top 50 new albums list and a Top 20 reissues list. Much more prog to get your teeth into, essentially.

Often the subject of frenzied scrutiny and social media comment, we thought we'd amass some of the Prog team - Editor Jerry Ewing, Art Editor Russell Fairbrother, News Editor Julian Marszalek and Associate Editor Jo Kendall - to discuss the results, and why we've gone down this particular route this year and even try to explain why some releases make the cut, and others don't.

So check out the lists in the magazine, if you haven't already seen them, or the links on this page, and as you're typing out 'I can't believe X didn't make the list!' on Facebook or X, get stuck into our ramblings below.

Enjoy, And Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! Welcome to the very first issue of 2026! To start what we’re hoping will be a seriously good year, we’re celebrating a legend. Forty years ago (almost to the day if you’re reading this on our on-sale day), we lost Thin Lizzy’s Phil Lynott to the great gig in the sky.

In this issue, we talked to some of his friends, bandmates and associates to remember him and paint a picture of the man and rock star he was. We also collared a cast of thousands (I may be exaggerating!) to choose their favourite Thin Lizzy song. For what it’s worth, if I’d been asked, my favourite is Don’t Believe A Word…

This issue we also sit down with Francis Rossi to discuss life after Quo, chat with Alter Bridge about their new album, find out what makes Sammy Hagar tick, bid a fond farewell to Steve Cropper, and so much more

PS. Given it’s the time for New Year’s resolutions, how about resolving to never miss an issue of Classic Rock in 2026? The easiest way to do that is to get a subscription. You’ll save a chunk of money and have your mag delivered to your door

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock

Features

Phil Lynott
Forty years after his passing, Scott Gorham, Eric Bell, Mark Stanway, Laurence Archer and more talk about the bandmate and friend – the real Phil – that they knew. And the stars choose their favourite Thin Lizzy song and tell us why.

Karnivool
After a 12-year gap between albums, the prog-metallers tell us they’re back to reclaim their crown.

Francis Rossi
Enjoying his An Audience With… tours, a new album was far from his mind. But one thing led to another, and…

Elles Bailey
The roots star talks fame, vanity, mental health, and the childhood trauma behind her smoke ’n’ honey battle cry.

Alter Bridge
With solo projects, a Creed reunion and more going on, there were whispers that they might have to call it quits. Instead they regrouped and recorded a brilliant new album.

Sammy Hagar
Don’t have a plan. Don’t be cocky. Doing drugs is dumb. Know when to quit. These things and more shape his worldview.

Heavy Pettin
They were ready to be big shots. Then their entry for 1987’s Eurovision misfired and killed their career. Now they're back.

Regulars

The Dirt
David Coverdale announces his retirement;. no 'Ozzy Airport' name change for Brum; AC/DC gig in Aus causes earth tremors. Welcome back Brinsley Schwarz and Femme Fatale. Say hello to Solomon Hicks and Ever Age. Say goodbye to Steve Cropper, Jimmy Cliff, Mani, Donna Jean Godchaux, Gilson Lavis.

Steve Cropper
Goodbye to the Soul Man whose guitar playing and songwriting lit up the soundtrack of a generation.

The Stories Behind The Songs: The Lemonheads
How a 90s cover of a 60s classic became an era-defining hit.

Q&A: Black Stone Cherry
Frontman Chris Robertson on their new EP, battling Darth Vader, and what Billy Gibbons is looking at on the internet.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month it's Lovehoney, Kashus Culpepper, Hällas, The Molotovs and more.

Reviews
New albums from Alter Bridge, Def Leppard, Gluecifer, Electric Boys, Kreator, Laura Cox, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Elles Bailey, MC50, Lovehoney and more. Reissues from Pink Floyd, Freddie Mercury, T.Rex, Johnny Thunders, Yes, Lenny Kravitz, Brian Wilson, Levellers, Type O Negative and more. DVDs, films and books on The Yardbirds, Robbie Robertson, Cream and more. Live reviews of Radiohead, Carlos Alomar, Halestorm, Those Damn Crows, Todd Rundgren, The Saints, Peter Perrett and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Jim Steinman
The best music from this maverick with a musical vision.

Lives: We preview tours by Ten Years After, Fury and Airbourne. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Marcus King
Singer/guitarist Marcus King picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* NB: Due to some unexpected logistical delays, this issue will be on the UK newsstand from Tuesday

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

The brand new issue of Prog is on sale now!

It's our first-ever Review-Of-The-Year issue! We felt the achievements of the prog world in 2025 needed celebrating properly, so that’s what we’ve done.

Aside from grabbing chats with Steven Wilson, Yes, Marillion’s Steve Rothery, Genesis, EBB, Steeleye Span and more, we also shine a light on the work of the Progrock.com’s Essentials label and the Solent Area Prog gigs held at the 1865 in Southampton; pay our respects to those who left us in 2025; and Prog’s own newshound Julian dons his best Mystic Meg outfit and looks ahead to what’s coming your way in 2026. Oh, and even though it hasn’t happened yet, it’s been all over the media for the latter part of this year, so we look at the Rush reunion: how it happened and what we think the tour will entail.

There’s also a change in our annual Critics’ Choice: we’ve bumped the list up to a massive 50 Best Prog Albums of the Year and the 20 Best Reissues, too. There’s plenty to dive in, get your teeth into and, no doubt, debate on social media, if past years are anything to go by!

Despite all that going on, we’ve still managed to squeeze in a chat with former Jethro Tull guitarist Martin Barre in The Prog Interview, and bring you all the latest prog news, as well as album and live reviews.

Plus there's a fantastic 22-track sampler from our friends at Progrock.com's Essentials featuring the likes of Discipline, Phideaux, Unitopia, Solstice, Ghost Of The Machine, Spriggan Mist and more, as well as four Prog postcards.

Your Prog 166 contents...

The Top 50 Albums Of 2025 - the Prog writers’ deliver their albums of the year.

Steven Wilson - from The Overview to his plans for 2026.

Progrock.com's Essentials - we dive into the prog label of the year.

Steve Rothery - the guitarist on Bioscope, Hackett and a new Marillion album!

David Gilmour - still at the top of the prog game at 79.

Top 20 Reissues Of 2025 - the year’s very best reissues.

Genesis - fifty years of The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway dissected with a bit of help from Peter Gabriel and Steve Hackett.

Steeleye Span - folk proggers still going strong with new album, Conflict

Yes - Steve Howe on the band's year and also reveals a new album is on the way!

Solent Area Prog - making a prog noise on the south coast.

EBB - 2204's Best New Band poll winners are back with their second album, The Mirror.

In Memoriam - remembering those we lost in 2025.

Rush - They’re touring next year, you know!

2026 Preview - what’s progging your world next year

Martin Barre - the former Jethro Tull guitarist discusses his career on the back of his new autobiography.

Jordan Rudess - the Dream Theater keyboardist on a prog world full of ELP, Steven Wilson, VdGG and Neil Young

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Big Big Train, Camel, IQ, Dream Theater, Airbag, EBB, Frank Zappa, The Pineapple Thief, Martin Barre, Jerome Froese, Jonas Lindberg & The Other Side, Hällas, Procol Harum, Ultravox, Keith Jarrett, Caligula’s Horse and loads more...

This month, we’ve been to see shows by Moon Safari; Justin Hayward; Gong; Public Service Broadcasting; Black Country, New Road and more.

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

* You can use our store finder to find your nearest stockist. Go to Prog on the alphabetical pull-down menu and enter your postcode.

* The easiest option for everyone would be to go digital. You can get single digital issues from the Apple Store, from Zinio and all manner of digital magazine retailers.

* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

Dunno about anyone else, but I have zero clue where this year has gone. I’m pretty sure I say words to that effect in this space every year, but I genuinely think that 2025 has whizzed by at the speed of light! But pass it has, and here we are with our End Of Year bonanza.

As you’ve no doubt realised by now, the new issue of Classic Rock is our annual look back at what happened in the world of rock over the past 12 months – the amazing new albums and songs that got us endangering (what’s left of) our hearing, the reissues that reminded us and upgraded old favourites, Black Sabbath’s epic Back To The Beginning show (and subsequent devastating loss of Ozzy), and much more besides.

To make the issue even more festive, it's a premium edition and comes with four exclusive gifts: An Ozzy Osbourne 2026 calendar, official Where's Ozzy? beer mats, some giant rockin' wrapping paper and 16 high-voltage gift tags (subscribers, UK newsstand and online orders from Magazines Direct only).

So please put your feet up, grab your beverage of choice and join us in looking back at the Year In Rock 2025. And from all of us here at Classic Rock, we hope you have an excellent Christmas break and a very happy and healthy 2026. We’ll see you next year.

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock

Features

Albums Of The Year
Whether from established artists or talented newcomers, we've had plenty of cracking albums released in the past 12 months. CR's writers have chosen the best 50, including….

Danko Jones
With this year’s Leo Rising being met with more positive responses than they’re used to, things are looking good.

Cardiacs
The story of the eclectic band and their long-awaited, brilliantly received, final studio album.

His Lordship
Aiming for an album of good old rock’n roll, Bored Animal shows their aim was true.

Jethro Tull
Ian Anderson talks about latest album Curious Ruminant.

Cheap Trick
Fifty years in, they’re still knocking out classy records.

Plus...

Back To The Beginning
Lzzy Hale , who appeared at Ozzy's farewell, recalls the build-up and the day of the rock event of the past 12 months.

2025 Playlist
Tracks from all genres , all deserving a listen, to get stuck into.

Orange Goblin
Frontman Ben Ward explains why its the end of their road, and reflects on three decades of creating metal thunder.

Reissues Of The Year
From nothing new ,to extras-bolstered to multi-disc, bells-and-whistles box sets, we've picked the cream of the crop.

Bruce Springsteen
With an album release, a biopic in cinemas and the completion of a tour, 2025 saw a lot of The Boss.

Guns N’ Roses
The latest from Slash, who tells us: “I constantly have to stop and be thankful that we’re able to do something that I love so much.”

Goodbye to…
As with every year, in 2025 we said goodbye to far too many people who brought something good to the world of music.

Regulars

The Dirt
The return of Bon Jovi to the stage; Journey announce final tour; Spinal Tap say goodbye with a show at Stonehenge. Welcome back Coroner, Say hello to Luna Marble. Say goodbye to Marcie Free, David Ball, Scott Sorry.

Q&A: Justin Hawkins
The Darkness frontman on being back in arenas, supporting Iron Maiden, brother Dan being a rock star, Yungblud and more.

Reviews
New albums from Casket Rats, Slash, Jan Akkerman, AVTT/PTTN, Graham Bonnet, Sunn O))), Jim Peterik & World Stage, The Saints. Reissues from Rush, Iron Maiden, Rolling Stones, Thin Lizzy, Patti Smith, Dream Theater, Faces, Motörhead, Uriah Heep, Ministry. DVDs, films and books on Bon Jovi, Roddy Bottum, Layne Staley, The Police, Bruce Springsteen, Nicky Hopkins… Live reviews of Glenn Hughes, Lord Rochester, Fields Of The Nephilim, Creeper, Young Gods and more.

Lives
We preview tours by Clutch, John Mitchell & Friends and The Commoners. Plus the latest gig listings: Who's playing where, and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Kenny Leckremo
The H.E.A.T frontman picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* NB: Due to some unexpected logistical delays, this issue will be on the UK newsstand from Tuesday

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

The brand new, gift-packed issue of Prog is on sale now, with Porcupine Tree on the front cover.

We tell the story of Porcupine Tree’s Deadwing, as the album celebrates its 20th anniversary. And what an intriguing story it is, of a UK band signed to a major US label with the idea of breaking progressive music on a commercial scale. Add in the ghostly script to an unmade movie, stellar musicians and a groundbreaking tour with their mates Opeth… and as for the strippers – well, you’ll have to read about that for yourselves.

Elsewhere in this issue, we say a sad farewell to the Moody Blues bassist and singer John Lodge, who died last month; Peter Hammill unpicks his solo years on Charisma and Virgin Record for us; guitarist Steve Morse brings tales of Dixie Dregs, Kansas, Deep Purple, Flying Colors and more to the table; and Gazpacho, Crown Lands, Atomic Rooster, Cardiacs, The Utopia Strong, Cate Le Bon, Barry Palmer and Amorphis all discuss their latest releases.

This issue arrives with our Icons Of Prog calendar, this time cherry-picking the prog delights from former Melody Maker photographer Barrie Wentzell’s fabulous new book, Should’ve Been There, from Rufus Publications, a great Porcupine Tree Deadwing art print, a 148-page eBook on THE band of the moment, Rush, and our good pal Jacob Holm-Lupo has curated a fantastic White Willow sampler.

Your Prog 165 contents...

John Lodge: the prog world pays tribute to The Moody Blues singer/bassist who died in October.

Peter Hammill: the VdGG frontman considers his solo work on the back of the 20-disc Charisma & Virgin Recordings 1971-86 box set.

Atomic Rooster: former guitarist Mick Bolton heads up the reformed band and their new album, Reach For The Sun.

Gazpacho: we uncover the story of false starts to the fascinating concept album, Magic 8-Ball.

The Utopia Strong: the cosmic prog trio truly find their feet with their third album, Doperider.

Cardiacs: the story of how the late Tim Smith’s unfinished final Cardiacs album was lovingly brought to life.

Crown Lands: the Canadian duo find a new record label and artistic freedom with their two Ritual releases.

Cate Le Bon: the Welsh art-rocker finds catharsis in ruminating on personal heartache

Amorphis: the Finnish prog metallers discuss new album Borderland and where their love of prog comes from.

Barry Palmer: the former Triumvirat and Mike Oldfield singer on shock 70s pop hits and his new musical venture with Robert Reed.

Steve Morse: he's played with Dixie Dregs, Kansas, Deep Purple and Flying Colors as well as his own band. And does he have some stories to tell! Read them here.

Andy Glass: the Solstice guitarist on a prog world full of Yes, Floyd, Tull, Steven Wilson and Loyle Carner.

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Pink Floyd, Yes, Kate Bush, Tangerine Dream, Dream Theater, Mike Oldfield, Brian Eno & Beatie Wolfe, Spock’s Beard, Leprous, Solstice, Nektar, Tears For Fears, Snarky Puppy, Jethro Tull, IQ, Ozric Tentacles and loads more!

This month, we went to Summer’s End and Be Prog! My Friend festivals and saw Yes, Steven Wilson, Dream Theater, Roy Harper, Kansas and more.

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

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* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

This Saturday, artists including Bad Company, Soundgarden, The White Stripes and Joe Cocker will be inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame at a ceremony in Los Angeles.

The evening will be broadcast live from the Peacock Theater through Disney+. ABC viewers will be able to tune into a highlight package of the ceremony on January 1, with Hulu showing the ceremony from January 2.

Bad Company, Soundgarden, The White Stripes and Joe Cocker and joined in the Performer category by Chubby Checker, Cyndi Lauper and Outkast, while Salt N Pepa and Warren Zevon will be inducted via the Musical Influence category.

This year's Musical Excellence inductees are Thom Bell, Nicky Hopkins and Carol Kaye, while the 2025 Ahmet Ertegun Award goes to producer and music industry executive Lenny Waronker.

The ceremony will also see appearances and performances by artists including Elton John, Heart's Nancy Wilson, Pearl Jam's Mike McCready, Jerry Cantrell, Bryan Adams, Avril Lavigne, Mick Fleetwood, Beck, The Killers, Chappell Roan, Olivio Rodrigo, Tedeschi Trucks Band, Taylor Momsen, Twenty One Pilots and Red Hot Chili Pepper, Flea.

How to watch the induction ceremony

Disney+ have exclusive rights to show the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame induction ceremony. If you've still to sign up to the popular streaming service, there's loads more to dig into if you pick up a subscription.

All the family-friendly Disney content you'd expect is here, but it's also home to the entire Star Wars universe, all the Marvel movies, series and shorts, Pixar, The Simpsons, National Geographic and the Hulu channel.

For music fans, you'll there's loads to dig into, including Peter Jackson's The Beatles: Get Back which sits alongside The Beatles' 1970 film Let It Be. There's also Thank You, Goodnight: The Bon Jovi Story, Elton John Live, the 2024 Beach Boys doc, Pam & Tommy, London music film Camden, Hip Hop Uncovered and more.

Disney+ subscriptions start from just $9.99/£4.99 per month for the Standard with ads tier and go up to Premium which comes in at $13.99/£10.99 per month.

Earlier this week, Bad Company's Paul Rodgers pulled out of appearing at this weekend's ceremony, with drummer Simon Kirke set to be in attendance to accept the award and will also perform.

Rodgers said: "My hope was to be at the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame induction ceremony and to perform for the fans, but at this time I have to prioritise my health. I have no problem singing, it's the stress of everything else. Thank you for understanding."

Rodgers added: "Simon, along with some outstanding musicians, will be stepping in for me - guaranteed to rock."

The evening’s entertainment will be shown on Disney+ from 5pm PT, 8pm ET and 1am BST.

Funny how things pop into your mind at the most random of moments. Earlier this week, I was in M&S, picking up something for lunch. When the self-service till showed me my total to pay, it made me chuckle, as the amount was £6.66. And yes, the very first thing that popped into my head were the lyrics to Iron Maiden’s The Number Of The Beast.

I’m taking it as a sign, as this issue we have an exclusive extract from Iron Maiden’s Infinite Dreams book about the beginning of their imperial era when Bruce joined the band and they became the world-dominating group that we know and love. We also spoke to both Steve Harris and Bruce Dickinson about the early days of the band and how their partnership began.

Also in this issue: we venture back to 1990 to hang out with Judas Priest in Marbella to talk about the making of Painkiller; we talk to Solstice about being the best-kept secret of English prog; we go back to school with Massive Wagons; and much more.

Shortly before we went to press with this issue we learned the sad news that Ace Frehley had passed away, so we also pay tribute to the Space Ace.

Until next month…

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock

Features

Iron Maiden
Fifty years in, Steve Harris looks back at band building, Bruce Dickinson recalls how he came to join, and a book extract takes us back to the birth of The Number Of The Beast.

Ace Frehley
Farewell to the Space Ace.

Stephen Dale Petit
His new album, Be The Love, burns with the urgency and creativity of a cancer-stricken man living on borrowed time.

Mammoth
On his third Mammoth album, Wolfgang Van Halen raises his playing, singing and songwriting game.

Judas Priest
This interview from 1990 finds them on edge just before the lawsuit that delayed the release of their classic Painkiller.

Whiskey Myers
Distancing themselves from the trappings and demands of the music business, they're a band for themselves and their fans.

Massive Wagons
The British rockers play a hometown show for kids as well as advocating for anti-bullying and mental health campaigns.

Solstice
The best-kept secret in English prog celebrate their 45th anniversary with a new album.

Regulars

The Dirt
Rush return with new drummer; Foo Fighters release surprise EP; Jonathan Cain quits Journey? Welcome back The Trews and Holly Golightly. Say hello to Die Spitz and Christone ‘Kingfish’ Ingram. Say goodbye to John Lodge, Chris Dreja, Danny Thompson and Viv Prince.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Levellers
During an era of post-grunge, the Levellers were derided as obsolete crusties, but one of their biggest hits was influenced by classic 70s rock.

Q&A: Ian Gillan
The Deep Purple frontman on collaborating with Urock, being 80, vision problems, a new Purple album, not having a TV and more.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include Royal Republic, The Southern River Band, Demob Happy, Gyasi, Bones Owens and more.

Reviews
New albums from Bon Jovi, Cheap Trick, Creeper, Spock's Beard, Sammy Hagar, Radiohead, Duff McKagan and more. Reissues from The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Bruce Springsteen, Status Quo, Blackberry Smoke, Humble Pie, Kate Bush, Clutch and more. DVDs, films and books on Wings, Def Leppard, Frankie Miller, Jean-Michel Jarre and more. Live reviews of Roy Harper, Feeder, Edwyn Collins, Francis Rossi, Luke Morley/Willie Dowling and more.

Buyer’s Guide: The Cramps
Celebrating the finest in American trash and kitsch culture, The Cramps played rock’n’roll at its delinquent, B-movie best.

Lives
We preview tours by John Payne’s Asia & Foghat, Dave Hill's Slade and Parker Barrow. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Steve Morse
Deep Purple’s longest-serving guitarist Steve Morse on his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* NB: Due to some unexpected logistical delays, this issue will be on the UK newsstand from Tuesday

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

Justin Broadrick was 15 years old when he first changed the landscape of heavy metal. A social misfit inspired by anarcho-punks Crass and the sonic terrorism of industrial originators Throbbing Gristle, he was conscripted into Napalm Death as guitarist in 1985. He appeared on the first side of their 1987 debut album, Scum, a record that helped lay down the template for grindcore, and has remained a lodestone for adrenaline-fuelled agitators ever since.

“Ninety-five per cent of the A-side of Scum was my music,” he says. “I was sitting in my bedroom in a council estate in Birmingham, writing riff after riff after riff. I was a weird machine. If I think back to it, it was always this endless river of sound. I have to stop myself from creating. You see how many projects I’ve got, it’s ridiculous. And for me, it’s the tip of an iceberg. I would release way more if I knew I wasn’t suffocating people with my music.”

We’re having coffee in central Oslo, a few hours before he’ll terrorise audiences at the city’s Inferno Festival with Godflesh, the hugely influential band he has been at the centre of, on and off, for the past 35 years. Lanky, with a tufty beard making him look like an urban wizard, the 53-year-old is a dynamo of effusive, gregarious energy, as if an endless amount of information is constantly whirring in his brain.

Justin may be one of the underground’s most prolific musicians – Napalm Death, Head Of David, Fall Of Because, Final, Techno Animal and Jesu are just some of the countless projects he’s been involved with. But the entity that’s been his defining work is Godflesh.

Formed in 1988 with fellow Fall Of Because member Benny Green, and powered by a cheap drum machine they bought with a loan from Benny’s mum, Godflesh viewed the then-burgeoning industrial scene through the grimiest, most godforsaken of lenses fashioned from their claustrophobic Birmingham surroundings. Boiled down to a vision of humanity locked into an endless struggle against overpowering forces, they were George Orwell’s 1984 on steroids. Textured by Justin’s guitar riffs squirming like welts around a point of impact, the result was startling, but transcendent too, the pummelling repetition of their music treating nihilism as a tantric state. It felt as though something utterly new and terrified was being born, and beaten down, on an endless loop. You couldn’t look away.

“It’s protest music,” says Justin. “I always felt it was resignation, how humanity is a cesspool of shit and will never crawl out of it, but still not giving in. So it’s a protest against everything we are, but the embodiment of the human condition is me fighting against that, and as I recently learned, it’s been me fighting against my autism.”

Friends had asked if he’d ever considered that he might be autistic, but he put the way his mind worked down to the “terrible anxiety” he suffered. He was eventually diagnosed with autism in June last year.

“It suddenly put everything in place: my hypersensitivity, my sense of self-failing, of being misunderstood, of feeling isolated and alone, my sense of masking, my sense of trying to be something that I know I’m not, and so on,” he says. “It’s like a battle against everything fundamentally.”

Justin knew he was different at an early age. Unable to focus at school, his report cards regularly stated he was highly equipped, but too much of a dreamer to excel.

“Although I didn’t know it then, that was a blueprint for autism,” he says. “Everything was too fast. For me, it was all carnage, mess, 360 degree perception and I’d just look out the window at the lights and the sun, and I was happier just escaping into that world than this chaos of people. Even now, I’m hearing conversations behind me, trying to filter them out. If a glass breaks behind me, I’ll be thinking what’s happening there, why is that happening, and I can be so distracted so easily.”

Abandoned by his biological father, living with an alcoholic mother, much of his sense of isolation came from a sense of being a burden to those around him. The one relative who would give him attention was his German grandmother, a renegade during WWII, who was forced into a concentration camp before being liberated by the man she later married.

“My nan would explicitly overshare, like I do. All I’d ever hear about when I was a kid were these stories of fucking horror. She was still there, even to the day she died: pure German accent and still recounting these experiences. She said she stood in front of mountains of dead bodies, and I was just a seven-year-old child. So I was being exposed to this brutal imagery with my sensitivities, and now I have lifelong PTSD as well. So imagery is very easy for me to concoct and to feel. I have highly empathetic responses to things, so I just carried all this anger and all this horror.”

The one language that Justin could think in at his own pace was music. His mother and stepdad were hippies turned punks, forming a band, Anti-Social, who put out an obscure seven-inch single of punk-meets-shock horror. He was turned onto Alice Cooper, the Sex Pistols and Lou Reed, most notably the latter’s provocative 1975 album Metal Machine Music, a record consisting entirely of feedback that was designed as either a grand art statement or a deliberate fuck-you to Reed’s label.

Justin formed a powerelectronics band at the age of 11, spurred on by his love of Throbbing Gristle and fellow industrial provocateurs Whitehouse. He went on to join Birmingham band Fall Of Because as drummer and vocalist, before a meeting with Napalm Death’s then-singer and bassist Nic Bullen led to him doubling up as that band’s guitarist, before in-fighting forced him to leave after recording just one side of Scum. A brief stint in experimental metallers Head Of David followed, though it was Godflesh where everything coalesced musically and lyrically for Justin.

Among his stepdad’s records, one that offered particular inspiration was by The Stranglers. “It was the bass playing. I just connected with filth in sounds. That texture and dirt and chaos and carnage within it, and me trying to abbreviate it and contain it almost. We wanted to turn the guitar and bass down so fucking low that we could barely even play anymore – until we were physically merging with the filth of this sound. The lower we tuned, and the more guttural it became, the more connection I had with it."

When Godflesh’s self-titled debut EP was released in 1988 via Swordfish Records, its impact was immediate. It might have drawn from both metal and industrial, but it felt like a hermetically sealed world with its own irresistible force of gravity. Influential Radio 1 DJ John Peel was an early champion, and Earache Records, home to the likes of Morbid Angel, Deicide and Napalm Death, signed them.

Their debut full-length album, Streetcleaner, was released the following year. This wasn’t so much music as the sound of a machine under unbearable stress. The hyperdense Christbait Rising was as relentless as a pneumatic torture device while the looped artillery barrage of Pulp didn’t just touch a nerve, it slammed a metric fuckton of pressure onto it. Its extremity attracted a host of fans. Justin was asked to join Faith No More on guitar by a besotted Mike Patton, while Danzig and Type O Negative also asked, in vain, for Godflesh to support them on tour in the US (the band have subsequently been cited by Metallica, Devin Townsend, Code Orange and more as an inspiration). Still, it was a surprise when major labels started calling.

“It was a surreal experience,” Justin remembers. “We were being told that we were going to be the new Nine Inch Nails, the new Nirvana, even though we don’t sound remotely like them. I remember being chauffeur-driven from Birmingham to London to some exclusive hotel, and I’d only just signed off [from unemployment benefit]. We knew we were exploding, and I was getting a little ego about it, because I’d spent my whole childhood being ignored and marginalised, and all of a sudden, you’re sitting in front of this guy saying to my face that Godflesh are the next big thing. It was like, ‘How does this make any sense?’”

Thanks to a deal between Earache and Columbia, Godflesh’s third album, 1994’s Selfless, was released via a major label in the US. Their flirtation with the mainstream music industry didn’t last long – Columbia unceremoniously dropped the band a year later. But while the chances of Godflesh becoming “the next big thing” were always remote, they were unconsciously sowing the seeds for a new generation of commercially viable bands.

Among the first of these were Nottingham industrial metallers Pitchshifter, who formed the year Streetcleaner was released and were early adopters of the Godflesh sound. Soon, Justin’s influence was beginning to show in a wave of soon-to-be famous American bands, among them Korn and Fear Factory.

“I remember [Justin’s bandmate in the Techno Animal side-project] Kevin Martin phoning me, saying, ‘Jus, do you want to hear an American band sounding just like you?’ And he played me Blind by Korn. I was like, ‘Are you kidding? It sounds like Godflesh meets Faith No More.’

“Fear Factory were structured entirely around us, but I thought it was so much more conservative. But also I saw the beauty and the fact that that’s how you take my formula, be tactical about it, and present it to a larger audience who go, ‘Oh my God, this is amazing!’ And then they hear where it came from, and they go... ‘Oh!’ Ha ha ha!"

Ultimately, the combination of musical and personal pressures got too much, and Godflesh buckled in 2002, on the verge of a huge US tour with Strapping Young Lad and Fear Factory.

“I remember thinking, ‘I can’t do this anymore. I don’t want to go into unpredictable situations,’” Justin recalls. “I was sick of it. And I was sick of having to drain alcohol every night and do bongs all the time to deal with people and unpredictable situations and information overload. And because I hadn’t been diagnosed, nobody got it, obviously. No one understood why I was reacting like this – not even me at the time.”

He retreated to his new home in rural Wales and formed a new band, Jesu, as his main outlet. Initially, he took the sludgiest elements of Godflesh, expanded on the melancholia that lay at the band’s heart, and wed them to richer, post-rock textures. The project soon broadened into more pastoral and redemptive realms, recalling the 90s shoegaze era long before the revival began in earnest, and even ventured into outright pop.

Although Jesu is still a going concern, and a long-term partner and child have given him much-need balance, some demons refuse to die. At the instigation of Hellfest festival, Justin and Benny reformed Godflesh in 2009 as a live act, but the urge to record together again became too strong.

This year’s Purge is their third album since their reformation. It’s brought back the breakbeat elements of 1992’s Pure record, but it still finds new ways to distil a lifetime’s worth of dislocation and hypersensitivity. But as their colossal set at the Inferno festival in Norway will prove later tonight, Godflesh remain a galvanising and unifying force as deeply affecting for new generations of fans as much as long-term ones.

“Those shows prove this isn’t just old man music,” laughs Justin. “It actually communicates something to people, and although we never became that big band, we’ve somehow attained this legendary status.”

For all Godflesh’s negativity and misanthropy, and the wilful nihilism of mantras like ‘Don’t hold me back, this is my own hell’ (from Streetcleaner’s Christbait Rising), this is music whose overwhelming power becomes an act of deliverance – a stripping away of ego and a surrender to the ecstatic, even if it’s through the most masochistic of routes.

“There has to be some form of communion,” says Justin. “When I go onstage, it’s not a celebration. I’m not hereto entertain you. I’m on the verge of tears the entire time, because I’m so immersed in it. I want it to be this suffocating, claustrophobic experience that I feel. I am fucking crushed by it, and I do want to crush everyone else with it. But it’s not an act of vengeance. It’s a human, shared experience.”

This article was originally published in Metal Hammer issue 376, July 2023. Godflesh will perform a special show at Scala, London on Thursday, October 30.

The brand new issue of Prog Magazine is on sale now, as we reflect on the life and times of Supertramp and their co-founder, Rick Davies, who sadly died last month.

We look at the life of the man behind School, Goodbye Stranger and Bloody Well Right, cast an eye over some of the greatest songs he wrote, and delve into the making of the band’s breakthrough album, 1974’s Crime Of The Century.

Elsewhere, Derek Shulman tells us in The Prog Interview how he went from rock star to record company exec; John Lees gives us the lowdown on the first new JLBJH album in 12 years; Rick Wakeman discusses his new piano album Melancholia, and gives us a sneak preview of the full-on prog rock album that’s coming next year; and we celebrate 10 years of Progzilla Radio!

There’s also the latest on new releases from Lunatic Soul, Arjen Lucassen, Luke Machin’s Soulshine project, Jo Quail, The Emerald Dawn, Spriggan Mist and Between The Buried And Me, plus Adam Wakeman brings us up to date on Headspace.

Our friends at Progzilla Radio have compiled this issue’s sampler for us, highlighting some great up-and-coming prog bands you might not have heard. I urge you to give it a listen (it’s free, after all!) and see how healthy the emerging scene really is. It’s why we partnered with them to highlight our Limelight acts.

Also in Prog 164...

John Lees' Barclay James Harvest - the prog veterans return with Relativity, their first new studio album for 12 years!

Jo Quail - the acclaimed cellist discusses her bold new work, Notan.

Rick Wakeman - the dad jokes are on hold – for now – as Uncle Rick plays moving piano moments.

The Emerald Dawn - the Cornish proggers deliver a strong climate treatise with the first volume of The Land, The Sea, The Air.

Lunatic Soul - Mariusz Duda’s Circle of Life and Death cycle comes to a close with LS’s The World Under Unsun.

Soulshine - Maschine and Tangent guitarist Luke Machin goes full-on soul with his debut solo release.

Arjen Lucassen - musings on the end of the world with the Dutch prog polymath.

Progzilla Radio - the story of the first 10 years of the UK’s leading prog radio and podcast setup.

Between The Buried And Me - the US prog metal quartet are at their most experimental with the conceptual The Blue Nowhere.

Spriggan Mist - Bracknell’s pagan proggers make a wild sound on new album The Glare.

Adam Wakeman - prog’s busiest man, Adam Wakeman, looks forward to Headspace live shows, gigs with his dad, and reflects on Ozzy’s Back To The Beginning show.

Derek Shluman - Gentle Giant’s Derek Shulman discusses his dual careers as rock star and record company executive to the sta

VLMV - Pete Lambrou on a prog world full of Pink Floyd, Radiohead and The Mars Volta, among others.

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Gazpacho, David Gilmour, Alan Parsons Project, Frank Zappa, The Emerald Dawn, King Crimson, Barclay James Harvest, Lunatic Soul, Cardiacs, Solstice, XTC, Spriggan Mist and loads more!

And this month we went to ArcTanGent, Pelagic Fest and A Sunday In September and saw gigs by Auri, Symphony X, Ihlo and more...

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

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* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

Figaro-oh-oh-oh! Oh boy, do we have a royally jam-packed issue this month! Yep, hard as it may be to believe, but October (Halloween, to be specific) marks the 50th anniversary of the original release of Queen’s epic single Bohemian Rhapsody. Undoubtedly one of rock’s Dead Sea Scrolls, it’s not hyperbole to say that Bo Rhap changed the course of the band’s career and popular music as we know it.

This issue we celebrate it and the making of the groundbreaking album from whence it came – Queen’s A Night At The Opera – in the company of Sir Brian May and Roger Taylor. Both single and album are about to be re-released on vinyl, so I do wonder if we might have another Bo Rhap No.1 on our hands this year?

What's more, the new issue is one of our premium editions, and includes an official A Night At The Opera sticker, poster and art card (subscribers, UK newsstand and online orders only).

Also in the issue: we chat to Scorpions about their 60 years in rock; get the story behind UFO’s sojourn to Montserrat to record No Place To Run with George Martin; go behind the scenes of Tom Petty’s deeply personal Wildflowers album; Ann and Nancy Wilson tell us about the making of Heart’s debut record and much more besides.

Until next month…

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock

Features

Queen
Fifty years on, Brian May and Roger Taylor reveal the vision, precision and daring behind Queen’s A Night At The Opera, the album that rewrote rock’s rules.

Scorpions
Rudolph Schenker and Klause Meine look back over 60 years, from being trashed in the UK press to being lauded rock icons.

Heart
How Ann and Nancy Wilson gatecrashed a male-dominated, payola-fuelled rock scene 50 years ago with Dreamboat Annie.

Creeper
Before the vampires and rock’n’roll theatre, it was shoestring punk gigs, DIY video shoots, hard work and, ouch, sales work.

Tom Petty
Despite all the chaos and confusion that fed into it, the deeply personal Wildflowers is the album he regarded as his best.

David Bowie
Band members, friends and associates tell the story of The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars.

UFO
When ace-card guitarist Michael Schenker quit, no sulks, they took off to the Caribbean and recorded a belter without him.

Regulars

The Dirt
Foo Fighters back in the studio? Twister Sister to play 2026 world tour. Radiohead confirm UK shows. Welcome back Paradise Lost and Lemonheads. Say hello to Hollow Souls and Margarita Witch Cult. Say goodbye to Rick Davies, Brent Hinds, Tony Beard, Mark Volman.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Counting Crows
How a song written immediately after and about a wild night out became radio staple, a huge hit and their signature song.

Q&A: Eric Gales
The blues guitarist on his record for his late brother, cutting heads with Bonamassa, surviving time behind bars.

Reviews
New albums from Michael Schenker, Ash, Chrissie Hynde, Mammoth, Lemonheads, Cardiacs, Sparks, Vernon Reid, Dizzy Reed, Goo Goo Dolls, Biohazard and more. Reissues from John & Yoko/Plastic Ono Band, Ronnie Wood, Steve Howe, Foghat, Humble Pie, Frank Zappa, Elton John, Supergrass, King Crimson and more. DVDs, films and books on Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel, Charlie Harper, Ringo Starr, U2, Marianne Faithfull and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Zakk Wylde
The pick of his records with Ozzy, Black Label Society and more.

Lives
We preview tours by Todd Rundgren, Y&T and Coheed And Cambria. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Devon Allman
The singer and guitarist picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* NB: Due to some unexpected logistical delays, this issue will be on the UK newsstand from Tuesday

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

Motörhead. I’d wager there’s not a single person who’s likely to read a magazine called Classic Rock who doesn’t rate the mighty Motörhead. The band led by Lemmy that easily managed to unite all the disparate factions and tribes of rock by being, frankly, full-on and brilliant.

2025 marks the 50th anniversary of Lemmy forming that band – originally called Bastard, until cooler heads prevailed – after having been unceremoniously ousted from Hawkwind. And, shockingly, this year also marks 10 years of his passing. Where on earth does the time go?

This month we take a look at back at Lemmy and 50 years of his band in the company of his friends and associates. We also hear from the great man himself in a forthright and hilarious interview from the vaults. This Special Collector's Edition includes an official Motörhead Snaggletooth sticker (subscriptions, online orders and UK newsstand sales only).

Also in the issue: we sit down with Robert Plant to discuss his new Saving Grace project; take a deep dive into the finest moments of solo George Harrison; and hail the unexpected return of Spinal Tap.

We also check in with Mirador, the new project from Greta Van Fleet’s Jake Kiszka and alt-folkie Chris Turpin, and have worked with them to produce a unique bundle edition of Classic Rock that contains a hand-signed lyric sheet of their first single, Feels Like Gold.

Until next month…

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock
• Get the Mirador bundle edition

Features

Lemmy/Motörhead At 50
Close associates – friends, managers, writers, photographers, PRs, crew, former band members and more – offer personal stories, in their own words, about the band and in particular the man who was Motörhead. Also, in a candid interview from 2002, Lemmy explains what he learned, about women and men, drugs, violence, religion, rock’n’roll, and cooking the perfect dinner for one.

Robert Plant
The singer talks about his latest group Saving Grace, the joy of operating low-key and without an agenda, and feeling like musically he can just do whatever he likes, when he likes.

Mirador
When the worlds of Greta Van Fleet’s Jake Kiszka and alt.folkie Chris Turpin collided, it was musical love at first sight. After a whirlwind romance, their new project Mirador was born.

Spinal Tap
The band's improbable return is the comeback no one expected – and even fewer requested. David St Hubbins, Nigel Tufnel and Derek Smalls tell all.

George Harrison
An album-by-album guide to his greatest songs, solos, milestones and innovations away from The Beatles.

The Classic Rock x Mirador bundle edition

We've worked with Mirador, the new project from Greta Van Fleet’s Jake Kiszka and alt-folkie Chris Turpin, to produce a unique limited edition Classic Rock bundle that includes a hand-signed lyric sheet of their first single, Feels Like Gold.

They're gone when they're gone: Get yours now!

Regulars

The Dirt
Big names appear on all-star Bad Company tribute album;
Phil Lynott tribute concert to take place next year; Megadeth to split next year; Biff Byford undergoes surgery for bowel cancer; Welcome back The Hives and 38 Special; Say hello to Zig Zags and Castle Rat; Say goodbye to John ‘Poli’ Palmer, Bobby Whitlock and George Kooymans.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Grand Funk Railroad
In the early 70s they were doing okay, but they needed a breakthrough. That was We're An American Band.

Q&A: Luke Morley
The Thunder guitarist on the band’s future, his solo career and new album, playing with The Quireboys, songwriting and more.

Reviews
New albums from Robert Plant, Glenn Hughes, Suede,Biffy Clyro, Walter Trout, FM, The Vintage Caravan, 38 Special, Mirador, John Fogerty, Paradise Lost and more. Reissues from Led Zeppelin, Genesis, Clutch, Deep Purple, Van Halen, Ramones, David Bowie, XTC, Fleetwood Mac, Mötley Crüe, Johnny Winter, Be-Bop Deluxe and more. DVDs, films and books on Iron Maiden, Tom Petty, Stevie Nicks, Spinal Tap and more. Live reviews of AC/DC, Judas Priest, Manic Street Preachers, Alice Cooper, Queens Of The Stone Age, The Doobie Brothers and more.

Buyer’s Guide: W.A.S.P
The Blackie Lawless and co. albums you should listen to if you want to check out the best from the band.

Lives
We preview tours by Stewart Copeland, Graham Bonnet and Blaze Bayley. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Vernon Reid
The Living Colour guitarist on the records, artists and gigs that are of lasting significance to him.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* NB: Due to some unexpected logistical delays, this issue will be on the UK newsstand from Tuesday

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

The brand new issue of Prog Magazine is on sale now, with Genesis on the front cover.

With the release of the 50th-anniversary box set of Genesis’s fabled 1974 album, The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway, finally upon us, Prog looks at the ensuing tour for the album, during which, of course, Peter Gabriel decided to quit the band. Such a pivotal moment in the history of progressive rock, we're sure you’ll agree. We speak to those who were there at the time: band, management, crew and fans, to discover the truth behind what unveils itself to be a quite harrowing time in Genesis and prog’s evolution.

Equally fascinating are Roy Harper’s musings on his career in The Prog Interview; Jeff Wayne’s thoughts on his own and whether it’s been overshadowed by Martians; and an exploration of Hawkwind’s 1974 album Hall Of The Mountain Grill.

Elsewhere, this issue boasts a truly international line-up with young Scottish prog rockers Ihlo, Welsh pop-proggers Chimpan A, Norwegian prog rockers Green Carnation, US proggers Discipline, Swedish art-rockers Gaupa, and, from the UK, Jakko Jakszyk, Kindred Spirit Band and Moon Halo.

And do check out our great free downloadable sampler from UK prog rockers Stuckfish too.

Also in Prog 163...

Jeff Wayne - Martians, Spartacus, Peter Gabriel and David Essex collide in the crazy world of the producer and composer.

Ihlo - the young prog hotshots celebrate album number two, Legacy

Hawkwind - the story of 1974’s legendary Hall Of The Mountain Grill.

Chimpan A - Robert Reed and Steve Balsamo get arty with a new set of progressive pop.

Green Carnation - the Norwegian prog rockers unveil Part 1 of their A Dark Poem trilogy, The Shores Of Melancholia.

Jakko Jakszyk - King Crimson frontman explores his past on new solo record, Son Of Glen.

Kindred Spirit Band - UK folk proggers mix fantasy with themes of mental health on seventh album, The Journey Within.

Discipline - US prog rockers are back with their first new album for eight years.

Gaupa - now slimmed to a quartet, there’s no let up in the art-rock attack from this Swedish group.

Moon Halo - Mostly Autumn, Riversea and Lee Abraham musicians make a sweet melodic prog noise.

Mark Pritchard - The Thom Yorke collaborator and electronic musician talks about his work with the Radiohead artist.

Roy Harper - “When does folk become prog? And when does Roy become folk?” asks Roy Harper as he looks back over his lengthy career.

Crayola Lecturn - on a prog world full of Tangerine Dream, Rick Wakeman, Army Of Moths and ELO.

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Genesis,, Supertramp, Vangelis, Alan White, John Wetton, Green Carnation, Jo Quail, Arjen Lucassen, Faust, Crown Lands, Between The Buried And Me, Pink Floyd, Darryl Way’s Wolf, Huw Lloyd-Langton and loads more…

This issue we went to Prog For Peart, EppyFest and Bloodstock and saw The Von Hertzen Brothers, The Emerald Dawn, Dave Bainbridge and Sally Minnear and more!

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

* You can use our store finder to find your nearest stockist. Go to Prog on the alphabetical pull-down menu and enter your postcode.

* The easiest option for everyone would be to go digital. You can get single digital issues from the Apple Store, from Zinio and all manner of digital magazine retailers.

* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

This is an editorial that I never wanted to write. One that I hoped I’d never have to write. How can Ozzy possibly be gone? The mighty Double O has always been here, and I thought he always would be. I thought he’d outlive us all, even against all the odds. And in a way he will. His music, his legend and his legacy are bigger than all of us.

It’s not hyperbole to say that without Ozzy, Classic Rock and half the bands we write about wouldn’t exist, and that the landscape of hard rock would look very different. No Ozzy, no Black Sabbath. No Black Sabbath, no heavy metal.

This issue, which was originally destined to feature a celebration of Black Sabbath’s final hurrah, has morphed into a celebration of Ozzy, his life, his work and ultimately of the man he was.

If there’s been one overriding sentiment since we lost him – whether he’s thought of as the Prince Of Darkness, the Godfather Of Heavy Metal, the patriarch of The Osbournes reality TV show or Birmingham’s hometown hero – it’s what a fundamentally lovely guy he was. And how much he and Sharon were devoted to one another.

Rest in peace, Ozzy. We shall not see your like again.

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock
• Get the Glenn Hughes bundle edition
• Get the Walter Trout bundle edition

Features

Ozzy Osbourne
We look back and celebrate the life and times of the Godfather Of Heavy Metal, including specific events through the eyes of Classic Rock contributors and others who met him, many of whom knew him well. Hilarity, outrage, disbelief, madness, sadness. You really couldn't make it up. Plus, stars bid farewell.

Mick Ralphs
Goodbye to the guitarist and songwriter with Mott The Hoople and Bad Company. In the words of Ian Hunter and Paul Rodgers.

The Classic Rock Interview: Glenn Hughes
The bassist/vocalist has spent more than 50 years in rock. Addiction nearly derailed his career, but he pulled himself back from the brink and is still going strong. A life? Not half.

Harem Scarem
They never achieved the degree of success their music should have brought them, but they’re still knocking on the door.

Walter Trout
The bluesman returns with his new album Sign Of The Times, on which he looks at a world gone wrong.

The Classic Rock x Glenn Hughes bundle edition

Glenn Hughes’ latest solo album, Chosen, is set for release on September 5, and to celebrate we have a special edition of Classic Rock that features a limited-edition Glenn cover, a hand-signed lyric sheet and an exclusive coke bottle clear vinyl. Get yours now.

The Classic Rock x Walter Trout bundle edition

This Walter Trout x Classic Rock bundle comes with an exclusive, limited-edition Guitarwrist bracelet, made from guitar strings played by Walter Trout himself. It's available to order now.

Regulars

The Dirt
Joe Perry hints at final Aerosmith show; ELO forced to cancel final shows; a 100-minute version of Ozzy Osbourne’s Villa Park event to be released in cinemas next year. Welcome back Dinosaur Pile-Up and Rodney Crowell. Say hello to De’Wayne. Say goodbye to Dave Cousins, Kevin Riddles.

Q&A: Warren Haynes
Gov’t Mule’s leader on his new release, musical and marital partnerships, and how the blues can rescue you from misery.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include Tuk Smith & The Restless Hearts, Ashley McBryde, The Overjoyed, Starbenders, The Violent Hour and more.

Reviews
New albums from Bryan Adams, The Hives, Roger Waters, Helloween, The Black Keys, Enuff Z’Nuff, Wolfsbane, Dinosaur Pile-Up, Osees, Ron Sexsmith and more. Reissues from Deep Purple, Chicago, The Seeds, Hawkwind, Bruce Dickinson, Jeff Wayne, Butterfield Blues Band, Strapps and more. DVDs, films and books on Talking Heads, Alan Niven, John Sykes, George Harrison, Pamela Des Barres and more. Live reviews of Back To The Beginning (Black Sabbath, Metallica, GN’R and more), Neil Young And The Chrome Hearts, Muse, Nine Inch Nails, Iggy Pop, Rival Sons and more.

Lives
We preview tours by Helloween, Warrior Soul and Connor Selby. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Beaux Gris Gris & The Apocalypse
Singer Greta Valenti picks her records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

The brand new issue of Prog Magazine is on sale now, celebrating the 40th anniversary of Kate Bush's fifth album, Hounds Of Love, on the cover...

An almost perfect blend of progressive pop and progressive rock, the hugely successful singles on one side are counterpointed by the wonderful The Ninth Wave suite on the other. We tell the story of the album that made Kate a global phenomenon and look at the impact it had on musicians of today, while photographer Guido Harari draws back the curtain on the promotional photos he took of Kate at the time.

We pay tribute to Strawbs founder Dave Cousins, who sadly passed away last month, and we also look at how Mike Oldfield followed up the massive success of Tubular Bells with Hergest Ridge, which has a new anniversary reissue out. We also speak to Peter Giles about his time in King Crimson and more, discuss Steve Rothery and Thorsten Quaeschning’s new project Bioscope, and explore the new Canterbury sound being made by younger bands inspired by their 60s and 70s heroes.

As well as that, Nad Sylvan, Hats Off Gentlemen It’s Adequate, Gösta Berlings Saga, Auri, Nosound and Magic Pie bring us up to speed with their new releases, and there’s a wonderful Kate Bush art print and a great free sampler from UK prog rockers Jump, celebrating 35 years of making music.

Also in Prog 162...

Dave Cousins - we pay tribute to the Strawbs bandleader, who died in July.

Mike Oldfield - how on earth do you follow up the massive-selling, No.1 debut album Tubular Bells? Find out here.

Nad Sylvan - the Steve Hackett vocalist takes inspiration from his past to move his sound onwards on Monumentata.

Bioscope - Marillion’s Steve Rothery and Tangerine Dream’s Thorsten Quaeschning make compelling music in this new project.

Hats Off Gentlemen It's Adequate - the prog boffins are back and this time they’ve got uncertainty in their sights.

Gösta Berlings Saga - the Swedish instrumental proggers celebrate 25 years in style with new album Forever Now.

Canterbury 2.0 - the Kent city has cast an auspicious shadow over progressive music for more than 50 years. Facelift Magazine's Phil Howitt introduces us to modern musicians inspired by its sound.

Auri - the folky prog Nightwish offshoot make their third album and look forward to touring for the first time!

Magic Pie - the Norwegian prog rockers break their writers’ block with Maestro, their first new music for six years.

Nosound - Giancarlo Erra talks us through the first Nosound music for six years.

Peter Giles - Peter has gone from playing bass for Giles, Giles & Fripp and King Crimson to becoming a Gold Medal-winning athlete at 80. He tells us his story.

Heather Findlay - Heather tells us about her prog world full of Floyd, Genesis, Kate Bush and Worzel Gummidge!

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Bioscope;, Jethro Tull; Gilgamesh; National Health; Giles, Giles & Fripp; Popol Vuh; Hawkwind; Auri; Chimpan A; Styx; Van der Graaf Generator; Ihlo; John McLaughlin; Discipline; Cardiacs; Be-Bop Deluxe and loads more.

And this month we’ve seen gigs by Galahad, The Flower Kings, Neal Morse, Adrian Belew and Jerry Harrison, Kraftwerk, Gryphon and more...

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

* You can use our store finder to find your nearest stockist. Go to Prog on the alphabetical pull-down menu and enter your postcode.

* The easiest option for everyone would be to go digital. You can get single digital issues from the Apple Store, from Zinio and all manner of digital magazine retailers.

* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

Bad Moon Rising, Proud Mary, Born On The Bayou, Fortunate Son, Up Around The Bend (my favourite, if push came to shove)… All songs that are intrinsically part of the fabric of classic rock, or let’s be honest, popular music as a whole. And that’s just a mere handful!

They all came from Creedence Clearwater Revival and the mind and the pen of that band’s guiding light, John Fogerty. This month we sat down with him to discuss the trials and tribulations of Creedence, his songwriting and his decision to reclaim his Creedence legacy (and songs) by ‘doing a Taylor Swift’ and re-visiting some of his classics. “I probably didn’t deserve to have my songs stolen,” he tells us.

This month, we've also produced a Halestorm bundle to celebrate their upcoming album, Everest. This includes the magazine with a bespoke cover starring the band, and comes with an exclusive, hand-signed lyric sheet, as well as a hot pink variant of the album. It's available to pre-order now.

Sadly, this month has also been a bit of a sobering one in terms of people who we have lost to the great gig in the sky. We pay tribute to Beach Boys mastermind Brian Wilson and funk rock legend Sly Stone and, as promised, publish the last in-depth interview with Rick Derringer. Next issue we will pay full tribute to Mick Ralphs, who passed away just as we were going to print.

Until next month…

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock
• Get the Halestorm bundle edition

Features

John Fogerty
At the age of 80, John Fogerty is still going strong. This month he sits down for the Classic Rock interview to discuss the life and times of Creedence Clearwater Revival.

Bush
Whipping boys of the UK music press in the 90s, Bush know what an uphill battle feels like. Today they’re still fighting.

Rick Derringer
In a rare and exclusive interview before his death in May, the 60s pop star recalls inspiring Eddie Van Halen, being in a band with Johnny Winter, and much more.

Joe Bonamassa & Joanne Shaw Taylor
The two blues giants talk about AI, internet trolls, crap journalists, and music execs who need a punch in the face.

Wytch Hazel
While they don’t describe themselves as a Christian rock band, they admit their religious beliefs feed into and help their music.

The Black Keys
While 2024 is a year they’d like to forget, with a new outlook and new album they’re hoping 2025 will be one to remember.

The Classic Rock x Halestorm bundle edition

This Halestorm x Classic Rock bundle comes with an exclusive lyric sheet, hand-signed by the band, as well as a hot pink variant of the band’s forthcoming album, Everest. It's available to pre-order now.

Regulars

The Dirt
Bon Jovi return to the stage; Townshend responds to Starkey sacking; Birmingham hosts world’s first Ozzy exhibition; Vivian Campbell finally cancer-free.Welcome back Brent Cobb and Willie Nile. Say hello to California Irish and Young Gun Silver Fox. Say goodbye to Sly Stone, Brian Wilson, Colin Jerwood and more.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Steve Harley And Cockney Rebel
Written as a dig at the band members who quit, Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me) became a timeless hit.

Q&A: Volbeat
Singer/guitarist Michael Poulsen on life, loss, evil, spirituality, choosing music over boxing, the new album, goats…

Ever Meet Lemmy?: Lzzy Hale
Ronnie Dio pinched her cheeks, Wolfgang Van Halen took her to 5150, she bought Rob Halford high heels for Christmas.

Reviews
New albums from Alice Cooper, Halestorm, Styx, Bush, Joe Bonamassa, The Cold Stares, Luke Morley, Orianthi, Diamond Head, Paul Weller and more. Reissues from Jeff Beck, Jethro Tull, Cats In Space,J Mascis, Ginderman, Sweet and more. DVDs, films and books on Deep Purple, Blondie, Bob Dylan, The Cure and more. Live reviews of Iron Maiden, Alice Cooper, Download, Sparks, Chantel McGregor, Forever Now festival, Royal Republic and more.

Lives
We preview tours by Cardinal Black, Michael Shannon & Jason Narducy and Lita Ford. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Orianthi
Guitarist/singer/ songwriter Orianthi picks her records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

There’s a part of me that refuses to believe that Dire Straits’ Brothers In Arms can be celebrating its 40th birthday this year. It seems only a few years ago that I listened to it on a cassette that a friend’s elder brother taped for me (yeah, we were killing music, remember?). I remember it being a staple on my stereo for a very long time. Then, as these things have a habit of happening, I didn’t listen to it for an absolute age.

I was reminded of its excellence in 2001 when the title track was used to brilliant effect scoring a scene in US political drama The West Wing. It was enough to rekindle a love affair with Dire Straits’ finest hour.

This issue we talked to Mark Knopfler and his erstwhile bandmates to discuss the making of that stone-cold classic and epoch-defining record (or should I say CD?).

We also caught up with the Alice Cooper band to discover how they finally reunited to make their first album in 50 years (and we've also created a special Alice-themed bundle edition of the new issue – see details below). And we revisit some of Iron Maiden’s standout live moments, take a trip back to the US Live Aid, look back at the life of Mike Peters and much more. Until next month…

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock
• Get the Alice Cooper bundle edition

Features

Dire Straits
After four Top 5 albums, they were doing well but were hardly a household name. Then they released Brothers In Arms. Mark Knopfler, John Illsley and Guy Fletcher take us back.

Iron Maiden
As the Run For Your Lives tour begins, Maiden manager Rod Smallwood shares what he regards as “the most important and interesting” shows the band have ever played.

Alice Cooper
When Billion Dollar Babies hit No.1 in 1973, instead of solidifying the band they unravelled. Now they’re back. Cooper, Dunaway, Smith and Bruce tell all.

Live Aid USA
Despite the flood of goodwill and camaraderie, the lead-up to the event wasn’t without some clashes of the titans.

Eureka Machines
The importance of “pissing about” according to Chris Catalyst and his crew.

The Classic Rock x Alice Cooper bundle edition

This Alice Cooper x Classic Rock bundle comes with a limited-edition, smart format poster that gives you instant digital access to two exclusive bonus tracks upon receipt of the poster and a high-quality download of the full album on release day. It's available now.

Regulars

The Dirt
The Who dismiss drummer Zak Starkey – again; Springsteen and Trump trade blows; Judas Priest documentary in the pipeline. Welcome back A Thousand Horses and Fishbone, say hello to Ravagers and Star Circus, say goodbye to Mike Peters, Rick Derringer, Simon House and more.

The Stories Behind The Songs: Buckcherry
How frontman Josh Todd’s mea culpa gave the Californian rockers their biggest radio hit, Sorry.

Q&A: H.E.A.T
H.A.A.T frontman Kenny Leckremo on the state of rock, his predecessor, why Swedes write great songs, being cheesy, big hair and more.

Six Things You Need To Know About: Battlesnake
They often perform in just underwear, they like to live dangerously on stage, they dig chaos, bombast and more.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include Ace Monroe, Robert Randolph, Orianthi, Whiskey Myers, Joanne Shaw Taylor, Zig Zag, His Lordship and more.

Reviews
New albums from Buckcherry, Neil Young, Sparks, His Lordship, Saxon, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Queens Of The Stone Age, Fishbone, Volbeat, Tangerine Dream and more. Reissues from Queen, Bruce Springsteen, Steve Harley, Mike Oldfield, Motörhead, Robin Trower, Metallica, Greg Lake, Grateful Dead and more. DVDs, films and books on Frank Zappa, The Who, Bono, Queens Of The Stone Age, Arthur Baker and more. Live reviews of Steven Wilson, Dead & Company, Sammy Hagar, Bearded Theory Festival and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Steve Lillywhite
The producer has his fingerprints all over a number of top rock, post-punk, new wave and art-rock albums of the 80s in particular.

Lives
We preview tours by Lynyrd Skynyrd , Sparks and King Diamond. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Adam Duritz
Counting Crows’ mainman picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

* Copies of the new issue of Classic Rock can be purchased online from Magazines Direct

* Classic Rock is on sale in the UK in shops such as supermarkets and newsagents.

* In North America, Classic Rock is available in branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* An easy option is to go digital. You can subscribe digitally from just £20.99 for six months. Individual issues and subscriptions are also from the Apple Store, Zinio, Readly, Press Reader and Pocketmags.

* Save money by buying a physical subscription. UK and overseas subscriptions are available.

The brand new, gift-packed issue of Prog Magazine is on sale now, with Marillion on the front cover...

We celebrate 30 years of Afraid Of Sunlight, the band’s final album for EMI, looking at the making of the album as the band recall how they created triumph out of potential impending disaster with one of their most-loved and enduring of albums.

Also this month we catch up with Canterbury legend Richard Sinclair for a trawl through his illustrious musical history; Derek Shulman, Kerry Minnear, Gary Green and John Weathers discuss the revamp of Gentle Giant’s Playing The Fool live album; former Tangerine Dream man Peter Baumann is back making music after a six-year hiatus and we pay tribute to former Hawkwind and David Bowie musician Simon House, who sadly died last month.

Elsewhere, Katatonia, John Hackett Band, Pride Of Passion, Lars Fredrik Frøislie, Robert Reed, Hedvig Mollestad Trio and AVKRVST tell us all about their latest releases, and we review the 50th-anniversary celebration of Mike Oldfield’s Hergest Ridge as well as live shows by Steven Wilson, Jon Anderson, Hawkwind and the Winter’s End festival.

And as for all the gifts, you get four Marillion Afraid Of Sunlight coasters plus an art print and four AoS coasters, a newly updated Jethro Tull e-book plus a great Comedy Of Errors digital sampler too. Enjoy.

Inside Prog 161...

Simon House - remembering the former High Tide, Hawkwind and David Bowie musician who died in May.

Gentle Giant - Derek Shulman, Kerry Minnear, Gary Green and John Weathers discuss their carefully remastered 70s live album.

Katatonia - frontman Jonas Renkse guides Prog through the band’s recent upheavals.

John Hackett Band - Hackett and co discuss their current album, Red Institution.

Pride Of Passion - the 80s proggers, featuring a former member of Marillion, return.

Peter Baumann - the one-time Tangerine Dream man releases first solo music for a decade.

Lars Fredrik Frøislie - Wobbler’s keyboardist discusses
old-school instruments, singing in Norwegian and his latest solo venture.

Robert Reed - Wales’s answer to Mike Oldfield discusses his fourth Sanctuary album.

Hedvig Mollestad Trio - Hedvig’s back with her trio and they’re rocking out on Bees In The Bonnet.

AVKRVST - young Norwegian proggers tell us about their return with richly atmospheric second LP Waving At The Sky.

Anyone - Riz Story discusses his Anyone project and the latest concept album, Echoes Of Man.

Richard Sinclair - the Canterbury legend details his musical journey that takes in Caravan, Hatfield & The North, Camel, National Health, In Cahoots and so much more.

Joe Cairney - the Comedy Of Errors singer on a prog world full of Genesis, Camel, IQ and cheesy pop!

Plus reviews of new releases and reissues by Mike Oldfield, Rick Wakeman, Greg Lake, Horslips, Steve Hackett, Happy The Man,
Frank Zappa, Atomic Rooster, Nosound, Chicago, Nad Sylvan, Tangerine Dream, Jakko M Jakszyk, Brian Eno & Beatie Wolfe and loads more…

And this month we’ve seen gigs by Steven Wilson, Jon Anderson, Hawkwind, Winter's End Festival, Elder, Exit North and more...

Buying Prog Magazine made easy...

* You can use our store finder to find your nearest stockist. Go to Prog on the alphabetical pull-down menu and enter your postcode.

* The easiest option for everyone would be to go digital. You can get single digital issues from the Apple Store, from Zinio and all manner of digital magazine retailers.

* Subscribe to Prog. We are now accepting subscriptions from the rest of the world. Subscriptions available here.

* In North America, Prog is available is branches of Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, although new issues do not go on sale until a couple of weeks after they're published in The UK.

* Single print issues of Prog can be purchased online from Magazines Direct and also Burning Shed.

Click on the corresponding cover on the single issue page at Magazines Direct for payment options.

As Babymetal hit London’s O2 Arena and prepare to release new album Metal Forth, we speak to the trio about why they’ve gone collab crazy!

Metal Forth features a whopping seven guest stars from the modern metal scene: Poppy, Spiritbox, Electric Callboy, Slaughter To Prevail, Bloodywood, Polyphia and Tom Morello.

Babymetal singer Su-metal says they formed friendships with the artists through touring, resulting in an album that’s “incredibly rich and diverse”. The trio’s ambition now is to inspire others.

“During the making of the new album Metal Forth, and throughout these past few years of touring, we’ve really felt that Babymetal is being recognised within the metal world, and that there are people we’ve influenced who are now becoming the next generation of metal artists,” says Su-metal. “Our next goal is to help lead that next generation.”

We also speak to the guest collaborators themselves, about what it’s like to work with Japan’s biggest and brightest metal band.

“After so many years of writing music mostly on our own, it was refreshing to have totally different influences come into play,” explains Electric Callboy’s Kevin Ratajcazk of hit song Ratatata. “It made us more aware of how easy it is to get stuck in your ways, and it helped us to think more outside the box.”

Also in the issue, Metallica guitar legend Kirk Hammett reveals why he doesn’t believe in retirement, why he’s working on a new solo album – and why he cooked breakfast for Hollywood hotshot Jason Momoa.

Volbeat’s Michael Poulsen gets The Hammer Interview treatment, opening up about his friendship with King Diamond, his deep-dive into Satanism, and his weird obsession with… goats?! Plus, ahead of Linkin Park’s show at Wembley Stadium, we investigate their triumph, tragedy and unlikely resurrection.

Elsewhere, Opeth uncover the story behind their anthem Ghost Of Perdition, and System Of A Down bassist/Seven Hours After Violet man Shavo Odadjian talks deathcore, Cuban cigars and nonsense lyrics.

We also remember the chaos of Nine Inch Nails’ infamous Self Destruct touring cycle, find out why The Conjuring star Vera Farmiga has formed metal band The Yagas, and watch symphonic metal band Plague Of Angels take on a bunch of irate Christians by playing York Minster.

All this, along with Sleep Token, Ghost, Bury Tomorrow, Confess, Kuunatic, Malevolence, Vexed, Kalandra, Incineration festival, Inferno festival and much, much more.

Only in the new issue of Metal Hammer, on sale now. Order it online and have it delivered straight to your door.

Granted, we’re a fair few months away from our Best Of The Year issue, but if I was a betting girl I’d lay money now on knowing what the event of the year is going to be. Yes, you already know what I’m talking about… the reunion of the original line-up of Black Sabbath for their mighty last hurrah (with the esteemed company of rock and metal’s best in support to celebrate) in their home city of Birmingham.

To mark this momentous occasion, Classic Rock spoke with the four men who, let’s face it, invented heavy metal – Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward – ahead of what most definitely will be their final time on stage together. I have a suspicion July 5 is going to be a very emotional day for all involved.

This issue is a premium edition, which means that each copy comes with an official Black Sabbath Back to The Beginning gig poster and laptop sticker (subscribers, mail order and UK newsstand only).

Also available this month: A Skunk Anansie x Classic Rock bundle edition with an exclusive crystal and white splatter variant of their new album The Painful Truth (out today!), an art card signed by each member, and a limited-edition variant cover featuring Skin & Co on the cover.

• Get the new issue of Classic Rock
• Get the Skunk Anansie bundle edition

Features

Black Sabbath
We talk to all four original members about their final show.

Ghost
Tobias Forge, aka Papa V Perpetua, talks dark matters and working towards “newer, better, bigger”.

The Doobie Brothers
With vocalist Michael McDonald on board again and a new album, they’ve still got what it takes – just listen to the music.

Skunk Anansie
Their future in the balance, with the new album they “stood on top of the cliff, held hands and jumped into the clouds”.

Motörhead
Orgasmatron signalled a new start for Motörhead. We turn back the clock to 1986 with a classic interview.

Chris Goss
You can’t rush art. Mindfulness and spirituality matter… These are among the things that shape the Masters Of Reality mainman's worldview.

Regulars

The Dirt
Bad Company make it into the Hall Of Fame; new albums from Alice Cooper and Faces; Ritchie Blackmore grounded by doctors. Welcome back The Dead Daisies and Stan Lynch, say hello to Shuyler Jansen and Ally Venable, say goodbye to Clem Burke, Roy Thomas Baker, Les Binks and more.

The Stories Behind The Songs: The Stranglers
Driven by a gritty, hooky bass riff, Peaches was a UK Top 10 and is still a must-play by today’s Stranglers almost 50 years on.

John Lydon
The PiL frontman and former Sex Pistol on losing loved ones, living near the California fires, spoken-word gigs, underpants and more

Six Things You Need To Know About: When Rivers Meet
Lockdown helped them build a fan base, Aaron aspires to the silver screen, communication is key and more.

The Hot List
We look at some of the essential new tracks you need to hear and the artists to have on your radar. This month they include De’Wayne , Hollow Souls, Kadavar, Star Circus and more.

Reviews
New albums from Skunk Anansie, Doobie Brothers, Garbage, The Dead Daisies, Gary Moore, CJ Wildheart, Bernie Marsden and more. Reissues from Status Quo, Dire Straits, INXS, Black Stone Cherry, Don Henley, Sweet, Skid Row, Bruce Soord, Suede, Donnas and more. DVDs, films and books on Fleetwood Mac, Porcupine Tree, Jethro Tull, Genesis, Siouxsie And The Banshees, Yoko Ono and more. Live reviews of The Who, Ghost, Manic Street Preachers, Masters Of Reality, Eureka Machines and more.

Buyer’s Guide: Goo Goo Dolls
Although the strength of their songwriting has been frustratingly inconsistent, the band have shown moments of real class.

Lives
We preview tours by Bonnie Raitt, Zeal & Ardor and Chantel McGregor. Plus gig listings – who’s playing where and when.

The Soundtrack Of My Life: Robin Trower
Blues lifer Robin Trower picks his records, artists and gigs of lasting significance.

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