Mark Reale RIP
June 7, 1955 – January 25, 2012
Sad news today in the world of rock, as another long running band's founding member, Riot Guitarist Mark Reale has passed away.
Mark Reale, the founding guitarist of the hard rock / metal band Riot was admitted to San Antonio hospital last week in critical condition due to complications of Crohn's disease — an ailment he has battled for most of his life. - sadly yesterday he lost his battle for life, after being in a coma since January 11th.
Mark was 57.
I have to say that I never followed Riot passionately, but I certainly recognised Mark's talent and he was indeed one heck of a player and was the ONLY founding and remaining original member of the latest Riot line up, right up until the beginning of this year.
Sadly now he has gone.
I actually first saw Riot back in 1980 when they were playing the UK, opening for Sammy Hagar as a pre-cursor to their 'Fire Down Under' album, released the following year.
They were good no question and Mark even then was a shining star.
Riot released fifteen studio albums since they started in 1975 and the sad thing is, even for all of those, they never really broke through big time.
There's a lot of good material out there and my personal preference was the band earlier material, through the 80's.
After that they really became a lot heavier - IMO - but Mark remained a constant in the band throughout the years, so all power to him for persevering.
Prior to Mark passing, sadly two other well known former Riot players had passed on too.
Original vocalist Guy Speranza - with Riot from 1976 - 1981 - passed away in 2003.
Then the following vocalist Rhett Forrester - With Riot from 1981 - 1984 - Passed in 1994.
Today is another sad day in the lives of Riot fans.
My thoughts and prayers go out to Mark Reales family at this time.
RIP Mark, the pain is now over buddy.
Deep Purple announce new album will be released in 2013
This information comes from Deep Purple's official site ..., er, via www.Blabbermouth.net
Funny that huh?
Must say I've always found the official Deep Purple site - http://www.deeppurple.com/ - to be a little lame if I was honest, with the fan run site http://www.deep-purple.com/ to be a lot better and very much more up to date.
The fact that the official Deep Purple site posts a news update on the band, via another site to me pretty much sums things up!
Anyway, here's what comes from there ...
British hard rock legends Deep Purple are very excited by the prospect of making a new and significant album. To that end, they have decided to extend their writing and recording period through the summer of 2012.
Commented Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan: "We know we will disappoint some of our fans this summer. However, we look forward very much to our autumn/winter tour and continuing our worldwide tour with our new album in 2013."
Durung a 2011 interview with U.K.'s (Daily) Express and (Daily) Star, Gillan was asked when fans might be able to expect Deep Purple's follow-up to 2005's "Rapture Of The Deep" album.
"The fact is that we've been touring flat out," said Gillan. "We did 48 countries last year. We're getting so much off on that we just don't feel the drive at the moment for writing."
Gillan did reveal, though, that Deep Purple convened for a mini writing session earlier in the year.
"We were in Spain for a little while and we had a week off," he said. "We spent most of the time in the bar, to be honest with you. It was a good session, but nothing absolutely dynamic came out of it.
"I think to get some progress as far as an album's concerned you've got to have a target, you've got to work to a date, and that gives you pressure. If you've got the pressure, you get stuff done. We don't have a plan, to be honest."
"Things have always been chaos, certainly since I joined, and we've never been able to plan anything. If we'd been able to make plans, we'd probably have retired by now!"
"People like to do stuff that they're good at, that they enjoy, that they get something out of. So while it's fun and we're all getting older and bits are dropping off here and there, it's still great. I think there probably will be another album.
"And because we're not doing an album (right now) doesn't mean I don't write every day. It's a day off today and for me it's a full day at the office. This morning is interviews and this afternoon I've got two or three interesting pieces I'm working on at the moment. I write every day and so when I do come round to making an album there's never a shortage of what I call color material."
You can read more at the story source location here:
I guess we'll just have to wait and see folks, but no live dates in 2012, unless you catch the current tour running through Canada. Details here:
That's really it for today folks, I really do appreciate those of you that tuned into the online interview I did with CJAM - 99.1 FM.
For those that didn't you can go to www.CJAM.ca and then click on "Programming," then select the day - Wednesday 25th January. - scroll down to 4 - 4.30pm and 'U Talkin' 2 Me?' and click there.
You will then see all the previous podcasts for the year so far including the 25th January.
Right clich on that date, select 'Save As,' and you can download the show as an Mp3 file.
Hope you enjoyed the listen those of you that did and if you didn't, I hope you enjoy the interview playback from the download.
Cheers and thanks as always for your continued support,
Al
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