By Steve Newton The first time I interviewed Slash was two months after the release of “The Spaghetti Incident?”, Guns N’ Roses’ collection of punk and hard-rock cover tunes by […]
By Steve Newton Last week I posted a blog about the Iron Maiden/Guns N’ Roses gig I went to in Vancouver 30 years ago, on May 30, 1988. That was […]
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE GEORGIA STRAIGHT, JUNE 3, 1988 By Steve Newton The politics of rockin’ can be tough on new bands just getting used to the tour circuit. Take […]
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE GEORGIA STRAIGHT, NOV. 25, 1993 By Steve Newton As Guns N’ Roses would likely proclaim themselves, The Spaghetti Incident KICKS F***IN’ ASS! It’s the band’s […]
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE GEORGIA STRAIGHT, SEPT. 19, 1991 By Steve Newton It’s hard to believe that just three years ago Guns N’ Roses couldn’t get a rise out of […]
photo by the Newt By Steve Newton I wasn’t that excited about going to see Guns N’ Roses at BC Place last night, mainly because I wasn’t sure if they […]
By Steve Newton I was interviewing Todd Kerns a couple weeks ago in advance of the Age of Electric show at the Commodore tonight (April 30), and had an evil thought. Since […]
By Steve Newton “Rock and roll’s a loser’s game,” Ian Hunter once sang, and today I get what he was talkin’ about in that line from “The Ballad of Mott […]
If the setlist from Slash‘s show in San Francisco two nights ago is any indication, his Vancouver fans are in for a whole lotta GN’R action tonight. During his show at […]
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE GEORGIA STRAIGHT, APRIL 1, 1993 By Steve Newton The first time I saw Guns N’ Roses perform, the band was opening for Iron Maiden at the […]
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE GEORGIA STRAIGHT, AUG. 13, 1992 By Steve Newton Some hard-rock bands like to boast about not using keyboards; they take pride in sticking with the trusty […]
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE GEORGIA STRAIGHT, FEBRUARY 11, 1994 By Steve Newton Guns N’ Roses may well be the most popular hard-rock band in the world. It’s certainly one of […]
By Steve Newton Guns N’ Roses were probably the biggest rock band in the world–or was fighting it out with U2 for that title–when this telling photo was snapped backstage […]
ORIGINALLY POSTED ON STRAIGHT.COM, AUG. 11, 2005 By Steve Newton The last time Philadelphia hard-rockers CKY were set to play Vancouver, they were just minutes from warming up for Guns […]
By Steve Newton I’m a huge Stevie Ray fan. Got a ton of his albums, seen him in concert a buncha times, interviewed him twice, got his autograph, shook his […]
By Steve Newton I haven’t interviewed that many drummers over the years–mainly because I like talking to guitarists more–but when Van Hagar was heading to Vancouver for a show in […]
By Steve Newton As a hardcore fan of electric guitar music, I’ve managed to interview some of the top practitioners of the trade, Eric Johnson being one of them. When […]
By Steve Newton If you were reading the top guitar magazines back in the early ’80s you may have heard the buzz about this phenomenal British player named Allan Holdsworth. […]
By Steve Newton Some concerts experiences are just seared into memory–if you’re lucky–and one of the most unforgettable for me was seeing Kiss at Vancouver’s Commodore Ballroom in January of […]
By Steve Newton I did my first interview with Steve Vai when he was touring with Whitesnake in May of 1990, but I was more interested in talking about his […]
By Steve Newton I was crazy about Kiss when their first album dropped back in the Year of Our Lord, 1974. I was 16 at the time, which is all […]
By Steve Newton I freakin’ love guitar solos, where some talented artist carefully chooses the perfect notes and uses vibrato and tremolo and all that other technical shit to come […]
By Steve Newton I did my first interview with David Lee Roth in June of 1994, when he was promoting his Nile Rodgers-produced album Your Filthy Little Mouth. He called me from […]
By Steve Newton Since I got “temporarily” laid off from work yesterday–after 35 years with the Georgia Straight newspaper in Vancouver–I’ve been wondering which of my hundreds of old interviews […]
By Steve Newton When I interviewed Stevie Ray Vaughan in July of 1990, six weeks before his death, I asked him what he’d been listening to in his spare time–if […]
By Steve Newton The first time I interviewed blues legend John Mayall was in December of 1988, shortly after he’d released his Chicago Line album, which featured smokin’ guitarists Walter […]
By Steve Newton I did my first interview with Steve Vai in May of 1990, when he was just 29. He had just released his solo album Passion and Warfare, […]
