ROCK ’N’ ROLL NEWS

ROCKY ’N’ ROLL NEWS

According to a member of their entourage, Rolling Stone Keith Richard may soon be a man without a country. He can’t get back into England because of tax problems, and his recent inabsentia French drug bust is making it hard for him to go anywhere else. French authorities, looking to make an example of | the exiled rocker, have alerted their counterparts in all corners of the globe, virtually sealing Keith into his Jamaican retreat. The only other country which will tolerate his presence is Switzerland. In the meantime, the rest of the Stones are reportedly talking about replacing Keith with Ron Wood of the Faces for upcoming tour dates.

Hottest news this month is the grapevine report that Deep Purple will soon be undergoing some major alterations. According to our sources, guitarist Richie Blackmore will be amicably departing the group to form his own power trio. What the band?® will do to replace him is uncertain, but stay tuned.

Sun Ra has a clause in his impulse contract which specifies that if life is found to exist on other planets, he retains all rights to his songs there.

While on his last tour, David Bowie was overheard telling ' patrons at Max’s Kansas City that he would not be producing JUra Reed in the future because Reed was .borrowing too much of his identity. He% sigh t; been copping Bowie’s riffs from j| the time Bowie formed the Velvet • Underground back in the mid11 Sixties. (Seen AU About Eve recently, David?)

Wonder whiz Todd Rundgren, never one to rest on his laurels, has taken on perhaps the biggest challenge of his career: he’s set out, to produce the ex-biggest group in the world, Grand Funk Railroad. “This will either put them back on top,” Todd repotted in mock-seriousness, “or will destroy my career permanently,” *'

Chickens Coming Nome to Roost Dept,: At-the Chicago stop on their-monumental tour, two members of Alice Cooper got a dangerous dose of their own medicine. Guitarist Glen Buxton was hit in the head with a full bottle of Michelob, and drummer Neal Smith caught a dart in the back. Neither injury was serious. “It was all in good fun,” said Buxton, “ but Jit just got out of hand.” When asked if he expected incidents of this sort to happen again, Buxton replied with an emphatic “yes.”

Hank Williams, the legendary country singer who died 20 years ago, still earns at least SI00,000 a year in song royalties..

The Spencer Davis Group has |§ re-formed and been signed by PhonograaU The band - minus, of course, the Winwood brothers -,1s essentially the same one that had all them hits way back when.

The Rolling Stones and The Who are reportedly talking over the possibility of several joint shows in Britain this summer.

Rod Stewart (talking to a reporter from Melody Maker) on Ooh La La and the Faces’ recent fortunes: “It was a disgrace, a bloody mess. We^te^g playin’ the same bleedin’ numbers ’cos we got nothing else to do. There’s a couple of new numbers on the album .,. thing is, we can’t play ’em.’’

Jethro Tull head honcho Ian Anderson was ordered to bed by his doctor recently, causing ^ cancellation of a few British gigs. The malady, which kept him bedridden for two weeks, was described as “nervous exhaustion.”

Yes, that’s Jeff Beck playing guitar on Stevie Wonder’s “Superstition.”

Rumor has Rolling Stone Mick Taylor joining Nicky Hopkins' band for the latter’s U.S. tour.

Don Agrati, who recently released his first album on Elektra, is the same human who, using the stage name Don Grady, was a regular for several years on TV’s “My Three Sons.”

Contrary to what you might have heard, Mott the Hoople’s next album is not being produced by Roy Wood. They tried it out for a couple of sessions, then dropped the idea by mutual agreement. The band will now produce it themselves, with Ian Hunter | reporting that the next album “will be everything the last one should have been.”

According ,o spouse Pat, Dick Nixon likes his boogie loud. He likes to turn up the volume so that “it blasts through the (White) house. He thinks that’s the only way to listen; when it’s real loud and you can hear everything.” An unnamed source reports that the President’s current fave selection is “Search and Destroy” by the Stooges, though rumors that Ron Ashton will replace White House aide John Ehrlich man are not true. Look for MGM prexy Mike Curb to accept that post.

Ry Cooder is talking about the possibility of bringing blues giant Sleepy John Estes along on his next tour.

Check out the nekkid dingdong centerspread of Dr. Hook in the current issue of Zipper magazine, the poor man’s After Dark. We wondered how they obtained those boners, till a flack from a prominent West Coast PR mill clued us in: she popped ’em a tit. No limp wrists in that band . . .

Also rumored to be on the rocks is Ten Years After, with Alvin Lee supposedly making his exit to put together some kind of band with Mylon. According to Chrysalis head Derek Sutton, such notions are totally unfounded. “Alvin has been sitting in with Mylon and King Crimson,” he reported, “but this will in no way affect his I * status with TYA, He’s testing himself as a musician, trying out some different directions in the hope that he will bring some new and fresh ideas to TYA.” One . insider speculates that the rumors were perpetrated by some of the people Alvin has been informally playing with, all ot whom would j obviously stand to benefit by an assoc la non with his nam e,

Steeleye Span were.recently forced off a couple of big Procol Harum gigs, reportedly because they had been upstaging the stars.

TMpk Wakaman, the keyboardv-1 ventriloquist of Yes, will debut a hew 'jnopgwhfetvThC. band next reaches these shores. Built to his own specifiea lions, the instrument cost 520,000. It features a, special memory7bank which can store tunes oh program cardsjf^ enabling the,band to carry on without Wakeman, should he i oversleep or have to run to the little, boy’s room in the middle of *a performance.

Clarence White, late of the Byrds, has re-formed his pre-Byrd bluegrass group, the Kentucky .v Colonels. With him are brothers Roland and Eric, as well a§ exDillard Herb Pederson. They 11 record for Warners.'

The Sidewinders, Boston-based rockers who released a debut album op RCA last year, are back an^ better than ever. At a recent Max’s Kansas City gig they had reps from every major label dancing and screaming in the, § aisles, with the eheerleading section being ledby Mick J agger. j Several labels are currently §| fighting it out to sign themiJi

The T.A.M.I. Show, legendary 1965 rock flick which enjoyed a t re men d ous re su rgcnee following a featured appearance in these pages some months ago. will he aired on TV soon. It will be part of the PBS Network's “Verite’*I| film series, and there’s„a chance that the Beach Boys-segment, deleted from recent prints, will be shown as well.

Ex-Beach Boy Bruce Johnston.is not going with Elton John’s Rocket label, as has been widely / - reported. He's forming his own ■label with producer Terry Meldber, a label which will initially not seek a major distribution pact. Acts for the label -include California (Johnston, Meleher and Dean Torrance),' Doris Day (Terry’s mom) and, according to Johnston, the Beach Boys will be approached with the ideaWhen their Warners contract expires next year.

Thei'e’s a fetid brewing between. Move mates Roy Wood and Jeff Lynne. We’re not sure what the source of the discomfort is, but at least part of it stems from the fact that Lynne’s Electric Light Orchestra - currently riding high with “Roll Over Beethoven” - is i enjoying much greater* commercial fortune than Wood's Wizard. The latest (and lowest?) blow is the B-side of Wizard's^, current British single, titled f “Bend Ovef Beethoven.!’*

Though Tony De Fries was' grooming Iggy, for the role, Berry |o^|y1tas beaten him to thjfs punch. Diana Ross* follow-up* to x Lady Sings the Blueswifi b? a portrayal of Peter Pan. ' *•%,

Mary Travers has been signed by the S'L Lodis Municipal OperaAssn, to star in Rogers and 1 Hammerstein’s “South Pacific,” recreating the role made famous on Broadway by Mary Martin. Iggy loses out again.

Well, the cat's finally out of the bag, and a pretty mangy critter it is, too. Remember the secret ', “superstar” band called Faith that Terry Knight has been trumpeting down everybody’s throats these last few months? The “superstars” are reported to be a group formerly known as Limousine, who released an album on the ,GSF label some months back. Our source goes on to state that .the ■ * Faith album is actually that-very same Limousine album, re-mixed vg bit and with some song title , I changes. The reason the Limousine album never made-it the first time around is obvious to anyone, unfortunate enough to -have been duped into buying it as -.Faith. And Terry maintains that they’ll headline Madison Square Garden on Christmas. It’s nice to 5 kpow that somebody in this3 business still has a sense of 1 humor.

Elvis Presley and the. Las Vegas Hilton are being sued by four men who charge that they were beaten and jailed when they attempted • to shake hands with The Man during a performance on Feb. 19. Elvis was scheduled to make an appearance in San Francisco awhile back, but had to cancel out at the last minute, when he discovered a contract clause which stipulated that he couldn’t . make a public appearance within a 300 mile radius of Lake Tahoe for one week prior to his opening there. But Elvis wasn’t to sing in Frisco, he was only gonna break a few bricks. Seems he Was to have been the guest star at the State Karate Championship. (Earth News)

Marc Bolan has been jamming with, the Electric Light Orchestra of late and may put in an appearance on their next album.

Having recorded his second album in the piano lounge of a Boeing 747, crazed Martin Mull will soon eihbark oh a tour of drivedn > theatres. ® ;*

Randy Weidner, singing regular on Bob Braun’s “50-50 Club” TV show out of Cincinnati, sustained a broken jaw on the show when he tripped on his bell bottoms' and fell. Also reported.damaged in the fall were his paste-on sidehums'. .

Rod Stewart, by the way, had no desire to, sing “Pinball Wizard” in that London production until he .was persuaded to do so by Ate producers. The "persuasion" was an antique Rolls Royce.

Captain Beefheart on the drag outfits worn by his band for the cover of Trout Mask Replica in *1969: “I wasn’t doing that to put down women. I always knew that no matter how hard I tried, I’d never have, tits. Td oever try to putrace a woman at her natural speed.” jjv?