With the summer just ahead and bands playing from coastline clubs to football stadiums and everywhere in between, plus a few new releases and benefits along the way this week’s music news is jam-packed with rock and roll goodies. So here goes.

First on tap is Jeff Beck, who is headlines the line-up of a very special Les Paul celebration in New York next week.

Jeff Beck and the Imelda May Band have already been confirmed to play at the Iridium Jazz Club in New York at A Celebration Of Les Paul, sponsored by Gibson Guitar. They are expected to be joined by Ace Frehley, Zakk Wylde, Johnny Winters, John Mcenroe, Meat Loaf, Chris North, Steve Miller, Robbie Robertson, Nils Lofgren, Warren Haynes, Paul Shaffer, Nigel Lythgoe, Stephen Colbert, Gibson Guitar Chairman/CEO Henry Juszkiewicz, John Varvatos and more.

Beck will pay tribute to his mentor and friend, the late guitar great Les Paul, with an intimate show consisting of Les Paul’s memorable classics along with some rockabilly favorites. Celebrating what would have been Les Paul’s 95th birthday, Beck will be joined on stage by Irish rockabilly sensation The Imelda May Band.

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Next, country music’s  Dierks Bentley is prepping for the release of his fifth Capitol Nashville studio album, “On The Ridge” slated to drop on June 8.

The  new disc features Bentley working with acoustic musicians from around and collaborating with the likes of Alison Krauss, Kris Kristofferson, Sam Bush, Vince Gill, Miranda Lambert, Jamey Johnson and bluegrass legend Del McCoury for the album.

Bentley wrote five of the album’s 12 tracks and artfully covered songs by such unlikely sources as Bob Dylan and U2.

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Wild Eye Releasing and MVD Visual is releasing of “GOLD: Before Woodstock. Beyond Reality” on July 27. Considered a ‘lost’ film for over 40 years since it’s recording in 1968, this is its first time ever on any form of home video.

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Platinum rock band, Filter will release their fifth studio album, “The Trouble With Angels” this August on Rocket Science Ventures. Produced by Bob Marlette (Black Sabbath, Atreyu, Saliva) the album’s debut single, ‘”he Inevitable Relapse,“ will be released to Active Rock and Alternative radio June 21st.
For news and tour info go to the band’s Website

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Ever the rock and roll superman, Bret Michaels has yet another venture under his belt, Vh1‘s “Life As I Know It,”  which takes a sometimes too real look at this front man/reality king’s life at home and on the road.  To check it out online go here.

Bret’s new album ‘Custom Built’ hits stores July 6, and boasts the single “Nothing To Lose” which Micheals recorded with pop princess Miley Cyrus.  Then there’s his solo BMB tour.  And the tour this summer with Skynyrd.  Oh heck, the list of current events with Mr. Michaels is so extensive, we’d need to write a News Book on his happenings. Just go to www.bretmichaels.com to see for yourself!

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Speaking of a long hot summer,  Journey is set to hit the studio this week with Producer Kevin Shirley (Aerosmith/Led Zeppelin/Iron Maiden). The band is in the early stages of creating a follow-up to “Revelation,” the band s 2008 album which introduced their latest lead singer, Arnel Pineda.

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Grammy Award winning roots-rock band Los Lobos has decided to cancel their scheduled performance at The Talking Stick Resort on June 10th, 2010. The band has made this decision based on the current call to boycott Arizona in response to SB 1070.

Through their management, Los Lobos issued the following statement: “We support the boycott of Arizona. The new law will inevitably lead to unfair racial profiling and possible abuse of people who just happen to look Latino. As a result, in good conscience, we could not see ourselves performing in Arizona. “
www.loslobos.org

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Wynonna Judd’s latest CD “Love Heals” hit #7 on  Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart. This CD,  a collection of Wynonna’s top singles and three other tracks is the latest release in Cracker Barrel’s exclusive music program.

A portion of the proceeds from the sale of each CD is being donated to Wounded Warrior Project, an organization that assists wounded service men and women and their families.
www.wynonna.com

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The Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival is carrying on  strides in its longstanding sustainability tradition. New initiatives are in place for the 2010 event, set to take place June 10-13 in Manchester, Tennessee. This year, organizers hope to extend the influence beyond the festival weekend, sending fans home with fresh inspiration for year-round sustainable lifestyles.

Non-profit organizations, eco-friendly vendors and performers will gather there to educate patrons about what they can do to enhance their own health as well as the planet’s. Fans who stop by Planet Roo will have the chance to learn about alternative fuels and energy sources, eat organic food at a waste-free restaurant

For a complete list of Bonnaroo greening initiatives, click here

News Compiled By Carol Anne Szel

By  Peter Lindblad

Nils Lofgren recorded The Loner using the Martin D-18 acoustic guitar Neil Young gave him after sessions for Young’s album After The Gold Rush were finished. Photo: Mark Hendrickson.

Nils Lofgren with Grin. Photo courtesy of www.nilslofgren.com

Nils Lofgren is well-known as a guitarist and piano sidekick for luminaries such as Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, and Ringo Starr as well as an artist with a far from disgraceful solo career. However, even before his 1975 debut solo album, Lofgren already had a considerable catalog under his belt with Grin, a band with whom — most fans will attest — Lofgren recorded the greatest music of his career.

Lofgren, born in 1951 to an Italian mother and Swedish father, had started out playing a thoroughly un–rock ’n’ roll instrument in the shape of the accordion before taking up the guitar at 15 after having been turned on to rock by The Beatles. It was only when Lofgren saw Jimi Hendrix live at the age of 17, though, that he decided to try to be a professional musician. Perhaps inevitably then, the band he put together in his hometown of Washington, D.C., was a three-piece, comprising Lofgren on guitar and the barnstorming rhythm section of bassist Bob Gordon and drummer Bob Berberich. Despite that barnstorming quality, the name chosen for the group was a giddy one.

“God knows all the names we went through, but the word Grin came up,” Lofgren recalled. “It was the late ’60s. We were all happy, positive, crazy, and we thought it had a good representation of a sentiment the band shared.” It was also a good representation of the perennially sunny nature of the songs Lofgren wrote for his band.

Grin’s major break came as a result of Lofgren barging in on a famous name playing in town: “[Grin] became a big local band. We were about to head to Los Angeles to look for a record deal, and just before we left, I snuck backstage and saw Neil Young and Crazy Horse in a D.C. club. Neil was kind enough to give me some time. I spent a couple of days with them. He said look me up when I got to California, which I did, and his producer, David Briggs, took us under his wing, so I got to really stay in the circle of musicians.”

At 18, Lofgren was playing piano and acoustic guitar on Young’s “After The Goldrush.” More important than that was the interest of Briggs, who recorded an album with Grin and then set about selling it to a record company. In 1971, it appeared eponymously on a new Columbia label called Spindizzy.

“Columbia had a lot of rules about their studios, their engineers, their producers, and to bypass the rules we set up a subsidiary with Clive Davis which would allow David to produce and engineer,” Lofgren explained.

That fine debut revealed a band with a unique sound: Though Grin had a punchy rhythm section, the ambience — as it always would be on Grin records — was predominately acoustic. This approach, Lofgren revealed, was due to Young: “He gave me a beautiful Martin acoustic guitar as a gift. It was really the first time I had a nice acoustic and played a lot of it, and since a lot of my melodies are melodic and maybe even a little country, it was just a good time to take advantage of that. Of course David had a lot of experience recording acoustic instruments with Neil, so it worked out.”

The album reveals other attributes that would become Grin trademarks: lovely melodies and an almost blush-inducing sweetness of spirit to Lofgren’s lyrics. However, these guys were no wimps — on the occasions where Lofgren brought out the electric guitar, it was to peel off absolutely blistering runs and solos. Adding to the band’s unusual air was a drummer (Berberich) who handled as many singing duties as Lofgren, on record and on stage. Often the two would sing within the same song, creating intriguing vocal textures, Berberich’s grizzled tones contrasting with Lofgren’s gentle voice.

“I didn’t have an affinity towards other styles like Bob did,” Lofgren said. “It was very loose, very friendly. I’d write the song, then when we rehearsed them, ‘Oh maybe I should sing the bridge and he’ll take the high part here and I’ll go underneath.’ We’d just work it out. It was a co–lead singer band.”

Despite their quality, the debut’s songs were not the end result of years spent honing songcraft. “The first record was basically the first 12 songs I wrote,” Lofgren revealed.

Lofgren time, apparently, is much faster than real time, underlined by the fact that the next Grin album — released only a year after the debut — is an all-time classic. Lofgren acknowledged the quantum leap: “I’m really proud of that [first] record but… by the second record, as a function of working pretty much nonstop, there was a dramatic improvement. We just played all the time. We lived together; we wrote; we rehearsed.”

The second album was recorded in an independent studio called Wally Heider’s in Los Angeles. “As the thing took shape, we realized that the batch of songs that we had were almost half and half — gentler and hard,” recalled Lofgren. “I don’t remember whose idea it was, but we all started batting around, ‘Well why don’t we just use it as a strength?’” The decision was made to have all the soft songs on one side and the up-tempo numbers on the other. This process also gave the new album its title: 1+1. “It was just a function of the Rockin’ Side and the Dreamy Side,” Lofgren said.

The cherry on the album’s icing is Briggs’ fabulous wide-screen production technique. 1+1 is described by the New Musical Express Encyclopedia Of Rockas “one of the lost classics of rock” because criminally, it failed to sell. “White Lies,” which opens the Rockin’ Side, became Grin’s only Top 40 chart entry.

By the time Grin released their third album, they had an additional guitarist. “My brother Tom Lofgren joined the band,” Lofgren said. “We just realized we had the rough, sparse thing covered as a trio, but now our music was getting a little more melodic and open and we really needed a fourth member.”

All Out (1973) is a thoroughly enjoyable record, if a little lightweight compared to its stunning predecessor. It was to be the band’s last record for Spindizzy, the controversial departure of Clive Davis making the band unhappy with the label. They ended up on A&M, but their final album, Gone Crazy (1974), is something of a damp squib, not just sales-wise but — for the first time — artistically. A&M pulled the plug.

“A&M spent a number of months considering whether to let me continue as a solo artist,” recalled Lofgren. “It was very traumatic at the time.”

Lofgren is now 30 years into that solo career — with his latest studio album Break Away Angel and the in-concert Nils Lofgren Band Live available via his Web site http://NilsLofgren.com — but true aficionados of his varied career will always reserve fond memories for his days with Grin, surely one of the most unjustly neglected ensembles ever to make use of recording tape.need me