MK ULTRA

SOURCE: ULTIMATE CLASSIC ROCK

Poison and Cheap Trick kicked off their 2018 summer tour, Nothin’ But a Good Time, last night in Irvine, Calif at the Five Point Amphitheater. We’ve got exclusive photos and each band’s full set list from the evening.

Cheap Trick did not play their new single, “The Summer Looks Good On You,” which they released just hours ahead of the show but knocked out hits like “The Flame, “Surrender,” “I Want You To Want Me” and their standard opener “Hello There” during their hour-long set. Frontman Robin Zander’s son Robin Zander Jr., now a touring member of the band, played rhythm guitar.

 
While Poison hasn’t put out an album since 2007’s covers collection Poison’d, their 75-minute set included songs from throughout their four-decade career, including their first single, “Cry Tough.”

The Michigan-based Pop Evil, who are celebrating the 10th anniversary of their debut album Lipstick on the Mirror, and who released their self-titled fifth album this year, opened the show with a spirited half-hour set.

The Nothin’ But a Good Time tour continues tonight in Las Vegas at the Joint, and keeps the bands on the road through the end of June.

Cheap Trick Setlist, May 18, 2018 — Five Point Amphitheater

1. “Hello There”
2. “Big Eyes”
3. “California Man”
4. “Ain’t That a Shame”
5. “Baby Loves to Rock”
6. “Long Time Coming”
7. “You Got It Going On”
8. “I’m Waiting For the Man” (Velvet Underground cover)
9. “The Flame”
10. “I Want You To Want Me”
11. “Dream Police”
12. “Surrender”
13. “Goodnight Now”

Poison Setlist, May 18, 2018 — Five Point Amphitheater

1. “Look What the Cat Dragged In”
2. “I Want Action”
3. “Ride the Wind”
4. “Cry Tough”
5. “I Won’t Forget You”
6. “Your Mama Don’t Dance” (Loggins & Messina cover)
7. “Fallen Angel”
8. “Something to Believe In”
9. “Unskinny Bop”
10. “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”
11. “Nothin’ But a Good Time’
12. “Talk Dirty To Me”

See full photos here: www.ultimateclassicrock.com/poison-cheap-trick-2018-tour-set-list-photos/

20th Century Fox‘s Deadpool 2 broke one record on Thursday night, and now it’s slashed through another. The box office totals for the film’s Friday night grosses have been revealed by the studio, and Deadpool 2 has now set the record for best opening-day for an R-rated film with $53.3 million. Deadpool 2 just narrowly beat out Warner Bros.’ IT for the slot, eclipsing it’s total of $50.4 million. Check back for the final box office tally!

The original Deadpool opened to $132.4 million in February of 2016 and went on to gross $363 million domestically and $783 million worldwide.

The David Leitch-directed film stars Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin, Morena Baccarin, Julian Dennison, Zazie Beetz, T.J. Miller, Brianna Hildebrand, and Jack Kesy.

The film’s “official synopsis” reads as follows: After surviving a near fatal bovine attack, a disfigured cafeteria chef (Wade Wilson) struggles to fulfill his dream of becoming Mayberry’s hottest bartender while also learning to cope with his lost sense of taste. Searching to regain his spice for life, as well as a flux capacitor, Wade must battle ninjas, the yakuza, and a pack of sexually aggressive canines, as he journeys around the world to discover the importance of family, friendship, and flavor – finding a new taste for adventure and earning the coveted coffee mug title of World’s Best Lover.

all photos by Cassie Balazic for mk ultra magazine and may not be reproduced in any manner without the expressed written consent of the photographer

PRONG returned to the Windy City almost a year to the day of their last swing thru Chicago and blew the roof off of the Bottom Lounge to 17 and older crowd on a school night opening for HELMET on their current tour.

With what may very well be the tightest and heaviest live incarnation of PRONG in the bands 3 decade career band founder Tommy Victor led the trio through a solid hour set of new favorites and old classics the likes of; Forced Into Tolerance, Another Worldly Device, Beg to Differ, Force Fed, Lost and Found, Unconditional, Ultimate Authority, Prove You Wrong, Rude Awakening, Broken Peace, Whose Fist Is This Anyway? and of course show stopper Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck.

With 5 full length releases since 2012’s ‘Carved Into Stone’, something unheard of in the current climate of the industry, Tommy Victor is seemingly at the top of his game touring relentlessly all while pulling double duty while recording and performing with DANZIG.

It’s this writer’s opinion that this is the PRONG that needs to be captured live on film and released on DVD as this powerhouse trio is truly a force to be reckoned with.

Tommy Victor (Vocals, Guitars)

Art Cruz (Drums)

Jason Christopher (Bass, Backing Vocals)

for more show photos  visit and like us at www.facebook.com/mkultramagazine

SOURCE: ROLLING STONE

Sax-heavy track highlights band’s upcoming ‘Bad Witch’ LP

 
Nine Inch Nails previewed their upcoming ninth LP Bad Witch with an eerie new song, “God Break Down the Door.” Trent Reznor croons menacing lines over a dizzying mix of synths, a moaning saxophone solo and drums. “God break down the door/ You won’t find the answers here – not the ones you came looking for,” the singer-producer warns over the electro-jazz onslaught.

 
Reznor spoke about the song’s experimental evolution in an interview with Beats 1 host Zane Lowe. He detailed how the piece originated from his desire to “really get [his] technique back” on the saxophone after being rusty for the past two decades.

 
“Looking around the studio and seeing the untouched baritone tenor and alto sax that are sitting there … they’re there because they remind me that I can’t play them as well as I used to be able to,” he said.

 
“There they sit taunting me in the corner. We pulled them out and we just started fucking around really, led with [Atticus Ross] arranging. I was just kind of going, an hour performance kind of turned into this thing that felt like we hadn’t been there before and that started to reveal a whole different character. The space changed and then we felt motivated. When it came time to sing I was really just trying things out, just to see. I never had the courage to sing like that, I didn’t know I could sing.”

Later in the interview, the frontman explained how Bad Witch – the final installment of a trilogy, following 2016’s Not the Actual Events and 2017’s Add Violence – grew from an EP into a full-length record, out June 22nd.

 
Reznor also detailed his band’s lengthy history with the Jesus and Mary Chain. The alt-rock band will open Nine Inch Nails’ upcoming “Cold and Black and Infinite” North American tour, which launches September 13th in Phoenix, Arizona.

 
“I’ve got some history with them,” he said. “The first real tour we ever played as Nine Inch Nails we opened for them. The good place in my heart of the good old days when life was simpler. They were cool. I love Jesus and Mary Chain, always had. The years before that, when Psycho Candy was out, they played the Fantasy Theater in Cleveland. We were rehearsing in the Fantasy, the upstairs is a nightclub. My manager at the time, his girlfriend ran the club and that’s where we would rehearse and we would hang out. The night of the Jesus and Mary Chain show, This is where they were only guaranteed to play eight minutes. You remember way back. They were frantic, they were about to go on we were upstairs just finishing rehearsal in a closed nightclub. And Michelle the owner, says ‘quick, quick, quick emergency – you guys have a drumstick? They only brought two, and they’ve lost one, and they’re not going on if they can’t find one.’ We did have a drumstick. So we saved the show.”

Grammy Award-winning rock band GHOST today treated fans to an early listen of track “Dance Macabre” off its forthcoming fourth sacred psalm, “Prequelle”. The song is available to stream in its entirety for a limited time exclusively via @thebandghost Instagram Stories. Watch Sister Imperator, Chris Jericho, Kirk Hammett, Charlie Benante, Mike Mckenna, Aleister Black, Jessica Pimentel, Chino Moreno, Josh Barnett, Bethany Cosentino, Phil Anselmo, Young Sister Imperator and Matt Shadows react to the song in the story here. The song will be available to hear tomorrow, May 18, on all platforms and as a complementary download for fans who pre-ordered the album.

“Prequelle” will be released on June 1 via Loma Vista Recordings. The record was tracked last year at Artery studios in Stockholm with producer Tom Dalgety (OPETH, ROYAL BLOOD) and mixed in January at Westlake Studios in West Hollywood, California with Andy Wallace (NIRVANA, SLAYER).

GHOST played the first official show of the “Rats! On The Road” U.S. tour on May 5 at Riverside Municipal Auditorium in Riverside, California. In addition to the previously released new single “Rats”, which opened the concert, GHOST played four more songs from the upcoming album, including “Faith”, “Dance Macabre”, “Miasma” and “Pro Memoria”. “Miasma” featured a saxophone solo from Papa Nihil, the aged “original” Papa Emeritus.

The band broke its show up into two sets, with the first featuring 12 songs and the second consisting of 11 numbers. The group spread out the new material across both sets, interspersed with fan favorites and hits like “Cirice”, “From The Pinnacle To The Pit”, “He Is”, “If You Have Ghosts” and show closer “Square Hammer”.

The band has expanded its onstage lineup to include at least eight musicians, not including the guest appearance from Papa Nihil.

Photo credit: Mikael Eriksson