Playing a series of intimate venues, this initial tour is set to launch on May 14th at the El Corazon in Seattle, Washington. The shows will conclude at TLA in Philadelphia, PA on May 29th, with tickets prices throughout averaging $50 per show.

Chickenfoot’s North American dates:

May 14 - El Corazon - Seattle, WA
May 15 - Commodore Ballroom - Vancouver, BC
May 17 - The Fillmore - San Francisco, CA
May 19 - The Roxy Theatre - West Hollywood, CA
May 22 - Park West - Chicago, IL
May 24 - The Mod Club Theatre - Toronto, ON
May 26 - Middle East Upstairs - Cambridge, MA
May 28 - The Fillmore NY Irving Plaza - New York, NY
May 29 - TLA - Philadelphia, PA

“We spent a lot of time together in the recording studio working long hours to make Chickenfoot live up to expectations,” said Satriani. “We really feel like we’ve mastered it and recorded a great album but now we’re especially excited to take the show on the road and see how the fans react to it live. I think we are really going to feed off of the fan’s energy. We’re really that type of band.”

“Chickenfoot” will be packaged in heat-sensitive artwork, which means when you put your hand on the CD inlay, photos of the band members will be revealed behind the Chickenfoot band logo.

“Chickenfoot” track listing:

1. Avenida Revolution
2. Soap on a Rope
3. Sexy Little Thing
4. Oh Yeah
5. Runnin’ Out
6. Get It Up
7. Down the Drain
8. My Kinda Girl
9. Learning to Fall
10. Turnin’ Left
11. Future in the Past

A great band is nothing without a great rhythm section, and Chickenfoot has one of the best in the two-man team of bassist Michael Anthony and drummer Chad Smith.

As a founding member (and fellow Rock and Roll Hall of Famer) of Van Halen, Anthony laid the bedrock for which guitar genius Eddie Van Halen could fly. More than that, he provided a signature style of background vocal that became an intrinsic part of that band. “A total fluke,” the good-natured bassist humbly asserts. “I was just doing what came naturally.”

Hagar sees Anthony’s abilities differently. “Michael keeps the band going,” he says. “Listen, he’s never going to get the kind of credit he deserves — he played next to Eddie Van Halen. Hell, Jack Bruce didn’t get much credit compared to Eric Clapton — that’s just the nature of things. Mikey held down the fort, and he still does.”

Aiding Anthony in holding down the fort is Chad Smith, drummer for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, who have, since Smith joined the group in the late Eighties, gone from cult faves to a worldwide force. Heretofore thought of as a “funk/alternative” drummer, Smith gets to rock hard with Chickenfoot, and the percussion explosion he creates might come as a surprise to those who only know of his work from tracks like “Under The Bridge.”

The members of Chickenfoot admit that the band came together almost by accident, a result of jams held at Hagar’s club, Cabo Wabo Cantina, in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

“We were just having fun,” recalls Michael Anthony. “After Sammy and I left Van Halen, we’d get together with musicians, and certain people seemed to really gel. Chad came down and we got on well with him. Gradually, we started talking about doing something more serious, but we needed a guitarist. Somebody smokin’ — somebody who could take us to the Promised Land.”

Enter Satch, who hooked up with Hagar, Anthony and Smith and felt “an immediate connection unlike anything I’d ever experienced before.” To Satriani, who had almost abandoned his lifelong dream of being a part of a “big-time rock band,” here was his chance, and here were his bandmates. “After just a few songs, it became stunningly obvious that we shared an overall musical agenda,” he says. “The only question was could we make a great album?”

The band answered that question last fall when they hunkered down with the illustrious producer Andy Johns at George Lucas’ Skywalker Studios and knocked out a batch of songs that sets a new standard for rock music in the new millennium.

From the thunderous, ominous opening strains of “Avenida Revolution” (detailing the bloody drug wars in Tijuana, in which Hagar makes his feelings come through his skin) to the album closer, the shimmering rock ballad “Future’s in the Past”, “Chickenfoot” is a firebomb of a record, the likes of which we haven’t heard in ages.

The band kicks and snorts their way through a passel of take-no-prisoners rockers like “Soap on a Rope,” “Sexy Little Thing,” “Oh Yeah” and “My Kind of Girl.”

“These are the kinds of songs I could never do on my own,” says Satriani. “I needed a band like this to make those songs come alive.”

The band explores mature themes on songs such as “Runnin’ Out,” about a world stretched to the breaking point to “Learning to Fall,” perhaps the most poignant love song Hagar has ever written lyrics for. As both a vocalist and songwriter, Hagar’s intensity and forcefulness are on vivid display on “Chickenfoot.”

“I write what comes to mind,” the singer says. “I’m not bound by anything subject-wise. I’m inspired by the music. When I heard the music Joe was going for, it made me reach, it made me stretch. I think it made me sing in a way that I normally wouldn’t have done. We seem to have that kind of effect on each other.”

Satriani agrees. “People have this idea of what this band is about, or what Sammy Hagar is about as a lyricist and a vocalist,” he says. “The thing is that we manage to get each guy to up his game in a non-confrontational way. When I play with Chickenfoot, I find myself wanting to give them more all the time. I don’t hold anything back. I think the rest of the guys feel the same way.”

That Satriani unleashes sheets of shred magna is, of course, a given, but what’s interesting is, as individualistic and recognizable as his talents are — and this is true of all the players — they transform in a strange and beautiful way on “Chickenfoot.”

Likewise, Anthony and Smith, channel past heroes. For Anthony it’s Electric Flag bassist Harvey Brooks. For Smith it’s Zeppelin’s John Bonham. Together, they perform something of an astonishing balancing act, dispending performances that meet at the intersection of Heavy and Nimble. This is what a rhythm section does, drives the band in forceful, creative ways. Listen to Chickenfoot and you’ll hear what a true rhythm section sounds like.

“Chickenfoot,” which is already being hailed as the most intense rock ‘n’ roll album since Led Zeppelin’s classic efforts, coincides with a European tour that will consist of outdoor festivals, including Montreaux, Switzerland, and Bospop, Holland, plus various intimate indoor rock shows, including the London O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire on June 25th.

Joe Satriani looks relieved as he shakes my hand. “Finally - a day I don’t have to talk about Coldplay,” he says. I get the drift and make a mental note not to ask any lawsuit questions.

I’m in Mill Valley, California, at Sammy Hagar’s office/studio/car lot to sit with three-fourths of Chickenfoot (which includes, in addition to Satriani and Hagar, bassist Michael Anthony and Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith) and talk about their eponymous debut album.

Tequila, Ferraris…this is Chickenfoot-land

Hagar has already primed me well, pouring me a tall glass of his premium Cabo Wabo Tequila (the stuff is smooth) before taking me on a 140 mph spin in his custom-made Ferrari (he owns 15 of them). Hagar cackles like a kid in an amusement park as we race through suburban streets. I laugh, too - out of terror.

Once I regain my senses, I sit down with the band (minus Smith, who is attending the birth of his son, Beckett Cash Smith) for one heck of a festive discussion.

Hagar and Anthony are happy to have found new life after Van Halen, and Satriani has realized his lifelong dream of being in a “big time, vocal-oriented rock band.” Formed last year after a series of jams at Hagar’s Cabo Wabo Cantina, Chickenfoot have already made waves for their kooky name and Hagar’s quotes in which he said the band could “rival Led Zeppelin.”

Whether Jimmy Page quakes in his bespoke boots after hearing Chickenfoot (the album’s due 7 June in the US through Best Buy; and 5 June and 8 June in Germany and the UK, respectively, on earMUSIC), remains to be seen.

But one thing’s for sure: Chickenfoot are a band down to the, uh, bone. Their 11-song CD, full of slamming cuts like Sexy Little Thing and My Kind Of Girl, along with arena anthems like Learning To Fall, bears no traces of the ‘project-itis’ that has marred other supergroup efforts.

“To call us a real band is the highest compliment you can give us,” Satriani says.

In the excusive MusicRadar podcast (click here to listen), Satriani, Hagar and Anthony recall their formation and recording sessions. Settle back, pour yourself something and revel in all that is Chickenfoot.

via Chickenfoot: world-exclusive podcast interview | musicradar.com.

Chickenfoot’s self-titled debut CD will be released in either APRIL or MAY. The first single might be either “Oh, Yeah!” or “Bitten By The Wolf.” The tour will kick off in MAY, warming up in smaller venues (possibly clubs) in the USA followed by a few weeks in Europe during the summer.

via Van Halen News Desk.

Sammy Hagar, Joe Satriani, Michael Anthony and Chad Smith team up for supergroup and give Classic Rock the exclusive lowdown.

The name Chickenfoot doesn’t exactly conjure up visions of a union between some of rocks mightiest musical behemoths; in fact it sounds more like a nasty side effect of bird flu.

“It was just supposed to be a bullshit name that we’d used for a while,” former Van Halen bassist Michael Anthony told Classic Rock. “And then the rumours spread about the band, everybody used that name so we thought, ‘fuck it, let’s call it Chickenfoot - it all comes down to the music anyway.”

Featuring Sammy Hagar (vocals), Joe Satriani (guitar), Chad Smith (drums) and Anthony; this million-dollar quartet are reluctant to call themselves a supergroup as a modest Smith explained: “We’re not a supergroup, we like hanging out together and the music is a bonus. We just happen to be in other groups.”

Classic Rock caught up with the band at Hagar’s recording studio in San Francisco where the ever ebullient Red Rocker explained the origins of the band.

“It started off with me, Michael and Chad jamming at my club-Cabo Wabo-in Mexico. Then people started asking us when we were going to tour, make a record etc. So I said if we’re going to do this properly then we’re going have to get a guitarist, let’s talk to Joe Satriani. As far as I’m concerned he’s the best guitarist in the world.”

The band made their official debut a year ago in Las Vegas at

via Classic Rock » Blog Archive » Exclusive Chickenfoot Interview!.

According to Rolling Stone-

“The style is high-energy, kick-ass rock n’ roll,” says Satriani. “We all bring to the table some unusual influences and then we also share a lot of roots. We’ll draw from funk, blues and experimental. We know what we want to get out of it. We want passages in songs that develop and we want everyone’s personality to be able to come out.”

Here’s a video from the chickenfoot site-

visit chickenfoot.us for more info

Photo: Uffberg/WireImage

Van Halen are rumored to be the next band to get its own Guitar Hero game, Joystiq.com is reporting. The group would be the third with a specifically branded Guitar Hero title, following Aerosmith and Metallica, whose version is set for release on March 29th (check out our Guitar Hero: Metallica sneak preview.) According to Joystiq, GH: VH will feature many of the band’s greatest hits (”Jump,” “Panama,” “Hot for Teacher”), plus recordings by Weezer, Tenacious D and Judas Priest.

While Activision wouldn’t comment on the game, the potential of a Van Halen Guitar Hero is already generating hundreds of questions. Will new bassist Wolfgang Van Halen appear in the game instead of Michael Anthony? Will the game feature playable versions David Lee Roth, Sammy Hagar and Gary Cherone, and if it’s just Roth does that mean his polygonal doppelganger will sing Hagar’s “Right Now?” Also, will Diamond Dave’s virtual dressing room ensure that he has enough room to practice his digital martial arts? We must know.

Of course, it comes as little surprise that rumors of a Van Halen Guitar Hero leaked out just days after their competitor Rock Band revealed more details about their own game dedicated to another pretty popular quartet. As Rock Daily reported last week, The Beatles: Rock Band will hit stores September 9th and feature career-spanning tracks from the Fab Four’s Please, Please Me through Abbey Road. Clearly the Guitar Hero makers had to plot a course of action to compete with Rock Band’s mega-release for the holiday sales, and they’re hoping the allure of blasting through “Eruption” and “Hot for Teacher” will ensure two video games are under the tree come Christmas.

via Rolling Stone

Trend alert! Aging hippies are now pairing up classic rock with their favorite vintage. On March 17th at Becco restaurant, Joe Bastianich is hosting an “unprecedented evening of wining, dining, and grooving with the music of Led Zeppelin.” He’ll be joined by author Mike Edison (also former publisher of High Times!) and David Lynch (not that one). For $175 you’ll be served up a 6-course dinner (one for each Zepp album), tunes, and a whole lotta wine. What pairing possibilities could occur as we wine on down the road? Last year Sammy Hagar poured his tequila at La Esquina. How about a Creedence Bottled Water Revival night, or a Steely Dan Kid Champagne tasting?

via Gothamist: New York City News, Food, Arts & Events.