Friday, August 12, 2011

Van Halen Cancel Australian Tour




Van Halen's Australian mini-tour – originally booked for September – has been canceled. It was supposed to be the band's first performances since their reunion tour with David Lee Roth ended in the summer of 2008. Van Halen was scheduled to headline the traveling five-date Soundwave Revolution Festival, but yesterday promoters announced that they were pulling the plug on the festival, which also had Alice Cooper, Hole, Bad Religion, Alter Bridge and Panic! At The Disco on the bill.

"Many of the festival bands will still be coming to Australia in that time period," says a note on the festival's website. "We will be announcing these events in the next seven days."

According to reports, the festival was canceled because of poor ticket sales – and organizers' inability to secure a second headliner. Australia's Triple M reports that festival organizers had unsuccessfully tried to book Aerosmith, who launch their own world tour in late October. Although some of the festival bands are still headed to Australia for make-up dates, Van Halen reportedly has no such plans.

Getting solid information from the Van Halen camp is like getting info out of the Kremlin, but the band is rumored to be close to finishing their first studio album with David Lee Roth since 1984. The band hasn't released a new album since their ill-fated 1998 disc Van Halen III with former Extreme frontman Gary Cherone. They reunited with Sammy Hagar for a tour in 2004, and three years later they brought David Lee Roth back to the fold – though by that point founding bassist Michael Anthony had been replaced by Eddie's son Wolfgang Van Halen.

The band has no dates on the books at the moment, hopefully they still plan on hitting the road this fall –preferably behind a new album. The fans have waited long enough.

-Andy Greene
Article originally appeared in Rolling Stone

No comments:

Post a Comment