Queen Musical Aims to Rock You on National Tour
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SATURDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2013 Musicians Korey Cooper, left, and John Cooper of the Christian rock band Skillet play music inside of their home. (Right) Members of the Christian rock band Skillet, from right, John Cooper, Jen Ledger, Korey Cooper and Seth Morrison signing autographs for fans, they affectionately call panheads, before a show in the Tinley Park section of Chicago. Skillet is starting to win mainstream music fans killet has long been much more than a area in the 1970s. Drummer Jen Ledger, an pressure of how do you follow up something open to interpretation - the intention of John pan to Christian music fans, but a new set England native, also lives in Kenosha and nobody can really put a handle on why it was Cooper, who writes most of the lyrics. In Sof mainstream music lovers are starting attends the same church. successful.” It could be of the energy they’ve “American Noise,” for instance: “Times will be to get to know the rock band that has been John Cooper helped start the band in put into relentlessly touring, concentrating on bad, times will be good, Things I wish I hadn’t around since the mid-1990s. Skillet released its Memphis 1996, but they’ve had lineup both mainstream and Christian crowds. They done and somehow wish I could, Cutting eighth album, “Rise,” this June - coming off its changes over the years. Currently, it’s the are in South America starting Thursday and through the American noise, You’ve got a best-selling album, “Awake,” which went plat- Coopers, Ledger and lead guitarist Seth will join Nickelback in Europe Oct 26. voice and a song to sing.” “We write them inum after three years. But singer John Cooper Morrison, who lives in Memphis. He joined in “Rise” made its debut at No. 4 on the through our world view, through my faith in hardly feels famous. “I like to tell people that 2011, and “Rise” was his first album with the Billboard 200 chart and No. 1 on the Top Rock Jesus, but I write it in a way that can interpret- Skillet is biggest selling band that you’ve nev- band. They’ve continually won over Christian Albums and Alternative Albums charts. And ed into lots of different things,” he said. “And I er heard of,” said Cooper at his home in rock fans, even being nominated in 2005 and this comes after the group’s last album in think Skillet’s music brings people together. I Kenosha, Wis. 2007 for Grammy Awards in the best rock 2009, “Awake,” reached No. 2. Despite their don’t think it alienates people of certain “People think I’m famous all the time, but gospel album category. The song that helped success, they’ve not had that one giant beliefs.” Even in the Christian crowd, they can’t they don’t know who Skillet is,” he said. “They cross them over to the rock charts was crossover hit, said Anthony Delia, senior vice seem to win everyone over. “There is a certain always think I’m somebody else. They always “Whispers in the Dark,” from the 2006 album president of marketing for their label, Atlantic. sect of Christian people who believe that think I’m Johnny Knoxville or Ryan Seacrest or “Comatose.” They’ve since had several songs “We’ve not been critical darlings,” he said. “It’s Christian music should be extremely overt,” somebody like that.” Off stage, Cooper and his on Billboard’s rock chart. hard a lot of times when you don’t have that Cooper said. Cooper said he once had a pro- wife, Korey, who also plays guitar and key- When the Coopers sat down to write “Rise,” early in your career. It becomes very hard to moter tell him they would be far more popular boards, live far from the spotlight in Kenosha, they reflected on the success of “Awake” - but come by as you continue to develop because I if they stopped talking about Jesus. He dis- a southern Wisconsin city of about 100,000 didn’t find many answers. “No one really think some publications write you off because agrees. “I think (fans) just appreciate that we people where Korey grew up. She has family knows why our last album went platinum,” they had written you off.” stand for something,” he said, “that we are real nearby and her father started a church in the Korey Cooper said. “... So there’s even added Their songs are not overtly religious and are about it and not embarrassed about it.” — AP Queen musical aims to rock you on national tour musical built around songs by the rock band instruments are banned, individuality is taboo and every- Queen has found a kind of magic abroad, charm- thing is controlled by an international corporation, a Aing European audiences for years. Now, its pro- small band of rebels wants to break free from the mind- ducers hope another group will finally go gaga for it - less dance music and celebrity gossip - called “gaga” - Americans. Eleven years after “We Will Rock You” that’s imposed from above. debuted in London and spawned tours in Australia, A hero emerges - Galileo Figaro - who teams up with Japan, Spain, Russia, South Africa and Italy, its first North a girl - Scaramouche (both names are lifted from the American tour kicks off this month. “We decided to take lyrics to the rock opera tune “Bohemian Rhapsody”) - and our time,” says producer Jane Rosenthal, whose Tribeca together they seek to resurrect real rock music. Songs Theatrical Productions, which she co-founded with include “Radio Ga Ga,” “Under Pressure” and “A Kind of This image released by Shore Fire Media shows Robert De Niro, will put the show on the road. “We decid- Magic.” “This is a way of taking this spectacular deep and the cast of “We Will Rock You.” — AP ed to let America wait.” rich catalog and being able to tell stories with it,” says Boasting an original futuristic story by British come- Rosenthal. “It defies any demographic.” Critics in England the surviving members of Queen to help them write a dian and writer Ben Elton, the show contains 24 of were less than kind when the show began its run in 2002, musical about Mercury. He immediately thought that Queen’s biggest songs including “Another One Bites the with the Times saying it was “so awful, it’s almost enter- was a terrible idea. Dust,” “Crazy Little Thing Called Love,” “We Are the taining” and the Guardian calling it “ruthlessly manufac- Instead, inspired by the Legend of King Arthur, “The Champions,” “Bohemian Rhapsody” and “We Will Rock tured.” The Daily Mirror went so far as to say that “Ben Matrix” and George Orwell’s “1984,” Elton penned a satir- You.” Elton worked with the surviving members of Elton should be shot for this risible story.” ical story that tweaks corporate show business for suck- Queen and the family of the late singer Freddie Mercury But “We Will Rock You” simply wouldn’t bite the ing away individuality. He has been able to update cer- to write a love story in a dystopian future studded with dust. The show is still on in London’s West End and has tain sections of the script to stay technologically relevant “perhaps the most theatrical rock music of all time.” spawned several tours through 17 countries, playing to over the years, adding jokes about Facebook or Twitter The tour launches in Baltimore on Oct. 15 and hits over 15 million people. A stripped down version opened as they got topical. “Because it’s a satire and a comedy, more than a dozen states and Canada over the next year, in Las Vegas in 2004 but lasted only a year. Elton, who the terms of reference change,” he says. “I’ll probably ending next summer in Los Angeles. It will star Brian helped write the groundbreaking TV comedies “Mr. bang a twerking gag in for a month. It won’t last long. Justin Crum and Ruby Lewis. Set in a future when musical Bean” and “The Young Ones,” was initially approached by The show can contain that.” —AP.