“Enough!” said Billy Idol,”2005 is the time for an original punk rocker to show his stuff.”
After taking himself out of the music business “to regenerate, get free of myself and make an album for the right reasons,” Billy Idol has completed his first album featuring new songs in over 10 years, aptly titled DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND.
The CD, which may or may not be named after a location deep inside the Idol mind, is scheduled for release on March 22, 2005, and is the English rocker’s first for CSP Records/Sanctuary Records.
The first single, “Scream,” is a down and dirty love romp featuring the sinister signature guitar of Steve Stevens and Idol’s rock and roll holla in the familiar vain of “Rebel Yell.” It will go to radio early January, with an impact date set for January 31.
Widely credited as one of the critical artists responsible for the golden age of Music Television and an early disciple of the art of controversy on the small screen, Idol will attempt to reinvent the video art form by making one for “Scream,” which will be completed early next year.
DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND is a journey through the musical mind, influences and taste of Billy Idol. The trip begins with the visceral thrust of the album’s opener “Super Overdrive, followed by the punk anthem “World Coming Down,” which borrows from his own history in the Bromley Contingent—the crew that included Siouxie Sioux, Steve Severin, The Clash’s Mick Jones and others who followed the Sex Pistols—as well as his own early group, Generation X. In total, there are 13 tracks to be experienced on DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND.
In the last few years, Idol and his band, which once again includes longtime guitarist Steve Stevens, as well as new drummer Brian Tichy, bassist Stephen McGrath and keyboardist Derek Sherinian, have been revving up the engine by playing a few select gigs across the country.
Billy was thinking about a new album but had not yet written the songs he wanted to record. After a particularly raucous concert at Hammerstein Ballroom in New York last year, Idol was approached by Sanctuary Group Inc. USA CEO Merck Mercuriadis, who asked him if he was ready to record “a great Billy Idol album.”
The conversation that followed motivated the artist to do something that he had contemplated never doing again: Idol signed a new record deal.
Already secure with 6 platinum and /or multi-platinum albums (BILLY IDOL, REBEL YELL, WHIPLASH SMILE, VITAL IDOL, CHARMED LIFE, GREATEST HITS) , a #1 single (“Mony Mony”), 7 Top 20 Hits (“White Wedding,” “Hot In the City,” Rebel Yell,” “Eyes Without A Face,” “Flesh For Fantasy,” “To Be A Lover,” “Cradle of Love,”), 2 Grammy Nominations and the first dance remix album to go Top 10 (VITAL IDOL) , Billy and the band went into the studio last April with long time producer Keith Forsey, with DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND as the end result.
Billy Idol will tour worldwide commencing March 2005.