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MUSIC

Shock as Avicii pulls plug on 2015 gigs

Fans were raging on Thursday after DJ superstar Avicii's announced a decision to cancel all gigs for the rest of 2015. The Swedish artist cited a hectic summer and his need to "grow up".

Published: 3 September 2015 12:20 CEST
Shock as Avicii pulls plug on 2015 gigs
Avicii at a gig in Stockholm in June 2015. Photo: Christine Olsson/TT

A spokesperson for Avicii confirmed to US Billboard magazine, who broke the story, that he would be moving his upcoming performances in Las Vegas, Shanghai and Japan to next year for a ”larger tour initiative and a well deserved break”.

The announcement comes just over a year after the Swedish artist called off earlier shows around the world after undergoing surgery to remove his gall bladder and appendix.

Upset fans took to social media on Thursday to express their disappointment.

But others came to the Swedish DJ star's defence.

The 26-year-old superstar, whose real name is Tim Bergling, lives in a luxury house in Los Angeles, but hails from Stockholm and is a regular visitor to his home country. With hits including 'Wake Me Up' and 'Hey Brother', he has risen to global stardom in the past years.

But the DJ hinted to Billboard that his success has come at a price, saying his hectic summer schedule  – including a gig at Sweden's royal wedding – had prompted him to call off his shows for the rest of the year.

“I look forward to keep being innovative with my team in leading a bigger change than just with my music. In moving my tour promotional responsibilities to next year, I have a great opportunity to focus on myself and spend time trying to grow up in a way I never got the chance to – normal, or as normal as it could get,” he said.

”My team, label and family have encouraged me to do that and I realize not many in my position get that opportunity.”

CULTURE

New songs mark sixth anniversary of French star Johnny Hallyday’s death

Fans of the late Johnny Hallyday, "the French Elvis Presley", will be able to commemorate the sixth anniversary of his death with two songs never released before.

Published: 17 November 2023 09:05 CET
New songs mark sixth anniversary of French star Johnny Hallyday's death

Hallyday, blessed with a powerful husky voice and seemingly boundless energy, died in December 2017, aged 74, of lung cancer after a long music and acting career.

After an estimated 110 million records sold during his lifetime – making him one of the world’s best-selling singers -Hallyday’s success has continued unabated beyond his death.

Almost half of his current listeners on Spotify are under the age of 35, according to the streaming service, and a posthumous greatest hits collection of “France’s favourite rock’n’roller”, whose real name was Jean-Philippe Leo
Smet, sold more than half a million copies.

The two new songs, Un cri (A cry) and Grave-moi le coeur (Engrave my heart), are featured on two albums published by different labels which also contain already-known hits in remastered or symphonic versions.

Un cri was written in 2017 by guitarist and producer Maxim Nucci – better known as Yodelice – who worked with Hallyday during the singer’s final years.

At the time Hallyday had just learned that his cancer had returned, and he “felt the need to make music outside the framework of an album,” Yodelice told reporters this week.

Hallyday recorded a demo version of the song, accompanied only by an acoustic blues guitar, but never brought it to full production.

Sensing the fans’ unbroken love for Hallyday, Yodelice decided to finish the job.

He separated the voice track from the guitar which he felt was too tame, and arranged a rockier, full-band accompaniment.

“It felt like I was playing with my buddy,” he said.

The second song, Grave-moi le coeur, is to be published in December under the artistic responsibility of another of the singer’s close collaborators, the arranger Yvan Cassar.

Hallyday recorded the song – a French version of Elvis’s Love Me Tender – with a view to performing it at a 1996 show in Las Vegas.

But in the end he did not play it live, opting instead for the original English-language version, and did not include it in any album.

“This may sound crazy, but the song was on a rehearsal tape that had never been digitalised,” Cassar told AFP.

The new songs are unlikely to be the last of new Hallyday tunes to delight fans, a source with knowledge of his work said. “There’s still a huge mass of recordings out there spanning his whole career,” the source said.

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