Kudos to Journey’s publicist for her excellent timing. Issuing this on the heels of the Sopranos finale, which ended with the strains of “Don’t Stop Believing” is a brilliant move. I hope she treated herself by leaving early for the day, after a long lunch. Because honestly: raise your hand if you even knew Steve Augeri had been replaced as lead singer of Journey. Hell, raise your hand if you thought Steve Perry was still the lead singer of Journey. Steve Perry certainly seems to.
Also, can we get a moratorium on the use of the phrase “no pun intended” when clearly a pun was intended?
JOURNEY ANNOUNCES DEPARTURE OF JEFF SCOTT SOTO
June 12, 2007 — Journey has parted ways with their recently named lead singer Jeff Scott Soto. Jeff’s first appearance with Journey was July 7, 2006 in Bristow, VA. He had been filling in for Steve Augeri, who had to leave the tour shortly after it began on June 23 due to illness. Jeff’s last performance was May 12, 2007 in Leesburg, VA.
According to guitarist Neal Schon, “We appreciate all of Jeff’s hard work and we can’t thank him enough for stepping in when Steve Augeri got sick last year. He did a tremendous job for us and we wish him the best. We’ve just decided to go our separate ways, no pun intended. We’re plotting our next move now.”
Keyboardist Jonathan Cain continues, “We were lucky to have a friend who was already a Journey fan step in on a moment’s notice during the Def Leppard tour to help us out. Jeff was always the consummate professional and we hope that he remains a friend of the band in the future. We just felt it was time to go in a different direction.”
Journey–Neal Schon (guitar), Ross Valory (bass), Jonathan Cain (keyboards) and Deen Castronovo (drums)—is taking the rest of 2007 off to spend time with their families, write new songs and map out plans for 2008.
<>“The song was, literally, cutting from lyric to lyric, from mother to son to James [Gandolfini] at the key moment and on [the lyric] ‘streetlight people,’ it pulls back with the cameras to reveal a streetlight and I said, ‘My God, this director [Chase] got it. He got the song!’ “<>Well, that confirms it. We can NOW officially recognize David Chase as a genius because he understood the astonishing nuance of a Journey lyric.
I smell a reunion tour!
I saw JSS’s 2nd show with Journey. He still needed a lyric sheet. I wrote a review somewhere. I think something about Side Show Bob pulling out every rock and roll front man cliche.