It's prolific year for Todd Rundgren. Already part of Ringo Starr's latest All-Starr Band, with playing and writing credits on the new Postcards From Paradise album, Rundgren will be releasing his 25th solo studio album, Global, on Apirl 7th (and will be touring to support it). And the musician has teamed with Norwegian electronic musicians Emil Nikolaisen and Hans-Peter Lindstrom for "Runnddans," a 39-minute song suite inspired by Rundgren's 1973 album A Wizard A True Star.
Rundgren -who last fall released a Todd Rundgren at the BBC box set -- will be touring extensively to support Global, staring April 2 in Denver with dates booked into mid-June; he'll be accompanied by a DJ and two singer-dancers "to humanize the whole thing, but I'll be taking care of most of the music myself." Come October, meanwhile, he'll be back on the road with the All-Starr Band, his second tenure with Ringo and this time part of a lineup the ex-Beatle has called his favorite one yet. "This is the first time he's gotten musicians that get along with each other and have mutual respect for each other and at the same time have a degree of musical expertise where we can all make significant contributions to each other's material," Rundgren says. "I know that he hasn't always been able to line it up like that before."
The alignment also allowed the All-Starrs to become a vital part of Starr's just-released new album. "That was all kind of an afterthought, actually," Rundgren says. "We were at the end of a tour last November and Ringo was wrapping up the album. In one instance we had this little song we were jamming on during sound check and Ringo said, 'Let's write something for it and finish it and then I'll record it and put it on my record,' and that was 'Island in the Sun.' And another time Ringo came into the dressing room one day and sat next to me and said, 'You fancy writing a song wtih me?' And I said, 'Well, sure. How much time have we got?' He said 'A couple days.' (Laughs) He had a demo track and an idea of what the song should be about and I had a couple days off right after the tour, and I put together a demo and sent it to him and he finished it off in L.A. and now it's on the record."
The alignment also allowed the All-Starrs to become a vital part of Starr's just-released new album. "That was all kind of an afterthought, actually," Rundgren says. "We were at the end of a tour last November and Ringo was wrapping up the album. In one instance we had this little song we were jamming on during sound check and Ringo said, 'Let's write something for it and finish it and then I'll record it and put it on my record,' and that was 'Island in the Sun.' And another time Ringo came into the dressing room one day and sat next to me and said, 'You fancy writing a song wtih me?' And I said, 'Well, sure. How much time have we got?' He said 'A couple days.' (Laughs) He had a demo track and an idea of what the song should be about and I had a couple days off right after the tour, and I put together a demo and sent it to him and he finished it off in L.A. and now it's on the record."
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