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Jon Oliva

Video: JON OLIVA Brings ‘Storytellers Tour’ To St. Petersburg

Manos Spanos
More than thirty years after the start of his career with SAVATAGE, and successive projects/bands like TRANS-SIBERIAN ORCHESTRA and JON OLIVA'S PAIN, now-legendary songwriter and performer Jon Oliva brought his "Storytellers Tour" to State Theatre in St. Petersburg, Florida on Saturday, December 14. Fan-filmed video footage of the performance can be seen below. Oliva's recently released debut solo album, "Raise The Curtain", combines Jon's early music influences of '70s prog rock with the sound he cultivated with SAVATAGE and JON OLIVA'S PAIN. The result is a high-class, thrilling musical journey, something all lovers from rock to metal shouldn't miss. "Raise The Curtain" was released on June 21 in Europe and July 2 in North America via AFM Records. The 11-song CD, which contains ideas collected over the course of the last four or five years, was tracked this past winter at Morrisound Studios in Tampa, Florida with producer Tom Morris, with Jon handling laying down nearly all the instrument tracks and vocals himself as well as playing drums on three songs. "Raise The Curtain" was released simply under the banner OLIVA and fans can expect a mixture of Jon's early influences and the material he wrote and recorded throughout his whole career. "Raise The Curtain" was made available as a CD digipak (first pressing) and two-LP vinyl (gatefold, limited to 800 copies worldwide).
01 min read

JON OLIVA Says SAVATAGE Was One Of First Progressive Metal Bands

Manos Spanos
Greg Prato of Songfacts recently conducted an interview with Jon Oliva (SAVATAGE, TRANS-SIBERIAN ORCHESTRA, JON OLIVA'S PAIN). A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below. Songfacts: Would you agree that SAVATAGE was one of the first-ever true prog metal bands? Jon: Absolutely. No doubt about it. I think that really started with "Hall Of The Mountain King", but then definitely from "Gutter Ballet" on, we definitely expanded. We had done three or four records that were basically the same, except for "Fight For The Rock", which we don't count. That's like the red-headed stepchild. But yeah, we started going that route, definitely with "Gutter" and "Streets". I had never heard of the term prog rock until a few years ago. I didn't know what it was. Back in 1987 I don't remember that term being around. Was it? Songfacts: The only other band that may have been described that way is maybe QUEENSRŸCHE, but I really don't remember them being described like that around the time that also SAVATAGE was around, back in '87. Jon: Yeah, it's weird. I'm wondering when that prog base first started popping up as a new genre. I've got to check that out. That's going to bother me all day now. I want to know when the first time someone said "prog rock." Songfacts: I think DREAM THEATER may have been the first band to be called prog metal. Jon: If you really think about it, the first prog-type band was probably ELP. But I see what you're saying. DREAM THEATER to me, I like that band a lot. I think the drummer is amazing, just too many solos for me. I can't help it, man. They're great players. You can't take away the talent. These guys are unbelievably talented. Some of those solo sections are just like, "Okaaaay," but great band. People like 'em, so people like 20-minute guitar solos.
04 min read

JON OLIVA Says European Fans Seem To Be ‘More Into The Live-Performance Thing’

Manos Spanos
Matt Coe of DeadRhetoric.com recently conducted an interview with JON OLIVA'S PAIN and SAVATAGE mastermind Jon Oliva. A few excerpts from the chat follow below: DeadRhetoric.com: "Raise The Curtain" is the first solo album in your career. Can you inform the readers why now is the right time to release a solo record and what type of guidelines did you put on the songwriting that maybe differentiate this release from your work in SAVATAGE or JON OLIVA'S PAIN? Jon Oliva: The idea actually came to do the solo record when guitaristMatt LaPorte passed away. A friend of mine, Dan Fasciano, who you see on the record, co-wrote a lot of the material with me. I was working withTSO (TRANS-SIBERIAN ORCHESTRA) in the afternoons and Dan and I would hang out in the mornings and we just started writing material. I had a few riffs of [late SAVATAGE guitarist and Jon's brother] Criss's [Oliva] left that I wanted to do something with and it wasn't really planned that way. Losing Matt, I didn'
04 min read