LED ZEPPELIN

Led Zeppelin were an English rock band formed in 1968 by Jimmy Page (guitar), Robert Plant (vocals), John Paul Jones (bass guitar, keyboards) and John Bonham (drums). With their heavy, guitar-driven sound, Led Zeppelin are regarded as one of the first heavy metal bands. However, the band's individualistic style draws from many sources and transcends any one genre. Their rock-infused interpretation of the blues and folk genres also incorporated rockabilly, reggae, soul, funk, classical, Celtic, Indian, Arabic, pop, Latin and country. The band did not release the popular songs from their albums as singles in the UK, as they preferred to develop the concept of album-oriented rock. Close to 30 years after disbanding following Bonham's death in 1980, the band continues to be held in high regard for their artistic achievements, commercial success and broad influence. The band have sold more than 300 million albums worldwide, including 111.5 million sales in the United States and they have had all of their original studio albums reach the U.S. Billboard Top 10, with six reaching the number one spot. Led Zeppelin are ranked #1 on VH1's 100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock. Rolling Stone magazine has described Led Zeppelin as "the heaviest band of all time" and "the biggest band of the '70s".
On 10 December 2007 the surviving members of Led Zeppelin reunited (along with deceased drummer John Bonham's son, Jason) for the Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert at The O2 Arena in London.

GUNS N' ROSES

Guns N' Roses is an American rock band, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1985. The band, led by frontman and co-founder Axl Rose, has gone through numerous line-up changes and controversies since their formation. The band has released six studio albums, three EPs and one live album during their career.
The band has sold an estimated 100 million albums worldwide, including over 43 million in the United States. The band's 1987 major label debut album Appetite for Destruction has sold in excess of 28 million copies and reached number one on the United States Billboard 200. The album still remains the fastest-selling debut album in history. In addition, the album charted three Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including "Sweet Child O' Mine" which reached number one. The 1991 albums Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II debuted on the two highest spots on the Billboard 200 and have sold a combined 14 million copies in the United States alone. After over a decade of work, the band released their follow-up album, Chinese Democracy, in 2008.

Ozzy Osbourne

John Michael "Ozzy" Osbourne (born 3 December 1948) is an English singer-songwriter, whose career has now spanned four decades. Osbourne rose to prominence as lead vocalist of pioneering English heavy metal band Black Sabbath, and eventually achieved a multi-platinum solo career which revolutionized the heavy metal genre. As a result he is known as the "Godfather of Heavy Metal", and, because of some of his material, the "Prince of Darkness". In the early 2000s, his career as a celebrity hit a new zenith when he became a star in his own reality show, The Osbournes, alongside wife/manager Sharon and two of their three children, Kelly and Jack. In August 2008, Osbourne stated in USA Today that he intends to retire from his music career after two more albums.
Osbourne was born in Aston, Birmingham. His father Jack worked shifts as a toolmaker at GEC and his mother Lillian for the car components firm Lucas, to support him and his five siblings. Osbourne reportedly suffered from learning difficulties (claiming to be dyslexic,) making life at Prince Albert Road Junior School and Birchfield Road Secondary Modern School in Perry Barr difficult for him. However, he did like music and took part in school plays. He also became a great fan of The Beatles from the age of 14 when he heard their first hit single. He left school at 15 and was then employed as a construction site labourer, trainee plumber, apprentice toolmaker, car factory worker and slaughterhouse worker. He also spent a few weeks in Winson Green Prison, when he was unable to pay a fine after being found guilty of burglary of a clothes shop.

Pearl Jam

Pearl Jam is an American rock band that formed in Seattle, Washington in 1990. Since its inception, the band's line-up has included Eddie Vedder (lead vocals, guitar), Jeff Ament (bass guitar), Stone Gossard (rhythm guitar), and Mike McCready (lead guitar). The band's current drummer is Matt Cameron, formerly of Sound garden, who has been with the band since 1998.
Formed after the demise of Ament and Gossard's previous band Mother Love Bone, Pearl Jam broke into the mainstream with its debut album, Ten. One of the key bands of the grunge movement in the early 1990s, Pearl Jam was criticized early on — most notably by Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain — as being a corporate cash-in on the alternative rock explosion. However, over the course of the band's career its members became noted for their refusal to adhere to traditional music industry practices, including refusing to make music videos and engaging in a much-publicized boycott of Ticketmaster. In 2006, Rolling Stone described the band as having "spent much of the past decade deliberately tearing apart their own fame."
Since its inception, the band has sold over thirty million records in the U.S., and an estimated sixty million albums worldwide. Pearl Jam has outlasted many of its contemporaries from the alternative rock breakthrough of the early 1990s, and is considered one of the most influential bands of the decade. All music calls Pearl Jam "the most popular American rock & roll band of the '90s."

Skid Row

Skid Row is an American heavy metal band, formed in 1986 in Toms River, New Jersey. They are named after Phil Lynott and Gary Moore's first band. They were most successful in the late 1980s and early 1990s when their first two albums with lead singer Sebastian Bach and drummer Rob Affuso were multi-platinum successes. Their current line-up consists of Johnny Solinger (vocals), Dave "The Snake" Sabo, Scotti Hill (guitar), Rachel Bolan (bass) and Dave Gara (drums). As of the end of 1996 the band has sold over 20 million albums worldwide.

As of 2008, Skid Row has released five full-length albums, an EP, a compilation album, and a live album. For album and single sales information, see the Skid Row discography page. They became popular with their first two albums, Skid Row and Slave to the Grind, which are often considered their best-known works to date. Their last full-length studio album, Revolutions per Minute, came out on October 24, 2006.

They are often associated with glam metal, partly due to their image on their debut album, Skid Row, which spawned the hits "18 and Life", "Youth Gone Wild", and "I Remember You" for the band. They would eventually go on to foster an image base geared toward more traditional heavy metal and hard rock audiences.

SCORPIONS

Scorpions are a heavy metal/hard rock band from Hanover, Germany, probably best known for their 1980s rock anthem "Rock You Like a Hurricane" and their singles "No One Like You", "Still Loving You", and "Wind of Change". The band has sold over 75 million albums worldwide and were ranked #46 on VH1's Greatest Rudolf Schenker, the band's rhythm guitarist launched the band in 1965. At first, the band had beat influences and Schenker himself did the vocals. Things began to come together in 1969 when Schenker's younger brother Michael and vocalist Klaus Meine joined the band. In 1972, the group recorded and released their debut album Lonesome Crow, with Lothar Heimberg on bass and Wolfgang Dziony on drums. During the Lonesome Crow tour, the Scorpions opened for upcoming British band UFO. Near the end of the tour, the members of UFO offered guitarist Michael Schenker the lead guitar job; an offer which he soon accepted. Uli Roth, a friend of the Schenker brothers, was then called in temporarily to finish off the tour.
The departure of Michael Schenker led to the breakup of the band. In 1973, Uli Roth, who had helped the Scorpions complete the Lonesome Crow tour, was offered the role as lead guitarist, but turned the band down, preferring instead to remain in the band Dawn Road. Schenker eventually decided that he wanted to work with Roth, but did not want to resurrect the last Scorpions lineup. He attended some of Dawn Road's rehearsals and ultimately decided to join the band, which consisted of Roth, Francis Buchholz (bass), Achim Kirschning (keyboards) and Jurgen Rosenthal (drums). Roth and Buchholz persuaded Rudolf Schenker to invite Klaus Meine to join, which he soon did. While there were more members of Dawn Road than Scorpions in the band, they decided to use the Scorpions name because it was well-known in the German hard rock scene and an album had been released under that name.
Artists of Hard Rock program.

Van Halen

Van Halen is a hard rock band formed in Pasadena, California in 1972. They enjoyed success from the release of their self titled debut album in 1978. As of 2007 Van Halen has sold more than 80 million albums worldwide and have had the most number one hits on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. During the 1980s they also had more Billboard Hot 100 hits than any other hard rock or heavy metal band. According to the Recording Industry Association of America, Van Halen is the 19th best selling band/artist of all time with sales of over 56 million albums in the USA and is one of five rock bands that have had two albums sell more than 10 million copies in the USA.
In addition to being recognized for success, the band is known for the drama surrounding the exits of former members. The (multiple) exits of singers David Lee Roth and Sammy Hagar were surrounded in controversy and mass press coverage with various contrasting press statements between them and the band. The band changed style dramatically following the departure of Roth, with his solo career being more similar to the band's original work than Van Halen's own songs with later singers. More recently, Michael Anthony was kicked out of the band for controversial reasons. Following their 2004 concert tour the band was on a hiatus from the public until September 2006, when new bassist Wolfgang Van Halen's place was confirmed and Roth-reunion rumors began to re-surface coinciding with the band's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction on March 12, 2007.After years of speculation, Van Halen began a tour with Roth in late 2007 across North America, which has been extended into 2008. An album is proposed to follow. Along with this, a live tour DVD was announced at their May 13, 2008 concert at the Izod Center that would contain recordings from several performances on their current tour.

WHITE SNEAKS

Whitesnake is an English hard rock band, founded in 1977 by David Coverdale (formerly of Deep Purple). The band's early material has been compared by critics to Deep Purple but by the mid eighties Whitesnake had moved away from the early blues-rock influenced heavy metal to a more commercial hard rock style. David Coverdale founded Whitesnake in 1977. The core line-up had been working as his backing band The White Snake Band on their album tour and they retained the title before officially being known as Whitesnake. They toured with Coverdale as his support band and for both of the solo albums he released, between exiting Deep Purple and founding Whitesnake. During the band's early years their music was primarily (although Coverdale described Whitesnake's early style as "progressive. At this time, the band was made up of, and drummer with keyboardist Brian Johnston. Johnston would soon be replaced by organ player and keyboardist. Because of Solley's commitments he was replaced by the former keyboard player during sessions for the first LP.

The Yardbirds

The Yardbirds are an English rock band, noted for starting the careers of three of rock's most famous guitarists: Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page. A blues-based band whose sound evolved into experimental rock, they had a string of hits including "For Your Love", "Over, Under, Sideways, Down" and "Heart Full of Soul". They were a crucial link between British R&B and psychedelia.
The Yardbirds were pioneers in almost every guitar innovation of the '60s: fuzz tone, feedback, distortion, backwards echo, improved amplification. They were one of the first to put an emphasis on complex lead guitar parts and experimentation.
The bulk of the band's conceptual ideas, as well as their songwriting, came from the quartet of singer/harmonica player Keith Relf, drummer Jim McCarty, rhythm guitarist/bassist Chris Dreja, and bassist/producer Paul Samwell-Smith, all of whom co-wrote the Yardbirds' original hits and constituted the core of the group. The band's musical foundation would also lay the groundwork for the formation of the 1970s rock band Led Zeppelin, formed by Jimmy Page after the disbandment of the Yardbirds in 1968. The band reformed in the 1990s, featuring McCarty, Dreja, and new members.

Neil Young

Neil Percival Young OM (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian singer-songwriter, musician and film director.
Young's work is characterized by deeply personal lyrics, distinctive guitar work, and signature falsetto tenor singing voice. Although he accompanies himself on several different instruments—including piano and harmonica—his claw hammer acoustic guitar style and often idiosyncratic electric guitar soloing are the linchpins of a sometimes ragged, sometimes polished sound. Although Young has experimented widely with differing music styles, including swing, jazz, rockabilly, blues, and electronic music throughout a varied career, his best known work usually falls into either of two distinct styles: folk-esque acoustic rock ("Heart of Gold", "Harvest Moon" and "Old Man") and electric-charged hard rock (like "Cinnamon Girl", "Rockin' in the Free World" and "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)"). In recent years, Young has adopted elements from newer styles like industrial, alternative country and grunge. Young's profound influence on the latter caused some to dub him "the godfather of grunge". As of mid-2008, Young has sold an estimated seventy-nine million albums worldwide.
Young has directed (or co-directed) a number of films using the pseudonym Bernard Shakey, including Journey Through the Past (1973), Rust Never Sleeps (1979), Human Highway (1982), Greendale (2003), and CSNY Déjà Vu (2008). He is currently working on a documentary about electric car technology, tentatively titled Linc/Volt. The project involves a 1959 Lincoln Continental converted to hybrid technology, which Young plans to drive to Washington, DC as an example to lawmakers there.
He is also an outspoken advocate for environmental issues and small farmers, having co-founded in 1985 the benefit concert Farm Aid, and in 1986 helped found The Bridge School, and its annual supporting Bridge School Benefit concerts, together with his wife Pegi (in this, Young's involvement stems at least partially from the fact that both of his sons have cerebral palsy and his daughter, like Young himself, has epilepsy).
Although Young sings as frequently about U.S. legends and myths as he does about his native country, he remains a Canadian citizen and has never wanted to relinquish his Canadian citizenship.