Bruce Springsteen, Fiona Apple and Steve Earle are among the special guests gracing Life, Death and Dennis Hopper, the forthcoming album from The Waterboys.
The record is a concept album about the life of Hollywood legend and counter-culture icon Dennis Hopper, whose storied CV includes Easy Rider, Blue Velvet, Apocalyse Now, Cool Hand Luke, True Romance, True Grit and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
“[Hopper] was at the big bang of youth culture in Rebel Without A Cause with James Dean; and the beginnings of Pop Art with the young Andy Warhol,” says Waterboys frontman Mike Scott in a statement explaining the reasoning behind his decision to write a 25-song album dedicated to Hopper, adding “The arc of his life was the story of our times.”
“He was part of the counter-culture, hippie, civil rights, and psychedelic scenes of the ’60s. In the ’70s and ’80s he went on a wild 10-year rip, almost died, came back, got straight and became a five-movies-a-year character actor without losing the sparkle in his eye or the sense of danger or unpredictability that always gathered around him.”
“It begins in his childhood, ends the morning after his death, and I get to say a whole lot along the way, not just about Dennis, but about the whole strange adventure of being a human soul on planet Earth,” says Scott.
Steve Earle appears on the album's opening song Kansas, Bruce Springsteen guests on Ten Years Gone, and Fiona Apple joins the band for Letter From An Unknown Girlfriend.
The album's first single, Hopper’s On Top (Genius), will be released on Friday, January 10, and celebrates Hopper's directorial debut on the classic 1969 cult film Easy Rider.
