Rose Tattoo will release a cover of Stevie Wright’s ‘Hard Road’ in February marking the first new music for the band since 2008.
Stevie Wright was lead singer of The Easybeats. ‘Hard Road’ was Stevie Wright’s first solo single and the title track off his first solo album.
Wright released ‘Hard Road’ in 1974. The song was written and produced by ex-Easybeats Harry Vanda and George Young. Vanda, Young and Wright played on the song making the recording three fifths of The Easybeats.
Stevie’s ‘Hard Road’ also featured George Young’s brother, AC/DC legend Malcolm Young, on guitar.
The song was also recorded later that year by Rod Stewart for his ‘Smiler’ album.
Rose Tattoo’s first four albums were on Albert Productions, the label were Vanda and Young were the house producers and the label that signed AC/DC, The Angels and Rose Tattoo.
Vanda and Young produced the Rose Tattoo albums ‘Rose Tattoo’ (1978), ‘Assault & Battery’ (1981), ‘Scarred For Life’ (1982) and ‘Southern Stars’ (1984).
The Rose Tattoo version of ‘Hard Road’ will be released on 27 February 2025.
There will be a new Tatts album later in the year. It will be the first Rose Tattoo album since ‘Blood Brothers’ in 2008.
In a statement Angry Anderson said, “Brothers and Sisters, I’m writing to officially announce our recent single-track recording release, it’s no secret that I’m a big Stevie Wright, Easy Beats, fan, the Rosie Tatts have previously covered and released Black Eyed Bruiser, a Stevie Wright song and so it will come as no surprise that we now release another Stevie toon Hard Road which will be included on our next album release later this year.
“First I was a fan, then became a friend and was honoured to become a confidant of Stevie, we shared much together; he was chuffed that we covered Bruiser and that we did our own version, luckily I was able to tell him, before we lost him, that we would cover Hard Road, he was chuffed about that as well, so there you have it, Hard Road is a song for our time, it helps
signal our feelings, as a band, as we grow ever closer to the end of the road for our beloved Rose Tattoo, the end is in sight, it’s been worth every highlight and heartbreak of our long Hard Road.”
Rose Tattoo are performing in Australia until May 2025. Dates are here.
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