{"id":341289,"date":"2026-09-09T01:14:59","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T01:14:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/341289\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T01:14:59","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T01:14:59","slug":"brian-may-joins-william-shatners-all-star-metal-enterprise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/341289\/","title":{"rendered":"Brian May joins William Shatner\u2019s all-star metal enterprise"},"content":{"rendered":"

William Shatner might not have been able to lay his hands on a real Gibson Les Paul Standard for the promo shoot for his forthcoming all-star metal album<\/a> \u2013 the electric guitar<\/a> he is holding is monstrous AI-creation \u2013 but he is having no problem signing up human talent for the project.<\/p>\n

Among a reported 35-strong cast of guitarists, Queen<\/a>\u2019s Brian May has now been announced as one of the actor and musician\u2019s special guests. He even mixes the track he is appearing on.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

On the face of it, it\u2019s an unlikely collaboration. But these two have a lot in common. They have both spent considerable time among the stars; Shatner as Star Trek\u2019s Captain James T Kirk of the USS Enterprise, May as an astrophysicist. Both have asteroids named after them; as the press release reads, \u201cAsteroid 52665 Brianmay, meet Asteroid 31556 Shatner\u201d. Quite. Asteroids are all well and good. But this project is going to be a very different kind of rock.<\/p>\n

Latest Videos FromMusicRadar<\/p>\n

Shatner says the project was inspired by former Megadeth<\/a> guitarist Chris Poland and the work he is doing now in Nuclear Messiah.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Nuclear Messiah came to life, something clicked,\u201d said Shatner. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t just a track \u2013 it was a doorway. It made me want to go all the way in, bring in the best metal players I could find, and create something fearless.\u201d<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

May is the first guitarist to be confirmed for the project \u2013 though we would expect Poland to turn up, and given that Zakk Wylde<\/a> gifted Shatner an electric guitar, then surely the Black Label Society frontman will drop in, too.<\/p>\n

Shatner isn\u2019t short in some serious players, though. We\u2019ve got a bona-fide Metal God contributing vocals as Rob Halford signed on. There is one of metal\u2019s greatest drummers, Dave Lombardo, formerly of Slayer. John Moyer from Disturbed will play bass guitar<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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The production team includes Adam Hamilton and Brian Perera of Cleopatra Records, whose label is releasing the album.<\/p>\n

Shatner, who will be performing in Chicago at this year\u2019s Riotfest, promises some original material \u2013 plus a few classics from the old masters.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve spent a lifetime exploring in both reality and fiction,\u201d said Shatner. \u201cNow I am stepping out into the unknown once again with my new project in heavy metal. I am covering Black Sabbath<\/a>, Judas Priest and Iron Maiden as well as a number of new songs written by my team. The whole project is destined for this year. I hope you will join me in the exploration.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"William Shatner might not have been able to lay his hands on a real Gibson Les Paul Standard…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":341290,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-341289","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341289"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341289\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/341290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}