United Stations

Host Lou Brutus Anchors – Exclusive Musician Audio Featured

New York, NY – April 26, 2021 -- United Stations Radio Networks, Inc., (USRN) an independent leader in original network radio programming, has announced that its daily rock program, hardDrive XL, has created a special theme week for the program in order to honor the 30th anniversary of the release of Temple of the Dog, the eponymous and only album by that influential collection of musicians.  The tribute episodes will air across the five weeknight broadcasts of hardDrive XL all this week, starting today April 26 and running through Friday, April 30th. The announcement comes from United Stations headquarters in New York.   

Temple of the Dog was released in April of 1991 just as the so-called Seattle or Grunge sound was sweeping the nation.  The project was created as a tribute to Andrew Wood of the band Mother Love Bone after Wood died of a drug overdose.  The group was the brainchild of Wood’s former roommate, the late Chris Cornell, and Cornell brought together members of Soundgarden and Pearl Jam months before the historic first Pearl Jam album, Ten, was even released.  Temple of the Dog was both the name of the group and their one and only album, and while its 1991 release met with moderate success, it was re-discovered in 1992.  By that time, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden both had major breakthroughs, and the album was suddenly seen as a super-group combining the members of both bands.  In fact, the song “Hunger Strike” from Temple of the Dog still stands as a monumental track since it features a soaring duet between Chris Cornell and Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder.  That 90s rock is still a huge part of the library of rock radio stations and hardDrive XL today. 

To complete the on-air tribute, the staff of hardDrive XL has pulled together both archival audio and interviews with members of Temple of the Dog as well as gathering audio from some of today’s top artists influenced by that early 90’s release.  Current musicians featured during the Temple of the Dog tribute week will include Arejay Hale of Halestorm, Lajon Witherspoon of Sevendust and current rising star Ayron Jones, a Seattle musician himself.   Audio from the late Chris Cornell, a frequent guest on both hardDrive XL and its weekend counterpart, hardDrive, will also be featured during the week.

hardDrive XL has been on the air since February of 2007, and at the time of its launch it was a brand extension of the successful weekend program, hardDrive which is celebrating 25 years on the air this summer.   Both the nightly weeknight program and the weekend show are hosted by Lou Brutus who has a long history in rock radio including stops at WMMR/Philadelphia, WRCX/ Chicago, WBCN/Boston, WHFS/Washington DC and WHJY/Providence. Lou Brutus is one of the most respected rock radio hosts of the last two decades, and his relationships with the artists, his encyclopedic knowledge of music trivia, his interviewing skills and his ability to entertain the audience make him a quadruple threat on the airwaves.  hardDrive and hardDrive XL is produced by an outstanding team of programming and production veterans including Mark Abramson, Randy Hawke, Bill Powell and Zak Tranese. 

United Stations Media Networks, Inc. is a division of United Stations, America's leading independently owned and operated radio network.  United Stations produces and distributes dozens of format-specific programs and services accounting for roughly 6000 affiliations with commercial radio stations across the country.  The New York-based company maintains programming, sales and affiliation offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Dallas, Washington and Nashville and was founded in 1994 by radio pioneers Dick Clark and Nick Verbitsky.

                                                         Press contacts:  Andy Denemark - andyd@unitedstations.com