By Martin Popoff

Consummate east cost crooner JOE LYNN TURNER (RAINBOW, YNGWIE MALMSTEEN, DEEP PURPLE) has generously provided his time to the John Entwistle Foundation, a charitable organization formed by Steve Luongo, drummer in the legendary WHO bassist’s solo band for well on 15 years, before JOHN ENTWISTLE’s death on June 27th, 2002. Having put together benefit concerts for hurricane relief, his latest mission to help provide music education and instruments to be accessed through the library system, primarily in lower income areas.

Currently, there are two high profile streams to raise funds for this worthy venture, one being the “Classic Rock Cares” concert series with some heavy duty names behind it, Joe of course, plus MARK FARNER (GRAND FUNK) and both Brian Johnson and Cliff Williams, singer and bassist, respectively, for a little pop combo known as AC/DC. Secondly, in conjunction with the shows, there are meet ‘n’ greets (with choice seats for the shows) being auctioned off through eBay. See www.johnentwistle.org/crc/meet_greet.html on the bidding process, and www.johnentwistle.org/crc/pr.html for general info on the upcoming shows.

“I’m on the board of advisers at this point,” explains Turner, who is also celebrating his new studio album just out, called Second Hand Life. “What happened was with the John Entwistle Foundation, is that we were doing some shows down in Florida, with Steve Luongo who was John’s drummer and cofounder of this foundation. We were doing some charity work for the JE Foundation and also Robin Zander’s foundation, and also, I believe, oh, let’s see, we had Eddie Money out there, and there was Make A Wish Foundation and whatnot, Katrina. It was like six months of doing a lot of charity work… autism, cancer, whatever.”
“And I looked at Steve and said, ‘Why don’t we just make this thing huge for the Entwistle Foundation, and do something with this properly?’ So we enlisted Brian Johnson and Cliff Williams from AC/DC, who are wonderful guys by the way, honestly, just wonderful, genuine down-to-earth people. And they were so willing to help out. So we tried to take this thing to a bigger level at first, with all the agencies and whatnot. And none of the agencies would have us - it struck them as absurd. It wasn’t real to them. I guess they didn’t believe us, and they turned us down. And now, we’ve done about… I guess we’re doing eight or ten shows, and they’re all over us! This thing is on fire. The Internet has caught hold of it. For example, we’re in New York again tonight, and there are French journalists flying in, we’ve got Sony there, we’ve got the AC/DC management people there. We’ve got all kinds of people coming out to see this show, and all of them go away shaking their head saying ‘This is one of the most amazing shows we’ve ever seen.’”
“So it really started… not as a whim, but just trying to make the foundation and try to help underprivileged children. Because that’s what the John Entwistle Foundation is. We buy musical instruments and education for underprivileged children. We use the libraries as our delivery system because with the schools there are too many politics, and they can get lost in there. Just like the government - because the government doesn’t do anything. So we’re trying to keep kids off the street and stop them from smoking crack and hanging out on the corner. Give them a dream, give them something else… an alternative.”

See www.johnentwistle.org for more on the foundation and www.joelynnturner.com for more on Joe’s new album and touring plans.