The Road Rage Tour was a

concert tour A concert tour (or simply tour) is a series of concerts by an artist or group of artists in different cities, countries or locations. Often, concert tours are named to differentiate different tours by the same artist and to associate a specific ...

co-headlined by

The New Cars The New Cars were a band formed in 2005 by two of the original members of the 1970s/1980s new wave band the Cars. The band was composed of original Cars members Elliot Easton and Greg Hawkes, along with vocalist/guitarist Todd Rundgren, bassist ...

and Blondie in the North America in 2006.

Background

The Road Rage Tour was

' first tour, the first time an incarnation of

The Cars The Cars were an American Rock music, rock band formed in Boston in 1976. Emerging from the New wave music, new wave Subculture, scene in the late 1970s, they consisted of Ric Ocasek (rhythm guitar), Benjamin Orr (bass guitar), Elliot Easton (l ...

has toured in seventeen years. VH-1 Classic sponsored the tour, and commercials were aired frequently on VH-1 and its sister channels to draw attention to the tour. The tour featured a unique

internet The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...

promotion. With each online ticket purchase through VH1classic.com or Ticketmaster.com a full album ''The New Cars and Blondie: Road Rage'' was offered to free download from eMusic.com. The album included five songs performed by The New Cars (four classic songs of The Cars, recorded live and the newly penned studio track "Not Tonight") and five songs performed by Blondie (four previously unreleased live tracks and one new studio cover of

Roxy Music Roxy Music are an English rock music, rock band formed in 1970 by Bryan Ferry (lead vocals/keyboards/principal songwriter) and Graham Simpson (musician), Graham Simpson (bass). By the time the band recorded their Roxy Music (album), first albu ...

hit " More than This"). Currently eMusic offers a shortened version of the album in a form of 4 track EP.

Set

The New Cars set was reportedly designed by drummer

Prairie Prince Charles Lempriere "Prairie" Prince (born May 7, 1950) is an American drummer and visual artist. He came to prominence in the 1970s as a member of the San Francisco–based rock group The Tubes, was a member of Jefferson Starship from 1992 to ...

. It featured large, circular, metallic rings with screens in them suspended above the stage. The rings were meant to resemble a stop light. The drummer sat in a large glowing ring, and the keyboards were elevated behind the center of the stage. The set was concealed when Blondie performed by a large black tarp, meant to resemble the New York City skyline.

Tour cancellation

On June 5, 2006, the driver of The New Cars' tour bus swerved to avoid a collision with a vehicle, resulting in the New Cars' guitarist Elliot Easton suffering a broken left clavicle. Easton played four more shows despite the injury, but when it became apparent that he needed surgery, the rest of the tour was cancelled. Easton had surgery in New York on June 12.

Set list

Tour dates

;Notes *A ^ This show was Blondie only without The New Cars

Cancelled dates

Road Rage Winter Tour

After the original tour cancellation The New Cars and Blondie went separate ways. Blondie went on short tour to Asia in September with single stops in USA before and after, while The New Cars continued the Road Rage tour in winter without Blondie with

Persephone's Bees Persephone's Bees is an Oakland-based pop/rock/electropop music group, whose members are Angelina Moysov (vocals), Tom Ayres (who plays guitar), Paul Bertolino (drums), and Bart Davenport (bass). Bass players have included Mike Ferrel and Ethan ...

as a supporting act. The winter dates were scheduled to be of much smaller, theatre, venues, than large-scale arenas of the summer leg. Kasim Sulton was not featured on several shows due to his touring with

Meat Loaf Michael Lee Aday (born Marvin Lee Aday; September 27, 1947 – January 20, 2022), known professionally by his stage name Meat Loaf, was an American singer and actor. He was known for his powerful, wide-ranging voice and theatrical live shows. ...

in support of '' Bat Out of Hell III: The Monster Is Loose'' album with

Atom Ellis Atom Ellis (born April 8, 1966) is a bass guitarist from San Francisco, California. Musical career Atom was a founding member of the Thrash Funk band Psychefunkapus from 1986 to 1992 and a member of the San Francisco band Dieselhed from 1993 ...

filling for him.

Promotion

''VIP Tickets'', a popular feature during the summer tour, was available for ''most'' venues of the winter leg, with the exclusion of the

Count Basie Theatre The Count Basie Center for the Arts, originally Count Basie Theatre, is a landmarked performing arts center in Red Bank, New Jersey. The building first opened in 1926 as the Carlton Theater and later, in 1973, became known as the Monmouth Arts ...

in Red Bank. Reserved fan-club seating was also available at ''most'' venues, except the Count Basie. A ticket pre-sale began on September 18, 2006.

Ticketmaster Ticketmaster Entertainment, LLC is an American ticket sales and distribution company based in Beverly Hills, California, with operations in many countries around the world. In 2010, it merged with Live Nation under the name Live Nation Ente ...

supplied the tickets for most of the venues, although Seatadvisor and various box offices did carry tickets for others.

Personnel

;Blondie *

Debbie Harry Deborah Ann Harry (born Angela Trimble, July 1, 1945) is an American singer, songwriter and actress, best known as the lead vocalist of the band Blondie (band), Blondie. Four of her songs with the band reached on the US charts between 1979 and 1 ...

–

vocals Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define sing ...

Chris Stein Christopher Stein (born January 5, 1950) is an American musician and songwriter known as the co-founder and guitarist of the new wave band Blondie. He is also a producer and performer for the classic soundtrack of the hip hop film '' Wild St ...

–

guitars The guitar is a stringed musical instrument that is usually fretted (with Fretless guitar, some exceptions) and typically has six or Twelve-string guitar, twelve strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming ...

Clem Burke Clement Anthony Burke (né Bozewski; November 24, 1954 – April 6, 2025) was an American musician best known as the drummer for the band Blondie. He joined the band shortly after its formation in 1975 and remained with Blondie throughout the b ...

–

drums The drum is a member of the percussion instrument, percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, it is a membranophones, membranophone. Drums consist of at least one Acoustic membrane, membrane, c ...

* Kevin Patrick – keyboards * Leigh Foxx –

bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Wood * Bass or basswood, the wood of the tilia americana tree Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in th ...

* Paul Carbonara – guitars ;The New Cars *

Todd Rundgren Todd Harry Rundgren (born June 22, 1948) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer who has performed a diverse range of styles as a solo artist and as a member of the bands Nazz and Utopia. He is known for his sophistica ...

– lead vocals, rhythm guitar * Elliot Easton – lead guitar, backing vocals *

Greg Hawkes Gregory A. Hawkes (born October 22, 1952) is an American musician who is best known as the keyboardist and founding member of the American new wave band the Cars. Hawkes is credited with helping popularize new wave and synth-pop in American popu ...

– keyboards, backing vocals *

Kasim Sulton Kasim as a given name, a variant of Qasim. It may refer to: People known only by the given name Kasim *Kasım Pasha, Ottoman general and governor *Kasım of Karaman, the last bey of the Karaman Beylik, a Turkish principality in Anatolia *Şehza ...

– bass guitar, lead and backing vocals *

– drums, percussion

References

{{The Cars 2006 concert tours Blondie (band) concert tours The Cars concert tours