Rod Stewart and Elton John are decades old frenemies. They really love each other, but like Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds they love going at each other.

So Rod’s new album is called “The Tears of Hercules,” which sounds like a little poke at Elton’s 1972 song, “Hercules.” Indeed, Elton liked to call himself Elton Hercules John for a minute back in the day.

Rod’s fourth album of new songs since 2013 comes on November 12th and is kicked off by a single called “One More Time” that has a cheeky video to along with it. Like all of Rod’s songs with producer collaborator Kevin Savigar, it’s very catchy.

The album features a song called “Touchline,” which he dedicated to his father, who taught him and his brothers to love football, a tradition Sir Rod has passed down to his sons. In the album’s sleeve note, Stewart says he’s proud of the album. “I’ve never said this before about any previous efforts, but I believe this is by far my best album in many a year,” he writes.

I’ve always said that Rod is a many with a career of nine lives. He never stops, and he always returns with a bang. There’s a rumor he’s also working on a new Faces album for the first time in 50 years. He and his mega agent Arnold Stiefel are two of the greats in show biz. They’ve even booked Las Vegas dates at Caesar’s Palace to celebrate the 10th anniversary of his acclaimed residency, “Rod Stewart: The Hits.” He’ll play nine shows at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace between October 6th and 23rd.

If like me you continually astonished by the genius of Jimi Hendrix, here’s an online event you cannot miss.

Tomorrow night. Saturday at 7pm, my old friend Bob Davis of Soul Patrol is hosting a Hendrix webinar featuring Ernie Isley of the Isley Brothers.

Here’s the schedule:

The panel will be moderated by Bob Davis and will consist of the author Cory Washington, Darrell McNeill (Black Rock Coalition) and Ernie Isley (Isley Bros.)

Featured partricipants will be Corey Washington, author of “Jimi Hendrix: Black Legacy,” Darrell McNeill of the Black Rock Coalition – he’s een spreading the “Gospel” of Hendrix for the past 40 years, and the amazing Ernie Isley of the Isley Brothers.

There will be a 45 minute video presentation  bbased on Jimi Hendrix/Black Legacy, produced by Corey Washington and a 1 hour panel discussion, based on the issues related to Jimi Hendrix/Black Legacy.

Sign Up/Register for the event at:
http://soul-patrol.com/webinars/jimi-hendrix-black-legacy-retrospective/?wspage=register

If you don’t know about www.soul-patrol.com and you’re an R&B fan, please go there and start reading. I met Bob Davis in the 90s, and he’s been a True Believer all these years. When I was working my way up to making “Only the Strong Survive,” he was incredibly helpful.

Classic R&B has to preserved. Sirius can’t do it alone with Soul Town! So tune in. As for Hendrix, he’s like James Brown. The more you listen to him now, you realize what an utter genius he was. Ernie Isley is going to talk about how Hendrix’s sound took the IB’s from “This Old Heart of Mine” to “Who’s That Lady.” I can’t wait!

Beatles fans: These are four unreleased tracks that will be included in the “Let it Be” anniversary collection coming October 15th. So far, no one seems to know they’re up on YouTube, but now we do.

The “Let it Be” collection comes right before the Get Back documentary about “Let it Be” in November.

The collection retails for $117 and is currently number 3 on Amazon, which is sort of wild. This will be the last of the Beatles’ 50th anniversary box sets as “Let it Be” was their final release in May 1970.

Oh Lorde!

The New Zealand pop star had a massive hit with “Royals,” which turns out to be a one off chart star.

But that was four years ago. Lorde’s second album wasn’t a hit, although it did get a mysterious Album of the Year nomination from the Grammys.

Three weeks ago, Lorde dropped her third album, “Solar Power,” after the title single did little business. The result was not much business. The total sales number is 113,000 including streaming. Actual sales and downloads came to 42,000.

Basically, Lorde needs prayers at this point. She hasn’t been able to reproduce the “Royals” magic. The “Solar Power” song was criticized for sounding like it lifted music from George Michael. The album overall received meh reviews.

Practically speaking, it’s almost impossible to purchase a Lorde CD for a normal price on Amazon. They’re just not available. Lorde doesn’t believe in issuing them, although she does offer an expensive vinyl version. So she’s basically shot herself in the foot. Her record company must be thrilled.

Will she get another Grammy nomination for Album of the Year? When this happened with “Melodrama,” another sales stinker, everyone was puzzled. This time around, without those secret Grammy committees, it seems unlikely.

Flip open the calendar. In two months it will be mid November 2021. The last time Adele released a new album was November 20, 2015, six years ago.

That’s right. Adele Laurie Blue Adkins has only released three albums in her career: numbered 19, 21, and 25. The latter album sold millions of copies when it was released, and launched hit singles including “Hello” and “When I Was Young.”

She followed that album with a world tour that also made her millions. A few months later she released a separate single, the James Bond movie theme for “Skyfall.”  And then she fell — off the career map.

Now Adele faces an ignominious anniversary. New new album in six years. I’d say it’s “a record” but actually her Sony Music labelmate is much worse. Sade hasn’t released a new album in almost 11 years. And it was eight years in between her last two releases.

Does it matter? Kinda, yeah. Sade also released three albums in a short period, establishing her career and her hits. But Sade also learned that spacing out releases like this makes it harder and harder to sell records no matter how famous or popular you are. You simply lose your age group. The fans outgrow buying your records.

The preponderance of “classic” rock and pop acts from the 60s, 70s and early 80s released record after record for five or six years in a row. They built their own demographic. Adele has completely ignored all that. When she does return, she’ll have a big opening week or two, but sales and interest will cool off quickly. And the longer she waits, the worse it will get.

So Adele, wherever you are, it’s time to get going. The kids who bought “Hello” in 2015, if they were 15, are now finishing college. All your peers– Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, Miley, Halsey, Ariana, etc — have released dozens of records in that time, songs they will be able to go back to 20 years from now when their fans are nostalgic. I think you may be sorry you didn’t keep up with them.