Tony Harnell and Ronni Le Tekrø together again and to announce new TNT line-up
Tony Harnell and Ronni Le Tekrø together again and to announce new TNT line-up
Tony Harnell and Ronni Le Tekrø are back writing new material together and will be announcing a new TNT line-up in the near future.
A posting on Harnell‘s “Musician/Band Facebook page less than 24 hours ago states:
“For immediate release:
TNT announces that Tony Harnell and Ronni Le Tekrø will start writing new material together for the first time in over 10 years and that the Norwegian/American band plans to enter the studio to start recording new music this summer. The new line up will be announced soon. We’re happy to be working together creatively again and hope our fans are are as excited as we are. We’re already booking shows in the U.S. and across the world in 2017 and also hope to play in as many countries as possible over the next couple of years. Hopefully many countries that we haven’t been to in a long time or perhaps ever! Stay tuned for more news soon!”
Wikipedia states the following on Harnell‘s time in TNT (with slight edits):
“Ronni Le Tekrø stated “We heard an original sounding voice from heaven, and invited him to Norway to join the band.” The tape was a demo of several projects Tony had been involved with between 1981–84, including some songs from The Jackals, the New York City band Tony left to join TNT in 1984. The Jackals also included renowned drummer John Tempesta who went on to play with Rob Zombie and is currently in The Cult. To this day Tony states he doesn’t know how the demo got to TNT.
In 1984, after a show, Harnell was introduced to Mike Varney who began discussing this great band in Norway that was looking for a singer. He handed Harnell the tape of TNT and said to check them out. Of this experience, Harnell has said, “I took it home and I was blown away. It was that good. And it was exactly the kind of music I wanted to do at that point in my life.”
The working relationship of TNT has always presented the challenge of geography, but it has also helped in the development of creative solutions. Upon his introduction to this Norwegian rock band, Harnell was impressed with the musicianship and style established while the rest of the band was convinced that this American brought the right voice to their music.
The special relationship and brotherly bond that Tony developed with guitarist Ronni Le Tekrø was the creative driving force in the band. The two of them wrote co-wrote all of TNT‘s material together during Tony‘s 22 year run with the band.
Steve Huey of AMG has written “With a level of musicianship higher than the average hair-metal band, Norway’s TNT offered a prog-tinged take on pop-metal due largely to the stunning vocal range of lead singer Tony Harnell.”
With TNT, Tony Harnell recorded 9 studio albums, two live videos and two “best of” cds, toured the U.S. several times with acts such as Stryper, Twisted Sister and Great White and headlined sold out tours in 89 in both the U.S. and Japan. From 1997-1999 TNT also toured Japan and Norway. In the 2000s on the heels of The Big Bang which went gold in Norway and the critically acclaimed My Religion he performed to huge audiences with TNT at festivals throughout Europe, including the Sweden Rock Festival with 20,000+ in attendance, where they shared the bill with numerous greats including metal legends, Judas Priest. TNT also supported the band Europe for the Lorca Festival show in Spain with 10,000+ fans in attendance.
It is estimated that TNT with Harnell sold between 1.5-2 million albums in total. They received a Norwegian Grammy award in 1987 for rock album of the year for “Tell No Tales” and received numerous silver, gold, diamond and platinum awards in Norway and Japan.
He left the band in April 2006 for both “personal and professional” reasons and made it clear that this time it’s for good. He performed his last show with the band on June 30, 2006 and a DVD was released in the Autumn of 2006 that features the second to last show in Madrid, Spain on April 1, 2006. Although it was stated by Ronni Le Tekrø in an interview that Tony left the band “in the middle of a tour”, he actually resigned after the final show in Madrid and agreed to perform the one show left on the books at that time, which was Polar Rock Festival in the north of Norway. He did perform this final show with the band though they had already been touring with new singer Tony Mills by that time. Polar Rock Fest asked that Tony Harnell perform with the band and he agreed out of respect for the promoter and to say goodbye to the fans in Norway. Harnell brought Mills up on stage for the last song of the set to pass the torch over and they sang “Harley Davidson” together, Tony‘s least favorite TNT song from the 1st album before he was a member. He has said in interviews that this was not the song he would have wanted to be the last he sang on stage with TNT as he felt strongly that it did not represent the music he created with the band.
On October 17, 2013 Harnell announced that he had rejoined TNT, stating, “I’m very proud of all we accomplished over the years and proud to have written and recorded all those great songs with my brother from another mother, Ronni Le Tekrø. Sometimes it’s just time to give the fans what they’re asking for.”
After a year and a half absence, during which he fronted Skid Row, Harnell announced his return to TNT in May 2016.”