News | Michael McDonald Releases New Music And More To Come

Timely

Michael McDonald released a live rendition of “What The World Needs Now” which was taken from a performance during his 2019 tour. The track was originally written in 1965 by Hal David and Burt Bacharach. The timely recording featured heartwarming clips of families. The musician told Billboard that he likes closing his live shows with “What the World Needs Now” or Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” or sometimes, both.

He said, “We’ve tried to make our live shows leave people with a sense of community and a little something more important than just all of us getting together to hear some live music. That’s certainly a wonderful thing…but nonetheless we take the opportunity to say something beyond that to all the people who are nice enough to come hear us that points to the fact we’re a community. And the mindfulness of being a community is always important — especially now.”

He also shared that there will be more music coming our way and most of them are original. He’s working on a new studio album too – a follow-up to 2017’s “Wide Open.” That’s not all, there’s an EP with “some songs I’ve written over the years I thought I might never record.” He explains, “It turned out to be a California kind of project. We just kind of hang out at the barn and jam, and we started doing some of these songs and this is what it turned into. It was originally going to be something I did just for the tour but it’s turned into something a little more than that.”

He’s supposed to go on a summer tour with The Doobie Brothers which is slated to kick off on July 1. There’s been no update whether the dates have been postponed or canceled and even McDonald has been waiting for any announcement. Even the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony has been moved to later this year.