After seven years of separation, Rage Against the Machine made its first appearance in New York this past Saturday, July 28, at the “Rock the Bells” festival. This was the first of two shows in a festival that drew around 70,000 fans and included hip-hop artists Wu-Tang Clan, Public Enemy, Cypress Hill, the Roots and Talib Kweli. Another concert featuring Rage Against the Machine at Alpine Valley in East Troy, Wisconsin on August 24 has also been announced with Queens of the Stone Age. However, when asked if the band were planning on recording a new album, Morello answered:
“There are no plans to do that. That’s a whole other ball of wax right there. Writing and recording albums is a whole different thing than getting back on the bike (laughs), you know, and playing these songs. But I think that the one thing about the Rage catalog is that to me none of it feels dated. You know, it doesn’t feel at all like a nostalgia show. It feels like these are songs that were born and bred to be played now.”