The Dead Daisies, featuring former members of Guns 'n' Roses, will tour Cuba this month in a first for a US rock band since the easing of decades of tensions.
The hard rockers plan a week of recording sessions with local artists and other events in Havana culminating in a performance on February 28 at the Cuba Rocks for Peace concert at open-air Salon Rosado de la Tropical.
The band said that the tour would be the first for a major US act since President Barack Obama's landmark announcement in December that Washington would seek to repair relations with Cuba and ease decades of economic pressure against the communist island.
"With the long overdue changes in diplomacy just ahead, it feels like the right time to come and hang," said keyboardist Dizzy Reed, who was previously with Guns 'N' Roses.
"It's been a life long dream of mine to experience Cuba, so much history and influence in this part of the world, and now that is about to happen." Reed said in a statement Tuesday announcing the visit.
Bassist Marco Mendoza, who grew up in Mexico and speaks Spanish, said that he looked forward to exploring the island's heritage, especially the Afro-Cuban culture.
Despite the prolonged political animosity between their countries, musicians have long served as a bridge and prominent Cuban artists have worked in the United States.
Audioslave, the hard rock band headed by former Soundgarden singer Chris Cornell, played before tens of thousands of people in Cuba in 2005. Audioslave's guitarist Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine is known for his left-wing politics, although he said that the concert was not aimed at making a direct political statement.
Superstar music couple Jay-Z and Beyonce visited Cuba in 2013, leading some conservatives to charge that they were violating a US ban on tourism to the island.
But the Treasury Department had approved the couple's trip, along with Audioslave's years earlier, as a cultural exchange. Obama has called for easing restrictions on US travel to Cuba.
Source: AFP