It’s been hard to miss Joel Hoekstra on a concert stage over the past decade. He’s done a lot of road work playing shows with Trans-Siberian Orchestra, the Broadway musical Rock of Ages and Night Ranger. More recently, he’s been the newest addition to the Whitesnake lineup, sharing guitar duties with Reb Beach.

He’ll add another entry to his growing discography with the Oct. 16 release of Dying to Live, the debut album from his new project, Joel Hoekstra’s 13. We have the exclusive premiere of the lyric video for “Anymore,” which you can watch above.

Hoekstra told Ultimate Classic Rock in a recent interview that the roots of his new band's name can be traced back to the fact that he’s had a lot of important life events that have happened to him on the 13th of each month, and there are additional related threads that carry over into the themes on Dying to Live too.

“I was born on the 13th and I got married on the 13th -- it’s always been a number that’s appealed to me,” he says. “It has the lucky and unlucky connotations, and a lot of this album is about that type of stuff, just life and struggles within life. It just seemed appropriate for the title of the side project. I’ve had three solo albums out already that were all instrumental and focused more on my guitar playing. So this was an interesting thing for me.”

I wanted to write a record that just sounded like a band," he continues. "But the reality of it, it was like, Well, okay, I’m [still] doing all of the writing and producing this, so it seemed appropriate to give it a new side project name, so Joel Hoekstra’s 13 is essentially the name of my rock side project.”

Hoekstra lined up of a roster of veteran musicians. Russell Allen (Adrenaline Mob, Symphony X) and Jeff Scott Soto (Journey, Yngwie Malmsteen) handle vocals; Vinny Appice (Dio, Black Sabbath) plays drums; Tony Franklin (the Firm) is on bass; and Derek Sherinian (Dream Theater, Billy Idol) plays keyboards. "There’s lots of talent across the board," Hoekstra says.

The idea for the project is something that’s been brewing for quite a while in Hoekstra’s mind. “It started a while ago with me just deciding that I wanted to do something with a singer and have it just be a rock project," he explains. "So I came up with a lot of riffs and basically was just looking for the right guy to collaborate with. ... But it definitely came together as it went. It wasn’t like I sat down and had every detail mapped out.”

Hoekstra says "Anymore" is a representative track. "[It's] basically about gaining control over forces that have a negative impact on your life," he says. "Everyone has their vices or demons to do battle with. It's a straight-ahead, melodic hard rocker. As with many of the songs on Dying to Live, I came up with the chorus first, and the rest just fell into place."

Dying to Live is available for pre-order now at iTunes and Amazon. All pre-orders will receive an instant download of "Anymore."

See Whitesnake's 'Lovehunter' and Others on Our List of Nude Album Covers

More From Ultimate Classic Rock