spugbrap’s blog

This is a follow-up to my review of the Danzig concert that I went to on Tuesday, October 23, 2007. I’ve been reading various reviews, news articles, and forum threads about the show, and decided to compile several of them into a list (in no particular order).

• REVIEW: evb: start of the Danzig tour last night in Baltimore
  • Elizabeth (evb) posted the first review that I found about the show. She felt that the girl (apparently Doyle’s wife) pole dancing during Gorgeous Frankenstein’s set was a pitiful attempt to distract from the band not being so great. I agree with that, except I actually liked the distraction. Hers is one of the only reviews I’ve seen that actually said much about the opening bands, which is kinda cool, since my friends and I arrived pretty late.
• REVIEW: RockN Roll Experience - Danzig 10/23/07
  • This is a thorough review of the Danzig show, with some excellent photos, and even a video of Glenn Danzig getting back up on the stage after having fallen off. There was a very detailed description of the events surrounding Glenn’s fall, and the impact it seemed to have on his attitude. They also described some events that happened after the show, including a roadie collecting stuff from the fans that stuck around the longest, and Glenn autographing one thing for each person. I was a bit bummed to read this, because we did stick around for a while, and all we got was a water bottle with a setlist wrapped around it. But, I didn’t really have anything to hand to a roadie to get autographed, anyways, so oh well.
• REVIEW: Clint: All the CONCERTS I’ve ever been to: Danzig. 20071023.
  • My friend Clint maintains this list of all the concerts he’s ever been to, including short write-ups about many of them. His review of the 10/23/2007 Danzig show conveys many of the same sentiments I expressed in my own; primarily, major disappointment about the complete lack of Misfits songs.
• NEWS: Baltimore Citypaper: Glenn Danzig Takes a Spill
  • This is the first item that came up in my Google Alert for “danzig misfits rams head”. Yes, I made a Google Alert, because I was curious to hear what other people had to say about the show. This article is where I found out about the RockN Roll Experience review (linked above), so thanks to Michael Byrne for that!
• NEWS: Washington Post: Danzig Isn’t Up to Playing the Fall Guy
  • While it’s sort of cool seeing this covered in a major newspaper, I think journalist Chris Richards sensationalized it a little bit too much. He spoke of “Watching that killer set climax with Complete. Danzig. Meltdown.” but I think that calling it a complete meltdown is quite a stretch. I was right there, and did not even realize he was being grumpy and yelling at people. I may have seen a little bit of that, but if I did, it was not significant enough to remember. Maybe it was more obvious to people that were closer to the stage (I was about 10 people back, and to the side), but I wouldn’t call it a complete meltdown, because it didn’t cause the whole show to grind to a halt. I’ve been to a good number of concerts, before, and it’s not that unusual for a singer to walk off the stage, and come back within a minute. Glenn may have been in a pissy mood, but he did keep playing, and I thoroughly enjoyed it when he sang songs from my favorite Danzig albums (the first 4 albums). I just wish he could have done at least one Misfits song. No offense intended to Chris Richards, though. I actually really enjoyed reading the article. :)

More to come as I read them. Feel free to post links to other articles you’ve read, in the comments section!

This is primarily meant to be a short review of the Danzig concert that I went to on Tuesday, October 23, 2007, at Rams Head Live in Baltimore, MD. I’m starting with a little background on how I got into Danzig and The Misfits, to put the review in context, but if you just want to see what I have to say about the show, you can skip ahead to the review.

Background:
I’ve been a Danzig fan since high school, when Glenn Danzig’s dark, sinister lyrics helped me along (sort of) through my depressed-teenager years. I saw him in concert 2-3 times during my high school and first couple years of college, and one of those (11/29/1994, with Godflesh and Type O Negative opening for Danzig) was among my favorite concerts, ever.

I loved Danzig’s first 3 albums (Danzig, Lucifuge, and How the Gods Kill), and liked the 4th (Danzig 4p), too. Danzig 5:Blackacidevil was very different, with a metal/”industrial” feel, but I grew to like that, too. I even liked Glenn Danzig’s solo, instrumental, “classical music”album, Black Aria.

However, I was very disappointed with Danzig 6:66 Satan’s Child, as well as Danzig 777: I Luciferi. Those two were not worth the CD-Rs I burned them on, in my opinion.

In 1996, I was introduced to The Misfits, but was not an instant fan. When I had an opportunity to go see them in concert, though, especially on Halloween, I took it. On the way there, we listened to the entire Misfits Box Set, and I learned many of the lyrics by following along in a big stack of printed-out lyrics that I’d found online before we left. That probably sounds pretty dorky, but it definitely helped me to appreciate the songs, more, and by the time we got there I was really psyched. I think I enjoyed the show(s)¹, but of course it wasn’t quite the same (as the albums), without Glenn Danzig.

Review:
About a month ago, my friend Clint forwarded an email to me, announcing an upcoming show:

Danzig “Playing the Music of the Misfits”
w/ Gorgeous Frankenstein (ft. Doyle of the Misfits)
Tuesday, October 23 Doors 7pm $25 ALL AGES Ram’s Head
[…]

I knew, immediately, that I had to go to that show! It seemed like one of those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities. As I said, I enjoyed the Misfits show(s) that I went to back in 1996, but wished I could have seen them back when Glenn Danzig, himself, was the lead singer. Unfortunately, Glenn disbanded the original Misfits in 1983, when I was only 5 years old, so I never had that opportunity.

So, I bought my ticket (~$30 including service charges and $2 fee to print the ticket), and went to the show on this past Tuesday night, at Rams Head Live in Baltimore, MD. The ticket site called the event, “Danzig, Playing classic Misfits and Danzig Songs“. I don’t live close to Baltimore, so I carpooled with my friends Clint, Carolyn, and Chris. It was about an hour and a half drive.

We arrived in time to see the last 5-6 songs from Gorgeous Frankenstein. They were okay, but I was there for only one reason, and I wasn’t really in the right mindset to give them a chance. You can’t really go wrong with a scantily-clad blonde chick writhing around on a stripper pole, though, so they automatically get some points for that. :)

When Danzig came on, we got closer to the stage, and waited anxiously for the Misfits songs we were promised. The set started with a bunch of songs I was not familiar with, and eventually (thankfully!) they started doing some songs from the first 4 Danzig albums. I kept waiting for the thing that I came for, though, Danzig playing the music of The Misfits.

After a while, I started yelling “Misfits” every time there was any sort of pause between songs. But, alas, the main set ended with NO MISFITS SONGS AT ALL! Surely they’d at least play a couple Misfits songs for the encore, though, right? WRONG! I did enjoy the encore, which consisted of Dirty Black Summer and She Rides, but I’d already seen Danzig perform those songs, before. I came for my once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see Danzig perform Misfits songs.

After the encores, some lights were turned on, but it wasn’t quite all of the lights. A lot of people left, but a lot of people, like me, who had come to see Danzig perform Misfits songs, just couldn’t believe it was over, and we stuck around. I don’t remember if it was before or after this point, but a bunch of people started chanting “Bullshit” over and over, for several minutes. I joined in, because I agreed with the sentiment. I also continued yelling “Misfits”, as loud as I could, until my voice finally gave out.

Eventually, more lights came on. Some of us still stuck around, hoping for any sort of explanation. We talked to a couple of security guys, and at one point, the bassist came out and talked to us a little bit. Apparently, Glenn fell off the stage, at some point, and dislocated his shoulder. This was the only information we were able to get. We were still confused about how that makes any difference at all, though, since he did still perform a full set of Danzig songs, pulling a little bit from almost all of their albums (I don’t think there was anything from Danzig 5). Do Misfits songs require more shoulder movement than Danzig songs?! I just don’t get it.

Someone ended up handing Chris a water bottle from the stage, which had a set list wrapped around it. I took a couple of blurry (but readable) pictures of it, with my phone. You can see those, along with a few other blurry photos from before and after the show, in the Photos section, below.

Overall, I did enjoy the show, but it was totally not what I went for. I’ve seen Danzig 2-3 times, before, and would not have expended the time/effort/money/etc. on this show, had I known that there would be no Misfits songs performed.

Photos: (from my flickr photo set, Danzig concert 10/23/2007)

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Footnotes:
¹ My friend, Chris, and I recently argued about how many Misfits shows we went to. I only remember one, on 10/31/1996 in Philadelphia. Chris insisted that we went to 2-3 shows in a row. I concede that we may have also gone to the one on 10/30/1996, in Baltimore.