Random Thoughts and Random Video From Last Night’s Misfits Reunion Show in New Jersey
So Chino Wongeno and I hit up the Misfits reunion show in New Jersey last night. In addition to being my first opportunity to see the band’s three most important members share a stage since I was in diapers, it was also my first opportunity to be forced to use a cellphone condom so as to make this a “phone-free show.” Both were interesting experiences, which I shall relay to you now.
The Show
The show was fucking great! I mean, I’ll be honest… y’know how when you go see Iron Maiden, after the show you’re like, “Wow, I can’t believe Bruce Dickinson is still in such great shape at his age!”? Yeah well no one’s gonna say that about the 62-year-old Glenn Danzig. As another friend put it after the gig, “Danzig’s voice was shot at the beginning of the show, and he was completely out of gas by the end.” I… huff, huff… I… huff, huff… I mean… huff, huff, huff his… huff his in-between… huff stage… banter huff huff huff… though often huff huff… playful… huff was beyond huff huff winded. Like, to the point where I thought the dude might have a heart attack in the middle of the concert.
That being said, Danzig didn’t let these physical challenges stop him from giving it his all, as did his more-fit bandmates, Jerry Only and Doyle Wolfgang Von Frankenstein, and live members Dave Lombardo (credits not necessary) and Acey Slade (ex-Murderdolls, ex-Dope). And like I said, his stage banter suggested that Danzig was enjoying himself, and enjoying himself isn’t really the way we picture him these days. In fact, at one point, he actually did catch someone in the crowd filming the show on a phone, and his response — something to the effect of “Stop taking pictures or I’ll come down there and slit your throat” before chuckling “We don’t mind if you take a few pictures, but don’t make a fucking career out of it” — was downright calm compared to some of his past behavior.
In any case, the group also had some insane production value to back them up, which didn’t hurt.
The crowd certainly dug it — they were maybe the craziest I’ve ever seen at an arena show before. The moment the Misfits took the stage, these crazy motherfuckers surged forward with such force as to move the entire center of the barrier a couple of feet. Security basically balanced its time between trying to make sure said barrier didn’t break altogether and catching crowd surfers.
The setlist was perfect. What classic Misfits song did you wanna hear them play? Yeah they played that.
- “Death Comes Ripping”
- “I Turned Into a Martian”
- “20 Eyes”
- “Mommy, Can I Go Out and Kill Tonight?”
- “Vampira”
- “Devilock”
- “Where Eagles Dare”
- “London Dungeon”
- “Hybrid Moments”
- “Teenagers From Mars”
- “Earth A.D.”
- “Horror Business”
- “Hollywood Babylon”
- “Bullet”
- “Who Killed Marilyn?”
- “Green Hell”
- “Halloween”
- “Skulls”
- “Die, Die My Darling”
- “Astro Zombies”
- “Last Caress”
- “Some Kinda Hate”
- “She”
- “Violent World”
- “All Hell Breaks Loose”
- “Attitude”
So yeah A++++ WDBWA.
The Phone Condoms
Maybe this dates me, but it was actually quite nice having a show where people’s phones weren’t in the air the whole goddamn time! And the process of having someone lock and unlock your pouch thinger wasn’t as time consuming as you might fear. I didn’t even really notice that I didn’t have access to my phone until Chino went to the bathroom and I had nothing to do. Again, maybe this makes me the old man yelling at clouds (hey, it has to happen one of these days), but I wouldn’t object to other bands employing this tool. As a comedic side effect, no one could find their goddamn seats because no one had a flashlight.
But also, as we suspected would be the case, the phondoms were ultimately ineffective: as of this morning, there’s plenty of fan-filmed video from the show online. We spotted the occasional pouch torn open and left empty on the venue floor, so clearly, some people were able to get theirs open; for the sake of curiosity, I tried to open mine and had no luck. In any case, I’ve put all the video I’ve found so far below, in chronological order by song. Enjoy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZAz3Coxi2Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xIZ3tup9LA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiY6XzN5Zdk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-fQ95docms
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLUFHDl-amE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AghrJFkrdOM
