Eddie Gobbo from Something Is Waiting Shows off His Metal T-Shirt Collection
A metalhead’s t-shirt collection contains some of their most prized possessions. Sweaty, stained and torn, our shirts are chronicles of our lives, physical markers of a past time and place that we pridefully put on our bodies every day. They have a clear pecking order: there are those shirts you wear only when all the best ones are in the laundry, there are the absolute favorites you wear once every couple of weeks, and there are all the shirts in between, each with their own clear rank. To a metalhead, T-shirts are EVERYTHING.
Eddie Gobbo, frontman for Something Is Waiting (and a former MetalSucks columnist!), is the latest to share his most prized threads for our series My Metal T-Shirt Collection. Something Is Waiting’s music is described as a cross between noise rock and hair metal, “like Unsane covering Too Fast for Love, or Axl Rose frontingThe Jesus Lizard.“ The band’s sophomore album, Songs for the Sally Beauty Pavilion, is out March 29th on Learning Curve Records, and can be pre-ordered here. Before we let Eddie take it away, have a listen to Some Is Waiting’s latest single “Nikki Lane’s Neo Nashville Airbnb” below (courtesy of Kerrang!), or let it soothe your ears while you peruse Eddie’s t-shirt in envy.
Metal Up Your Armpit
We’ll start with a couple common Metallica shirts. The left, known as the “Doris” shirt, is the second band shirt I ever owned. Saw it for the first time in “Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitters Dead” and had to have it. You’ll notice it’s sleeveless. This was out of necessity. When I was a kid I used to wear Right Guard spray-on deodorant. After using it for about a decade, I realized that sweating while RIGHTED GUARDed caused a residue under your arms that would harden. The underarms of your shirts would become white and rock hard. Yes, it took me 10 years to figure this out. The “Sad But True” shirt on the right was an ave atque vale gift from my friend who was leaving Chicago. The origin of the shirt itself though is Flint, MI. Its original owner was the guitarist of King 810.
When The Walking Dead Was a Documentary
My favorite band shirt of all time courtsey of one of the baddest bands ever. And I’ve got two of em! The first, the shortsleeve, was a Christmas gift from my then girlfriend. Loved it! Six months later, she got me the longsleeve version for my Birthday. Loved it again! Yes, you can receive the same gift twice and love it both times! This shirt not only takes me back to a time when White Zombie and Pantera roamed and ruled the Earth, but it personally represents that I am indeed able to keep a woman in my life for longer than 6 months.
Tell The World My Story
Once upon a time, this Chaos AD tour shirt was given to me by some guy to “hang on to” cus he didn’t want his “ole lady finding it.” Never saw him again. Never once met the ole lady. Heard there maybe wasn’t even an ole lady. Later, Dude! As for this Against era “IRevolt” shirt: If you saw me wearing this in my 20’s, it meant game on. It was my drinking shirt. I wanted my own version of “TCB” and I lazily concluded this would do.
ICTees
Two perfect shirts for when the circus comes to town and you play the lead clown. There’s only one better KORN shirt than this; the one where the scarecrow is dead and laying against a barbed wire fence. You’ll have to look that one up on your own time. The right is not a band shirt actually. It’s a wrestling shirt. Doink the Clown, 1994. This shirt is currently MISSING! Thanks, bands I’ve let stay at my house.
Orange You Glad I’m Showing You These Shirts?
Just one more wrestling shirt. ECW Taz shirt circa 1995. I literally wear this shirt every day. I use it as a nightgown. I never wash it. As for the Poison one; I’ve always worship 80’s hair metal, and have been shit on for years by TRUE Metal fans (you know, the ones that listened to Weezer and Bright Eyes 5 years ago) for doing so. I end up fighting them, they end up crying, then I’M the asshole. A family friend took me to this concert when I was 17, got me wasted, and I had the time of my life. We’ve seen Poison together about 14 times since then, but this one meant the most. This was well before Rock of Love, or any nostalgia resurgence. We were in a half full pavilion on a Tuesday night for this one, but the mid-40’s ragers had that place lit! Learned a great life lesson at this show; Hang out with older people and you’ll never grow old.
Jersey? Sure.
Got an Oakland Raider, LA Laker, or San Antonio Spur game coming up?
I’m Going To Need You To Turn That Shirt Inside Out, Son.
Ever just wake up and feel like offending a motherfucker for no reason whatsoever? These three. The Michael Monroe “Rock Like Fuck” shirt circa 1985 I place as the first shirt ever to have the word “Fuck” on it. You remember this 90’s theme park Marilyn Manson staple, don’t you? The Blood Guts and Pussy Dwarves shirt once got me in trouble in an airport.
Confederacy For Dum Dums
Ok, this is one of those shirts you gotta keep chained to a radiator. Yes, I know what you’re thinking, and I agree with you; for some reason all strippers are racist. No idea where it came from, but I actually have the suedo-matching trucker cap.
Consider the Alternative
Got to soften things up for a date with a Winona Ryder-esc babe? You got a Silverchair 3/4 sleeve baseball tee from the Neon Ballroom tour. I forgot I had this INXS shirt, but I’m throwing it out after this article. It’s one of the worst shirts I’ve ever felt. Feels like a shirtless Matt Damon in Singles screenprinted in his apartment. Speaking of which, Yatzee! Citizen Dick shirt!
With Liberty, and One Size Fits All
When someone asks you what size shirt you are, say “All of ’em” and see what happens. I assume this Randy Rhodes Tribute shirt was made for a 9 year old, and this Ozzy bite’s head off bat shirt is basically a bedsheet.
I Learned It From Watching Kriss Kross
Bootleg Tees. Horrifying, but after seeing a $35 price tag on a shirt in a venue, that $10 shirt sold by the guy in a wheel chair in the parking lot starts looking pretty good. The funny thing abut Bootleg tees; Usually one side is badass, and the other side is mortifying. No clue why, but they’re all like that. Why wouldn’t they just print the one side that’s good and quit while they’re ahead? I can’t even show you the fronts of these Anthrax and Korn/Rob Zombie tour shirts. They’re THAT bad. BUT the backs rule. I spent a lot of time in High School wearing these shirts with my arms crossed. I ONCE even took a risk and wore the Anthrax shirt backwards with an unbuttoned flannel. Got called out for it.
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