When I was a kid, the hottest band in the world (and my absolute favorite) was KISS. When I was five I got my first album, it was KISS Rock and Roll Over. When I was seven I received the KISS dolls for a First Communion gift... ironic I know. Later I wore out my KISS Alive Two record and watched KISS meets the Phantom of the Park about 53 times too may. But I never saw them in concert. Every time they did their "final" tour, I was too broke to go. Eventually about 20 years ago, I had the money but it just didn't seem the same going to see 65 year old guys dressed up in makeup and breathing fire. I was dumb. I should have gone.
For me, I imagined the second best thing would be to see GWAR. Last Thursday, I was able to scratch that off my bucket list. oh my god I am so happy I did.
Ok let's get this out of the way right now. You all know I hate spoilers but... spoiler alert... GWAR IS NOT BEING SERIOUS! They are comedians/performance artists. Their entire shtick is pure, unadulterated and brilliant satire. They are not Satan worshipers. They are not from outer space. They do not really shoot blood from every orifice in their bodies.
To be honest, perhaps my favorite part of the show was looking around trying to see if anyone in the audience thought this was all serious. I'd like to think no one did. But I do know that in the real world, MANY people think this over the top farce is serious... and dangerous. For years when talking heads on TV talked about the evils of Heavy Metal, they always seemed to use GWAR as the cherry on top. They would talk about how Heavy Metal would rot your brain, make you do drugs and of course worship Satan. They would show a few isolated lyrics form one band, show a couple of still images and then say something dramatic like... "and the there's GWAR." They would then show GWAR dressed in their ridiculous costumes while performing over the top gory stunts on stage... and they would act like it was real! It still happens today. After the first 20 seconds of the show, it made me question the intelligence of any person who didn't immediately get this was a complete joke. Now it is a dirty, disgusting and ridiculous joke, but it is a joke nonetheless. You can say you don't appreciate the humor, but for god's sake at least recognize it is in fact a joke.
OK so on to the show. It opened with ominous music and a voice over of a narrator saying "Throughout the history of planet earth one eternal truth has remained... eternally true. Might makes right! Those who hold the power make the laws control nations and rule the world..." Then they talk about shadow super powers running the word from smoke filled board rooms. They go on to say that there is an artifact that can save the world. It is the key to world domination. And what is this awesomely powerful object... its a dinosaur egg of course. And then for the entire show the dinosaur grows up and become super powerful. All the while some Sleestak looking mothertrucker tries to steal it for his own evil purpose. Remember when I said they were comedians.
In between scenes with the baby dinosaur (yes... I just wrote that) the band does play some pretty hardcore heavy metal with some pretty absurd lyrics. Just take a look at some of the song titles and I think you'll get a flavor of the evening:
Sick of You Immortal Corrupter Meat Sandwich Ham on the Bone Maggots Slaughterama Horror of Yig The Salaminizer Bring Back the Bomb Surf of Syn Let Us Slay If You Want Blood (You've Got It) Nitro Burning Funny Bong Gor-Gor (Also the name of the baby dinosaur) Tormentor
When they weren't protecting or chasing around that baby dinosaur, they were bringing out ridiculous caricatures of famous people and politicians and hitting them with gigantic fake swords that always resulted in the character spewing a fire hose of "blood" onto the crowd. People in the crowd actually had on full rain ponchos in order to avoid being covered in the fake blood. While these people wanted to avoid it, about 2/3 of the crowd reveled in the red goo.
If you have ever seen a metal show, the uniform of 99% of the crowd is a black t-shirt and jeans. But not at GWAR. You see, people want to remember their experience and prove they were there so white t-shirts are wildly popular at these shows. When I was first looking at the merch, I was surprised there were so many white shirts for sale. But once the roadie connected the first hose to the first "victim" I knew why they were so popular. As we were walking out of the show, anyone close to the stage who once had a white shirt was now wearing red. They all looked like they were stunt doubles in the pig's blood scene from Carrie. I mean people literally looked like they had taken a shower in Hawaiian Punch fruit punch. I did everything I could not to accidentally bump into anyone.
All in all I am so happy I got to witness these brilliant comedians do their thing. I don't think I need to see them again but I was in awe of what I saw. The only way I would see them again is if I were doing what my friend did... take a newbie to see the show. Now it is definitely not for everyone but if you can handle over the top cartoon-like gore and some extremely dark satire, GWAR is the show for you.
