Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
On way to Sunrise, Snider talks new tunes and Trump
At a point in his career when most musicians become risk-averse, Dee Snider is not afraid to challenge expectations — those of his veteran glammetal army of fans or a singular friend such as Donald Trump.
Such will be his mindset when the Twisted Sister vocalist and ringmaster takes the stage Sunday at Markham Park in Sunrise, his first live show since the release of “We Are the Ones,” a collection that abandons the metal bombast beloved by millions for a more polished, modern-rock sound.
Influenced by the Foo Fighters, with dashes of Imagine Dragons and Thirty Seconds to Mars, Snider says this is what he sounds like now, and we all need to get used to it. His concert in Markham Park, part of the pediatric cancer fundraiser called the Toys in the Sun Run, will not suck up to fans of his old band, he says.
“I’m being very open about this. This is a new band with new music. I’m not doing all Twisted music with a couple of new songs. I’m doing all new music with a couple of classics,” he says.
Just before the album came out, Snider performed a September show at Riot Fest in Chicago (on a bill with the Misfits, Rob Zombie and the Deftones), and more than held his own, according to a reviewer with music magazine Blurt.
But it is “We’re Not Gonna Take It” that has been getting most of the attention recently, with the new version providing the basis for a video shot by illusionist Criss Angel to dramatize the scourge of pediatric cancer. Angel’s 2-year-old son has been diagnosed with leukemia.
The video shows Snider, dressed in white, with a single accompanist playing a white piano, as the singer stalks a bare desert landscape and delivers “We’re Not Gonna Take It,” deliberately and forcefully, into the camera.
“These are children we’re talking about. Our future. I decided I’m going to get up there and be the angry voice, because the quiet voices haven’t been heard. I want to be the one that says, ‘Give me your f------ help now!’ ” Snider says, laughing.
It was the hit 1984 version of “We’re Not Gonna Take It” that got Snider crossways with Trump, a fellow Queens native who hosted the singer on his reality-TV show “Celebrity Apprentice” in 2013.
Snider allowed Trump to begin using “We’re Not Gonna Take It” on the campaign trail in 2015.
But several months later, Snider asked Trump to stop using the song, which he did that night. The conversation was quick and uncomplicated.
“When some of the things we never talked about over drinks and dinner started to come out, I called him and said, ‘Donald, I can’t have my song used in support of these things,’ ” Snider says. “And he said, ‘OK.’ ”