CRAZIEST CONCERT EVER?
Aural assault by Pearl Jam/Ministry among contenders
Ask boomers about the craziest Pittsburgh show ever and they might say ZZ Top/Aerosmith at Three Rivers Stadium. Ask Gen X-ers and they might recall Aug. 16, 1992, when Pearl Jam killed it in the second slot and when Ministry emerged from the darkness. It didn’t seem like all of us were getting out alive.
Al Jourgensen, with the skull perched on his mic stand, reigned over pure hostile insanity. The Chicago industrial metal pioneers didn’t thrive for long before times changed and substances got the best of Jourgensen. Fast forward to 2022 and Ministry is delivering performances that are really no less intense, as witnessed at Stage AE on Friday. Playing behind a steel fence (no barbed wire), the 62-year-old frontman and his sextet assaulted us with sound, drawing from the late ’80s/early ’90s albums “The Land of Rape and Honey,” “The Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Taste” and “Psalm 69.” A circle pit was generated, for old times’ sake, but clearly the audience is older, tamer and smaller (about 700 strong), making it a much different experience. The gates stayed up until Ministry encored with new songs “Red Alert” and “Good Trouble” that would have given security the same kind of headaches 30 years ago.
• Speaking of headaches, before Ministry came on, sludge-metal masters Melvins made sure our brain cells were rejiggered, if that’s a thing. It sure felt like it. King Buzzo, in his cloak, held court, unleashing painful waves of distortion amid the sonic chaos of Dale Crover and Steven Shane McDonald.
• Grushecky and the Houserockers are about to head east for a different slice of heaven: The Light of Day Winterfest in New Jersey. The event was established 22 years ago to raise money and awareness to defeat Parkinson’s disease and its related illnesses and has grown exponentially since then. The Houserockers will play the hallowed ground of The Stone Pony on March 11 and then, on March 12, join Bob’s Birthday Bash at the Count Basie Center for the Arts with Willie Nile, Jesse Malin and, if the past is prologue, surprise guest Bruce Springsteen. Bob is Jersey artist manager Bob Benjamin, the inspiration for Light of Day, which began on his 40th birthday after he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s.
• One of the reactions to my Tool review last week was an Instagram comment from shay, saying, “I chose not to go this tour because of the gestapo security situation that MJK [Maynard James Keenan] promotes at Tool shows. It was so distracting last show…
We were on the floor. And MJK was ratting people out to security for smoking [weed] singing it to alert them.” At PPG Paints Arena, there were warnings posted to curb your cellphone and ushers enforcing it by ejecting violators after illuminating them with flashlights. For the last song, “Invincible,” when Keenan allowed fans to raise their “stupid cellphones” and take photos, Keenan ripped into a fan down front for having his flashlight on. He told that poor guy that his 7-year-old is better at using a phone.
• I don’t like the tension that these clampdown concert rules create — seeing ushers playing cop all over the place — but it is kind of nice to watch a show without the distraction of people making their terrible concert videos. It does make everyone more present in the moment, which is the intent. The best approach I’ve seen is for the artist to tell the crowd they can hold up their phones all they want for, like, the third or fourth song, and then put them away. British blues-rocker Jake Bugg did that at the Three Rivers Arts Festival a few years back.
• Not many artists like to pick little fights with crowd members the way Keenan did, but among those I recall doing it in Pittsburgh are Jeff Tweedy, Ryan Adams, Michael Stipe and Phil Anselmo. Let me know
if you can think of others.
• For its February In Memoriam page, Goldmine, the magazine of music collectors, paid tribute to the late Jerry Weber, creator of Jerry’s Records, by reaching out to another Pittsburgh legend, Joe Grushecky. The Houserocker recalled taking some friends from Switzerland to Jerry’s when they visited Pittsburgh. “They thought they had died and gone to heaven and ended up purchasing several hundred dollars worth of vinyl, all the while marveling at Jerry’s willingness to share his time and insights. He will be missed,” Grushecky said.
Late last fall, I had the good fortune of seeing Jerry out for a walk with his cane, while driving down McClure Street in Swissvale. We had a nice time catching up, and he reminded me to come get the copy of “Secret Treaties” he put aside for me (can’t find mine). Along with the store, his warehouse and the many records I bought from him — going all the way back to the Record Graveyard — I’ll always have McClure Street to remember that beautiful man.
• Pittsburgh indie-rockers Murder for Girls announced on Twitter last week that a new album, “Nine Stories,” is coming soon. “This is our most creative, most mature, most unified album yet, and the first one on vinyl,” the band noted.
• One of the best things that came out of interviewing talented Pittsburgh singersongwriter-guitarist Steve Seel a few weeks ago was his suggestion to check out Rick Beato’s YouTube channel. The Atlanta-based musician-producer, who has a master’s degree in jazz studies from the New England Conservatory of Music and has worked with such artists as Parmalee and Shinedown (I know, not too impressive), breaks down songs in segments called “What Makes This Song Great.” Not only is he a fantastic player with a ridiculous knowledge of music — he got to the bottom of Tool’s time signature changes — he’s a lot of fun to watch and has a joyful spirit about all sorts of music. It’s been a revelation and an education; however, I did try to watch one of his Music Theory lectures and couldn’t make it past the circle of fifths.
• By the way, Seel, the guitarist for such bands as A.T.S., Smokin’ Section and R.E.M. tribute band The Reckoning, has released “Coelum,” the second in his trilogy of albums this winter. This is the one that rocks a little harder.
• Chevy Woods, of Taylor Gang fame, goes hard on “Detroit,“an old- school banger and the second single from “Big Woods Season,” a new project dropping later this month. Shout-out to Aaron Rodgers on there. It follows ”Perfect Sex No Percocets,” which rides a more chill Wiz vibe.
• Masks will not be required at Heinz Hall for the Alice Cooper show on March 20, but the vaccine mandate at the venue is effective through March 31. I’m not going to make an “effective” joke.
• A handful of Pittsburgh artists will be in Johnstown July 29-20 for The Flood City Music Festival. The lineup is The Spin Doctors, Railroad Earth. Big Something, Brandon “Taz” Neiderauer, Ally Venable Band, Karina Rykman, Vanessa Collier, The Fritz, Buffalo Rose, Habatat, Shelf Life String Band, Silver Screen, Kevin Dale and The Rusty Shackles.
• Singer-songwriter Regina Spektor, responding to a tweet by writer Yair Rosenberg condemning the removal of Russian films from the Glasgow Film Festival: “Completely agree! Artists need to communicate/send messages from their lands. In dictatorships that’s the only thing that can reach the outside world. Stop letting Russian oligarchs invest billions into tech/realestate. Stop letting them buy the world. Don’t shut up the artists.”
• The newspapers were on strike and social media didn’t exist, so there was no local coverage of that Lollapalooza ’92 — except for the item I got to write for the one-sheet PG Newsfax. Yes, it was faxed to people. Editor John Craig’s idea. Not sure how I summed that all up in one sentence.