Last Saturday, I got to see Michale Graves with my friends Misfitboy and Thera at Peabody’s in Cleveland. As usual, I shot lots of video. First of all, you’ll see a fantastic young death metal band Silver Skull perform on the Pirate’s Cove stage; then you’ll see the great Pittsburgh punk band The Cheats; and finally, you’ll see Michale Graves with his new sweet lineup. Enjoy.

I shot these clips on three different devices . . . a GoPro Hero2, a Nikon CoolPix, and my Droid X2 phone. The sound quality varies among the different clips because of this.

It was my second show in the past week at Stage AE, and the crowd was completely different than the Megadeth/Rob Zombie one. I’ve seen Primus/Les Claypool many, many times, and the performance was fantastic as always. I was surprised to hear “Wynona” again — they surprised me with that song in the encore of their show here last October — but there were no big surprises with any of the other songs they played. One of the things I did like is that Les played “Over the Falls” on his Michael Kelly Bayou 4 Resonator Bass, as opposed to the upright he normally uses.

The opening bands were fantastic! The Dead Kenny G’s (the first two pictures below) went on first, and sounded great. The saxophonist, Skerik, is always amazing, and it was a crazy beautiful creative sound experience. I had never heard of the next band, Gogol Bordello. Wow, were they a lot of fun, with amazing energy and presence. They’re described as Gypsy Punk, which is completely fitting. They threw an amazing party. I’m now a fan.

Again, video and photos I took on my point-and-shoot.

On May 16, 2012, I was one of those lucky people to get to go see the Megadeth – Rob Zombie show in Pittsburgh. It’s the first time that I’ve been to the outdoor stage at Stage AE (I went to see Primus on their indoor stage last October). While I’ve seen Rob Zombie countless times — both as White Zombie and Rob Zombie — this is the first time I’ve seen Megadeth, and I’m glad I did.

The only weak part of the show was the opening band, Lacuna Coil. I couldn’t have cared less about them, and their music was very bland. Then Dave Mustaine brought up the girl who sings for a duet rendition of Et Tu Le Monde, which would have been much better without her.

Other than that, the show rocked. I shot videos on my point-and-shoot camera, and also took a ton of pictures. Enjoy.

I just posted this video to Youtube — Michale Graves performing his song “Saturday Night.” I shot it on my tiny point-and-shoot camera when I saw his show last year in Cleveland. One of my favorite artists!

Let me tell you, I’m a big Misfits fan. Or at least I was, up until today.

Their new album came out today, and since I could get it at Best Buy for 8 bucks with a coupon, I figured I’d go out on a limb. I haven’t really liked anything they’ve done since Michale Graves left the band, and Jerry Only resorted to taking over vocal duties. Let me tell you this: Jerry Only is a mediocre bassist at best, but his bass skills are light years ahead of his vocal abilities.

And that really sticks out on “Devil’s Rain.” He belts out forgettable choruses sounding like he’s drunk and trying to sound like Graves and Danzig at the same time.

The songwriting is abysmal. The one time I listened through the album, there was no point at all where I thought, “Hey, this sounds cool.” It was bland, uninspired, and forced.

On Facebook, I commented on my disappointment with the album, posting it on the official Misfits page. There were many others who did the same. Shortly thereafter, my comment mysteriously disappeared. So did the other negative ones. And they’ve blocked me from interacting on their Facebook page at all now.

This really upsets me. If they’re that paranoid about someone seeing negative reviews of their albums, then that’s a sure sign that they realize their lack of listenable material. They’re getting old — the Misfits are essentially a nostalgia act at this point — and know that the band’s days are numbered.

How sad. Gone are the glory days with the likes of Glenn Danzig, Doyle, Michale Graves, and Chud. Now all we have is Jerry Only desperately clinging onto the corpse of a band that died in 2000.

You’re looking at a fan of everything the Misfits did until 2000. I am now sickened and saddened by post-2000 Misfits, and will never make an effort to see one of their shows or buy any more albums (unless by some miracle we see a reunion of Graves, Doyle, Chud and Only — or even something with Danzig, as weird as that would be).

RIP Misfits.

Every once in a while, I get time to write some new songs and record some stuff. As with most of the songs I write, this new one is the product of just making it up as I go along, having no real plan for how it should turn out.

Holovin Mavers

You can download this on the music page.

Of all the bands I’ve gone out to see throughout my life — starting with the Pittsburgh stop of They Might Be Giants’ Apollo 18 tour when I was 15 — Phish is the most wonderful, consistent group I’ve seen. Even if you just listen to any of their readily-available live recordings, you’ll hear that they strive to stretch the bounds of their music and deliver new experiences to their audience. And to rock.

Last night was a fantastic Phish show. The highlights for me were “Sample in a Jar,” “Mike’s Song” segued into “Weekapaug Groove,” “Character Zero,” and “The Squirming Coil” as their encore/closer. I always get chills when Page pounds out the last bars of that one.

I took all these pictures on my Blackberry Storm, so the quality sucks on some of them.

The crowd was thick, hot, and impatient. Bottlenecks going in, and worse bottlenecks trying to get out afterward.

The weatherman called for scattered thunderstorms, but it never rained until well after the show. While I’m glad that we didn’t get dumped on while Phish played, I was actually praying for the rains to come and alleviate the humidity. I was coated in sweat the whole time.

Phish has the best light show. Period. Chris Kuroda is a brilliant lighting designer, and is as much a part of the band as any of the four playing on stage.

Balloon Guy. This hippie kept running through the crowd with ornate balloon animals, and seemed to really like running around the area we were standing in.

For the better part of a decade now, I’ve been working on a series of songs based on Zombi 2. There are several of these written and recorded in many forms, but I’m not finished yet.

This is a song about Susan. I originally wrote it faster and heavier, but was never really happy with the arrangement and my vocals. It kinda sucks. So I reworked the whole song, and even made a little video to go along with it that follows the story.

. . . which is terrible for his friends, family, and fans. But I didn’t care for any of his music, so I’m not that concerned.

I feel bad that I haven’t posted anything in several days, so to try to appease your wrath, I bring you my rendition of the Gordon Lightfoot song. I sing/play everything in the song.

Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald