I really had no idea what was waiting for me inside the Quest yesterday afternoon as I stood alone in my green plaid shirt, aviator glasses, twins hat, and brown boots reading Ernest Hemmingway’s “The Snows of Kilimunjaro” and surrounded by hordes of teenagers clothed in black T-shirts, girl pants, eye-liner, and asymmetrical bangs/neon dye jobs/suburban-approved gel-hawks. I was definitely the only “old-dude” there an hour and a half early for the AFI/Dillinger Escape Plan/(indie rock band I pretty much ignored to go to the Merch Booth to get my DEP $35 pack of awesomeness: DVD, LP, 2 Stickers, 3 buttons, a poster, a T-shirt with a badass Unicorn on it, and a promo sampler). I tried to focus on the machismo in the book in front of me, but the teenage-anti-conformity-conformity and insecurity was almost too irresistible to ignore. Hell, that was me 10 years ago. Purple hair, Marilyn Manson shirts, big-ass pants, insecure as hell, and convinced I was going to show the world how fucking individual I was. One thing that threw me more than anything was how many homophobic references I heard while standing there. Guys calling each other faggots, and girls saying “that’s so gay.” I found that odd, because I was under the impression that the singer of AFI was gay. Anyway, kids spewing homophobic shit like that, which, as I will regale you with later, screamed ironic to no end. Incidentally, I thought Goth-punk was a safe haven for young homosexuals that the mainstream suburban culture rejects like nerds and rockers. Eh.

As I said, I pretty much ignored the opener. I gave them a shot and they reminded me of the Killers and nothing they were doing really harnessed my attention. And I should say right now that I’m not going to bother looking up the names of any of the band members. I have a lot to say, and if you really want to know these people’s names, go buy the albums or look up the bands on Allmusic.com. After the first band finished strangely dressed “roadies” started setting up for Dillinger Escape Plan. I said to Ames, “God I wonder if that’s them (DEP). That’s so fucking awesome when a band sets up their own shit. It’s real. None of this ‘behind the curtain, wait for an encore’ bullshit.”

Turns out it was them.

I have NEVER in my life seen a show (if you could call it a show. It was more like an atom bomb exploding over the course of 40 minutes) like that which Dillenger Escape Plan pummeled into the unsuspecting crowd of 13-year-old Goth-punks in Jack Skelington T-shirts at the Quest’s main room. This was more than a hardcore show. Like a cadre of Hessian Mercenary lunatics, they sliced through the air with their guitars and microphones as through they were decapitating invisible Viking-enemies that raped their mothers. At one point, the singer knocked over one of the guitarist’s marshal stacks, and the guitarist immediately jumped on top of the fallen cabinet and stomped on it as though it were a corpse that refused to die. After he was done with it, the singer grabbed it by it’s handle and dragged it to the center of the stage, only to kick it over and drag it back like some bloodied wrestler trying to escape the ring – only macho-man Randy Savage has a couple “Oh YEAHs” left in ‘em. But there was no mercy for the Marshall cabinet. It became victim of the Dillinger Escape Plan.

Rarely did any one member, save the drummer, stay in place for more than 15 seconds. Guitar stage-right, between slashes, sporadically launched off of amplifiers, risers, band members, and PA speakers – all the while, somehow magically playing to perfection riffs that would make even the hippest mathematician scratch his head. Stage left, the bassist (full bearded, 6 & ½ feet tall, no socks and low tops, and thigh-length cut-offs) lurched and lunged this way and that, and the guitarist (also cutoffs, no socks, and maybe penny-loafers?) was generally anchored though he made periodic pilgrimages to stage right. Each song was punctuated but alternating yellow lights that you’d expect to see during a “self-destruct countdown” in any of the ALIENS movies, and furious strobes that almost sent me into seizures. Stage diving, throwing bottles of water into the dumbfounded crowd, smashing into each other, and, more impressively, avoiding each other, for a full 40 minutes after which the singer announced “We’re Dillinger Escape Plan, thank you for your patience.” Indeed. I think the crowd was a little too sensitive to be punched in the face so many times. The final song of the set found the singer and guitarist atop the 10 foot PA stacks on either side of the stage. Both launching into the maelstrom of remaining band members below.

Their mind-boggling complicated time signature stop-on-a-dime switches rendered the audience unable to mosh, let along bring their hands together after any calm in the storm. Like this music was so insanely complex and heavy that people couldn’t even figure out how to move to it – luckily the band has got it down to a visceral science both on an unparalleled physical and technical level. Their collective energy would power a small Slovakian city for a year.

I guess you could liken it to doing your taxes while playing Olympic water polo without getting your calculator wet AND kicking the other teams ass to boot.

90% of the people were there for AFI. Actually, this is a good point to talk about the line-up. The opener, a quartet of skinny NYC indie rockers that sounded like a Diet version of the Killers, came out with their black hair and new-wave rock n roll to an expectedly un-enthusiastic crowd, followed by the other-worldly intensity of the Dillinger Escape Plan, followed by the Clear-Channel Production of AFI. It didn’t quite make sense. It was almost like going to a drive-in: first is a bad sequel like “102 Dalmatians,” followed by David Lynch’s “Mulholland Drive” only it’s been overdubbed in Togalog arranged into iambic pentameter, and then the new “American Pie.” Imagine being a 13-year-old at this drive in, and you could probably get a sense for the vibe of the show. Starting out with a tired idea, but done with a different twist, followed by something utterly mind-boggling, and then rounding it off with some written-for the masses pop fluff. Don’t get me wrong. All the acts were solid in their own respects. And I think that the reason I’m not writing the name of the first band down is that I just don’t have anything nice to say about them.

The sold-out crowd was clearly there for AFI. The began chanting once the roadies had set up the 4 marshal full-stacks and three risers at the front of the stage. Everything was all-white. AFI’s new album “December Underground” and it’s predecessor, the slickly produced Butch Vig produced “Sing the Sorrow” are both chock-full of rousing stadium-rock anthems, filled with big hits and huge choruses. And to think that AFI has transitioned from a skate-punk hardcore band into a Goth-pop-punk dynamo that is able to sell out a show after 15 years is pretty impressive.

I’d have to say the stark contrast of fashion presentation between DEP and AFI was almost more jarring than the musical differences. DEP’s DIY attitude from setting up their equipment themselves permeated their odd fashion sense (i.e. cutoffs, T-shirts, sockless penny loafers) – no gimmicks. AFI on the other hand, was pure 80’s hair-metal Glam. The band emerged in all white, to a “we will rock you” flavored opener with full audience participation. I have never seen such tight pants in all my life. The singer (and herein lies the irony), apart from the tightest pants of all, was sporting turquoise eye-shadow that would shame Elizabeth Taylor, and white fishnet armlets, and did I mention REALLY TIGHT PANTS. Really, there were points when I wished the singer played guitar so I wouldn’t have to look at his bullfrog any more. But OH the IRONY. This singer reminded me a bit of Mick Jagger, only more effeminate. Apart from strutting, there was quite a bit of bent-wrist, moving bags-out-of-eyes like Cher, and androgynous twisting and turning. At one point he said with a soft sincerity,” God it’s hot. Is it making my hair all poofy?”

Now I know this behavior doesn’t qualify him as gay or straight. However, given stereotypes and pop-cultural models like the “normal” Jack from will and grace, and even-more over the top cliches unfairly painting gays as limp-wristed, lisping, effeminate weirdoes in drag, you’d think the kids in line calling each other “faggots” and writing off lame shit as “gay” wouldn’t be so into the hero worship of this 30 year old Goth prince. I hope I’m not coming off as a homophobe in any way. To be honest, I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, had the little bastards in line not been spreading their ignorance around like creamy peanut butter on white toast. If you google “Is Davey Havok (singer) gay?” you’ll get oodles of forums telling you a little bit of everything. Funny thing is, you look at Bowie, Mick Jagger, Brian Molko, Freddie Mercury, and other rock stars, androgyny in the eyes of the vast public, tends to fall on the side of “straight” though evidence may indisputably point to the contrary.

The rest of the band was pretty as well, with the exception of the bassist who donned the signature rock n roll, “I’m going bald so I’ll shave my head” hairdo. Bear in mind, most of these dudes are in their 30s. Regardless, they were showmen and had the crowd singing along in full chorus to every song. And the singer, when he screamed, fucking rocked enough for you to forget about the eyeshadow.

Going into the show, there were songs that I wanted to hear such as “The Leaving Song pt 2” and the one about “Summer Rain,” which not only did they play right away, but the response from the crowd was absolutely electric. The Glam onstage and the rousing choruses made me think of hair metal bands of the 80’s. How these macho guys in lipstick and eyeshadow would sing huge choruses about “Girls Girls Girls” and urge their listeners to “Kum on Feel the Noize.” To be honest, I think it would be fun to be in a band where you had a room of 1,500 people as your backup singers, throwing their fists into the air. But where bands like Skid Row and Motley Crew sang about having fun, and sex and drugs and rock and roll – these new Goth-pop-punk bands sing about sorrow and emptiness and loneliness and all those other things that made bands like Bauhaus and the Cure so great in the 80s. I look at Good Charlotte as being the godfathers of what I like to refer to as Goth-Tarts. Where once there was Motley Crew, Quiet Riot, Ratt, and Firehouse, not there is Fall Out Boy, Alkaline Trio, Good Charlotte, and AFI. Blending the doom and gloom of Tim-Burton Goth with the dumb fun of pop-punk. AFI has taken it one step further by adding Glam of 80s hair metal in both style and big chords, and tuned up the Goth to the level of a watered-down hybrid of Joy Division and Slaughter so that kids can sing together as they cut themselves. Ok, that was below the belt. But it just seems so contradictory to me. Then again, the way so many small-town white-trash gay-hating thugs can get into a big hair ‘n’ make-up band like Motley Crew is a contradiction too, isn’t it? They’re so badass they can dress like women and still get 3,600 blow jobs from hot chicks a year. Maybe it’s the same kind of rationale with AFI.

I have to say it was fun being at a show with so much audience participation, but after about 5 anthems, you get kind of anthemed out. That, and I tend not to trust a 30 year old that is still singing emo. There are things in life to be happy about – like a sold out show of 1,500 screaming fans.

Anyway I appreciate what AFI is doing and was able to enjoy it to a point. In the end, any music with the spirit of 80’s hair metal, even if it is an evil spirit, is still FUN. Kind of like that earnest Skid Row anthem, “18 and Life to Go.” Unless you’re willing to travel to Botno North Dakota for Rockin’ the Hills, AFI is the closest you’re gonna get to the glory days of Hair Metal.

p.s.

Go see dillinger escape plan at any and all costs. I swear to God, it’s like a soundtrack to an HP Lovecraft novella – unlike anything you’ve ever heard or could ever describe