Static-X

Freaks on Parade 8/12/22

It is rare that I want to see every band on the bill, especially when four bands are playing. This was that rare instance. Bob, Kyle and I decided that making the drive up to Irvine on a Friday was a much better option than doing the hometown show in Chula Vista on a Sunday. This allowed us to get loose and enjoy ourselves a little more than we would have on a “school night.” None of us had ever been to the Fivepoint Amphitheatre that was built in 2018 to replace the Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre I had previously seen a handful of shows at. Capacity is only 11,730 so even though our seats were near the back we still did not seem that far back. That of course did not stop me from trying to weasel our way into better seats but more on that later….

The aptly labeled “Freaks on Parade” tour started with Powerman 5000. There was a time when I really liked this band but the only remnant left from that band is Rob Zombie’s little brother Spider One. I guess if there is only going to be one member of the original band left the singer is the preferable person since actual instruments are easier to approximate than the vocals. They were alright but things just have not been the same since everyone else left. All members jumping up and down in unison just came across as very contrived. I still enjoyed it but that was mostly due to the setlist they chose. We did get away with sitting in the best seats in our section thanks to my sweet talking the security guard so that was a bonus too.

SETLIST: Footsteps and Voices, Nobody’s Real, Invade, Destroy, Repeat, Horror Show/Seven Nation Army, Bombshell, Supernova Goes Pop, When Worlds Collide

“Static-X” was the last band I saw before the pandemic lockdown. I put “Static-X” in quotation marks because this of course was without Wayne Static who passed back in 2014. Instead, this was the original lineup with a character named “Xero” filling in for Wayne. They did a damn good impression last time and this time was just as good if not better. Of course it did not hurt that the entire setlist with the exception of “Cold” was taken from the Wisconsin Death Trip album. We tried to sneak into better seats before they came on but failed as security at this amphitheater is tighter than most.

SETLIST: Bled For Days, Wisconsin Death Trip, Sweat of the Bud, Love Dump, Cold, I’m With Stupid, Push It

Though both Mudvayne and I were at Rockfest 2000 this was before they were on my radar so I really only saw them once over 20 years ago at Ozzfest 2001. They put on a pretty fierce show back then so I was excited to see if they could match that level of performance after all this time. They did in spades. Chad Gray and company never broke character and took us into the darkness, both proverbially and literally. The songs held up nicely and the band played tight yet loose, which produced a very natural sound for such a brutal brand of music. Welcome back!

SETLIST: Dig, Under My Skin, -1, Severed, Death Blooms, Internal Primates Forever, Determined, Not Falling, Nothing to Gein, Dull Boy, World So Cold, Happy?

I was no phantom stranger to seeing one Mr. Rob Zombie as I was privileged enough to see White Zombie three times back in the day and Rob Zombie solo four times before this but I had not seen Zombie since Aftershock 2019. Though I miss White Zombie I love seeing him because he has both John 5 and Ginger Fish so it is essentially like seeing Marilyn Manson at his peak with a different singer. Rob Zombie himself has always been a mixed bag in the previous times seeing him but on this particular night he sounded great. Overall, the sound from where we were was not great but the atmosphere created by the full moon and good company more than made up for it. At one point they played a good portion of AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck” and convinced all of us in the crowd that we were going to be treated to the whole thing but then they ripped into “Thunder Kiss ’65.” You got us good fucker!

SETLIST: The Triumph of King Freak (A Crypt of Preservation and Superstition), Superbeast, Meet the Creeper, Shake Your Ass-Smoke Your Grass, Living Dead Girl, More Human Than Human, Scum of the Earth, Dead City Radio and the New Gods of Supertown, Never Gonna Stop (The Red, Red Kroovy), Well, Everybody’s Fucking in a U.F.O., House of 1000 Corpses, Thunder Kiss ’65/ Blitzkrieg Bop, We’re An American Band, Shadow of the Cemetary Man, Dragula

Static-X 3/12/20

I was fortunate enough to see Static-X five times in the early part of their career but the possibility of seeing them again live disappeared when Wayne Static passed away on November 1, 2014. Then in 2019 it was announced that the original members minus Wayne were getting together with a masked mystery singer/guitarist to celebrate the 20^th anniversary of Wisconsin Death Trip in honor of Wayne. I was conflicted about seeing this since Wayne was so unique and I was able to see the real thing so many times but then I remembered how great it was to hear STP songs live again with singers other than Scott Weiland. None of my feelings mattered since there were no San Diego dates…until the tour resumed in 2020 with San Diego as the first date.

When I started thinking about how much I love Wisconsin Death Trip and received an email from Brick By Brick announcing there were less than 50 tickets left something finally clicked in my brain and I came around. Unfortunately this being on a Thursday did not make it very easy to find anyone else willing to accompany me so I ended up going alone.

Static-X aside this was an interesting time because I had not had any weed or alcohol in over 30 days after taking a self-imposed break and because Coronavirus panic was taking hold of the world. Bands started cancelling shows and elected officials were putting orders in place to prevent gatherings of more than 250 people, then 50 people and finally 10 people. This show was in question up to the last hours before showtime. Ultimately these gathering restrictions went into place midnight of this night, making this the last show I was going to be able to attend for the foreseeable future.

After returning to my gummy taking ways I arrived at Brick By Brick with exactly enough time to grab a tall boy Modelo and situate myself at the familiar back end of the floor area before Static-X came out. The mystery man, who was later revealed to be Edsel Dope, wore a semi-creepy mask that has X’s through the eyes and on the forehead and must have not had enough time to re-create Wayne’s famous hairdo since he wore a hoodie the whole time. He did an admirable job filling in for Wayne and I thought it was pretty cool of “Xer0” to address the crowd basically saying, “I am not trying to replace anyone. I was friends with Wayne and love these songs as much as you guys so I’m thankful that you are allowing me to be a part of bringing these songs back to life for all of us to enjoy.”

It took all of two songs for them to get to the title track of Wisconsin Death Trip for me to feel really great about my decision to attend. After a fantastic “The Trance is the Motion” they hit the highlight reel of rippers from Machine then hot selections from the rest of the catalog before coming back around to “I’m With Stupid” and “Push It” and then they were gone. All in all the show was badass but they need to fire the sound guy because the performance was great but the actual sound was inconsistent.

Next up in the Static-X orbit is Project Regeneration, which will be new music featuring Wayne’s voice from recordings before his death set to be released later in 2020.

SETLIST: Bled for Days, Wisconsin Death Trip, Sweat of the Bud, Love Dump. I Am, Otsegolation, The Trance is the Motion, Get to the Gone, Black and White, This Is Not, Destroy All, Start a War, Behemoth, Cold, I’m With Stupid, Push It

Static-X 9/1/04

There is a Chili’s in the parking lot of the Sports Arena that neighbors Soma. Marvin and I decided to stop in to have some beers before the show since Soma is an all ages venue. We did not have tickets yet but checked with the box office earlier and they were far from sold out. As we were drinking Marvin said wouldn’t it be funny if we just snuck in. As more beers went down our throat we convinced ourselves that this would be a great idea. What’s the worst that could happen kind of scenario? As previously stated Soma is not a large venue. You can walk around the building and see where the bands are going in (not terribly hard to spot a tour bus). Anyway we approached the back door and there was only one guy “watching” it. We just put on our most confident faces and walked in like we owned the place. No problem. Once inside though we were a little lost and tried making a left turn. A guy stopped us and said “oh you want to go that way” and pointed us to the floor. I don’t know if this person knew what was going on but if he did he just did not give a fuck. Static X ripped as usual. Another funny moment was when the drummer threw a drumstick out into the crowd and I solidly got a hand on it. Someone else got a hand on it too but I used all of my strength to try to wrangle it from this other person until I realized it was Marvin. We laughed and I kept the drum stick. It would be less than six months from this show that the guitarist Tripp Eisen would be kicked out of the band for sexual assault charges. I asked someone inside for their ticket stub which is how I ended up with one.

Static-X 11/25/03

Static-X was touring for the excellent album Shadow Zone that had just come out less than two months before this show. Marcus and I went to this one with his brother and you guessed it – were drinking. Maybe that is why I don’t remember much from this show other than it rocked and the guys in Static-X were taking shots on the stage.

The Family Values Tour 11/16/01

I had seen each of these bands before but Lucinda had not. It was just her and I at this show and we were able to get very good seats on the left side of the stage. Static-X had just released their second album Machine about six months before this show and had the material pretty polished by the time they rolled into Portland. Staind was touring behind their recently released album Break the Cycle. Staind is an interesting band to watch live because Aaron Lewis doesn’t move around the stage very quickly, no matter how heavy the song is. They did rock though. Linkin Park was also there still promoting their first album and played it almost in its entirety. Finally came the real reason we spent our Friday night at the concert, Stone Temple Pilots. They were touring for their severely underrated album Shangri-La Dee Da. Scott Weiland appeared to be drunk at this show but the band nonetheless put on a very great entertaining show. Scott thanked the people who had drinks with him at the strip club Mary’s the prior evening. During “Hollywood Bitch” they had a very slutty looking lady come dance around on stage only to reveal at the end of the song that it was actually a man. They had Chester from Linkin Park come sing a song with them at some point. The highlight was when Weiland started to rant about how rock n’ roll was stolen from all the black jazz musicians. He jumped out into the crowd and walked right through it to the very back of the arena all while ranting. The funny thing is that he didn’t have any security near him but nobody touched him. I think everyone was a little scared of the guy. The other thing that stands out in my mind is a moment when they left the stage. Moments later the whole stage revolved 180 degrees and there they were sitting on couches playing an acoustic version of the Beatles “Revolution.” Magical.

Ozzfest 8/24/00

Main Stage: Ozzy Osbourne, Pantera, Godsmack, Static-X, Incubus, Methods of Mayhem, P.O.D., Queens of the Stone Age

Second Stage: Soulfly, Kittie, Disturbed, Taproot, Reveille, Primer 55, Black Label Society

So here I am again returning to the Gorge with my honey Lucinda for some good old rock/metal. Friends Mark and Claude joined us. Taproot was touring for their debut album Gift and the first band up that we were interested in seeing. They seemed pretty polished to be playing on the second stage. Disturbed played next. There was a buzz around them and they did not disappoint. They had just released The Sickness in March and played the finer moments of the album in their set. I remember wanting to watch Soulfly but the distance between the second and main stages at the Gorge is sometimes too great for the time allowed between bands. I didn’t want to miss whoever was up next on the main stage. Speaking of the main stage, Queens of the Stone Age should have been there but for some reason our show was the first they were not at (they took a break from Ozzfest August 24th-30th). Methods of Mayhem were the first band there that we watched on the main stage instead. Tommy Lee did a great job as a frontman/guitarist for being known as a drummer. He had a funny narrative about crawling back home after a night of heavy drinking. Incubus was next and this was the first time I had got to see them perform songs from Make Yourself. After seeing them open for 311 I forgot about them until I heard an acoustic version of “Pardon Me” that blew my mind. They definitely impressed the crowd. Static-X followed with almost the same setlist as the year before but had pumped up their stage show a little. Wayne’s hair may have grew a little longer too, which for those who are unfamiliar with it is about two feet of hair sticking straight toward the sky. Godsmack was after Static-X. Their debut album slowly grew on me after hearing Lucinda play it a number of times to the point of me actually looking forward to seeing them. They rocked their ass off and even played the then unreleased song “Awake.” As the theme of the summer seemed to be, I was once again really at this show to see one band: the almighty Pantera. I was turned onto them by Claude right after Vulgar Display of Power came out and have been a fan ever since. I was lucky enough to be able to buy Far Beyond Driven and The Great Southern Trendkill the day the albums came out. For this show they were on tour for the album Reinventing the Steel that had just been released a few months prior. I remember the crowd going crazier than I have ever seen a crowd go. They were fucking going off. I remember trying to protect Lucinda from the debauchery since she was so small and we were in the floor section. Dimebag was a showboater but with his level of talent had every reason to be. We stayed around to watch Ozzy but weren’t really that stoked to be there. Pantera kicked our ass and I’ve never really been a fan of Ozzy’s solo efforts because I have Black Sabbath to compare to. Don’t get me wrong, he was nuts but unfortunately he had the displeasure of playing after Pantera and competing against my previous year’s experience of watching Black Sabbath. If you are fan of Pantera then unfortunately you know how the rest of their story unfolded, which is why I never got to see them again.

Ozzfest 7/18/99

Main Stage: Black Sabbath, Rob Zombie, Deftones, Slayer, Primus, Godsmack, System of a Down

Second Stage: Fear Factory, Static-X, Slipknot, Puya, Drain STH, hed (pe), Apartment 26, Flashpoint

This was the first Ozzfest that had come in my proximity. Ozzfest had been going since 1996 and kind of filled the summer void that Lollapalooza had left. I was pretty excited about this show because every band on the main stage was a band I wanted to see even though I had already seen some of the bands before. A girl in one of my classes named Tawni turned me onto System of a Down. I was lucky enough to sit next to her in my math class and we had similar musical musings. My cousin Earl really liked them too and gave me their first album on CD for my 21^st birthday. They were the first band on the main stage and touring for their eponymous album. Claude strikes again though. Bless his soul but the guy’s just not all there sometimes and this time he didn’t quite comprehend the importance of leaving at a specified time. Long story short we arrived just in time to see the last 3 songs of System of a Down’s set. By we I mean Earl and I only because we ran all the way down to the floor from the moment we arrived inside the Pearly Gates. I believe Roscoe was also with us? The next band up was Godsmack who was also touring for their eponymous album. They were on it. They played pretty much their whole first album. Primus was next and let me just say that Les Claypool is a badass. They were still a few months away from releasing Antipop so they technically touring for their EP of cover songs Rhinoplasty. This is probably about the time in the show we started shifting from the first stage to the second stage all the way up on the hill. We saw Static-X up there, who was on tour for their new album Wisconsin Death Trip! We also saw Slipknot who had just unleashed their debut eponymous album on the world a few short weeks earlier. I wasn’t really into them at the time but did find it quite entertaining to see nine guys dressed up in fucked up masks rocking their ass off and just flat out going crazy onstage. Back to the mainstage was Slayer whose newest effort at the time was Diabolus in Musica. I love their fat ass guitar riffs but at the time just could not get with Tom Araya’s voice. Next up was Deftones. This was the third time I was lucky enough to see them and they were nothing short of amazing. Deftones are a hard act to follow but Rob Zombie somehow managed. It had only been three months since the last time I saw him but I think this performance was much better. Maybe it was just because I knew Korn wasn’t following him this time. The closing band was none other than Black Sabbath! I’m not talking about that shit with Dio, I’m talking about the real Black Sabbath with Ozzy. I was as excited about this as any other band of the day. Never in a million years did I think I would ever get the opportunity to see a band that was huge in the 1970’s. I really got into Black Sabbath when I was about 16. It started with the album Paranoid and then I bought the whole catalog one album at a time. They did not disappoint me. Ozzy was still as crazy as he was made out to be, Tony Iommi was razor sharp on his riffs, and the rhythm section was holding down the groove. Little did I know that this would not be the last time I would see them.