I don't know where to begin.
Let's start here:
Last night I went to see Mötley Crüe at the Gund Arena. Now, normally from an early 80s pseudo-metal hair band, I would assume I'd get a nice 90 minute set of all the fun hits I remembered as a wee lad and see some boobs while I'm at it, right? right?
NO, YOU'RE NOT
I swear, this concert was the strangest thing I've ever seen. I've never been on LSD, but I imagine it is similar to the event I witnessed last night. So here it is,
The Top 10 WTF Moments from Last Night's Mötley Crüe Concert (in order of appearance)
1. Claymation Crüe
After waiting about an hour and a half for the show to start (no opening band!), the lights dim. The crowd goes bananas, and we hear the roar of the guitar and the pounding - no, wait - a screen is dropping... and now we're watching a cartoon. A claymation cartoon. Okay... in the cartoon, the President is on TV and the band is watching. Mind you, the President is black yet speaks with a spanish accent, so I have no clue what year this takes place in. Apparently, a KILLER PLANETOID is on its way to Earth. So Crüe decides they want to have the last concert on Earth. Then - I swear to God, they start playing a song called "Killer Planetoid". After that, they decide they didn't want to die, so they'd stop the KILLER PLANETOID - by slingshotting a naked woman at it. Well, that doesn't work, and all that happens is that her boobs explode. Okayyy... then Nikki Syxx says "This looks like a job for Mighty Mike!" Which brings us to...
2. Mighty Mike
Keep in mind that this is Mötley Crüe. Most of the audience has been baked since at least 4pm. So the movie screen rolls up, and out on stage comes some sort of alien looking creature thing, some midget in a costume. He has really big hands and starts speaking in some bizarre high voice. Alrighty then... he asks us if we are ready for the show, but we're not, we're confused as hell. Finally, he disappears down a hole that two dancing chicks pop out of, and the show starts.
3. Intermission
Ah, nothing says "RAWK!!" like a 10 minute intermission. No, not the period between end of set and encore - Vince actually said "It's time for intermission, we'll be back in 10 minutes." This was after about 30 minutes, just as the crowd was getting way into it. Kiss doesn't get an intermission, the Stones don't get an intermission - no way in hell does Crüe get one. Weird. Ah, but weirder still was what happened during intermission:
4. More Claymation!
The only thing more rock n' roll than intermission is claymation. We were treated to a 10 minute preview of something called "Disaster: The Movie", which from what I could tell is about a KILLER PLANETOID and the French trying to stop it. Somewhere along the way is a penis and some really really really dumb humor. Ha - on the website right now, I'm watching a scientist masturbate. I never thought I'd type that. It was hard to tell what exactly was happening, but all I got out of it was "In space, no one can hear you fart." Sweet.
5. Midget Motor Madness
When intermission is up, we hear the thunder of a motorcycle. Sweet! The lights start going nuts, the crowd is on their feet, and here comes A MIDGET ON A MOTORCYCLE. Man. I guess I'm in the minority when I say that the midget thing has really been played out. Mini-me kinda killed it off as a source of hilarity. Anyways, he gets chased off the stage by the roadies, who are dressed as CLOWNS. Alrighty.
6. Saw people
After an hour or so, you start to realize every song sounds pretty much the same. Luckily, they took a break in the action for the traditional guitar solo - no, wait - that's not a guitar - Nikki gets up on the a keyboard and plays some theremin-type noises as a woman comes out rubbing a saw against her body to generate sparks. Then Nikki starts sparking. Okay. So there's a woman prancing around stage with a power tool to freaky keyboard music. Viva le rock, I guess.
7. Tommy's Solo
After they played Dr. Feelgood 6 times (or six different songs, I have no clüe), finally Tommy F'in Lee starts his drum solo. The crowd is going nuts because, hey, he's Tommy Lee and we're not, so boom-boom, whatever, there's a giant freaky eye on the video screen, and this sucks, so he gets out from behind the drums, attaches himself to a bungee cord, then flies up in the air to a drum set above the stage. Oh, but these are no ordinary drums. They're trash cans. I shit you not. He played the trash cans. It was like a retarded version of Stomp. So, cool Tommy, we like your trash cans. BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE - he flies to the other side of above the stage, where there's another drum set - er, wait, no - it's keyboards. Okay. Then he starts to play "Closer" by Nine Inch Nails. Well, not exactly, but pretty close. Now - picture the crowd here. Drunk fat dudes pushin' 40. They don't really know what to do at this point. I swear I saw some of them weeping because Tommy had crossed over to the dark(er) side. Then he flew back and forth between the two suspended drum kits, alternating between trash can solo and NIN ripoffs. WTF, Tommy?
8. New Songs
Nikki says he didn't want to go on tour if all they were gonna do is play their hits. Oh, great. Then they say they're gonna play some "NEW SHIT CLEVELAND OH MY GOD". Well, that'd be okay, if the new stuff wasn't horrible. See, Vince's voice rules when he sings in his higher registers. However, the new stuff is all techno-ish and Vince sings in some sort of low monotone that was not on tune with the instruments, plus he had the lyrics laying on the stage! Now, this wasn't "American Pie" or some Bob Dylan cover - this song had about 16 lines and they all sucked. Vince sang them really quiet too because you could tell he didn't know what he was singing. Fantastic. A true "Beer Time" moment. They played their new single and some other song, which featured giant gnashing teeth on the video screen. Yeah.
9. Giant Skeleton Skull
Okay, so the play some more shiz, and boom boom boom thank you good night, it's over. OR IS IT??? A giant inflatable skeleton clown head starts inflating. The crowd is batshit - are they gonna finish with a triumphant version of "Smoking in the Boys' Room"?? Are they? The band runs back out, the skeleton's eyes light up, and whiz bam bang - here it is - a cover of "Helter Skelter"??? Not exactly what anybody expected, but hey, it's hard to screw up the Beatles, so it sounded good. But now, NOW was the big finale, "Smoking in the Boys' Room", right??? RIGHT??? No - they played "Anarchy in the UK". WTF? Oh, it's their own version with silly lyric changes and mentioning USA here and there. Ok. During it, we had a woman on stilts dressed as Uncle Sam, a midget juggling fire, then just juggling, and several random clowns. Hmm. Well, then that was over - and here it comes... "Smoking in the Boys Room!!!" No.
10. The End
No "Smoking in the Boys Room". They ended with a shitty remake of a Sex Pistols song, then the lights went out, and the curtains came down. Show over.. or was it?? The arena lights were still out, and the guitars were still humming. The crowd is like "No way, another encore??" And YES! We hear the motorcycle again! Sweet! But then out comes that damn midget again. Telling us "MOTLEY CRUE IS BACK BECAUSE THEY'RE ON TOUR". WTF??? Then he waves goodbye, arena lights on, show over, go home and figure out what in God's holy hell you just witnessed.
Well, that was interesting. No doubt, it was a fun show, great dumb rock and roll. But there were so many bizarre elements that I think this gets elevated above rock and should be labelled as "avant-garde". Or "savant-garde". I guess this is what I get for being sober. Vince's voice wasn't really up to par, and I have no clue how he's gonna do a whole tour, but whatever. At least I know that we are safe from the KILLER PLANETOID.
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