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| Portrait of the author wearing his favorite misfits shirt summer 1997. |
So, I was singing the praises of the reunited Misfits to anyone who would listen in 1996. I had seen two incredible live gigs and AT FIRST couldn't really tell the difference between the classic era and the current. No new songs had been released and the shows were just filled with maniacs going bananas. Although a couple shows the following year were so-so, I still carried the torch. Then something happened. Something terrible. Something that would have me cowering in the corner in fear. That something was called American Psycho.
Granted, if the album had any other name on it, I may have liked it, but I saw it as one misstep in a great catalogue and thought "fuck it, they'll still do old stuff." So when I found out that they were playing with KILLING TIME in Albany the summer of 1997, some friends and I went. After staying at some weird feminist college "we hate Jeremy compound," we got to the show really early, as we didn't have tickets and wanted to make sure we got in; and as luck would have it, we got there as Doyle and Jerry were carrying a workout bench into the club- SWEET.
While we sat our pale lumpy bodies against the wall outside the club, the promoter Ted Etoll walked up with a grocery bag and handed it to Jerry; they then began rummaging through the contents:
"Hey, I got you some Fruit Loops!"
"FRUIT LOOPS?! I LOVE Fruit Loops!"
Right there the mystique of the Misfits was dead to me. Maybe it could have clawed its way back, maybe the reunited Misfits could have won me over again... That is until I saw Dr. Chud and Michael Graves running down the street chasing after an ice cream truck.
Killing Time KILLED IT, Anthony had less girth back then and the crowd was way into it. The Misfits put on a great "Rock Show" set and I just wasn't into it, it all seemed like a cartoon. These ice cream eating- fruit loop loving guys singing "Die Die." It was over for me BUT they did film some footage that ended up in this video:
I guess I never made it into any of the footage, probably because of my bummed out face.
