That's the only pic I bothered to take at the recent PETER MURPHY show a couple weeks ago here in Salt Lake City, July 17, at our small local dive bar THE URBAN LOUNGE.
Before Peter Murphy took the stage, I want to mention that the excellent band OURS currently out of LA opened for him. I was lucky enough to catch them live the last time Peter Murphy toured through Salt Lake City, and once again they delivered a pounding, mesmerizing new wave industrial alternative set with their lead singer Jimmy Gnecco fronting with a dark charisma that I personally have found missing from today's scene. OURS is a refreshing alternative band for the Twenty-Teens. Now that I've seen them perform twice, I'm bummed that I missed them headline here last year (I think it was). If OURS ever tours through here again, I will be sure to attend that show and support them. I intend to get their albums, most likely starting backward with their Rick Rubin produced 2008 album Dancing For The Death Of An Imaginary Enemy.
Finally, Peter Murphy and his band padded out onto the stage. They delivered the BAUHAUS hits alright. 90% of the setlist was comprised of old Bauhaus tunes (as promised). Come to think of it, I don't recall having heard a single song off their excellent swan song GO AWAY WHITE, which is either too bad or else I somehow missed it during all the excitement. Peter Murphy's band is a pretty tight-knit group of goths. His guitarist resembled Trent Reznor. Drummer looked like a cross between Josh Brolin and Dax Riggs. Bass player looked eerily like my friend and Freezine veteran Vincent Daemon. That set the stage visually for the perfect 80s Goth night out. Swear to god the place was packed to the gills with dead fish. Yes it was Sold Out. . . to zombies.
I really wanted to push through the packed crowd in front of the stage—but everyone is standing room only with drinks in their hands—and I'm not about to be "that guy" who spills someone's drink, I'm there to have a good time and not be an A-hole. So we wait it out for awhile but the entire time no one up front is dancing or anything. Eventually I say "fukkit" and just, you know, squeeeeeze thru the dumbfounded dipshits until I get practically to the front center (being led the way by my beautiful friend whose good female looks grant her more of a pass than my sorry good for nothing ass I'll say that much). So I follow her as best I can, until I'm almost up there and some yahoo behind me shoves me forward (of course, which I like actually...that gets me to grinning) up into the front row peeps, whereupon this rankled chick comes at me with a cold look and a "don't be an asshole, man" and I just look at her and smile saying "I got shoved up here, sorry" and she dares to repeat her dumb line, "don't be an asshole" again, so I just ignore her.
My friend is right there beside me, and she obviously wants to dance, as I do. So we start doing our best, only this lost generation of "twenty-teens" or whatever the Hell you wanna call it doesn't really know what to do—are we trying to mosh—?—[NO]. It's called dancing, Google it. So of course they respond as if we're trying to start a moshpit and I'll tell you what. I have no problem with the notion of starting up a pit here, but honestly that is not why I came to see Peter Murphy. Also I am not that guy. Wrong show. So of course I allow myself to be shoved to and fro with a big smile on my face all the while, really enjoying the extra attention by peeved morons in the crowd. Soon they give up, and then I really start dancing in place—not shoving anyone—just doing the Twist with the manic intensity of Tom Jones, so my friend joins in and we're just having a blast. There's maybe three other people near us also dancing and that's it. The rest just stand there, annoyed. We are overjoyed. I begin to frenetically gyrate my hips ala Ahmet Zappa, exaggeratedly shaking my ass with as much lewdness as I can muster (which is quite a lot, actually). Now we're really having fun and soon we're doing the "fish bubble shimmy", as I call it (you know the one) to Peter Murphy's impassioned singing. We were just having the time of our lives. I know Peter Murphy noticed us, cuz we were right smack in front of him practically, I had my gray tank-top with the old-school black BATMAN logo on it to honor "the bats flew from the belfry..." aka Bela Lugosi's Dead.
It must've been in the mid-to high 90s in that club, but that didn't stop us, nor did it seem to phase Peter and his band much. They took a break at one point but when they returned back onstage for the encores, Peter had changed up his shirt to a long-sleeve! The sweat drip-drip-dripped steadily off his nose while he tweaked on various synth instruments.
I didn't stick around for autographs or anything like that, just had to escape out into the crisp nighttime air and cool off a bit.
That was my fourth Peter Murphy show and it was excellent.
I'M SORRY I DID NOT JOT DOWN THE SETLIST. HERE IS THE 'AVERAGE SETLIST' FOR THE MR. MOONLIGHT TOUR, TO GIVE YOU AN IDEA.
