CENTERSTAGE

CENTERSTAGE

SEE MY LONELY MANUSCRIPT UNFOLD

ALICE COOPER MEGADETH TESLA

Long Beach Arena, Long Beach, CA March 21, 1987

John Kordosh

The Long Beach Arena’s one place they’ve had some serious concert problems, most notably the Run-DMC episode of last year. I don’t know what’s caused those serious problems in the past, but this night—March 21, that is—I do know many in the audience were seriously fucked up. Very much so.

I went into the john at one point and there were three guys puking—puking violently. “Maybe I should try to help these fellows out,” I thought—so I found an arena employee and told him what was going down... or up, as the case may be. He smiled, kind of ruefully, and said they get 40 to 80 such cases at every concert. Wonderful that it’s quantized. Anyway, I guess he was right: when I went back later on, there were a couple of new guys puking.

There were plenty of other weird vibes: some heavy-duty Christian proselytizing outside, including one cat with a mike who got lots of echo going on the word “Bible... bible.. .bible.. .bible,” in a messianic rapfest. It was a real shake-down getting in, too, as everyone was searched for bad things, spouses were separated and woe was general. I swear, the whole idea of a concert has become warped. Instead of saying, “Hey, let’s go to a concert,” people should say, “Hey, let’s get dressed up, fucked up and possibly beaten up in some teeny police state.” It’d be a new level of conversational accuracy.

These flaws are unfortunate, particularly this night—March 21, that is—as the bill was undeniably a metal forum (if I may turn a phrase) of remarkable interest. In a strange twist worth considering for its sociological value, the bands played in reverse order of their positions on the charts—Tesla breaking big with their debut album, Megadeth hanging tough with Peace Sells, and the Coop’s Constrictor having left chartdom forevermore. Another thing worth considering is that—between the three—there was quite the cross-section of metal, circa 1987: Tesla being MOR-ish newcomers, ’Deth being established thrash dudes, and Cooper being the sort of resurrected echo we’re seeing plenty of these days.

What makes these points even more interesting (to me, anyway) is that this was clearly Cooper’s crowd and Cooper’s show. Tesla seemed more than happy with the 18 inches of stage they were allowed to use during their abbreviated set. And Jeff Keith, their singer, seemed not at all ashamed to endorse a local radio station from his curb’sworth of stage: “Do they rock or what?” was his query to the audience. You know, that’s a good question... perversely, I’m inclined to mentally substitute that “what” with stuff like “cure all childhood ailments once and for all” or “play our record many, many times each day, for which we are humbly grateful.”

Speaking of perversity, Megadeth has nothing to do with it: they’re about as straight-ahead as advertised. Sadly, I missed much of their set, as I was preoccupied with people who were vomiting vigorously, but what I caught was pretty good. This Mustaine character looks to have a lot of staying power, and good luck to him.

And speaking of good luck, let’s wish some on Mr. Cooper while we’re at it. If this concert—and this tour—proved one thing, it’s that the old Alice Cooper band sure had a lot of hits. B’gosh, Alice played most of ’em, too: everything from “Welcome To My Nightmare” to “I’m Eighteen” to “Billion Dollar Babies” to “The Ballad Of Dwight Frye” to “I Love The Dead.” These were fine songs, and this evening—March 21, as I’ve probably mentioned—the crowd got into them in a big way.

There was a problem though, and it might best be illustrated by a conversation I had with a guy sitting next to me. (Now, this guy is an exemplary sort, highly acknowledgable regarding all that rocks and could very easily be a critic of music itself, were he so inclined.) Here’s how the conversation went, about two-thirds of the way through a song:

Me: You know, I once rewrote the lyrics of this song to make it much funnier.

Exemplary Guy: What song is this?

Me: It’s “Welcome To My Nightmare,” Exemplary Guy!

You see my point. If Exemplary Guy didn’t even know what was being played—and E.G. has every album Cooper’s ever made, unless he got rid of some of the post -Muscle Of Love stuff, needing the money—what does that say for the rendition?

That it stunk.

And that, by and large, is the case with Coop’s old material. Like I said earlier, these were good songs—and probably could be good songs once again, if they weren’t performed in such a perfunctory fashion. Seriously, Alice played it as if motions were wanting him to go through them, and that kind of stuff just doesn’t make it.

OK?