All photos by David Hampton

I awoke Saturday, October 31^st, a new man.  It was Halloween.  The clock on the oven read 9:47 a.m. I put a pot of coffee on the burner.

I stepped out onto the deck of the apartment we had finagled for the weekend, took a breath of the brisk morning air, and looked up at the clear blue sky of what very well could be the most amazing day of my life.  For, in less than 24 hours, my photographer and I were going to be within a football field (at least) of KISS.  KISS live!!!

I’d been waiting my whole life for this show.

Around 10:30 a.m., Dave finally woke from the dead.  I had been trying to organize my notes and ideas from the hell of the first day at Voodoo Fest while, at the same time, keeping one ear and eye on ESPN to catch the day’s predictions on the Texas vs. Oklahoma State game.

We were both starving so we headed downtown.

Our stomachs led us to the French Quarter where an unruly gaggle of tourists were trudging up and down the street with beers and various other adult beverages in hand.

Great Scott!! The breakfast shift hasn’t let out and this city is already raring to go?!

My body was still demanding bacon, eggs, some grits maybe, and some coffee, and everybody around me was getting blasted!!

It was just before noon when Dave and I finally found a table in a darkened corner of Sean Kelly’s Royal Street Diner where the lovely wait staff welcomed us with a few honest “How you doin’, boys?” and “More coffee, darlins’?”  We were exactly where we needed to be.

After polishing off an alligator sausage po-boy, about five more mugs of coffee, an ice cold Budweiser, a glass of ice water for myself, and a steak and bleu cheese po-boy, about five or six mugs of coffee, and a glass of ice water for my photographer, we stopped into Harry’s Corner on Chartres Avenue to have a few beers, chat with the locals, and watch a few quarters of the Indiana vs. Iowa and Mississippi State vs. Auburn games.

Before we knew it, the time was well past 2:00 p.m. and we were still sitting on bar-stools somewhere in New Orleans, picking songs off the jukebox and discussing the rise and fall of Eminem’s career with a few natives of the city.

MUTEMATH

It was mid-afternoon before we finally made it to the Voodoo Festival grounds.  Today, luckily, one of the festival workers waved us to the “press” entrance, which saved us the near-hour walk we made twice there and back the night before.  I gave him some tobacco for this massive favor, as it was all I had to offer.

We walked in during the last half of MUTEMATH’s Saturday afternoon set.  Dave (who is much more of a fan than I) made his way to the photo pit to catch some good shots before it was too late, and I perused the crowd to evaluate the myriad of costumes that turned City Park into a gargantuan quagmire of Trick-or-Treat and muddy feet.

Despite my apathy toward the band, MUTEMATH was a great show.  Paul Meany commanded his hometown crowd with a refreshing authority and demeanor reminiscent of the great front-men of yesteryear.  Perhaps it was the key-tar?  God only knows…but one thing I can definitely vouch for on MUTEMATH’s behalf is their unique ingenuity.  They played a valiant set which they dedicated to “Papa G” (Meany’s grandfather, from my understanding) and played a handful of notable hits including “Armistice” and “Chaos.”

It was around this time that Dave and I began aimlessly wandering around the exclusive “artist” area where we indulged on the free food and steady supply of cold MGDs and/or High Life tallboys.

The next set we stumbled upon was Gogol Bordello, who took to the Playstation Stage with a beautiful fury of which I’d only (up until this point) heard legend.  The crowd was lit up by the ruckus of Eugene Hütz’s wine-guzzling tirades of drunken yelps and taunts.  This was pure, unadulterated chaos, and it was majestic from where I stood, just a few steps to the right of the PlayStation Stage.

Gogol Bordello

Gypsy punk (or whatever the label-makers are calling it) is one of these new/old phenomena that are gaining ground in an era that is bereft of any resources or environment to actually scratch at the surface of innovation.  Personally, I embrace the old ways.  The notion that anything can “progress” is an illusion (especially in music and art), and our greatest hopes of ever catching a revelatory glimpse at the lifeblood of the human condition — the miracle of the species spirit — is to turn around and look back to what has come before us.  In other words, the best is behind us.  Let us drink from the waters that flowed before us to find the refreshment so many are vainly seeking in the waters that have yet and may never come.

Hmmm…how did Gogol Bordello spur on that rant?  Bygones!…the show was a fantastic celebration of revelry and good ol’ foot-stomping.  The otherworldly collage of accordions, mandolins, guitars, various reed instruments, buxom dancers, and dreaded rappers (?) was nothing short of ethereal.  I needed it.  Dave needed it.  The day had just picked up a furious pace. We ran back to the “press” tent for another cold drink.

Wolfmother

Our next show on the list was Wolfmother, who had been recently reformed by front-man Andrew Stockdale after Chris Ross (bass & keyboards) and Myles Heskett (drums) left the band on account of “irreconcilable personal and musical differences” — a rock and roll divorce.

Stockdale himself hasn’t lost a step, I must say.  Joined now by Ian Peres on bass and keys, Aidan Nemeth on rhythm guitars, and Dave Atkins on drums, Wolfmother is as much as (if not more so) a rock and roll powerhouse in the vein of the heavy distorted rail-splitters of the ’70s.  Just a week off their new release, Cosmic Egg (out on October 23^rd), Wolfmother played like they had an ax to grind…and that’s exactly what they did.

Amidst all the sword-wielding and posturing, Stockdale somehow managed to wrangle a costume prop from a member of the audience that looked like he’d shoved a plunger through his head.

“Happy Halloween!!” He smiled.  Indeed.

With Wolfmother, the mushroom cloud of rock at Voodoo Fest 2009 began to build, and Dave and I were starting to feel the first effects of the radioactive waves of the coming KISS show.

But first, the masses gathered at the PlayStation Stage for the Jane’s Addiction set — one of the main acts on the weekend’s bill and a perennial favorite of those kids who found themselves conflicted between the glitz and glam left over from the late ’70s and ’80s and the nihilistic sincerity of the early ’90s.

Jane's Addiction

“Let’s celebrate death,” Perry Farrell shouted to the crowd, holding up a bottle of wine that was probably priced at, at least, a few days of good pay for the majority of the crowd.  No one seemed to mind, however, and Jane’s Addiction rode on a wave of adoration from the Voodoo audience.

Yes, they played “Jane Says” and a handful of other notable radio hits.  Farrell and Dave Navarro were both in rare form.  Farrell donned what looked like a skin-tight, black peacock outfit — a throwaway from the wardrobe of an abandoned sequel to The Crow.  Navarro was, of course, shirtless and, from nearly 200 yards away, I could still see the guy’s nipple rings through the smoke.  I’d heard once before, from an old friend of mine, that spotting the glint of Navarro’s boob jewelry was a well-respected and proven sobriety test for Lollapaloozans.  I agree.

Overall, I thought the show was great.  I’ve always enjoyed Jane’s Addiction despite the continual expansion of their front-man and lead guitarists’ egos.  The music is good, if not great, and its timelessness forgives a thousand and one sins by the band-members.

Nonetheless, my photographer and I ducked out a bit early in hopes of catching George Clinton over at the SoCo Stage on the other side of the festival grounds.  Time was beginning to crunch, as I could already see a substantial portion of the festival’s population shifting towards the main stage where KISS was set to play in less than an hour.

The George Clinton and Parliament set had yet to begin, and it was getting much too close to 7:30 p.m. for me to garner any confidence about seeing Parliament.  I was on a mission.  KISS was my priority for the weekend, and there was no way in heaven or hell that I was going to let Clinton’s late start jeopardize my chances at getting a good spot for the show of a lifetime.  Plus, the rains from Friday night had built a substantial moat through which the devout were wading through, losing shoes, and otherwise covering themselves knee-deep with mud just to make it to the SoCo Stage.

Dave had already made the first step when I yelled, “No way, Dave!!! Dammit!!! I’m going to KISS!!!”  And, with that, I turned around and broke out into a sprint to the main stage.

Dave was quick on my heels, and we both reached the outer boundaries of the VIP section where, we learned, only the “fans-who-paid” were being admitted.  From the fences, we were a good 50 to 70 yards from the stage at an angle that I knew wouldn’t provide me with the vantage point I needed to make this the greatest show on Earth.  I had to get into the VIP section.

The guard at the gate was checking wristbands.  He looked down for one second to set his flashlight on the wrist of a probable groupie, and I made my move.  After so many years of doing this, the “dash” has become pure instinct for me — a reflex that shoots from my hip to my knees to my feet sans a conscious thought.  I was in!!!!  I didn’t even look back for Dave (who, I’d later find out, was caught and stopped by the guard as I passed out of sight into the VIP crowd).

I plowed my way through the bodies as close as I could to the front of the stage.  Within minutes, I was standing no more than five people from the stage, and my head was pumped full of pure human adrenaline — a euphoric rush of childlike anticipation.

Paul Stanley of KISS

Dave then slapped me on the back.  He’d made it in too!  At once, we both screamed, “KISS!!!”

The crowd, at that point, had taken on a life of its own – a pulsating artery that was pumping a furious stream of lifeblood into the gigantic black banner on which “KISS” was printed in metallic silver lettering.

Everyone was beginning to pass out Halloween candy as a voice thundered over our heads:

“YOU WANTED THE BEST? WELL…YOU GOT THE BEST…THE GREATEST BAND IN THE WORLD…KISS!!!!!!!!!”

Cue “Deuce.”  Other than Keith Richards strolling out of a pair of puckered lips strumming “Start Me Up” on a weathered Telecaster, I have never seen nor heard a more cataclysmic opening to a rock and roll concert.  KISS is, by all means, a product — an entertainment gadget intended to do nothing more than kick your front teeth in with some of the best rock and roll music you can get on the planet Earth.

But this…this was surreal!

They did it all.  The fire-breathing, the blood-spitting, the firework-shooting guitars, the elevating drum-set, the flying, the screaming, the rocking and the rolling…everything that first blew my mind as an eleven-year-old watching concert footage I’d jacked from my friend’s dad’s VHS collection of bootleg concerts.  It was perfect.

They ran through the fundamental track-listing of KISS Alive! (1974) playing “Strutter,” “Hotter Than Hell,” “100,000 Years,” “C’mon and Love Me,” and so on and so forth.  They also included “Modern Day Delilah,” as Paul Stanley introduced the new album, Sonic Boom. His pitch, “The album can be bought exclusively at WalMart,” drew a good laugh from the crowd.  If not being masters of the stadium-crumbling guitar riff and innuendo, KISS has somehow, by a jilted genius, managed to preserve a shred of musical/artistic integrity while marketing themselves with an unashamed lust for the cold hard dollar.

But let’s set these petty semantics aside and enjoy this experience.

They ended the first half of the show with the anthem of anthems, “Rock and Roll All Nite,” and a wave of white confetti enveloped the entire crowd like a blizzard was being blown in all over City Park.  I could have died…we all could have died…at that moment…and all our souls would have been satisfied.

But that was only half the show.  The encore included “Lick It Up” and a gritty rendition of the garage rock classic (at least in my hometown) “Detroit Rock City.”

Nearly three hours of KISS and I was still ready for more.  My only complaint was the lack of KISS’s cover of Argent’s “God Gave Rock and Roll to You,” but…perhaps that would have been too much for me to handle in one go.  After all, I have a family at home, and how could my wife explain to the kiddies that their Pops kicked the bucket from a KISS overdose?

‘Tis a noble death. ‘Tis a noble death.

The show finally ended, and I turned to my photographer who had been standing behind me for most of the show.

“Amazing!” was all I could say…

“Dude…are you messed up?” he asked me, his eyes wide and wild.

“No.” I started to laugh.

“Man…I’ve been freakin’ out for the past hour!!”

I put the pieces together.  The frantic, irregular behavior, the jittery speech patterns and pure paranoia in my photographer’s dilated eyes made it painfully obvious that he had eaten a “bad” (or “good,” depending on who you ask) piece of candy sometime when everyone was passing various trick-or-treats around the crowd before the show.

“God…man…Ramus!…that was the greatest show I’ve ever seen…I mean…like…that was the greatest…the greatest show I’ve ever seen!!”

“Yes, yes it was, Dave,” I said enjoying the tragic humor of my photographer’s rather precarious predicament.

“Man…I’m freaking out, Ramus!!  This whole place is full of monsters!!  Everybody’s dressed like monsters, man…and it’s freaking me out!!”

Dave was now stumbling around in the mud, apparently trying to dodge the horrible visions that were beginning to shatter his cognitive ability to distinguish between just what really was real and what wasn’t.

“I’m glad you’re not messed up, man…or…or…there’s no way I’d make it out of here alive, man.”

“We’re getting out of here…we’re going home, Dave, be cool, man.”

“Man…Ramus!! Did you see that show!?!” he was hanging onto my shoulder now.

“Yes…but not like you, Dave, not like you did.”

“Man…I mean…Paul Stanley…he did it!! Man, he did it!!!  I mean…one minute he’s up there playing guitar…you know, just a dude playing and singing with makeup…and then…and then…man, he stepped out and flew right over our heads!!!  He flew, Ramus!! Did you see him?  He did it!!!  There was no strings, man!! I couldn’t see any lines, Ramus!! They were all blurred, I guess…or he was really flying!!  He just stepped out there and took off…I saw it, man, with my eyes…he went from a rock star and then took flight, man…the Dark Angel of Death flying out over the masses, seeking out his revenge…on me!!!!”

“Yes!!!”

Happy Halloween.