Dark metal progenitor Glenn Danzig hails from Lodi New Jersey. His screaming Elvis meets Jim Morrison at Anton Levey’s Satanic church styled voice came in into the music scene with his first band The Misfits in the latter 70’s and they as were raw and viscous as anything else that was punk and east coast at the time. What set The Misfits apart was not their musicianship but Danzig’s unique howl and his penchant for building catchy hooks around B-Movie themes, such as Astro Zombies, Return of the Fly and Night of the Living Dead. The band’s onstage appearance was spooky and their garb and make-up seems to predate both Goth fashion and even the Black Metal look that would come out of Scandinavia with bands like Mayhem and Emperor. I am familiar with this band through a couple anthologies I have and the music is stripped down and played pretty fast. The songs are loaded with dark humor and inferences to old sci-fi and horror films. The band’s label was even called Plan 9 records after the Ed Wood Jr. cult movie classic Plan 9 from Outer Space.

The Misfits were a hard rocking outfit and their brief moment on the punk scene proved to be more of an influence on later bands and trends than Danzig would have ever cared to admit. He mostly dismisses his time with the band now but says it was a fun time. It served as a suitable vehicle to release his dark vision with a theatrical flare he become adept at. There is some sort of band now called The Misfits that I know little about except that they dress up the same way and play sounds about midnight movies.  I have heard a couple songs even and they do not sound that bad but do not be confused, this is not the same Misfits that penned such immortal lines as:

I’ve got something to say, I killed your baby today.
An’ it doesn’t matter much to me as long as it’s dead.
An’ I’ve got somethng to say. I raped your mother today.
An it doesn’t matter much to me as long as she’s spread.

The Misfits spilt up after prolonged disputes in 1983 and Danzig went on to form Samhain. Everyone probably knows that is the original Celtic word for what has come to be known as Halloween during the good ol’ pagan days. Samhain is the lesser known period of Danzig’s career. It is the bridge period between the now legendary Misfits and the later to come Danzig period. There are a few significant changes in the musical approach that challenge the criticisms that Samhain was just the Misfits with out the punk. The music did slow down and became heavier and brooding, and that seems be to Danzig’s liking since ultimately that is where his sound would evolve. The lyrics became less about midnight movies and more about dark and demonic themes. Danzig appears to take his occult matters seriously at times (and tongue in cheek at others)and he seems as if he comes from some dark castle in Norway rather than Bruce Springsteen’s backyard. Another element is that the music and production is simply better than The Misfits. I have Intium and the EP Unholy Passion. Unholy has some really dark guitar by Pete Damien. I have not explored the other albums too much although I do own them all.

During the live shows Danzig would appear on stage covered in fake blood (I assume) wearing a leather cowl and S&M looking garb and was known to make use of his sizable biceps by actually leaping into the audience and pulverizing ungracious fans. Again internal strife signaled time for change and Danzig formed a long lasting partnership with Def American Record’s Rick Rubin and with bassist Eerie Von dropped the Samhain band name and formed what is now known in one incarnation or another as Danzig. I do have a special note concerning Danzig the band before going further. Pete Damien was canned (Danzig is notorious for firing band members and the line up list is exhausting to look at) and replaced him with heavy blues based guitarist John Christ (nice last name for a Satanic metal band’s guitarist wouldn’t you say?) who is from Baltimore Maryland and was school mates with my old cult movie pal in Seattle Matt Gehringer who shared some small school stories of John before he filled in on guitar for some of Danzig’s finest moments before he too was sacked after a couple fantastic albums.

Essentially Samhain and Danzig were pretty much the same entity at one time and some Samhain projects were even finished a couple years after albums were being produced under the Danzig name. A Samhain reunion tour happened in 1999 but Danzig has since said there would never be another. There is bad blood between him and Eerie Von and Peter Damien and Danzig does not seem like one to waste time trying to rekindle long dead fires. He is a work horse it seems and has plenty of other activities to keep him busy.

The first three Danzig albums, the eponymous Danzig, Lucifuge and How the God’s Kill are considered to be some of the best stuff Danzig has ever produced. They were followed by a live EP Thrall Demon’s Sweat Live that contained the live version of the FM hit Mother and the not too bad Danzig 4. But the first albums showed a marked departure from what he had been doing in The Misfits and Samhain, which despite his seriousness sometimes were simply campy and comical and at other times just poorly played and produced. On Lucifuge his voice was just so astonishing that it is really beyond belief. And not only his voice but the direction of the band had become clearer aswell and John Christ’s simple but heavy and tight guitar work was something sorely needed for Danzig’s soaring vocals. The band left the indiscipline of punk behind and moved into more polished metal territory. The vision of the music became more centered around typical metal themes and were even a tad epic in their scope at times. The Lucifuge album is one of my favorite albums really and if you are curious about Danzig but not familiar I would recommend you start with this one. Simply because his voice is so powerful and the guitar work is clear, professional and heavy.

As the 90’s decade advanced there were the obligatory numerous firings and line up changes. The list is long my friend but the outfits tended to be pretty tight and heavy in a dark aspect. However in the mid 90’s Danzig took it upon himself to release a strange album called Black Aria, which is an instrumental album of drone sounds and strings. It is Wagnerian in its intent but rock stars should not dabble in Wagner. I listened to a few minutes of it once and turned it off and never listened to it again. It was not want I wanted from Danzig I guess. Call me narrow minded. I can listen to the Bach Cello Suites if I want this type of thing, but who knows, I still have the music here somewhere and maybe I will give it a try again. Sometimes you can put something away for years and return to it and see it from a different angle.

But even stranger is the next album called Blackacidevil which I always tried to give him the benefit of the doubt on because he was so attacked by fans and critics but finally have to admit I do not like it too much myself. It seems to be an attempt at a heavt metal techno sound and there seems to be drum machines and all that industrial banging stuff which is great by bands like Ministry and Nine Inch Nails but not so endurable here.

In any case Danzig returned with a some decent heavy albums in the late 90’s and early 21st century such as Satan’s Child 6.66, I Luciferi and Circle of Snakes. I listened to I Luciferi for a month a while back and felt it was a return to the sound he had done during the early Danzig albums. Yes, some bands can branch out and experiment and do a variety of things and still pull it off. Other bands need to stay close to what it is they do best, or they might wind up like Metallica.

Danzig ultimatley did not wind up in some experimental abyss and though his material is sometimes weak, as is any performers, it is very strong at others and even on his worst albums his voice is dynamic and driven. It is a dark world his lyrics and music creates but not one full of angst and morbid, suicidal gloom. It is more like an atmospheric horror movie. Some songs are like 50’s rock roll played for an audience of demons in Hades (such as Blood and Tears on Lucifuge). All in all good stuff. But the Danzig legacy does not end with gothic metal music. Nay, there is but but one more chapter in Glenn’s creative universe we should peek into before we close the book.

Verotik Comics is Glenn Danzig’s foray into the field of comic book publishing and writing. The company came about in the 90’s while some of his Danzig projects were floundering a little. His energy was focused, I speculate, into getting his comic book titles off the ground and accepted in the comic book world. The company has been successful but do not expect to run down to the drug store comic book stand and pick these titles up. They are ultra violent and sexual and are found in comic book stores to be sold to persons over 18 only. A couple more popular titles are Santanika an Verotika and his list of talents include among others Frank Frazetta himself who has supported Danzig’s company and its policy of total creative freedom to the writer and artists. Other artists include Simon Bisley (sample from Prophesy included) and the legendary Esteban Maroto who did some of the greatest Warren stories ever, including some very sexy Vampirellas. I will let Danzig express himself in closing on the subject of Verotik comics:

“If an adult’s comics purchases are still limited to Superman and The X-Men, I think he or she needs their head examined. There’s nothing wrong with those titles, but with so many great comics out there that are pushing the envelope of what comics can be, I think people are really missing the boat. My feeling is that if a publisher is not hiring the best possible artist and writer, giving them artistic freedom and backing them with quality production, why bother?”

For further info check out these two Danzig based sites with Satan’s blessings.

http://www.the7thhouse.com/

http://www.danzig-verotik.com/verotik/

THREE SELECTIONS FROM THE MISFITS WITH DANZIG

Attitude

Last Caress

Return of the Fly

THREE SELECTIONS FROM DANZIG’S SECOND SOLO ALBUM LUCIFUGE

Long Way back from Hell

I’m the One

Blood and Tears

This entry was posted on Friday, October 24th, 2008 at 5:46 am and is filed under Comic Books, Music-MP3s . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.