So tonight’s show is Wednesday 13's first
Halloween gig in England and what a better place
to play the show than the Astoria in London, as
most people are aware this show was actually part
of his May/June UK tour which he was doing to
promote his new album release 'Skeletons' but
due to scheduling conflicts the London date had
to be cancelled and Wednesday came up with the
great idea of rescheduling the show for October
31st 2008 which is better known as Halloween.
From what I remember the show was originally scheduled
to happen at the Astoria 2 which is better known
as the Mean Fiddler but as soon as the date was
changed and then Finish rockers Hanoi Rocks were
added to the line up as main support band the
ticket sales went through the roof and the show
got upgraded to the Astoria which to me was a
bonus as the Astoria is one of my favourite venues
in London, it’s a venue thats so small and
cosy where thousands of people can fit in, and,
just may I add and you can see from pretty much
anywhere in the venue, well apart from the Keith
Moon bar but that’s your own choice if you
decide to stay there, another reason I was happy
that the show was upgraded to the Astoria was
because over the past few years there have been
rumours that the Astoria is closing down and until
now the rumours have been untrue but the venue
is now due to close in the early weeks of 2009
so any extra shows I can go to at the Astoria
before it closes is a bonus and I’m sure
pretty much everyone else will agree as there
is no other venue quite like the Astoria in London.
 The doors for tonight’s show opened at 6.30pm,
we finally managed to get to the Astoria at 7.20pm
and the queue was still pretty big bending around
the corner of the venue, we headed to the back
of the queue and waited with everyone else to
get into the venue, a couple of guys behind us
were proper hardcore Hanoi Rocks fans and were
talking amongst themselves and one of them decided
to go to the gig last minute after hearing that
Hanoi Rocks are splitting up once again and hearing
that tonight was going to be there last ever London
show, after a bit of ear wigging I heard the guy
say that he just bought his ticket off a tout
for £200, now that just tells you what the
value of tonight’s show is to most people.
We managed to get into the venue at 7.40pm, Hanoi
Rocks had already been on stage for 10 minutes
at this point which led me to think that the guy
directly behind me who paid £200 for a ticket
could well be slightly pissed off, nevertheless
we headed to the cloak room and put our coats
in and started heading to the main downstairs
room to enjoy the last Hanoi Rocks London show,
when we got in the room, it was like a packed
out sweat pit, there was minimal room to move
and everything was so hot, people were dressed
up in their Halloween costumes making the most
of the creepy night and others were just dressed
in there usual gothic wear with as much make up
as they could plaster on to their faces, at times
it was quite interesting trying to figure of who
was in fancy dress and who wasn’t. You could
clearly tell who was mainly here to see Wednesday
13 and who was mainly here to see Hanoi Rocks
as the Wednesday 13 fans were dressed in black
and had various different make up/ face paint
on, whilst the most hardcore Hanoi Rocks fans
were in at least there 40's dressed in your usual
casual clothes of jeans and t-shirt.
 Hanoi Rocks seemed to play their set like they
were headlining the show, I saw them earlier in
the year next door at the Mean Fiddler and they
were extremely energetic and put on a great show,
but tonight they seemed to of outdone themselves,
their lighting show was big and bright with big
blue, green and pink lights spot lighting the
members of the band, the band moved about on stage
like they had all just taken a massive bag of
speed, and the crowd were truly loving it singing
along word for word.
Frontman Michael Monroe is one talented man, during
the night he sings his heart out whilst running
around the stage in his extremely energetic ways,
he alternates playing saxophone and singing in
such a short period of time and he generally bashes
the hell out of his equipment.
In their 50 minute set Hanoi Rocks managed to
fit in quite a lot of old material as well as
a lot of material from their 'Street Poetry' album,
newer songs like 'Fashion' and 'Hypemobile' went
down really well with the band putting their all
into them. Hanoi Rocks remind many people of Guns
N Roses because they do play pretty much the same
style of music, it’s just Hanoi Rocks don’t
piss about with 10 minute long songs, instead
they get straight into it with 3-4 minute long
rocking songs. The last song Hanoi Rocks played
was their usual set finisher 'Tootin’ Star'
and like normal the song went down extremely well.
 Overall, Hanoi Rocks put on a show like they were
headlining the Astoria tonight, they even left
the stage for a few minutes leaving everyone thinking
their set was over but they soon came back to
play an encore and this is something that support
bands don’t normally do but Hanoi Rocks
like to be different, they are special and as
it’s their last London show they can easily
get away with it, even when their last song finishes,
Hanoi Rocks carried on with frontman Michael Monroe
throwing and spinning his microphone stand across
the stage whilst the rest of the band jam along,
and when he’s done with that the microphone
gets thrown on the floor and the band leave the
stage.
Next up are the headliners Wednesday 13, there’s
a long 30 minute wait until the man takes to the
stage, the roadies are on stage setting up the
equipment for Wednesdays set, and before Wednesday
even takes to the stage you can tell that his
stage show is going to be pretty impressive with
a really spooky Halloween theme. He has dolls
heads hanging from his microphone stand, now this
is something Wednesday normally has, he can’t
play a show without something a bit morbid looking
hanging from his microphone stands, then we have
a big banner at the back with the colourful Wednesday
13 logo on it, the drum kit has a devil like face
on it with the Wednesday 13 logo across it as
well and to either side of the drum kit is a big
box which is done in the theme of his 'Fang Bang'
album cover with black and white swirley circles
going around with a big 13 printed on it, the
top of these boxes are covered by a cloth but
minutes before Wednesday takes to the stage the
roadies remove the covers to reveal two scary
looking clown faces covered in fake blood, which
brings a huge reaction from the crowd.
 A few minutes later the lights go off, the crowd
erupts with big screams of joy and a man dressed
in a black cloak with a white mask, big glasses
and a bright torch takes to the stage marching
across the stage to the music of this is Halloween,
within a minute he has left the stage and Wednesday
13 and his backing band take to the stage and
the fun begins, they slam right into the first
song and the crowd go mental.
If you have seen Wednesday 13 before then you
will know that the man doesn’t just play
songs from his solo albums he also plays songs
that he created in his previous bands such as
The Frankenstein Drag Queens From Planet 13 and
The Murderdolls, and songs from the days of Wednesday
13 fronting both of these bands make up a huge
chunk of tonight’s set list but that seems
to be fine with the crowd as the majority of people
are singing along word for word to each and every
song.
One of the main highlights from the set came early
on when Wednesday played the classic Murderdolls
track '197666' the song was the third track to
be played and it went down really well with crowd
bouncing up and down from the front to the back
throwing their horns in the air at Wednesday's
direction. Straight after this song finished they
went straight into my personal favourite Frankenstein
Drag Queens song 'Scary Song', the song was one
of those songs that I first listened to many years
ago when I first got into the Drag Queens and
the song has always remained a favourite of mine,
and it seems that tonight’s crowd agree
totally with me and love the song equally as much
as I do, Wednesday and his backing band fire through
the song in such a fast powerful way.
 Wednesday fires through songs from all different
stages of his career, it was good to hear him
play tracks from his latest album 'Skeletons'
as the album features some of the heaviest material
that Wednesday has ever made, the songs seemed
to go down well with the fans which shows that
they fully support the new direction that his
music is taking him. At one point he even treated
the people of the Astoria to an acoustic track,
now I have always loved acoustic music, it really
shows how talented a musician is to play just
by himself with an acoustic guitar and his vocals
and Wednesday proves that he can do it quite well
tonight, his vocals are quite dark and raw sounding
but you can excuse this because this is the style
of vocals Wednesday needs for the musical style
that he plays, either way it goes down well with
the crowd and it gives them a chance to catch
their breath after all the jumping and screaming
they have been doing up until this point.
Overall Wednesday 13 seemed much more polished
and tight sounding than when I first saw him play
solo in March 2004 when Death Becomes You were
his backing band, back in those days Wednesdays
face was covered in white face make up and had
extremely long dread locks, and nowadays the dreadlocks
are gone, well nearly all gone as there are a
few still left, and the white face make up is
nowhere to be seen which makes you think that
Wednesday lost his make up bag or has decided
to keep things more real, anyway tonight’s
show was definitely a lot more energetic than
back in 2004 which just shows how far Wednesday
has come in just 4 years, I wonder where he will
be in another 4 years? Maybe back with the Murderdolls
who knows.
I never really realised until today just how hardcore
Wednesday 13 fans are, during the day we managed
to speak to many fans before, during and after
the show and out of the people we spoke to, there
were many people who came all the way from Germany
to see the man play live, and even better wait
outside in the cold for well over an hour after
the show in hope of meeting the man, now that
is true dedication for you. We also met people
who travelled all the way from Manchester, Yorkshire,
Leeds and many other places for the show, Wednesday
13 has a cult following of truly hardcore fans
and this is something he should be proud of.
Hanoi Rocks 5/5
Wednesday 13 5/5
Review By Trigger |
Wednesday
13 
