From The Vault - ARMORED SAINT

This is the first of some Anthrax-themed vault postings here (more coming on Anthrax and S.O.D.) since Anthrax is coming to town very soon (and Red Lamb just played here on March 24 - show review coming soon). Armored Saint singer John Bush fronted Anthrax through arguably the band’s most creative and critically acclaimed period. I was fortunate enough to catch Armored Saint twice in the late 80s, then again during 2000.

My favorite show was on Memorial Day, May 26, 1986 at the Iowa State Fair Grandstand in Des Moines as part of the Iowa Jam, an annual Memorial Day festival (sadly long defunct now). Check out this monster lineup: the bill was topped by Aerosmith (supporting Done With Mirrors), Ted Nugent (out for Little Miss Dangerous), Dokken (promoting Under Lock And Key), Metallica (with Cliff Burton on the Master Of Puppets tour), and Armored Saint (supporting Delirious Nomad). Armored Saint was on first at 11 am and fired up the crowd with an inspired 35–40 minute set of songs from the first two albums. I’ll post the audio of this show later, so I’ll save additional comments for then. As you might expect, Metallica stunned an unsuspecting crowd, while the remaining bands all put on great shows.

I must’ve gotten lucky because the next time I saw Armored Saint was on the Raising Fear supporting Grim Reaper (supporting Rock You To Hell) with Helloween (touring for Keeper Of The Seven Keys - Part I) on October 17, 1987 at The Rimco Center in Rock Island, Illinois. This was an MTV Headbanger's Ball-sponsored tour. Helloween was amazing as they closed their opening set with “Halloween” and “How Many Tears”. Armored Saint a set similar to what I heard at the Iowa Jam the year before with the addition of some new songs like “Chemical Euphoria” and “Raising Fear”. Grim Reaper got upstaged by the openers, but they still put on a great show playing the title tracks from their three albums amongst other songs.

Click on any of the pictures to see more photos of Armored Saint live in 2000 (14).

Finally, the show from which the pictures are from was May 28, 2000 at Brick By Brick in San Diego during promotion for the Revelation album. This was a rapid, packed crowd eager to hear Armored Saint after an absence of many years while John Bush was in Anthrax. The main attraction for me was finally being able to hear songs performed from Symbol Of Salvation, standouts such as “Reign Of Fire”, “Dropping Like Flies” and “Tribal Dance”. With no security barricade it was difficult getting great pictures at the packed club, and it should be evident from them that everyone, both band and crowd, was having a fun night.

Anthrax performs Thursday, April 4 at First Avenue in Minneapolis with support from Exodus, High On Fire, Municipal Waste, and Holy Grail.

From The Vault - KID ROCK Part 2 of 2

Click on any of the pictures to see more photos of Kid Rock in 2000 on the Summer Sanitarium Tour (27).

My only other experience with Kid Rock (see From The Vault Part 1 from Lawrence, Kansas in 1999 here) was as part of Metallica's Summer Sanitarium tour on July 15, 2000 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum (Kid Rock just played St. Paul this past Friday). I had a wonderful friend at Warner Bros. at this time, and I asked with less than a week before this event if it would be possible to get a photo pass. She told me that everything had to be approved personally by Metallica's management and hardly anyone was being given access at this show, but she'd see what she could do. Lo and behold, the day before the show I got the call that management had approved my request! My friend at Warner once let me know that she was a high school friend of Incubus singer Brandon Boyd and she remembered my interview with him in the very first issue of my magazine. She told me this was some of the first national press that Incubus had so she'd help me with anything I wanted. Never did I imagine this would eventually allow me to photograph Metallica (thank you I will never forget this!)!!

Alongside Metallica, this tour featured Korn, Kid Rock, Powerman 5000, and System Of A Down. I missed System as all 8-10 photographers allowed were shown backstage and given access to a blocked off section of the stadium where we could sit, and we were given instructions about where we were permitted. Basically, this isolated section of the stadium was for us when we weren't in front of the stage. The photo pass we were given is the biggest one I've ever seen - this thing is the size of three typical passes! Another funny story was the photographer who was banned from leaving our seating during Korn. As she told it, Korn was mad that she published some old photos from their early days and their management had her banned from any Korn show!

So on to Kid Rock - by this time Devil Without A Cause had exploded and he was a superstar. His band had undergone some changes and the stage production was bigger since I saw him the year before, but the intensity of his show remained. The late Ron Jeremy introduced Kid Rock, and Joe C (also late) came out to rap for a few songs. I can't tell you what he played, but I'll assume that only material from Devil Without A Cause was performed. Kid Rock is one of the few major artists I can think of who has been able to successfully transition between musical genres. This undoubtedly has enabled his long-term success, but hopefully these pictures will take you back to a time when he was briefly accepted by metal fans.

The Big Four Simulcast From Sonisphere Festival

To allow fans worldwide to experience The Big Four (Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, and Anthrax) European festival dates this summer, portions of all four bands' sets from the Sonisphere Festival in Sofia, Bulgaria will be broadcast by satellite to movie theaters across North America, Europe, and Latin America on June 22. Broadcast times and ticket charges vary by region. For more details, including a list of participating theaters and how to buy tickets, check out The Big Four website. Here a list of Twin Cities area theaters that will be broadcasting the event:

Block E, Minneapolis

Showplace Theatre, Minneapolis

Eagan 16, Eagan

AMC Rosedale 14, Roseville

AMC Eden Prairie 18, Eden Prairie

Brooklyn Center 20, Minneapolis

Oakdale Cinema, St. Paul

Movies 8, Mankato

Parkwood 18 Theatre, Waite Park