Ministry on tour now with Die Krupps and Nitzer EBB stopped into Baltimore to bring us the early years of Ministry. 

German industrial band Die Krupps opened up the show and got the crowd pumped and ready. With a good mix of synth , guitars and booming bass, Die Krupps was a great opener. With songs like Metal Machine Music, Robo Sapien, and Bloodsuckers. 

Nitzer EBB was up next. Armed with just vocalist Bon Harris and his keyboardist , Nitzer EBB set was full of energy and life, Bon was all over the stage dancing and just living his best life. With songs like Blood Money, Hearts and Minds, and Join in the Chant, Nitzer got the goth crowd up and moving. 

Ministry was up next and it was gonna be a fun and weird night. I’ve seen Ministry many times but this would be the first time I’ve seen them without them playing either Thieves or NWO. That’s because we got blasted back into the in 1983 and 1986 with albums “With Sympathy” and “Twitch”.

The band sounded and looked amazing with AL supporting a disco fever fuzzy hat and glasses. Now like I’ve said I’ve seen Ministry many times and they have been heavy as all hell, but apparently the old school set with much bass in it was too much for Soundstages speakers as the band blew them out many times during the set. 

The fans didn’t care they stuck in full force and watched one of the most fun Ministry shows. It was great to hear all the old songs with a little bit of a modern twist to them. If you get to go and see this tour I encourage you to do so.   

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Ron

Ron has keen eye for new talent, a love for the underground, and a tremendous passion for music of any genera. You’ll probably bump into him at a horror convention or some seedy club checking out the next need-to-know band.

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Another M3 has come and gone and we are still rocking out to what an amazing weekend it was. 

M3 this year was a lot of fun. We had some big surprises in the acts that played, and we had some really great nights of rock and roll. 

On Friday, Sebastian Bach rocked the hell out of the crowd, and we got to hear some great Skid Row songs by the voice behind the song. 

Saturday was another kick-ass day. Child’s Play rocked thee, and then I helped my buddies at the Metal Summit with an interview with John Allen. Adler killed it again, and with The Metal Summit, we interview Ari once again. Slaughter and Winger rocked it; it was sad to know that Winger wasn’t going to be touring anymore. Accept made us rock out and get our balls to the wall with some German metal. Check out my interview with Wolf Hoffman below. The big surprise for Saturday was the return of Diamond Dave, or David Lee Roth to those that don’t know. Damn, he blows me away! It was great hearing all those Van Halen songs sung by the man himself. David sounded great, his band was amazing, and his backup singers were awesome. David would have to be a top 5 favorite band to play M3 ever, and that’s saying a lot. 

Sunday was another great day of bands and interviews. Opening up with Spread Eagle, who I joined with my guys in The Metal Summit for another kick-ass interview. Vixen and Lita Ford showed everyone that women kick just as much ass as the guys do. My big jaw-dropping moment of M3 was that I got the approval to sit down and talk to Lita Ford herself for a quick interview. Lita is a legend and such an amazing person. Check out the interview below. Great White and Warrant kicked ass. Ace Frehley was great and brought his smoking guitar to blow all of our minds. And ending the night, it was great to see Pearcy and DeMartini back on stage together and rocking all the dirty RATT rock ‘n roll. 

All in all, it was a great M3 again; the rain and thunderstorms kept themselves in check and gave us a good weekend of killer rock ‘n roll. I’m looking forward, as always, to seeing what bands M3 will bring next year. I love that they posted an online survey to see what bands they have had in the past that people would like to see and some bands that haven’t played before. But in my opinion, good rock ‘n roll doesn’t matter who’s on the stage; we go to M3 to listen to some kick-ass bands and hang out with our family of rockers for a weekend—that’s what it’s all about. 

About Author

Ron

Ron has keen eye for new talent, a love for the underground, and a tremendous passion for music of any genera. You’ll probably bump into him at a horror convention or some seedy club checking out the next need-to-know band.

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A drummer who looks like a cross between Peter Criss in Kiss and the Hamburglar—a guitarist with a huge, cartoon-looking burger head featuring long, silver tusks—a bassist, quite literally, in a gigantic, slightly terrifying Grimace costume, and a singer sporting a yellow and red striped jumpsuit featuring long strips of fabric hanging from the arms, bright red hair, and a clown makeup look with an uncanny resemblance to Ozzy Osbourne. That’s the summary of what you’d see walking into Jergel’s on April 29 during Mac Sabbath’s show.

To explain Mac Sabbath, you need to know a little about this extraordinary band’s backstory. I spoke with Mike the Manager, the manager for this fast-food-themed act, who took the band from performing in restaurant basements to stages at festivals around the world. He gave us a bit of insight into where the group came from and how their relationship came to be.

After a period of owning an oddities shop, Mike was used to receiving strange phone calls requesting him to come see something that would change his life. When he got another one of these calls, which required him to meet at a local burger franchise (which shall remain anonymous), he would’ve never expected that statement would actually be true.

“It was like a fight club sort of secret situation where all these people from this organization were there and weren’t supposed to be there. They were all against the organization, even though they worked for it. Everybody was waiting for this red and yellow curtain, stuffed between packages of hamburger buns and boxes of condiments. Then, the curtain drops, and it’s these mutated mascots doing these Black Sabbath riffs and screaming about MSG and GMOs. It was like radical performance art.”

So, after years of playing small shows, the band went on to open for bands like Kiss and Mötley Crüe and even meet Ozzy, the Prince of Darkness, himself. If you’ve ever seen anything online about the band, you probably know their silly antics, but their live show is really beyond what you would expect. Rather than just presenting a concert, Mac Sabbath aims to create an experience that leaves you pondering the intentions of the government.

“It’s something you really have to experience live because it’s more like a play. There’s a beginning, a middle, and an end. It’s an entire arc that you cannot appreciate by watching videos. There’s comedy, there’s magic, and then there’s also a social message. It’s very important for Ronald to keep it family-friendly to get the message to the kids because when a country is specifically poisoning its people on purpose, it starts with the children’s food. So everything Mac Sabbath does is tangible and appeals to the child in us all.”

And appeal to the child in us all they do. Like many others, I thought I knew what I was in for when arriving at the Mac Sabbath concert in Warrendale, PA. I figured I’d see a few “Fast Food” inspired characters making up Black Sabbath parodies much like Weird Al. Well, boy, was I wrong.

With two laser eyes, Ronald heads adorning each side of that red and yellow curtain Mike mentioned earlier, a crowd suddenly packs against the stage. What’s most interesting to me is I’ve never seen a crowd get so excited over a curtain drop. Immediately their vision clung to the stage as if they were children watching a cartoon show. And no wonder why; you’d be in a trance too if four fast-food mascot-looking musicians took the stage with ketchup and mustard bottles, flaming frying pans, chicken nuggets, larger-than-life straws, and a wacky cast of guest characters.

If you want to throw yourself into this adventure with Ronald Osbourne, the Catburglar, Grimalice, Slayer MacCheeze, think of the show as an alternate universe. This is an alternate universe where Ozzy Osbourne has a passion for the toxins of fast food and joins a cast of mascots to bring the man down from the inside. There is no Black Sabbath; there is only Mac Sabbath. And honestly? After hearing songs like Sweet Beef (Sweet Leaf), where ketchup and mustard (water) are squirted into the crowd’s mouth, or More Ribs (War Pigs), where a bucket of beer turns into confetti, I’m pretty okay with that universe.

Needless to say, if you want to understand this review in totality, you need to go to a Mac Sabbath show yourself. Between the characters and the music that’s familiar yet completely new, there are a lot of reasons to press full-send and buy that ticket. Even Ozzy’s seen Mac Sabbath, so why haven’t you?

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Kylie Thomas

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