As fall season, and Halloween approaches, it is time to take a look back at the devilishly delightful “The Show Must Go Off!: Alkaline Trio Live Halloween At The Metro DVD.”
Chicago’s Metro was hallowed ground to many punk bands, and on Halloween eve in 2002, Alkaline Trio filmed this show for Kung Fu Records live DVD series “The Show Must Go Off!” Set in front of a backdrop of a large, upside down lit up crucifix and dressed like gothic priests complete with face makeup, Alkaline Trio appropriately opened with “Hell Yes” to set the eerie tone right off the bat. Fresh off their new found success from “From Here To Infirmary,” this performance was peak trio.
This era of emo and pop-punk was special to many, and this performance will take you back in time when punk shows were full of raw emotion, and energy, and this night was all about that. During this performance, Matt Skiba has the swagger of a young Billie Joe Armstrong and at times even channels Tom DeLonge, while maintaining a sense of that there were bigger things to come in the career of himself and Dan Andriano and Derek Grant. The set included many songs geared toward Halloween like “Mr. Chainsaw,” “Maybe I’ll Catch Fire,” “Cringe,” “Tuck Me In, “Armageddon,” and “Queen of Pain,” which includes the fine lyric of “like vampire bats deprived of blood into the New York City night we crawl.” The encore continues with some of the classics in “Private Eye,” Crawl,” as well as ending soundly on '“97.”
Fans that were in attendance that night, were lucky enough due to the generosity of the band and an Asian Man Records, to obtain a grail collector’s item for any trio fan: The Alkaline Trio Halloween 7”. The orange vinyl was limited to just 3,000, and includes the band’s cover of the Misfits classic “Halloween.” Some of them are still floating around on eBay for starting price of over $300.
By MIKE DAMANTE
If you are a fan of pop-punk, Mike Damante’s latest book “Hey Suburbia: A guide to the emo/pop-punk rise” is out now, and features interviews with , Alkaline Trio, blink-182. Descendents, New Found Glory and others.