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Sunday night - NYC.

¤ We met up with my friend Chris at our hotel which was very close to the venue, then went out to dinner at Jack's Tavern, the oldest continuously operating tavern in NYC (O'Henry wrote "The Gift of the Magi" there.) Then back to the venue to stand on line for a bit. It wasn't as cold as Philly and the crowd was a bit older and less skateboard oriented from what I could tell.

¤ None of us had ever been to Irving Plaza before so we didn't know the layout or where the best places to head were. Turns out there really weren't any "best" places and it took us a while to find anyplace decent. We finally opted for a spot on the floor, off to the side and near where all Auf der Maur and Monster Magnet's equipment was stored.

¤ Auf der Maur played exactly the same set, with almost word for word "banter" as well. After their set everyone on the band except Melissa helped pack up their stuff so we got to chat a bit with one of their guitarists (sorry, don't know her name) and generally watch the process, which helped pass the time nicely between bands.

¤ Stage note: the night before in Philly HIM had a huge metallic heartagram behind them that all their lights were hung from. In NY they were back to the usual fabric backdrop. Don't know if it was because the venue was too small to set it up in or they just had it for the Philly show/filming.

¤ Monster Magnet were less offensive that night, perhaps because they had a more appreciative crowd. The guy standing next to Chris was certainly appreciative, blissfully air-guitaring his way through the entire set. And they had a video playing behind them in NY that was not in evidence in Philly - sort of a 60's porn, a la Russ Meyer, video. Lots of tits. Really, really BIG tits. The whole thing threatened to become a bit campy actually which got me to thinking about the nature of metal, who it appeals to, how easy it is to cross lines into a completely different genre. In other words, I was thinking about anything but the music again.

¤ In between Monster Magnet and HIM a video screen was lowered and a film called "The Undertaker and His Pals" was shown. Again, a sort of 60's, very campy, Roger Corman meets TRON meets John Waters affair that borrowed heavily from Sweeny Todd. Bands of thugs on motorcycles (that's how we know they're evil) target people (mostly women) for murder and mutilation. Turns out they own a diner and guess what's on the menu. Yep, you can see where this was going. Unfortunately we never found out how it ended because HIM came on

¤ They played pretty much the same set as they had the night before. No surprises, and no new material. They were once again looking happy and bouncy and in fine form.

¤ Standout moments: Someone told Ville she wanted to have his baby. He replied "Genetic mutations should not be allowed to live - I'm talking about me and my bad dreams."

¤ They dedicated "Fortress of Tears" to Bam and Jen, and Ville prefaced it by saying it was to good friends who had been separated for a while and are now back together.

¤ Ville tried to get everyone to do the chant thing again during "And Love said No" with minimal success. People were even denser about what he was asking, though I'm not sure he was being all that clear. (Chris seemed to think he was pretty drunk by the end of the show.)

¤ During "Solitary Man" Ville played more with the change of gender stuff. "Don't know if I will but until I can find me, a man who'll stay and won't play games behind me, I'll be what I am, solitary woman". He also played up that whole "man behind me" line with a coy little look. Are we finally returning to the gender playful days of yore??

¤ Ville began taking his coat off (the same shiny one from the night before) and girls (just girls??) started screaming, so he slipped it back on and then did the same thing again, to the same screams. This went on for a bit, Ville being playful and seeming to love the reaction. When he finally did take his coat off you could see he was drenched.

¤ Before they left the stage Ville said more or less the same stuff about encores, except tonight he said they had to leave the stage to have "a fag and piss" and he pointed out that they smoke (didn't catch the brand name, but presumably something long) and they have huge bladders. Despite that warning they weren't away too long.

¤ They did "In Joy and Sorrow" and in the middle Ville stopped to ask everyone to scream out their angst. The audience obviously didn't have that much angst to get rid of or they were once again clueless, so Ville decided to have each band member demonstrate. One by one Mige, Gas, Burton and Linde screamed into the mic in variously amusing ways. Then Ville said it's much more interesting when you get celebrities to scream so he got Bam and Brandon and Jen out on stage (Brandon kissed Bam and he's the same one who we saw Bam snogging at the NYC show back in April.) So he got them all to scream and Bam and Brandon left and he called Jen back to sing the end of the song with him. (Her voice is pretty good.) Big hugs and kisses after that.

¤ They finished off with "Soul on Fire" again - though sadly with shirts on. Oh well. They did wind up playing an amazingly long set. When it was over and I looked at my watch it was 12:20 which meant that they had played for over an hour and half (I think they went on at 10:30 or so).

¤ Post show note: The next morning at the hotel, as my friend and I were going downstairs to get breakfast the lead singer of Monster Magnet was coming up the stairs. I figured I had to say something so I said "Good show last night" - which seemed general enough to cover everyone and everything. I think it took him a second or two to register that we had been there and another second or two to process that we (aka old mom types) were commenting on his band's performance. Hee hee, I love when that happens!

¤ So, a good time was had by all, with the possible exception of Monster Magnet's singer, who may be suffering serious career trauma after running into us. :)