Just back from a gig in Colorado, Voltaire’s gypsy violin-driven quartet took the stage at NYC’s Albion/Batcave on Saturday August 3, 2002. To merely acknowledge vocalist Voltaire as writer, composer and guitarist falls far short of characterizing this multi-talented performer who modestly describes himself on his own website as a “Renaissance man.”

And that he is! A noted animator, comic, raconteur, poet, cartoonist and author, Voltaire, who cultivates an eerie resemblance to Satan, is likely the most successful and widely recognized figure to come out of the NYC Goth scene in a generation. He and his band perform around the nation and around the world, and are sought after for every kind of Gothic and/or geek convention as guest stars.

Voltaire’s animations are featured on the Scifi channel and are currently accessible on www.scifi.com. He has a bunch of cute and creative graphic novels— forever sold out— goofing on Goth pretensions and loaded with references to specific people and places in the NYC scene. He has just released a fourth CD, an anti-folk masterwork titled “Boo Hoo.”

He opened with a parody of a Ramstein number. The rest of the set consisted of eight minor key songs—mainly folk-rock to which the violin added a hint of European flavor— plus some original verse and several entertainingly funny stories.

A one-man “roast” of religion as well as all things Goth, Voltaire’s jokes and poems mainly consisted of friendly put-downs. Not shy about revealing his own shortcomings, Voltaire kept the audience in stitches by laying verbal and musical abuse on both the famous and the lesser-known that have crossed his path.

The song “Future Ex-Girlfriend” granted him opportunity to recite about his one date with Bjork, mocking his own masturbatory fascination with —and ultimate disillusionment in—the Icelandic diva. Religion got the Voltaire treatment in “The Man Upstairs,” a complaint about apartment living that has undertones of blasphemy. “When You’re Evil,” set to a tango, is Voltaire’s ode to himself.

   Fortunate and talented enough to make his living as multi-media artist and full-time Goth, he mocked those poseurs who disguise the fact that they are forced to lead double lives, He lampooned “Vampire Club” and spoofed those who term themselves “corporate Goths.” He teased his audience of “goyim” before closing with the traditional Jewish folk-dance number “Shalom”. And they loved it!

(Originally published in The Aquarian/East Coast Rocker)

The artistic and cultural phenomenon called “rock music” has ascended to a new and unprecedented level with the current tour of Tool, now performing around the country to promote their latest album, Lateralus. From their national debut on the “second stage” at Lollapalooza in the early 90’s to double sell-out of Madison Square Garden this year, Tool has emerged as not only the most successful, but also the longest surviving of the artistic super-heavy bands

As the lights went down at the beginning of Tool’s set, giant screens, four on stage, four more on the Spectra-Vision viewer hanging from the ceiling, lit up with the weirdly disturbing computer art now as closely identified with Tool as their music. One screen, a smaller version stood at stage-level and served as a backdrop to the silhouetted, crouching, spidery figure of mysterious lead vocalist, Maynard James Keenen. Pre-recorded ultra-deep, Tibetan monk throat-chant was heard prior to the first notes of opening number “The Grudge.” During the next two hours listeners were thrashed to “Stinkfist,” “Schism,” “Forty-six and 2,” “Pushit” and many more.

The screens displayed a vast fantasy kingdom of creepily humanoid and organic figures, many new creations but some from Tool’s groundbreaking videos. Now synchronized through the magic of computer animation, to Tool’s convulsive, cyclic music these offered glimpses into a nightmarish virtual reality—-a high-tech hellraising view of the creative mind of Tool.

Bass and drum rondos ominously built up a relentless, coordinated mantra upon which were imposed harsh, guitar and angry synthesizer melodies. Keenan’s’s beautifully controlled vocals preached an angry gospel of rebellion and independence, liberation and assertive self-expression. His tenor voice soared from soothing mellows to heights of rage. The music ranged from melodious, middle-eastern hooks to thumping industrial anthems. The crowd of young, fierce Tool devotees stood rather than sat, mesmerized by the rhythms, striving to sing along.

During a couple of brief interludes body-stocking-clad acrobats came on stage, then later dangled from the ceiling, echoing with their contortions the computer animated visuals of writhing, embryonic forms. Keenan played a little intellectual prank on his audience of would-be individualists by making them recite after him, then mocking them for it. The show ended with a resounding version of the title track, “Lateralus.” Then the mentally and emotionally spent crowd exited solemnly in a post-orgasmic state of enlightenment wrought by the mind of Tool.
Doktor John

During the 1996 recording of the Tool album Aenema, front man Maynard James Keenan (MJK) learned that his guitar tech, Billy Howerdel, was quietly working on the side on his own, creating computerized, symphonic-length compositions intended for a female vocalist.

Recognizing the potential and ever prepared to explore his feminine side MJK offered to be that vocalist if they could succeed in cutting down Howerdel’s works to song lengths. They added a female vocalist on bass guitar, a second guitar and a drummer.

MJK, a highly literate iconoclast and devotee of the late anthropologist, Joseph Campbell, has matched himself to Howerdel’s music masterfully, bridging the monumental guitar swells and drum rolls with his shrill, passionate vocal melodies. His lyrics, based upon highly personal ideas and criticisms are poetically presented in mythical-spiritual terms.

Wearing nothing but bikini panties and a waist length blond wig for the entire show, MJK opened the set with the song “Magdalena” his self-excoriating ode to the power of a go-go girl. Then “The Hollow” which attempts to speak from the point of view of a hungry, lustful vagina. “Sleeping Beauty” served for MJK to denounce intellectual laziness. “Orestes” is about the young man from the Greek tragedy who was forced by fate to kill his mother for having murdered his father, King Agamemnon.

No kidding. This is the kind of stuff he writes making it seem like he has sprung from the head of Camille Paglia. The lyrics to the song “Rose” tell best what MJK is all about: “I rose/ I roared aloud here/no longer will I lie down/ play this kneel-down martyr!”

On a more positive note, but still vociferous in his characteristic ululation, MJK sang an ode to his fiancée Brena; and to the joys of masturbating to a mental image in “Thinking of You.” They also did “Diary of a Lovesong,” a musical and lyrical reference to The Cure, but this does not appear on their current self-named album.

MJK apologized for not having more material with which to sing encores just before closing with their anthem-like diatribe against religion, “Judith.” Then the show abruptly ended. The exiting crowd of Tool fans left in disappointment.
A Perfect Circle is not a Tool side-project, but Billy Howerdel‘s magnum opus with MJK as one member.