The Halloween costumes at the Palms never disappoint. Throw in a rock concert on All Hallow’s Eve eve and the horror festival Fangoria Trinity of Terrors going on all weekend and you have the recipe for perfect people watching.
Rob Zombie’s Saturday night show at The Pearl brought out a wide variety of costumed freaks and a few people who were downright getting freaky. When I walked into the floor area of The Pearl, a bright green creature jumped out at me like a Cirque performer, wildly gesticulating to show off his costume. He was wrapped entirely in green screen fabric and looked rather amorphous with no face at all. In the sea of black leather-clad rock concert fans, his brightly colored head-to-toe ensemble really stood out.
Rob Zombie look-a-likes strolled around before the show, comparing their mangy wigs (one can only hope!) and tattered cowboy hats. Another homage to Zombie/someone’s worst nightmare came in the form of a man dressed up as the sadistic looking clown, Captain Spaulding, from his film House of 1000 Corpses.
When the singer took the stage, he was layered in a long black paisley jacket, skull bandana over his mouth and his trademark cowboy hat with the tightly curled sides. Zombie was all strip and no tease as the hat, face covering and jacket all came off during the first song, followed soon after by his scarf until he was down to a torn up sleeveless skull T-shirt. Thankfully, his pants alone were a costume, decked out with various skull and crossbones patches, holes, zippers and gigantic belt buckle. It’s a wonder there wasn’t a serious wardrobe malfunction or pants-related injury.
One concert-goer had no suck fortune. Wearing a black mesh top over a strapless bra that her ample cleavage seemed ready to abandon at any second, the fan was no more modest on the bottom half. As if she wasn’t already a spectacle enough, her likely intoxicated companion was not only grabbing her ass in front of everyone; but taking it a few steps further, as well.
Now, it’s one thing to sneak a little ass grab from your lover in public, but this was pretty over the top. The group of guys sitting next to me were cheering the couple on, calling the girl out by the name on her curved tramp stamp, “Nostradamus.”
As interesting – and sometimes distracting – as the costumes and outfits were in the crowd, the real action was up on the stage. Rob Zombie put on an energetic performance showcasing his classic hits and some soon-to-be favorites. With creepy and often sexy zombie movie footage in the background, he stayed true to form and showed scenes from his own films and plenty of sultry witches going topless, of course. (Witches Gone Wild!, anyone?)
For Halloween, Zombie added a twist. Just before he took the stage, he ran a clip with full sound from It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. A nearby fan added his take, “This is going to be devil shit in four seconds!”
Sure enough, the background scenes reverted to the traditional “devil shit” as Rob Zombie belted out hit after hit, like “Devil Man,” “More Human Than Human,” “Dragula” and “Living Dead Girl.” Zombie did add a few new tracks to his set list, including “What”, the single off his forthcoming album Hellbilly Deluxe 2 and “Werewolf Women of the SS”.
Rob Zombie jokingly lamented while introducing "Werewolf" that the production company destroyed most of the footage of the corresponding film whose fake trailer was included in the Grindhouse movie. Now at least the song has a place on his upcoming album and the German werewomen will get their due.
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