The Creepshow

A preface: This is why I love this city: after an hour of driving up and down unpopulated roads in the downtown core trying to find parking, I came to the conclusion that every road in Montreal I needed to use was blocked. It may have been an hour, it may have been half, all I knew is that I was late for The Creepshow. I mumbled to myself that I must’ve missed the first two opening bands: The Hypnophonics from Montreal and The Dreadnoughts from Vancouver as I slammed the door to my ’92 minivan and hiked up two blocks to the venue.

I finally got to the venue and as I paid for coat-check I hear the familiar chords of a song that captures my whole existence as a Montrealer. The Dreadnoughts: a bad ass 4-piece Celtic punk band from Vancouver, equipped with hard-hitting drums, sly-guitar riffs, and a sweet-sounding mandolin, were playing the opening notes of Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On”. It was, unfortunately, their last song but they left such an impact of me, not to mention to dancing crowd, that I haven’t stop playing them on my iPod since. But, the main attraction of the night was The Creepshow and, the excitement was definitely in the sweaty, venue air. The audience was filled with many pretty girls with perfect curled hair and boys with combs in their back pockets. It was a big party and kudos to The Creepshow for bringing it in the masses.

Then, your typical entrance begins.The lights dim down, the music gets louder and the crowd starts moving. The 4-piece set get on stage and Sarah Sin, the singer, comes rolled in on a wheelchair by the mandolin player of The Dreadnoughts. She stands up, unwraps herself out of a pirate flag and begins into the first song, “Run For Your Life”. The drums are thump, thump, thumping and the crowd is singing mercilessly to the ever catching chorus, yelling “run for your lives, no body is going to save your now”. It was complete debauchery. The ever so charming singer warmed up the crown by many sweet comments about our city. “Montreal, thank you for being Montreal” she exclaimed before going into the next song. The next song started off very slow with a capturing intro, “I’d like to tell a little story entitled... 'Zombies Ate Her Brain'”. About 30 seconds in, the song became mega fast, and crowd began to lose it. They got everybody dancing with this fast, sweet and short little number. It did not end their though. Sarah Sin called out to the crowd that the next one was “part of a dancing number” and she wanted to see the crowd moving. At this cue, the band got into their next song, “Shake”. The crown began to twist, thumb their feet and, as the song proclaimed, this got them shaking down to their knees. To this '50s-styled rockabilly tune the crowd began to crowd surf, ignoring the constant reminders from the security guards to abstain. The party hit its high note with this song but, little did we know, it was just beginning. For the next song the bassist called for a “wall of death” to which the crowd gladly separated. The song started loud and heavy. The mix between the bassist Hellcat's vocals and Sarah Sin’s was a great mix for this little bone-moving number. One the song began to kick-back, the crowd marched right into each other and the dancing party ensued once more. As the show began to come to a close, Sarah Sin invited the crown to “continue on the party” at Foufounes Electrique down the street. She showered the guest with many “merci beaucoup’s” and seemed very grateful to be playing. This transcended on the audience and not only did I have a good time, but the audience was very much into their last song. The band thanked and devoted the last song to STOMP Records, the whole tour and, of course, the crowd then, they delved into" Psycho Ball N’ Chain". This bass-thumping, drum-hitting, keyboard-bashing tune got the crowd on their feet and it was the perfect way to end (or perhaps start) a night of complete debauched partying. No matter how old you were, how high your pomp was or, how much leopard you were wearing that night, The Creepshow put on a show that night that got the crowd moving and they didn’t stop. I noticed myself humming the last few chords of the final song as I left the venue and marched down two blocks to my car.