Location: Ljubljana
Concert date: 17.07.2014
Attendance: 100
Ticket price: 15 € presale, 18 € on the day of the show
Looking at lively Metelkova made the eyes sting a little; a sea of fluorescent hair and skater gear spilled around the tour bus and the entrance to Gala Hala. Most of the chatter circled around one common theme, the assorted antics of MTv’s Jackass, with a slight undertone of nostalgia and anticipation. Anticipation of madness and general destruction, as befits Margera. Yes, the verbal babble mostly covered the exploits of one of the main men of the MTv “stunt” series. The pre-stage debates were cut short by the start of the show, with a backing track of Phil Collins’ In The Air Tonight, over which a chemically handicapped Novak, dressed in his birthday suit plus a hat, a scarf and a bottle of wine, gargled the choruses into the mic. Novak spiced up the karaoke with his “dangler” and the occasional shower of red wine, a combination he used to animate the crowd throughout the whole event.
A solid start to the night.
A solid start to the night in terms of general mayhem. The musical side slipped onto a siding in a few short episodes; a big part of the set was made up of covers from various projects tied to Margera’s work, such as All My Friends Are Dead by Turbonegro, during which Bam’s life partner thoroughly showered the heated-up crowd with a can of Staropramen. The crowd gave the original songs a warm reception, each one followed by a roaring applause, but they still expected more of those polished acrobatics. Of course, the crew spiced up every song with all sorts of extras. Nicole seasoned Bend My Dick with a striptease, and Južne duše likewise tried to loosen up the uptight Slovenian prudes; several girls showed up on stage, after which the whole band enthusiastically urged the girls to dance topless. “Come on, you’ve got bigger ones than I do, show a little something!” Nicole kept coaxing. Besides her bust, Novak’s “buddy” of course paraded loosely across the stage, now by the guitarist, now by the drummer. An American model of partying, a show that simply does whatever it feels like, and the Slovenian crowd gladly applauded it. Of course, the performance wasn’t all about the clowning; Indifference, dedicated to the late Ryan Dunn, was performed vocally and instrumentally by the guitarist in an utterly sincere and private way, carving out an honest moment on an otherwise chaotic timeline. The performance wrapped up relatively quickly (about an hour) with a cover of Van Halen’s Hot For Teacher and the farewell Beer+Ice=Ice Cold Beer, dedicated to Don Vito. After a quick exit from the stage, a little group of autograph- and photo-hungry female fans was already waiting behind the doors of Gala Hala.
Surprisingly, the show passed without a visit from firefighters or paramedics, which you’d kind of expect given how the night started. We could philosophize about the performance and the depth of the lyrics, but sadly that’s not going to happen. Fuckface Unstoppable doesn’t push the boundaries of taste, nor does it serve up earth-shattering, floor-ripping material. A show that, without any needless pretense, throws a night of switching off and going wild and follows a very simple ideology: Whatever pops into your head first goes down the hatch first.
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