This past Tuesday, on November XXVIII, MM, at The Masquerade in Atlanta, Georgia, I saw and interviewed Velvet Acid Christ(VAC) along with Haujobb and Din_Fiv. VAC was headlining the tour, in support of their latest album, "Twisted Thought Generator."

I was somewhat unsure what to expect from the performance, as a good deal of this industrial band's work is very technical. After Haujobb, only two pieces of musical equipment remained on stage, one of them a keyboard I recognized from the band's website.

When the show started, the reason for making the extra room became appearent. While two guys stood to the back behind the equipment, primary band member and mastermind Bryan Erickson, aka Disease Factory, made intense physical use of the expanded stage room.

The show started with a large amount of smoke and strobing lights filling the stage, and then went into the samples from "Star Trek: The Next Generation" that have to do with The Borg. The first song, "Futile," which was built around the samples, was beginning. VAC gave an added bonus to the diehard fans present, as the song was a hybrid between the standard "Futile" and the extended version, "Futile 98," found on the rare "Fun With Razors" CD.

The next song, "Dial 8," the second song on the CD "Twisted Thought Generator," featured Bryan's physical performance in addition to the vocals added a new emotional depth to the song, CD, and Bryan. The liner notes of the CD talk about Bryan's depression during the recording of the song and complications with drug use. During this performance, Bryan physically expressed himself on stage better than any performer I have ever seen. Included in his actions during this song, reiterating the subject matter of suicide, he made a pistol with his hand, held it to the side of his head, "pulled the trigger," and fell over hard onto the stage.

This song was just the beginning of the intense physical performance Bryan added to his vocal performance. During other songs, he mimed shooting up drugs into his arm, wrapping his microphone cord thoroughly around his neck, taking apart and reassembling the microphone and hitting himself in the head. In addition, he interacted well with the fans in the front rows. In addition to the standard giving five, he put his hand on people's foreheads. I was lucky enough to be the first person. He also took a mobile of surreal angels hanging from one of the keyboards and held it over the audience, which quickly grabbed it out of his hands. Another stage prop was also used in a comment aimed against religion.

Another action was his unplugging of the monitors at the front of the stage. After he did this, the sound quality improved greatly. During the interview, he mentioned the sound wasn't loud enough during the first half of the show, a point I especially noticed during "Futile," as I'm used to cranking up the volume whenever that song is on my stereo.

In addition to "Futile" and "Dial 8," VAC several other songs, including "The Calling," "Lysergia," "SpeedBall OD," "Asphyxia(Wasted)," what I think was "Hypersphere" during the encore, and two more of the band's best known songs, "Malfunction" and "Fun With Drugs."

VAC also did an encore, where Paul took over the vocals for "Lysergia." During the interview, Bryan noted that a second encore was planned, to feature the older songs "Revolution 101" or "We Have to see, We Have to know," but was tragically cut short by the venue.

The audience, which had mysteriously thinned out somewhat following Haujobb was great, as people were dancing and moshing. I have some good stories from the pit. A biga$$ dude in a Misfits shirt, who broke up the pits during Haujobb, returned to kick more a$$, although he barely touched the two most vicious moshers, which was two chicks going at it. Yes, two chicks. One's head got slammed into the side of my face, popping my jaw, but it was all good.

In closing, this is the best damn concert I've ever been to. Despite the initial sound problems, the intensity, audience, the band's great playing(no, it wasn't karaoke,) and especially Bryan's intense physical act while singing made a great impact and further enhanced already great songs.

I can't give this show justice in writing. See it yourself. For a great concert experience, go see these guys. It's worth it.

Coming soon: Interview with VAC