This week, “Punk On The Rocks” is getting into the Halloween spirit by highlighting some of the best horror punk that OurStage has to offer. For those of you who need a refresher course, horror punk is a subgenre of punk rock that combines punk music with horror movie themes and images, and no one does it better than The Misfits. With their “devil lock” hairstyle, ghoulish makeup, leather jackets, instantly recognizable “fiend skull” logo and songs like “Night of the Living Dead,” “Astro Zombies,” and “Mommy Can I Go Out & Kill Tonight” the band looked and sounded the part. The Misfits have influenced bands from Metallica to Guns ‘N’ Roses to My Chemical Romance. After the group broke up in 1983, vocalist Glenn Danzig formed horror punk band Samhain, and later heavy metal band Danzig. Original Misfit Jerry Only reformed the band in 1995 with his brother Doyle and a revolving cast of characters and they have been releasing albums and touring ever since.
The Misfits "fiend skull" logo
HorrorPops
Also under the horror punk umbrella is psychobilly, which combines elements of punk and rockabilly with lyrics inspired by sci-fi, horror and exploitation films. Rockabilly-influenced punks The Cramps and flamboyant blues singer Screamin’ Jay Hawkins were important precursors to the first wave of psychobilly bands in the early 1980s like The Meteors and Guana Batz. The psychobilly torch is carried on today by bands like Tiger Army, Nekromantix and HorrorPops.
Luckily, everything horror punk is, is represented on OurStage. A little bit punk and a little bit psychobilly, Portland, Oregon’s Toxic Zombie equal a whole lot of fun. The band is currently in the studio recording their first full length record. Get a taste of Toxic Zombie’s brains….I mean sound, in this live video of the band performing their song “Toxic Zombie” at this past February’s PDX Zombie Prom:
Pretty sure we’re going as the Dresden Dolls. My husband will be Amanda, obviously.