Prepare yourself for a fiendishly freaky time with The Creepshow this Saturday night at The Gilman

October 22, 10:34 AMSF Music ExaminerJamie Freedman

Previous Next

Comment Print Email RSS Subscribe

Subscribe

Get alerts when there is a new article from the SF Music Examiner. Read Examiner.com's terms of use.

Email Address   Include other special offers from Examiner.com Terms of Use

The Creepshow will get you in the mood for Halloween

Ghouls, demon lovers, zombies, the devil – just some of the characters found in the horrifically fun songs of The Creepshow. The group boasts four talented musicians: the cute but tough bombshell Sarah “Sin” Blackwood rocks on guitar and lead vocals, Sean “Sick Boy” McNab slaps away on a stand-up bass topped with a skull, Kristian “The Reverend McGinty” Rowles delivers dark-sounding sermons and creepy organ sounds à la J.S. Bach’s Toccata and Fugue, and Matt “Pomade” Gee keeps it all together with solid rhythms on drums. To get the hard-driving hybrid sound that makes this Canadian band unique and exciting, take a little Johnny Cash, mix in some Dead Kennedys and the Damned, throw in the zombie love child of Wanda Jackson and Elvis Presley, and add a dash each of skate punk, haunted house organ, 1980s goth, and 1950s/1960s vocal group harmonies. So whether you want to call it “horrorbilly,” “psychobilly,” “horror punk,” “punk-a-billy,” “hellbilly” or whatever other term people have come up with to describe the “rockabilly meets punk meets horror movie” style, the band prefers to simply call it “Rock n Roll.”

The Creepshow is currently touring to promote their second album, Run For Your Life, a record that ranges from angry tales of heartbreak and revenge in “You’ll Come Crawlin’” to boot-stomping anthems like “Buried Alive.” Then there are the peppier pop songs “Rock ‘n’ Roll Sweetheart” and “Demon Lover” featuring back-up vocal harmonies so infectious and irresistibly catchy that you’ll find yourself singing “ooh ooh ooh” along with the band in no time.

Flyer for Sept 24th show at The Gilman with The Creepshow

You’ll quickly fall under the spell of Sarah “Sin” Blackwood’s sultry, country-tinged sexiness. I asked her what it’s like to be a woman in a mostly male-dominated music scene. After joking about dealing with “the smell of dudes all the time,” she commented on the double standard that women face:

“Even if I am trying to tough it out [when I’m not feeling 100%], it still makes me seem wimpy if I complain, because I am a girl and that automatically puts me in a “diva” category. Like if the guys all ask for no tomato on their burgers and their fries not to touch their ketchup, it’s all good, but if I ask for that (which I f--king wouldn’t), then people think I am demanding and bitchy.”

She clearly endures the challenges of the road gracefully, for The Creepshow is known for their relentless touring schedule and spectacular live performances that give their fans something to remember. It’s this dedicated work ethic that has taken them from dive bars in Burlington, Ontario to sharing the stage with the likes of Rancid and Tiger Army.

McNab reflects on the trajectory of their career: “Since our first show, we've been touring our nutsacks off, playing between 200 and 300 shows a year. And because we didn’t have any record labels backing us, we had to do everything 100% ourselves. Just within the last year or so, all the hard work has started to pay off. Now we have the support of some amazing independent record labels [like Hellcat Records, one of the leading punk labels in the U.S., Stomp Records in Canada, and People Like You in Europe]. We couldn’t be happier with where we are right now!”

Being on tour has also provided the band with some great inspiration for their recent album. Sarah explains: “Anything on Run For Your Life is a story about something we have been through or seen or experienced. As the band grows and keeps touring, we have started writing a lot more about real life, but instead of getting all serious and emo about it, we turn it into stories and songs that are fun and exciting to sing and play. We are really all just kids at heart, so we’ll be like, 'We got robbed (by fake police) in Spain; let’s write a song about it,' but we will write the lyrics like it could be turned into a horror movie.”

Personal experiences also inspired the title track, "Run For Your Life," a song that personifies cocaine as a demon that “destroys you line by line” and causes “never-ending self-destruction.” McNab remembers how he was really bothered seeing his friends “become slaves to drug addiction and watching it ruin friendships and lives.” McGinty agrees about the message of the lyrics: “It’s is a wake-up song to a bunch of our friends who indulge too much in a past-time that isn't worthwhile, and is ruining their lives and bank accounts.”

The Creepshow's hairdo's will make you howl

The demons in the songs that make up Run For Your Life might be metaphors for the personal demons we all face, but that doesn’t mean The Creepshow has held back on the horror themes that characterized their first album, Sell Your Soul from 2006. Beginning with the sweetest 1950s pop vocal harmonies I’ve heard in a long time, “Take My Hand” tells of welcoming a new zombie to the world of the undead: “This is a hell-bound ride/but the Devil's on our side/Don't be afraid, my love/it’s just a little bit of blood.” Check out the video for this song below.
So if you’re a fan of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and zombie movies, or you just enjoy some great spine-tingling, eye-popping, heart-thumping punk-rockabilly-pop-country-goth music, enter the dark world of The Creepshow at The Gilman, Berkeley’s legendary punk club, Saturday night… if you dare!