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Headlining the first day of the 3-day long This is Hardcore fest at the Starlight was a band that broke up in 1997 and had only played two reunion shows in 2004 at CBGBs since then.
This version of Sheer Terror is completely different, though, as it features the inimitable PAUL BEARER on vocals backed by MICHAEL DELORENZO (formerly of KILL YOUR IDOLS as well as SERPICO) on guitar, JASON CARTER on bass and 21 year old drummer ANTHONY CORALLO. Thus, no former members were present and in essence Bearer has reformed Sheer Terror with entirely new members.
Still, if I would “close my eyes”, this show could convince anyone that it was 1993, when the original band was at the peak of its powers with its punishing music and Bearer’s drunken Borscht Belt comic as an ’80s hardcore punk stage persona. DeLorenzo and Carter are both long-time friends of Bearer’s and long-time fans as well and one could see and hear it in the sheer (sorry) amount of enthusiasm they brought to this show. Simply put, they were a joy to watch. It was as if they’d long dreamed of playing in Sheer Terror and finally, they got their wish. Corallo was another revelation, with cowbell(!) even being inserted into the intros of some of their old material.
And what material it is! 1990’s brutal Just Can’t Hate Enough is still the fan favorite and the vast majority of it was played on this evening. From the time that the band opened with “Here to Stay” (also the opening cut from Just Can’t Hate Enough), fans (some of whom, like me, had seen Sheer Terror plenty of times in the ’90s but not since and other younger fans who’d perhaps only heard them but had never been able to see them play) were going nuts! Not a one-album band, they also touched on material from 1992’s also excellent Thanks for Nuthin’ like the unbelievably heartbroken “Three Year Bitch” and “Time Don’t Heal a Thing” as well as brutal broadsides like “I, Spoiler” (which followed “Here to Stay” in their set) and “Don’t Hate Me Because I’m Beautiful”. These four songs illustrate the unique dynamic that Sheer Terror possess. For a hardcore punk singer with a super-gruff voice, Bearer wrote a lot of songs about failed romance and wrote them really well, too. It’s almost as if songs like the aforementioned “Here to Stay” and the main set closer“Just Can’t Hate Enough” (which leads reviewers on Amazon to describe them as “the hardest band you’ll ever hear”) are there to either make up for Bearer’s romantic sensibilities or to counterbalance them but either way, the dynamic works remarkably well. I also recognized the title track of their lone major label album, 1995’s Love Songs for the Unloved.
To conclude a 4-song encore (again, completely unheard of in hardcore, where sets are short and encores are rare), they played their patented cover of THE CURE‘s “Boys Don’t Cry”. I don’t know how many in the crowd felt this way, but I felt a lot of pleasure seeing a bunch of hardcore kids shout out the Cure classic.
As for the stage banter, Paul was completely on his game. Long known for his between song banter, he touched on subjects ranging from an impending tour of Japan in September (which segued into a discussion about disaster films set in Tokyo and its relation to 9/11) and a possible show in New York in November to gay marriage and homosexuality in general to shout-outs to members of the security staff and working people in general. At one point, amidst all the audience baiting and denunciation of certain former band members, Bearer said that he wanted a house with a porch so that he could grow vegetables. At another point, he talked about his books, his records and his cat. Now that I can relate to! Now 42, he’s definitely mellowing, though he’s still plenty angry! Still, it’s nice to see his soft side come out on this night in addition to his more infamous caustic one. Even more exciting, he announced the possibility of writing new songs with the new lineup. Long live Sheer Terror!
