A long time ago and in a nice Texas town called Austin the production company I managed was doing about six stages at SXSW. These were spread out over several miles, and we maxed out every piece of gear and every audio engineer we could find.
So in my infinite wisdom, I hired my son's youth pastor to cover the alternative stage. It was like something out of the Mad Max movies. Loading dock, all concrete, with chain link fences everywhere. I put one of my seasoned engineers at monitor land and told my youth pastor (who mixed regularly at church) he could handle it. Hmmm!
A couple of heavy metals bands later, the main act came on for the night. A beautiful blonde in full length leather jacket and leather hat came to front of house. I happen to be there for the set change and heard her talking with my FOH guy (remember – the youth pastor). She asked for some gritty effects to thicken up her voice and said the show was going to be very dramatic.
So I leave to go to another stage and left the band in the hands of the youth pastor. Less then 30 minutes later, I get a panic call over the radio from the youth pastor, and he can barely speak. He said she dropped the coat and walked on stage in nothing but leather bra and thong. Screaming at the top of her lungs obscenities he had never heard, and even the sailors were clearing out.
Genitorturers had arrived on the stage. The show proceeded to get wilder as many of you veterans may have experienced with this band. Nudity, bloodletting, immoral behavior…sounds like a rock show. My monitor guy tried to calm the youth pastor and assured him that the Smith and Wesson, which was within arms length at monitor land, would get the youth pastor out of any jam. The crowd was getting out of control and boiling over into every inch of the venue.
So I heard the panic and left my stage and headed over to see what the fuss was all about. Well, the youth pastor was outside holding his head, and the console was on autopilot. The band was thrashing and was into the "nude girl wrapped in plastic wrap" part of the show by now.
I sync'd with the monitor guy and headed to FOH in time for the closing songs. I had recently done Gwar and was pretty used to the debauchery, but this was pretty wild. The crowd was into it, the band was thrashing, and my youth pastor sat composing himself in my truck. This was the first night…needless to say, I was summoned to that stage many times over the next few days until he had blended with the scene. We have remained friends all these years, but I doubt he has ever forgiven me for what his eyes and ears experienced that night.
-Timothy Thornton
