Monster Magnet played Oslo, with the band My Sleeping Karma opening, and they were both excellent shows. Catch them on this tour if you can! My Sleeping Karma were kind of similar to Spine Of God era Monster Magnet with their long jams (instrumental), and were very well recieved by the audience. I thought they were super-heavy and will check out their CD’s. They were on stage around 9PM, while Monster Magnet entered at 10:15PM, closing the last song at 12:10AM. The reason there was no Spine of God “covers” 10″ EP (like in ’10 they had the Superjudge EP, and in 11″ the Dopes EPs) was because of Hurricane Sandy (well…), at least thats what the guy selling merchandise stuff said. They had awesome Spine Of God T-shirts, and one can buy them online as well, which I most certainly will.
I very briefly met Dave Wyndorf before the show while standing outside with a smoke, as he was coming out of the tour bus and I exchanged a few words with him. I said “Hi Mr. Wyndorf, I used to live in New Jersey and have a ripped and torn old Spine of God T-shirt I can’t wear!” He was like, “yeah, cool…”, and walked quickly inside.
So, Monster Magnet delivered a killer show compared to the “fat cigarette smoking Zoloft casualty” Wyndorf I saw in ’08 and ’10. It really was a killer performance for a mixed crowd of old rockers, freaks and various folks, who all were ecstatic while the entire Spine of God LP plus Freak Shop USA, Superjudge and Tractor were torn through. The band really sounded great and together. Dave introduced Ozium as an LSD tripper seducing a girl, and instructed the crowd how a nipple looked like while tripping. And I noticed the pizza delivery of 4 large pies for Dave and band after they had left the stage as I was leaving the venue; a well deserved meal for the band after such a blistering performance. I really did not miss Ed Mundell either, the lead guitar legend. His replacement was extremely tight and skilled. A fine night in Oslo indeed. I drank 3 beers and a Pepsi and headed home very satisfied.
Reviewed by Christian Mumford