By Jim Rowland
It was a real disappointment when Monster Magnet had to pull out of last summer’s Ramblin’ Man Fayre due to Dave Wyndorf requiring some urgent medical attention. The good news is that he’s now recovered, fit and back on stage for this run of European shows celebrating 1998’s classic ‘Powertrip’ album.
‘Powertrip’ was Monster Magnet’s most commercially successful album, and many fans would cite it as their favourite MM album, although there are many that would argue the case for ‘Spine Of God’, possibly myself included. They’ve done a few ‘plays the whole album’ tours before, but I’m pretty sure not with ‘Powertrip’, so this one promises to be pretty special.
Now it must be noted that despite the pre-tour blurb stating the band will be playing the album in full, they actually don’t, omitting two tracks, ’19 Witches’ and ‘Your Lies Become You’, which is a bit strange. I suppose neither is an essential ‘Powertrip’ cut, but it would have been good to get the entire album. The Cult did something similar on their ‘Sonic Temple’ tour not so long ago.
The other thing to note is that they do not play the album in sequence either, which does make more sense when you consider the first three tracks on the album are bona fide classics in ‘Crop Circle’, ‘Powertrip’ and ‘Space Lord’ – you don’t want to peak too early. ‘Crop Circle’ does feature early, following the opening salvo of ‘Atomic Clock’ and the wonderful ‘Tractor’, whilst not surprisingly the anthems that are ‘Powertrip’ and ‘Space Lord’ are saved until the end. Of course, those two would feature in most Monster Magnet sets, and we’ve seen them many times, so it’s great to see them do stuff like ‘Bummer’, ‘3rd Eye Landslide’, ‘Temple Of Your Dreams’ and the underrated ‘Baby Gotterdamerung’, and mighty fine they all are too.
Once ‘Powertrip’ is done and dusted, the band return for a cracking encore which kicks off with ‘Twin Earth’, a slight deviation on the previous two nights of the tour where I’m led to believe ‘Dopes To Infinity’ was preferred. I’m not complaining – the ‘Twin Earth’ single was what kicked everything Magnet off for me all those years ago, and it sounds great tonight. Robert Calvert’s ‘The Right Stuff’ is a welcome reminder that the spirit of the great man lives on, whilst it is back to ‘Dopes’ for ‘Look To Your Orb For the Warning’ and ‘Negasonic Teenage Warhead’ wrapping things up in fine style. In fact it may be that album that I saw them perform the last time I saw Monster Magnet, and whilst it’s great to see them perform those classic albums in (almost) their entirety, it’s worth remembering that MM should not be looked upon as just a nostalgia act these days, with more recent albums like ‘Mastermind’, ‘Mindfucker’ and especially ‘The Last Patrol’ all hitting the spot perfectly and illustrating they are still capable of producing top notch stuff.
Let’s hope it’s not too long before we see the band back promoting another new album. Was this as good as seeing Monster Magnet back in the late 90’s around the time of ‘Powertrip’s original release? Probably not, but a fine night out for any self-respecting Monster Magnet fan it certainly was, and perhaps more importantly, good to see Dave Wyndorf back, fit and on stage.
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