For any angsty youth with access to eyeliner and the outside world, Glenn Danzig, founder of The Misfits, Samhain and, of course, Danzig, has been a source of joy and an outlet for all of our “fuck society” feelings for over 30 years. The King of Creepy himself took time amidst his latest world tour to reminisce with Weekly Alibi about the last decades in the scene and what we can expect from him in the next year.Weekly Alibi: So it’s your 30th anniversary tour for Danzig, which is amazing. Did you think you would make it to this point?Danzig: I knew if I was still alive I’d still be doing music. I didn’t know Danzig would still be around playing you know, this long afterwards. It’s great because there were a lot of the obstacles in the way when we started.What are your thoughts on the bands that you’re touring with? I know that here in ABQ we’ll see you with Power Trip, and they’re one of my favorites.We’ve got Power Trip, Method Man who did a few shows with us back East here—they’re a really good band. Then of course we’ve got Venom. I love Venom! It’s great having them with us. They were on our Blackest of the Black tour last year.Did you pick them out yourself?I always pick the bands. So I put a list together of bands [I] would like to have out and see who’s available. Sometimes people would love to do it but they’re already on something else or they’re not available so you really have to have a big list going in, and that’s how you get a bunch of bands that you really like. I’m really happy. We’re two months out and most of the shows are already sold out.After such a long time, do you feel the same way about the material? Yeah, of course. I love everything that I’ve done. It’s just really cool that 30 years later we’re still here doing it.What’s it like looking back at your body of work? Are you able to kind of track your evolutionary progress?It’s actually a work in progress as I go along. I’m very aware of what I’ve done and what I’m going to be doing. It’s something I think about a lot while I’m doing it.What are some of your top favorite horror movies?Depends on what you define as horror. So many people define horror as something different and like to me, someone like a fascist leader or someone who kills like millions of people is scarier than someone who kills one or two people, you know. […] I’m not a big fan of the Saw movies, it’s just the same movie over and over again. But I have so many favorite horror movies. I like Eyes Without a Face. I like a lot of the old universal movies and the Cronenberg movies and the splatter movies. It’s across the board. It’d be tough to narrow it down. I might be able to pick 20.Favorite comic books?There’s so many great comics. I don’t see anything I really like anymore. Which is a shame because it would be cool if there was some really cool horror comics right now but, other than my stuff, I don’t see anyone doing anything like that. I liked the Watchmen when it came out and I still am a big fan of Alan Moore’s Promethea which they no longer publish. Howard Chaykin’s Black Kiss was pretty crazy when it came out.You’re working on a feature film based around your characters from the Verotik comics. Can you tell me which characters we’ll see?We’re still sussing it out but it looks like it’s gonna be kinda like an anthology film in the same vein or formula as Creepshow, like a couple of different separate stories. This one has Morella, which is one of our satanic vilenesses. When we launched the Verotika comic we had her thrown into those. So we’ll do her and then I know for sure the change of face story is going to be in there which is the crazy stripper who cuts off girls’ faces and wears them while she’s onstage. It’s a pretty crazy story. And then my take on the Countess Bathory for sure will be in there. We’re still on the fence about the other one but it looks like it might be the Dajette story. It’s gonna be a real horror movie. It’s gonna be bloody and unapologetic. If you’re a horror fan you’re going to dig it.Is this live action or will it be animated?It’s live action with actors and actresses, the whole nine yards.When is the projected release date?That I don’t know because we’re just doing preproduction right now and finalizing casting and locations and crew, so I would imagine maybe sometime in 2019 hopefully.If you hadn’t gone into a music career, what do you think you would have done?Oh I don’t know. It could have gone so many different ways. I could have gone down that road like a lot of my friends who aren’t here anymore you know doing bad stuff to people.I wanted to be a comic book artist, a brain surgeon, a pilot; it would change all the time. It could have gone anywhere.How do you perceive the punk/metal scene these days?Well that’s the cool thing, I’ll meet these kids and it’s their first metal, or even live show. A lot of them are gamers who sit in their rooms gaming or they go to raves or whatever and this is like their first live show with a live band. It’s not like these other bands that go out and are pretending to play and sing like Milli Vanilli. There’s so many metal bands that do it too and it’s a shame. If I paid like $30 or $40 for a ticket and the band wasn’t really playing and was pretending to play I would be so pissed off. So I think that’s one of the things that’s changed, that could never have happened back in the day. That would never never happen. I mean, there are bands that if their hard drive goes down on their computer system, that they can’t play and it’s sad. So that’s what’s changed. But in a lot of ways, it hasn’t changed at all in that this kind of music still gets the big middle finger from the radio and mainstream music media. So here it is, all these years later and it’s still a viable music scene but it still gets the big middle finger from mainstream music media and mainstream media in general. Look at these assholes like Conan or whoever and all these other places. They never have any good bands on there, its all stupid pop crap, the bands that don’t really play and sing.Anything else you want to say or talk about?No, not really. I don’t like talking about myself much.
Danzig’s 30th anniversary tour hits The HIstoric El Rey Theater in Albuquerque (622 Central Ave. SW) on Thursday. Nov. 1. Tickets (general admission) are $32.50. Doors open at 6:30pm. For more info go to thecomplexabq.com/event-1206.
