Misfits -- Astro Zombies

[janradder]

This is one of my favorite Misfits songs.  I've never seen the movie and have no idea whether it's one of those so bad it's good or so bad it's horrid films but the song is great.

I was introduced to the Misfits by my friend from swimming, Matt Brooks.  We'd bonded over a mutual love of horror films but hadn't really yet discovered punk rock.

Matt had been given a third generation copy of the Misfits' first album, "Walk Among Us" by an older friend he'd known in Florida.  The sound was muddy, there was considerable tape hiss, and everything was garbled enough that it was really hard to distinguish bass, guitar, and drums.  Glenn Danzig's voice stood out fine though.  At the time, for some reason, he reminded me of Jim Morrison.  I really don't know why except that there was something about the quality of his voice.

Almost from the first listen I loved this record and I loved this band.  I'd heard a little of Public Image, Ltd. as well as the Clash from when "Combat Rock" came out but this was my first real exposure to punk.  Until the Misfits, I had no idea that rock could be so simple and fast and at the same time be about horror movies.  Matt and I listened to his tape over and over and eventually I made a fourth generation copy from it.  We were so enamored with the Misfits that when we started our own band we used the Misfits' template of taking a horror film and writing a song about it to come up with our own first song ("Re-Animator" -- we even tried to throw in our own Danzig shouts and yells when we recorded it).

In the fall and winter of 1984, the Misfits were our favorite band.  We ordered T-shirts from Plan 9 out of Lodi, NJ (I still think of Danzig and the Misfits when I've driven past Lodi on the highway) -- they were the "Bullet" shirts with the picture of a smiling JFK waving to the crowd with his brains blown out behind him (this disturbed and upset our parents but only further proved to us that we'd made the right choice).  We loved the reactions we'd get from kids at school when they'd look at our shirts and finally figure out what they were looking at.  To further increase the cache they held, we'd heard a rumor that Danzig himself silk-screened them in his basement.   Whether this was true or not or just a myth like the one about them only playing on Halloween night didn't matter -- we were wearing a garment that may have been made by the singer of the Misfits.

I remember when the hard to find record was finally re-released.  We rushed out to buy it and were both disappointed because the sound was so crisp and clear and really didn't have a bit of that muddy sound we were accustomed to.  I've since considered making my own third generation tape from my vinyl copy but have never gotten around to it.

I don't really play it record very often anymore but I usually pull it out for Halloween, just to remember.  In 1988, my first year away from home as a freshman at college in NYC, I put "Walk Among Us" on my turntable Halloween night and then sat in my open window.  My room was on the sixth floor and looked over a check cashing store front and a steak house.  Down the street was Union Square Park.  I sat in that window facing east, towards the park, looking out at the city, listening to the Misfits and feeling a mix of loneliness and exhilirating independence.  Outside the room I could hear Parsons art students getting ready to go out clubbing -- some of my Parsons roommates had already gone out to the clubs.  Hearing them and listening to the Misfits and looking out at New York -- I can still put myself there, in that spot on the window, each time I play "Walk Among Us."