Porno For Pyros - July 18, 1992 - Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View, CA

Date: July 18, 1992
Location: Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View, CA
Recorded: No known recording
Status: Confirmed
Type: Concert
Lineup: Perry Farrell
Stephen Perkins
Martyn Lenoble
Peter DiStefano
Artwork:
 

Show Information:

Lollapalooza 92 show. Porno for Pyros performed on the second stage.

THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
July 20, 1992
Edition: FINAL
Section: DAILY NOTEBOOK
Page: E1

All-Day Rock Blowout at Shoreline
Author: Michael Snyder, Chronicle Staff Writer

Rock music's anti-censorship forces raised a furor all day Saturday during Lollapalooza '92 at Shoreline Amphitheater. And sure enough, the controversial rapper and bandleader Ice-T was right in the middle of things.

It was the first of two sold-out weekend shows for Lollapalooza, a national tour of seven acts that are defining alternative pop music for an audience that is more interested in the new and unusual than the comfortable and familiar. Now in its second year, Lollapalooza is essentially a traveling festival, complete with a carnival midway that offers food, games, politically correct causes to support, arts and crafts, trinkets for sale, and a second stage for a sideshow concert scheduled between the main stage acts.

Saturday was the first stop on this year's tour, and spirits were high throughout the site. The place was jammed and seething with youthful vigor from midafternoon until the last note, around 11 p.m.

PEPPERS TOP BILL

The bill featured the headlining L.A. punk-funk band Red Hot Chili Peppers, the near-toxic industrial rockers of Ministry, the incendiary inner-city rapper Ice Cube, the grungy Seattle hard-rock quartet Soundgarden, England's rock and roll deconstruction crew the Jesus and Mary Chain, the chart-climbing Seattle rock band Pearl Jam, and the jangly British dream-pop group Lush. There's a diversity of styles in that lineup, but also an implicit commitment to freedom of expression, exemplified in the person of Ice-T. Hell, Ice-T was the emcee of the whole affair.

That's the one and only Ice-T, whose raw street-smart hip-hop raps brought him fame and hard cash and whose recent album with his rock band Body Count ignited a nationwide ruckus over the lyrics to his song "Cop Killer." Police organizations are calling for the offending song to be banned, while Ice- T's record label defends his Constitutional rights.

At Lollapalooza, Ice-T was lionized as a hero. Every time he strode out to center stage to introduce a band or performer or make an announcement, the crowd went berserk. And performer solidarity was a given.

WARNING TO AUDIENCE

Chris Cornell, lead singer of Soundgarden, looks like one of those scraggly young souls that you often see wandering Haight Street, but he was sharp and to the point about censorship. Stopping between songs, he spoke out in favor of Ice-T and free speech and warned the audience to oppose the erosion of their rights.

Ice Cube extolled his "homey" during a set of harsh rap numbers with his "posse," the Lenchmob. The incidence of profanity in any of Mr. Cube's raps is many times that of Ice-T's material. "Gangsta Gangsta," a core number from Cube's career as a member of the Los Angeles rap group N.W.A., was particularly well-received on Saturday. It's full of violence and misogyny and vulgar language.

Ice-T introduced local punk-rock luminary and censorship target Jello Biafra as a colleague. Biafra of the now-defunct punk band the Dead Kennedys returned the favor, then insulted Tipper Gore, wife of Democratic vice presidential nominee Al Gore and leader of the movement to label certain rock albums that contained sexually explicit material. Then Biafra introduced the ear-splitting Ministry as the perfect music to play for Tipper if she's ever locked in a cell.

ALTERNATIVE BANDS

Obviously, none of the artists on the Lollapalooza '92 tour would be on Tipper's home entertainment center play list. They're all resolutely alternative, and with the exception of Pearl Jam's slow, soulful hit "Alive," they're all difficult listening for middle-aged, middle-of-the-road duffers.

But for the high school- and college- age crew and the other twentysomething rock fans that jockeyed for lawn space at the Shoreline, this was a whole day's worth of mega-cool performers for a regular concert ticket price, and a total socio-political experience to boot. With a different lineup of performers, Lollapalooza was one of the most successful concert tours of last summer. With the right performers, the set-up appears to transcend the recessionary hard times that are thinning profits in the concert business.

Highlights included Pearl Jam's "Alive," the first song to really rouse the sun-soaked midafternoon crowd; the Jesus and Mary Chain's "Head On," a feedback-powered blend of surf music and hard-rock raunch; "Slaves and Bulldozers," an unapologetically macho hunk of rock grunge from Soundgarden, played at ballad tempo, and Ministry's unrelenting, fist-pumping set of demonic guitar and sequencer grind to an amphetamine disco beat.

The stars of the show? The Red Hot Chili Peppers, the only band to play its entire set after dark. The quartet, led by hyper singer Anthony Kiedis, zapped from booty- funk hip-hop crunchers like "Give It Away" to full-fledged punk thrash, hitting an apex with the Chili's bopping version of the Stevie Wonder number "Higher Ground."

Even if the band on stage wasn't to your taste, there was the midway. There was bungee-jumping from a crane. You could check out various ethnic food booths and kinetic art sculptures. There was a "Wake Up George Bush -- $1 a swing" strength test with mallet and bell, next to a safe-sex wheel of fortune, both to raise funds for the homeless. There were "Vote for Choice" sign-up tables. "The Rhythm Beast" was a gigantic part-sculpture, part-percussion instrument that people hammered on throughout the day.

In keeping with the carnival theme, Jim Rose and his post-modern Circus Sideshow -- complete with the exotically pierced Mr. Lifto, the needle-skewered Torture King and the rest -- was one of the acts on the midway.

Ex-Jane's Addiction singer Perry Farrell -- considered one of the guiding lights behind the festival -- added a special treat: the brief, but knockout Bay Area debut of his new band Porno for Pyros on the second stage.

Perhaps Lollapalooza is prepackaged rebellion, but isn't that rock music in the modern industrialized world?