By Wendy Case / The Detroit News
PONTIAC
Aggro-metalfests come, and aggro-metalfests go. But few, it would seem, can measure up to the muscle of the latest contender in the summer tour sweepstakes, Tattoo the Earth.
A maelstrom of today’s hottest metal/hardcore acts
combined with high-profile tattoo and body artists from around the country,
the 18-city tour takes over Pontiac’s Phoenix Plaza Amphitheatre at noon
Sunday.
Included on the bill are costumed angst-mongers
Slipknot, revered metalists Slayer, hardcore heroes Sepultura and Sevendust,
Detroit’s the Workhorse Movement and many more bands.
In short, it’s a modern hardcore fan’s Fantasy
Island.
Workhorse drummer Joe Mackie is enthusiastic about
the tour.
“It’s going really well,” Mackie says via cell
phone from the tour bus. “The crowds have been great, and and there’s a
lot of good bands on the bill. It’s pretty cool watching Slayer every day.
You see (Slayer guitarist) Kerry King eating in the catering tent and it’s
like, whoa!”
Mackie says the band looks forward to hitting Detroit: “We’re really excited to come back to the hometown, and show people who believed in us what we’re doing.”
Music fans are excited about the show, too.
“This has got to be the best variety of bands I’ve
ever seen on tour,” says Melinda Male, 22, of Plymouth. “OzzFest was great,
but this blows it out of the water.”
Male is especially excited to see Slipknot, Slayer,
Sepultura and Hatebreed. “These are some of my favorite bands,” she says,
adding that her friends and co-workers at the Garden City music store Rock
of Ages are also looking forward to the show.
“It’s a big, huge fest of metal and hardcore, and
they’re incorporating tattoo artists into it, too,” says Male. “Everybody’s
talking about it. This is the first year that they’re doing it, and everybody’s
really excited. I’m definitely into seeing the Workhorse Movement, too.
I love those guys; they’re our Detroit homeboys.”
Like Slipknot and Sepultura, the Workhorse Movement
is signed to Roadrunner Records — a leading purveyor of what is often referred
to as “aggro-metal” or “nu metal.”
Typified by heavy, staccato drumbeats, deafening
guitars and aggressive, subversive lyrics, the popularity of aggro-metal
has brought a genre pioneered by the likes of Black Sabbath, Motorhead
and Metallica back into the mainstream.
“I think music goes through phases,” says Troy
Hanson, music director at WRIF-FM (101.1) in Detroit, one of the tour’s
local sponsors. Most of the bands on the Tattoo the Earth tour are on WRIF’s
normal radio playlist and they can all be heard on it’s internet station,
I-RIF (www.wrif.com).
“Rap-rock (Kid Rock, Limp Bizkit) helped to bring
a harder edge (to the music),” Hanson says. “And, while these bands aren’t
rap rock, they do have a hard edge. It’s the sound that kids seem to be
gravitating toward.”
Platinum-selling Slipknot, a relative newcomer to
the game, is expected to be an audience favorite. Hailing from Des Moines,
the band combines a dark Grand Guignol theater esthetic with hardcore sounds
for a bizarre Clockwork Orange meets Friday the 13th presence. As Hanson
knows so well, as long as it rocks, it’ll be a hit in Metro Detroit.
“Whether it’s the hard rock of Motley Crue or the
hard rock of Slipknot, this has always been a hard-rockin’ town,” he says.
“It’s a niche market, but ticket sales are doing better here than in other
markets. That’s why they call it Detroit Rock City.”
But according to Hanson, the best reason to get
out to Pontiac on Sunday will be to spend a day outdoors checking out some
live sounds.
“It’s the music, it’s the vibe,” he says. “Outdoor
things like this really bring it all together. All you need is sunscreen
— and a poncho in case it rains.”