Skinny Puppy performing at the Doomsday Festival
A twelve year old dream coming true:
As soon as it was announced that Skinny Puppy was going to perform in Dresden, Germany, at the Doomsday Festival the KillerV made sure to get a his ticket.

This was a lifetime opportunity to get to see the Puppies which I already missed twice: First time in 1988 when they played at Alexandra, Copenhagen. But due to illness I had to stay at home. 
Next time in 1992 the show was canceled a week prior to the performance, the reason being that Ogre had been injured during an earlier show.

On august 20th I got on the bus in Copenhagen and arrived in Dresden 7 pm.  Found my way to the Festival area and immediately got into trouble at the gate; the guy at the entrance would not allow me to bring my Nikon to the area! He wanted my to deposit it at the entrance which of course was not acceptable... I persuaded him to let me bring it in after I completely rewinded the film. What I jerk! Everybody else was bringing their SLR cameras.

However; as soon as I had gotten in I went to the toilets where I then pried open the film cassette and got the film back in the camera. Unfortunately the film was a 1600 ISO, so I had to wind it 10 frames forward in case it should have been exposed to light.


Click on the image to get hi
At 10:30 pm. the show kicked off with the thundering bass from "Choralone". At that point the hairs on my forearm stood right out!  When the next song, "Deep Down Trauma Hounds" started I knew it was for real!

For the first 4 or 5 songs Ogre was not visible on the stage. He was apparently hiding behind a sort of screen in the center of the stage, but the voice was unmistakablely his. Cevin Key, however, was visible! He was playing the drums on the left side of the stage, playing with some big nasty looking drumsticks.

When Ogre finally appeared barechested and barefooted (after being shot!) he was soaked in blood. His performance was absolutely brilliant; especially during "Testure" when he finally got to be the hunter, smashing a doll expanded from a string with his fists and feet. It was so real and ugly that it almost made me sick. 
Brilliant!

At this point I got my camera out but when I tried to shoot my 100-300 mm lens literally came apart. The focusing ring somehow got loose from the rest of the lens! Luckily I was able to force it back which enabled me to manually move the focusing part back and forth but it was not an optimal situation since there was no indication whether or not the frame was in focus...
During the next 2 or 3 songs I managed to shoot the remaining 26 frames, but as it turned out when I got back to Copenhagen only one of them was good enough to print! 

The show carried on and during "Harsh Stone White" Ogre was dangling from the big center screen. It looked so cool! At one point he was only hanging by his feet but still managed to keep on singing. No wonder he was injured back in 1992... it looked so out of control!

When the set was over Ogre and Cevin appeared holding each other, smoking on a big, big j.... and then they left the stage, but only to reappear for an absolutely fantastic encore to the sound  of "The Choke" which was followed by my all-time favorite "Smothered Hope".  This was so symbolically, being the very first song on the very first Skinny Puppy album! At this point rain began to fall, almost as if planned, which only added to the great atmosphere....

When "Smothered Hope" was over the band left the stage to the words of Ogre saying "thank you very, very much..." In my eyes it really looked as if he meant it...
Hopefully this concert will convince Cevin and Ogre to get back together again and brap on!

Walking back to my hotel in the middle of night while the rain was hammering down, still with the sound of "Smothered Hope" ringing in my ears is one of those moments I will never be able to forget!

Next morning I got back in my completely soaked clothes and headed for the bus back home to Copenhagen...

What a trip!

This is the set list as compiled from Litany:

Choralone
Deep down Trauma Hounds
Love in Vein
Inquisition
Hardset Head
Convulsion
Worlock 
Grave Wisdom
Killing Game
Social Deception
First Aid
Testure
Dig It
Tin Omen
Nature's Revenge
Harsh Stone White
live brap
The Choke
Smothered Hope

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