Road Reports Archive

Thor / Goat Horn / Nasty Disaster
The Continental . New York, USA

In addition to CBGB’s there is another legendary Punk venue where you can catch a killer show in an intimate setting. The club is The Continental and it is located in the Village in NYC. Tonight this was to be the scene of the The Return Of Thor, the Legendary Rock Warrior. Since I knew this was going to be a lot of fun I made sure to get there early enough to enjoy all of the festivities that were planned. Many people might not be aware but Thor has been a performer for over 20 years and in addition to Rocking Mighty with his sacred hammer, he performs feats of strength and endurance during the show. The night began with a few interesting groups who were all unsigned and while there were four in total I was only able to focus on a couple of them in particular as I was catching up with Friends as well. Goat Horn was a powerful and very fun Metal trio who played up the Death thing with a whole lot of melody. Given this was a Thor show I was not sure if some of the other acts would be of the same caliber of show. I wondered if GH was doing their music with a little tongue-in-cheek humor. I wondered this because the singer made the audience spell out Satan before the song that seemed to be called “Satan Is Coming”. Of course keeping the tongue firmly in cheek was hard to do when Nasty Disaster came onstage. This was a band that played Metal with songs that were about Metal. I have to say that they were a lot of fun from guitarist Ian McRock and songs like “Slut” it was just an amusing experience. I recommend looking out for them both.

Now the time had come for Thor and as smoke covered the stage the band came out and then from the dark the Mighty Rock Warrior himself. Jon Mikl Thor is a very visual performer and comes out masked and sporting a long leather cape. There are swords and other props around the stage and believe me he sure makes use of them during the set. Thor’s band for the tour was Steve Sack on guitar, John Ramirez on bass and Mike Favata on drums. Favata was actually a part of Thor’s lineup during some of his most popular releases such as “Only The Strong” and “Unchained”. The music was clearly tight and as the band played Thor ran about the small stage switching mask after mask for the first couple of numbers (I counted about 8 before he was completely unmasked). His songs are epic tales of heroism and fighting demons or evil and as Thor says this in his press kit “Really the stories convey the message that if you believe in yourself you can find the strength and the perseverance to overcome any obstacle”. He is very enthusiastic and literally seems to feed off of the energy that the audience gives him. His set included a large span of his classics and he played the tracks that I enjoyed from his catalog so I was very pleased to say the least. Thor is promoting his newest release on Smog Veil Records entitled “Thor Against The World”. As part of his show, he sported a sword which looked all too real at my close quarters of two feet from the band. He slew a demon lord on stage and then hefted a long metal bar and told the crowd he had it on stage to show what you can do if you set out to do something. Wrapping a shirt around the center to protect his back molars he then proceeded to bend the steel in half. My thinking this was more show than reality was quickly dispelled when he had given it to someone in the crowd and I was able to feel it. It was indeed a real piece of steel and very impressive to say the least.

As the set and evening drew closer to a close, Steve Sack announced that tonight would be a very special treat for we would witness the original Thor reunion with members Steve Price and Keith Zazz coming on stage to play guitar and bass on the last few tunes. This was clearly a high point in the show for the diehards in particular and for the closing number all the members present played as well. I mentioned that The Continental does not have a large stage and it was crowded to say the least with all those folks on it. This venue also allows you to get right up there in the mix so I pressed myself against the stage and tried to capture as many good and fun pictures as I could. I really had a great time and even got to take a candid pic with Thor himself, he was truly a nice guy and I was happy to have attended this show. If you are looking for a fun show, definitely check into Thor, he gives you his all.

Set List:
1. The Coming Of Thor
2. Ride Of The Chariots
3. We Live To Rock
4. Invader
5. Strange Lantern
6. Thunder Hawk
7. Knock Them Down
8. Thunder On The Tundra
9. Lightning Strikes
10. Let The Blood Run Red - encore
11. Anger - encore

Official Web site: www.ThorCentral.com

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