10/14/23
The Granada, Lawrence, KS
Full Gallery HERE
Playboy Manbaby from Phoenix AZ, punk aesthetic trio proclaiming the factuality of time travel if you just ignore the last 4 years since they’ve been in the area. It’s a solid theory, one I playfully support. With a skewed sense of humor, their engagement with the audience focused on self improvement, manifestation of a 2003 vehicle, and career dreams of going into work and tell your boss “fuck you”. Bringing a breath of fresh air to a punk scene that too often, takes themselves too seriously, they were fun, nonchalont, and quite the start to an enjoyable evening as we would have two thematic bands after them, Cybertronic Spree and Mac Sabbath.
Cybertronic Spree, hailing from Cybertron, the musical branch of the Transformers, fulfilled the nostalgic geekery in us all, with original songs and covers related to the Transformers to Pokémon and Led Zeppelin covers. Dispensing beach balls, t-shirts, and rock for the audience, the most incredible part of the show was standing back in awe as they effortlessly played their instruments, from Shockwave on drums, to Omicron on lead guitar. Hot Rod shared vocal duties with RC, who showed off her range with an excellent rendition of Zeppelins “Immigrant Song”. Themed bands that put this much effort into the showcase and presentation are few and far between, and it’s always exciting and wholesome when one gets the opportunity to experience a show like this.
If Cybertronic Spree was the journey into our Saturday afternoon childhood, Mac Sabbath was the the joy of opening a happy meal to play with those Transformer toys bundled with the cheeseburger and fries, with a small Hi-C Orange Drink, of course. Filled with enough bad puns to make even the most dad-jokey of dads groan, the 4 fathers of drive-thru metal, Ronald Osborne on lead vocals, Slayer MacCheeze on guitar, Grimalice on bass, and the Catburglar handing drum duties, the set began with Ronald struggling with a yellow leather straight jacket while belting out “Organic Funeral”, a parody of Black Sabbath’s “Electric Funeral”. The evening filled with fast food puns and outrageous costumes kept the show light and amusing. Better than Dairy Queensryche, the insane amalgamation of fast food giant McDonalds, and Metal Gods Black Sabbath was everything that I had hoped they would be.
