Creative metal parody band Mac Sabbath plays Bay Area
Twisted Black Sabbath parody/tribute outfit Mac Sabbath brings its current tour to Santa Cruz and San Francisco starting Thursday night with support from punk/metal veterans the Supersuckers.
With its surreal collision of fast-food iconography and twisted versions of classic Black Sabbath songs, Mac Sabbath has established itself as one of the most diabolically clever metal parody/tribute bands working today.
In the past eight years, the Los Angeles-based outfit fronted by clown-painted singer Ronald Osbourne and featuring elaborately costumed members Slayer MacCheeze on guitar, Grimalice on bass and the Catburglar on drums has risen from playing underground shows in fast-food restaurant basements (at least according to band manager and spokesman Mike Odd, who strangely sounds a bit like Osbourne without the British accent) to headlining clubs and playing major music celebrations like England's Download Festival and San Francisco's own Outside Lands Festival.
Armed with an arsenal of well-crafted props -- including a smoke-belching onstage "grill," inflatable cheeseburgers and Osbourne's giant striped straws that the singer uses to slurp unsuspecting audience members' drinks -- the band has become a popular live act with its warped versions of Black Sabbath gems like "Frying Pan" ("Iron Man"), "Pair-a-Buns" ("Paranoid") and "Sweet Beef" ("Sweet Leaf"). In 2017, Mac Sabbath put out a flexi single of "Pair-a-Buns" that was packaged with a special coloring book (the band also released a collaborative claymation video for the tune).
The band has continued to create unusual merchandise, putting out its limited edition Pop-Up Metal pop-up book in 2021 that they made in collaboration with artist Gris Grimy that includes a "secret vinyl surprise" featuring seven of the band's recordings of their twisted takes on Sabbath classics. The band brings its current tour celebrating ten years of heavy sounds and ridiculous parodies to the Bay Area this week.
For these two dates in Santa Cruz and San Francisco, the group is joined by venerable southern-tinged punk/metal band the Supersuckers. Mixing up elements of garage punk, hard rock and southern-fried country, the veteran crew has been dealing out their entertaining brand of party-hearty music for over three decades.
Founded as the Black Supersuckers in Tuscon, AZ, by high school friends Eddie Spaghetti (born Edward Carlyle Daly III) on bass, guitarist Ron "Rontrose" Heathman, guitarist Dan "Thunder" Bolton, drummer Dancing Eagle (born Dan Seigal) and lead singer Eric Martin in 1988, the band soon relocated to Seattle in pursuit of an audience more receptive to their raucous sound. The group stripped down to a four-piece as Martin departed soon after the move, with Spaghetti taking over as singer and the band dropping the "Black" from the name.
A series of 7-inch singles for a variety of independent labels led the Supersuckers to getting signed by famed Seattle imprint Sub Pop Records. The band's debut album for the label The Smoke Of Hell showcased their concise, tuneful style of roots-influenced hard rock that celebrated fast cars, good times and loose women while echoing the straightforward punky style of labelmates Mudhoney, the Reverend Horton Heat and the Dwarves.
Two more similarly minded albums followed, but in 1997 the Supersuckers delved far deeper into their country roots with Must've Been High. A full-blown exploration of honky tonk and cow punk that featured acoustic and lap-steel guitars and even a guest vocal spot from Willie Nelson, the recording was celebrated as one of the Supersuckers' best yet. The group also collaborated with latter-era country outlaw on an EP, but band would return to its sleazy, full-throttle earlier sound on it's follow-up album (and first effort after parting ways with Sub Pop), the landmark classic Evil Powers of Rock 'n' Roll.
Since then, the band has maintained a steady output of records while consistently touring for their loyal fanbase, even after the departure of longtime members Heathman and Bolton in the 2000s and Spaghetti's bout with lymph node cancer that surfaced in 2015. The current trio line-up of the founding bassist, guitarist "Metal" Marty Chandler and drummer Christopher "Chango" Von Streicher recorded the band's latest album, Play That Rock N' Roll, at Willie Nelson's home studio.
Released on Acetone Records in 2020, it featured the trio bashing out its trademark hard-rocking, tongue-in-cheek tunes. The following year, Spaghetti collaborated with fellow songwriter and Streetwalkin' Cheetahs' frontman Frank Meyer for the equally potent effort Motherf--kin' Rock N' Roll. More recently, Supersuckers contributed a cover of the AC/DC classic "Overdose" for the new Magnetic Eye Best of AC/DC tribute compilation and issued a number of live digital singles including covers of the R&B standard "99 1/2" and the Ramones gem "I Believe in Miracles" with Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder singing and Zeke's Blind Marky Feltchtone playing guitar. Earlier this year, Sub Pop released a limited vinyl reissue of their classic albums The Smoke Of Hell and La Mano Cornuda. Preposterously costumed Oakland surf-metal band Shark in the Water opens these two shows in Santa Cruz and San Francisco, with local fixture DJ Bleeding Priest (aka Death Angel and Old Granddad drummer Will Carroll) will be spinning metal records before and between bands for the Friday appearance at the DNA Lounge.
Mac Sabbath with the Supersuckers and Shark in the Water
Thursday, Nov. 14, 8 p.m. $35-$38
The Catalyst
Friday, Nov. 15, 8 p.m. $32-$41
DNA Lounge