((This is the last chance for Last Word members who we have lost contact with to shout up to keep their place in the band as we will be recruiting two new members shortly
Below is the first IC stuff anouncing the gig which I will post on the official forum later today or tomorrow. GG and Gorbaz, if you want to add anything or change owt, let me know asap here. As usual, I will post a description of the concert on the day so people who attend the party can rp having been to the concert should they wish.))


Stigma Magazine Online

Out of the Gutter – Exclusive The Last Word album and gig news.
By Chance Mullet

PARAGON punksters The Last Word have announced that their eagerly anticipated debut album is to be entitled Greetings from the Gutter.
After a series of acclaimed live appearances and band member Dee Dee Diablo attracting personality maulings in the media that money can’t buy, the release date for the album has finally been unveiled as November 30.
And more exciting than even that, after several weeks locked in the studio, The Last Word are to play an one off gig at the Comet Club, Galaxy City, on October 31, to showcase classic alum in waiting Greetings from the Gutter.
As well as the Word’s anthems and fan favourites Slip of the Tongue, Turmoil, Chemical Burn, Mother’s Ruin and The Place Where You Are, the band have announced that they will play live for the first time four new tracks written especially for the album.
Diablo said: “This album is really a journey. It was important that we included the songs we are known for that mean a lot to us as a band. But in the last six months I feel I’ve grown both as a person and a songwriter, and these new tracks reflect that. Hopefully our fans will come to love these songs just as much as stuff like Slip of the Tongue; and if they don’t they can always go f*ck themselves and listen to Avril Lavigne.”
The titles of these new tracks have been confirmed as Crucifixion Anxiety, Gimme Hell, Mrs Loverboy and Intravenous Redux. The latter is surely The Last Word’s touted reworking of Dead Birthday Clown’s breakthrough hit Intravenous, which the Clown’s Ethan Ink recently confessed was penned by Dee Dee Diablo during her brief stint with the band.
In recent months fans have seen the band appear with a depleted line up, and there are rumours that new Last Word members will make their debuts alongside the band’s backbone of Lady C, Diablo and Alice Springs.
Guest appearances by punk queen Suzi White, who has been working in the studio with The Last Word recently, and Diablo’s special friend Nene MacAllister, of Nene and the Nines fame, have been neither confirmed nor denied.
The Greetings from the Gutter gig takes place on Wednesday, October 31, at 7pm. Tickets are available from The Comet Club and the Paragon University student welfare office in Steel Canyon.

((Stuff for some posters that are being done for the event))

The Last Word present
Hell Night
Wednesday, October 31
7pm at the Comet Club, Galaxy City
Special guests (subject to availability)
Suzi “Gothic Overtones” White
Nene McAllister
Featuring songs from The Last Word's forthcoming debut album Greetings from the Gutter:
Intravenous Redux, Slip of the Tongue, Chemical Burn, Mother’s Ruin, Turmoil, Crucifixion Anxiety, Gimme Hell, Other Side of the Street, Mrs Loverboy, The Place Where You Are.

Hell Night
Aftershow Costume Party
Dee Dee Diablo and Nene McAllister request your company to celebrate the announcement of the forthcoming Greetings from the Gutter album by The Last Word.
The Jolly Roger bar (villains side), Pocket D
9pm til late
Wednesday, October 31
Admission free to anyone in costume
Anyone not in costume will be asked to make a donation to Dee and Nene’s favourite charity The Angel Foundation.

Posters advertising The Last Word's Hell Night concert and aftershow party are being displayed in clubs, book shops, record stores, cafes etc throughout Paragon City.



((Thanks to @Rhino for t'poster))

An advert has been running in Stigma Magazine for a couple of weeks:

Girl guitarist and wanted for up and coming hardcore/punk band.
Attitude as important as ability.
If interested text **** ******.

((There is a vacancy for a guitarist/s in The Last Word. We could go with an npc but ideally I’m looking for a good character/roleplayer to join the band.
IC: The character will be female, between 18 and 26, and have a punk rock attitude as well as exceptional musical ability specialising in the guitar. Being a hero or villain isn’t really an issue, but with four heroes in the band it’s unlikely they would hire a high profile or overt villain.
OOC: There aren’t many requirements to joining. Ideally you will be a good roleplayer that gets on with the other members. The Last Word don’t team up in game very often, so you will be free to do you own thing. All I ask is that the character is used enough to keep in touch with the other members and try to attend band events like hell Night on Weds. It is assumed that the characters meet regularly to rehearse, perform, record and socialise. I also need to be able to use characters in the write up of gigs, based on descriptions provided of how they behave and perform on stage.
You can find more details about the band at its members on the union roleplayers‘ wiki. Anyone interested can PM an IC text and an OOC introduction. The timeline is quite tight as I‘d like the new member in place for Hell Night.))

If you don't find a dedicated guitarist, then Suzi will happily fill in, but she won't formally join the band and will want credits as 'featuring Suzi White'

i.e. The Last Word, featuring Suzi White.

This is because she's also working on solo material, and of course was the headliner in her last band. Not a good career move to go back to be an unnamed part of a band unless her own.

I think for similar reasons that Suzi wouldn't want to be in the band there would be resistance from Dee for her being anything more than a guest artist. She respects Suzi, but they are at the brink of showing the world what they can do and wouldn't want to be labled Suzi White's new band. I think her being a guest artist and influence works well though.

If nobody suitable comes forward I think I'll create an npc guitarist. This would let me retro fit her into the band and give me more freedom when writing up the gigs. It might also be nice to have a bandmember who isn't a meta.

((This is the first part of the Hell Night write up. There is room for Gorbaz and GoodGuy to add descriptions of Alice and Des and make any additions or changes))

One Hell of a Show
Review of Hell Night concert by The Last Word
By Chance Mullet.

“Never go back.” Whoever coined that phrase obviously didn’t pass on his wisdom to
The Last Word who chose their old stomping ground of the Comet Club in Galaxy City to finally unleash their much anticipated debut album on the world. The band, who’s following has been swelling over the past few months as much for their off stage antics as their music, could have filled a venue twice the size. But for this self-confessed fan boy, who first heard the band make a raucous, drunken Friday night crowd stop fighting and f*cking each other long enough to the fiery statement of intent Slip of the Tongue eight months ago, there is no better venue for Paragon’s riot girls.

The venue, the crumbling walls seemingly held together with the faded posters of the hundreds of bands that have played there, was packed to capacity. The Hellion element usually dominant in a The Last Word crowd was present but diminished. The band has picked up a legion of new fans among students and music fans, and their was a healthy smattering of heroes. But the underlying threat of violence at a The Last Word gig, swimming beneath the sweaty excitement like a tiger shark was as palpable as ever.

But there was something else; an unspoken challenge to Diablo and company to put their money where their loud, dirty mouths are and deliver the album we all hope they are capable of.

But before The Last Word took to stage the crowd were given a tasty appetiser giving a hint that the night was going to be something special.

As the lights on stage came up for the opening act, the crowd gasped as Suzi White, star singer formerly of the Gothic Overtones stalked confidently to centre-stage. Dressed completely in white leather, from boots to long trenchcoat, she took the mic like she was embracing an old friend and without any hesitation, belted out a stunningly original version of the Rolling Stones classic “Paint It Black”. Her ethereal voice giving the lyrics a fresh potency as she made the song her own.

For the barest instant, it seemed as though the crowd was actually stunned by the performance as she finished, causing a half-second pause before the audience gave a rapturous response. As the music began for the next song, a hush once more descended as Suzi sang a previously unheard new number called “Beyond The Dark”.

A dark and heavy bassline gave the song plenty of rock appeal, but White’s soaring, hauntingly melodic voice wove pure magic into the number. If this song is anything to judge by, Ms White has grown still further as a singer and songwriter, and her next album, which the rumormill says is currently being written, will indeed be something to await eagerly.

White obviously subscribes to the motto “leave them begging for more”, leaving the crowd awestruck by her two powerful numbers, and very much ready for the main event as she said a simple thank you, bowed deeply just once and walked off stage.

The stage remained in darkness for several moments. Long enough for the crowd to get restless and vocal. Then from the darkness came one of the most familiar baselines of the last five years. The crowd seemed confused at hearing the opening Dead Birthday Clown’s Intravenous. Then the baseline stuttered and stopped. And started again before stuttering again. For many, this reviewer included, it seemed like the gig was going to come off the rails before it had really begun. Questions about the girls’ hard living lifestyle were raised in the mind before a single spotlight illuminated Dee Dee Diablo in the centre of the stage. Trademark low slung leather trousers and even lower slung five-string bass in place.

“I never liked how that f*cking song started anyway,” she said to the audience. “This is how its supposed to sound.”

She launched into a thrashing, kinetic baseline that seemed to gut punch every member of the crowd. The stage lights came up and Alice Springs added thunder to thunder with her own brand of drumming by way of a machine gun.

Alice wore her traditional outfit of baggy blue jeans and suede red leather jacket, which is starting to look more and more battered with each performance. Her trademark wrap-around shades, es ever, keeping her eyes hidden away. Surely this is her showing that she is not as willing as Diablo to bare all, but it would seem now that she no longer needs sight to pound out the rhythmns as not a slip-up was made during the entire concert

The Last Word has always had one of the tigh-*test*-('") rhythm engines in Diablo and Springs, from the off they raised their game to a new level with a sound that shook the building to its foundations.

GUITAR AND KEYBOARDS bit.

DESCRIPTION OF DES

It takes balls to open a gig with what amounts to a cover version. Even bigger balls to play a song sinuous with a more successful band. But the girls of The Last Word have balls as big as boulders, and they have them pressed firmly to the wall of rock.

Almost unrecognisable from Dead Birthday Clown’s Intravenous, The Last Word’s Intravenous Redux is a boneshaking, heartstring tearing account of desperation and dependence. Stripped of the original’s emo angst, the lyrics takes on a new resonance when Lady C blasts them out with equal measures of self awareness and loathing.

“The doctor says you’re killing me
But he don’t understand how you’re thrilling me
Getting more of you is how I spend every waking day
Only a fool can’t see the scars of needing you
Every breath that wants to be breathing you
But you’re the only thing that takes the pain away.”

Without a second the band roll into one of the most recognisable intros from the past few months. A raucous cheer erupted in the audience as they recognised Slip of the Tongue. This is the band’s anthemic rollercoaster and tonight everyone wanted a ride. Backed by an relentless baseline and frenetic guitar, Lady C tells the now familiar tale of a one night stand who wants to be something more. The crowd sand along to every word, competing with the vocal power of Lady C herself when it came to the hook:

“What we did was fun
Won’t say it was wrong
But you and me, honey
Was a slip of the tongue”.

And the ride didn’t stop there, with The Last Word ripping through Chemical Burn, Turmoil, Other Side of the Street. The dirty, frenetic bass of Diablo and the chugga-chugga guitar of NEW PERSON, grounded by the melodic platform of newcomer Nathalie Brissaud’s keyboards.

If the gig had stopped there it would have been a triumphant kick in the balls to announce the band’s album. But The Last Word aren’t into half measures, and the latter half of the gig raised the stakes with new material and reworkings of two of the band’s most respected songs.

Really nicely written, but if you'll allow me the liberty, there were, what seemed to me, three tiny errors that the perfection of the piece deserves to have caught:

((Thanks Ammon. And thanks GG for the stuff you sent me, amybe you can add what Lady C looks like/is wearing.
This is the second part, so Ammon, Gorbaz, GG, interested passerby, feel free to add, change, correct anything. I'll send versions to Diurne and Zortel so they can do the same and post a second draft here on Monday night or Tuesday))

The second half of Hell Night begins with a stream of overlapping news reports beneath a wavering hum of radio static.

Diablo leans into her mic with the swaggering confidence of the rock icon she is fast becoming.

And with switchblade syntax she speaks the opening of The Last Word’s first all new song of the night, Crucifixion Anxiety

“It’s crucifixion week on Channel 69
Now a word from our sponsors
F*ck you!”

With the expletive, Diablo’s partner in crime Lady C joins her on stage. By the time she has reached the centre, The Last Word rock engine is firing on all cylinders and she sings out the first new lyrics from the band in months:

Once bitten, shame on you
Twice bitten, fuck you too

La-*test*-('") victim of your persecution
Here I am, this week’s crucifixion
Roll up, come on, come and see the show.
A two faced, broken girl, a silent rodeo

Here’s the subject of this week’s new inquiry
Tie your words in knots, but you’ll never bind me.
The truth hurts, but hell’s for you
Don’t ya know, the devil always gets her due.

Dear lord here I am, it’s my darkest hour
Would you forgive me, if it was in your power
A prayer from a fallen angel in the world of men.
But f*cker you dealt this hand - and I’d do it all again.

It doesn’t take a genius to work out this is Diablo’s right to reply to the recent mauling she took in the New Paragon Inquirer. But lines like “Momma you failed me,/Hurt more than the f*ckers that nailed me” and the repeated word “crucifixion” in the chorus suggest that there are more demons are being exorcised in the song .

The tone then changed dramatically. Past the halfway mark, it was time for the keyboards of Nathalie Brissaud to take the lead. A lighter, bouncy tone, straying into pop, was the order of the day. But despite the tone, the song Mrs Loverboy might end up being the band’s most controversial yet. The lyrics tell the story of a girl tired of her relationship who finds new excitement and satisfaction in the arms and bed of an older woman. The track is permeated with recordings of two woman at the height of ecstasy, raising the obvious question of whether the moans and gasps belong to Diablo and her fellow musician lover Nene McAllister of Nene and the Nines fame. The song features the most explicit description of two women being intimate this reviewer has ever heard, and I subscribe to several gentlemen’s magazines and websites. With a strong following among teenage girls, one wonders if the band has gone too far and given critics another arrow to fire at them. But the band seem to welcome controversy like Michael Jackson welcomes pre-pubescent boys to sleepovers; and a The Last Word song that doesn’t offend someone is unimaginable:

You say that you love me
But your mom knows how to touch me
In places you can’t even find
Could show you how to f*ck me
Three minutes that won’t come back to me
You’re in my bed, she’s on my mind

You showed me what it means when they say love hurts
Only thing we have in common is f*cking things in skirts
You gave me STDs, she gave me joy
So ‘til you can be a better man, she’ll be my loverboy

Gimme Hell has the same anthemia quality of fan favourite Slip of the Tongue. A diatribe against Diablo’s perceived evils of the world. Another high octane hit, with newcomer HSHSHSHS let off the leash to perform gritty guitar solos and play a game of one-up-womanship with Diablo’s pace-setting bass.

At this point, Diablo took off her famous skull n crossbones vest and wiped it across her brow and through it into the crowd for a future e-Bay sale no doubt. And for the first time the reviewer noticed that, in her black leather bra, this is a leaner more ripped Diablo than we’ve ever seen and there were several whoops of approval for her honed, inked physique.

Now, Mother’s Ruin is a song that divides The Last Word fans. Some think it is indulgent and lacks the musical hard edge of their other work. Others, this reviewer included, think it’s one of the most ballsy, emotion wrenching songs ever written and destined to be a future classic.

Suzi White returned to the stage, sensationally dressed in a stylish red dress and with bright red hair to join with The Last Word for Mother‘s Ruin. The crowd seemed to really appreciate Suzi’s homage to Dee Dee in the notable change of style, and again the excitement lifted to a new high as the opening bars began.

With Suzi on acoustic guitar and Dee on vocals this could have been The Last Word being self-indulgent but there was one hell of a surprise in store.

Backed by SHSHWSHS haunting guitar and Brissaud’s dark toned keyboards, Diablo sang the song with a desolate, dirty emotion. Not content with this, White’s distinctive vocals added a new layer to the words that seemed to resonate throughout the venue like a rumour. The story of abandonment, betrayal, broken families and wasted lives hit harder than ever before, causing a few tears to be shed. And spontaneously, members of the crowd produced copies of The New Paragon Inquirer magazine with Diablo on the cover. And with neither collusion or discussion, they set light to them, releasing them to float into the air in an impromptu pyrotechnic show.

And then the band added a twist, cranking up the volume and energy to give the song a new rock out ending that saw the queen of punk White hold her own with the purple haired heir to the throne.

Diablo seemed drained by the performance, just muttering a thank you and nodding her appreciation to the former Gothic Overtones front woman.

Lady C rejoined the band on stage, accompanied by the second guest performer of the night Nene McAllister.

DESCRIPTION OF NENE

Nene hugged Diablo and the pair exchanged a few brief whispers before the assembled musicians fired up the Word’s perennial showstopper The Place Where You Are. The rock ballad pre-amble was dispensed with, the band preferring to launch into the cacophony of noise that they regular unleash to bring the house down at the end of the night. Lady C’s vocal gymnastics were bolstered with the very different voices of McAllister, White and Diablo to create a sound that just shouldn’t of worked - but by God it did. This reviewer stopped counting when the song had run into its eighteenth minute with nobody, either on stage or off, wanting it to end.

But end it did, with The Last Word proving that all the hype was justified and raising hopes that they can bottle thunder be capturing a fraction of what they can do on stage on the Greetings from the Gutter album. But as the band say themselves in Other Side of the Street “For those lying in the gutter, the only way out is up”.

Reall great stuff, mate.

Quick bit of copy-checking again for you:

This reads a little like the whole audience have the magazine. I think it reads better as:

but that's purely a suggestion. Its all good.

Really, really excellent writing, Rom.

((This is the revised part one.))

One Hell of a Night
Review of Hell Night concert by The Last Word plus support
By Chance Mullet.

“Never go back.” Whoever coined that phrase obviously didn’t pass on his wisdom to
The Last Word who chose their old stomping ground of the Comet Club in Galaxy City to finally unleash their much anticipated debut album on the world. The band, who’s following has been swelling over the past few months as much for their off stage antics as their music, could have filled a venue twice the size. But for this self-confessed fan boy, who first heard the band make a raucous, drunken Friday night crowd stop fighting and f*cking each other long enough to witness the fiery statement of intent Slip of the Tongue eight months ago, there is no better venue for Paragon’s riot girls.

The venue, the crumbling walls seemingly held together with the faded posters of the hundreds of bands that have played there, was packed to capacity. The Hellion element usually dominant in a The Last Word crowd was present but diminished. The band has picked up a legion of new fans among students and music fans, and there was a healthy smattering of heroes among the sea of flesh. But the underlying threat of violence at a The Last Word gig, swimming beneath the sweaty excitement like a tiger shark was as palpable as ever.

But there was something else; an unspoken challenge to Diablo and company to put their money where their loud, dirty mouths are and deliver the album we all hope they are capable of.

But before The Last Word took to stage the crowd were given a tasty appetiser giving a hint that the night was going to be something special.

As the lights on stage came up for the opening act, the crowd gasped as Suzi White, star singer formerly of the Gothic Overtones stalked confidently to centre-stage. Dressed completely in white leather, from boots to long trenchcoat, she took the mic like she was embracing an old friend and without any hesitation, belted out a stunningly original version of the Rolling Stones classic Paint It Black. Her ethereal voice giving the lyrics a fresh potency as she made the song her own.

For the barest instant, it seemed as though the crowd was actually stunned by the performance as she finished, causing a half-second pause before the audience gave a rapturous response. As the music began for the next song, a hush once more descended as Suzi sang a previously unheard new number called Beyond The Dark.

A dark and heavy bassline gave the song plenty of rock appeal, but White’s soaring, hauntingly melodic voice wove pure magic into the number. If this song is anything to judge by, Ms White has grown still further as a singer and songwriter, and her next album, which the rumormill says is currently being written, will indeed be something to eagerly await.

White obviously subscribes to the motto “leave them begging for more”, leaving the crowd awestruck by her two powerful numbers, and very much ready for the main event as she said a simple thank you, bowed deeply just once and walked off stage.

The stage remained in darkness for several moments. Long enough for the crowd to get restless and vocal. Then from the darkness came one of the most familiar baselines of the last five years. The crowd seemed confused at hearing the opening Dead Birthday Clown’s Intravenous. Then the baseline stuttered and stopped. And started again before stuttering again. For many, this reviewer included, it seemed like the gig was going to come off the rails before it had really begun. Questions about the girls’ hard living lifestyle were raised in the mind before a single spotlight illuminated Dee Dee Diablo in the centre of the stage. Trademark low-slung leather trousers and even lower slung five-string bass in place.

“I never liked how that f*cking song started anyway,” she said to the audience. “This is how it’s supposed to sound.”

She launched into a thrashing, kinetic baseline that seemed to gut punch every member of the crowd. The stage lights came up and Alice Springs added thunder to thunder with her own brand of drumming by way of a machine gun.

Alice wore her traditional outfit of baggy blue jeans and suede red leather jacket, which is starting to look more and more battered with each performance. Her trademark wrap-around shades, as ever, keeping her eyes hidden away.

The Last Word has always had one of the tigh-*test*-('") rhythm engines in Diablo and Springs, from the off they raised their game to a new level with a sound that shook the building to its foundations.

The band’s new additions create a more striking overall stage presence. The Last Word always looked like a bunch that would start a bar fight – now they look like they’re capable of finishing it.

Former Human Alternative fronter Nathalie Brissaud is an imposing figure, dressed in a revealing top, Freddy Kruger red and black striped tights, leather mini-skirt and knee-length boots. She was obviously happy with her newfound band as she radiated a palpable pleasure to be on stage. Taking Hell Night more literally than the rest of the band, she had decked out her keyboards in pumpkins and stylised flying witches and cobwebs.

She played a pivotal link throughout the night, performing complex solos between songs and for an extended period when Diablo and Lady C decided to put in drinks orders with the bar staff at about the halfway point of the gig.

The other new gun was billed simply as Silvia. The guitarist, who appears to have undergone extensive body modifications and tattooing to give her a feline appearance, held her own against the more experienced members of the band. Diablo seemed to square up to her a few times, and given her labelling guitarists as “on stage masturbators” it remains to be seen whether the red-haired thrasher will last longer than previous on stage masturbator Lance Simmons.

When the band beating out the well-known refrain of Slip of the Tongue, a faint tone could be heard above the music, steadily growing in intensity. Desiree Bell, preferring to go by the name Lady C these days, entered the stage howling her presence into the microphone. She boldly strode to the edge of the stage, still keeping that high-pitched note, where she stood in a defiant stance as if to dare the audience to storm the stage. She paused, seemingly takes great pleasure from the massive pounding from the abused speakers. She caressed herself and the microphone as the band turned the intensity up to eleven. When it seemed the speakers couldn’t take any more punishment, Lady C threw the microphone into the crowd and starts to sing.

It takes balls to open a gig with what amounts to a cover version. Even bigger balls to play a song synonymous with a more successful band. But the girls of The Last Word have balls as big as boulders, and they have them pressed firmly to the wall of rock.

Almost unrecognisable from Dead Birthday Clown’s Intravenous, The Last Word’s Intravenous Redux is a boneshaking, heartstring tearing account of desperation and dependence. Stripped of the original’s emo angst, the lyrics takes on a new resonance when Lady C blasts them out with equal measures of self awareness and loathing.

“The doctor says you’re killing me
But he don’t understand how you’re thrilling me
Getting more of you is how I spend every waking day
Only a fool can’t see the scars of needing you
Every breath that wants to be breathing you
But you’re the only thing that takes the pain away.”

Without a second the band roll into one of the most recognisable intros from the past few months. A raucous cheer erupted in the audience as they recognised Slip of the Tongue. This is the band’s anthemic rollercoaster and tonight everyone wanted a ride. Backed by a relentless baseline and frenetic guitar, Lady C tells the now familiar tale of a one-night stand who wants to be something more. The crowd sand along to every word, competing with the vocal power of Lady C herself when it came to the hook:

“What we did was fun
Won’t say it was wrong
But you and me, honey
Was a slip of the tongue”.

And the ride didn’t stop there, with The Last Word ripping through Chemical Burn, Turmoil and Other Side of the Street. The dirty, frenetic bass of Diablo and the chugga-chugga guitar of Silvia grounded by the melodic platform of Brissaud’s keyboards.

If the gig had stopped there it would have been a triumphant kick in the balls to announce the band’s album. But The Last Word aren’t into half measures, and the latter half of the gig raised the stakes with new material and reworkings of two of the band’s most respected songs.

((And the revised part two which just needs the contribution from Zortel. I know this is epic in length (oo-er) and will get several posts from people saying they couldn't be bothered to read it, but it's a nice record of the band and their music.))

The second half of Hell Night began with a stream of overlapping news reports beneath a wavering hum of radio static. Diablo leant into her mic with the swaggering confidence of the rock icon she is fast becoming. And with switchblade syntax she speaks the opening of The Last Word’s first all new song of the night, Crucifixion Anxiety

“It’s crucifixion week on Channel 69
Now a word from our sponsors
F*ck you!”

With the expletive, Diablo’s partner in crime Lady C joined her on stage. By the time she reached the centre, The Last Word rock engine was firing on all cylinders and she wailed out the first new lyrics from the band in months:

Once bitten, shame on you
Twice bitten, fuck you too

La-*test*-('") victim of your persecution
Here I am, this week’s crucifixion
Roll up, come on, come and see the show.
A two faced, broken girl, a silent rodeo

Here’s the subject of this week’s new inquiry
Tie your words in knots, but you’ll never bind me.
The truth hurts, but hell’s for you
Don’t ya know, the devil always gets her due.

Dear lord here I am, it’s my darkest hour
Would you forgive me, if it was in your power
A prayer from a fallen angel in the world of men.
But f*cker you dealt this hand - and I’d do it all again.

It doesn’t take a genius to work out this song is Diablo’s right to reply to the recent mauling she took in the New Paragon Inquirer. But lines like “Momma you failed me/Hurt more than the f*ckers that nailed me” and the repeated word “crucifixion” in the chorus suggest that there are more demons are being exorcised in the song.

The tone then changed dramatically. Past the halfway mark, it was time for the keyboards of Nathalie Brissaud to take the lead. A lighter, bouncy tone, almost straying into pop, was the order of the day. But despite the tone, the song Mrs Loverboy might end up being the band’s most controversial yet. The lyrics tell the story of a girl tired of her relationship who finds new excitement and satisfaction in the arms and bed of an older woman. The track is permeated with recordings of two women at the height of ecstasy, raising the obvious question of whether the moans and gasps belong to Diablo and her rumoured lover Nene McAllister of Nene and the Nines fame. The song features the most explicit description of two women being intimate this reviewer has ever heard, and I subscribe to several gentlemen’s magazines and websites. With Diablo in particular having a strong following among teenage girls, one wonders if the band has gone too far and given critics another arrow to fire at them. But the band seem to welcome controversy like Michael Jackson welcomes pre-pubescent boys to sleepovers; and a The Last Word song that doesn’t offend someone is unimaginable:

You say that you love me
But your mom knows how to touch me
In places you can’t even find
Could show you how to f*ck me
Three minutes that won’t come back to me
You’re in my bed, she’s on my mind

You showed me what it means when they say love hurts
Only thing we have in common is f*cking things in skirts
You gave me STDs, she gave me joy
So ‘til you can be a better man, she’ll be my loverboy

Gimme Hell has the same anthemic quality of fan favourite Slip of the Tongue. A diatribe against Diablo’s perceived evils of the world. Another high-octane hit, with Silvia let off the leash to perform gritty guitar solos and play a game of one-up-womanship with Diablo’s pace-setting bass.

At this point, Diablo took off her famous skull n crossbones vest and wiped it across her brow and threw it into the crowd for a future e-Bay sale no doubt. And for the first time the reviewer noticed that, in her black leather bra, this is a leaner more ripped Diablo than we’ve ever seen and there were several whoops of approval for her honed, inked physique.

Now, Mother’s Ruin is a song that divides The Last Word fans. Some think it is indulgent and lacks the musical hard edge of their other work. Others, this reviewer included, think it’s one of the ballsiest, emotion wrenching songs ever written and destined to be a future classic.

Suzi White returned to the stage, sensationally dressed in a stylish red dress and with bright red hair to join with The Last Word for Mother‘s Ruin. The crowd seemed to really appreciate Suzi’s homage to Dee Dee in the notable change of style, and again the excitement lifted to a new high as the opening bars began.

With Suzi on acoustic guitar and Dee on vocals this could have been The Last Word being self-indulgent but there was one hell of a surprise in store.

Backed by Silvia’s haunting guitar and Brissaud’s dark toned keyboards, Diablo sang the song with a desolate, dirty emotion. Not content with this, White’s distinctive vocals added new layers to the words that seemed to resonate throughout the venue like a rumour. The story of abandonment, betrayal, broken families and wasted lives hit harder than ever before, causing a few tears to be shed. And spontaneously, several members of the crowd produced copies of The New Paragon Inquirer magazine with Diablo on the cover. And with neither collusion nor discussion, they set light to them, releasing them to float into the air in an impromptu pyrotechnic show.

And then the band added a twist, cranking up the volume and energy to give the song a new rock out ending that saw the queen of alt rock White hold her own with the purple-haired pretender to the throne of punk.

Diablo seemed drained by the performance, just muttering a thank you and nodding her appreciation to the former Gothic Overtones front woman.

Lady C rejoined the band on stage, accompanied by the second guest performer of the night Nene McAllister.

DESCRIPTION OF NENE

Nene hugged Diablo and the pair exchanged a few brief whispers before the assembled musicians fired up the Word’s perennial showstopper Place Where You Are. The rock ballad pre-amble was dispensed with, the band preferring to launch into the cacophony of noise that they regular unleash to bring the house down at the end of the night. Lady C’s vocal gymnastics were bolstered with the very different voices of McAllister, White and Diablo to create a sound that just shouldn’t have worked - but by devil it did. This reviewer stopped counting when the song had run into its eighteenth minute with nobody, either on stage or off, wanting it to end.

But end it did, with The Last Word proving that all the hype was justified and raising hopes that they can bottle thunder by capturing a fraction of what they can do on stage on the Greetings from the Gutter album.

As the band say themselves say in Other Side of the Street: “For us lying in the gutter, the only way out is up”.

Excellent as always!

Stunning piece, and the small hints at the relationships, especially the hinted but unstated respect between Suzi and Dee gives it a really nice feel of depth and development.

Only small thing my proof-reader eye caught was in:

I think that either needs to say

or

Possibly because it is Hell Night after all, I like the second one a little better for how it trips off the tongue.

((The first part of this review appears on the Stigma Magazine website at about 10pm tonight with the second half appearing later. As well as being something people may wish to read for its own sake, it will give players an idea of what their characters saw and heard at the concert prior ro arriving at the aftershow party tonight (9pm, villains side, Pocket D). There will be a final news report posted just before 9pm of events that characters may have witnessed - This, as well as other things that happened or are talked about, may or may not have relevence to the Watchmen/Romanov plot))

One Hell of a Night
Review of Hell Night concert by The Last Word plus support
Part One
By Chance Mullet.

“Never go back.” Whoever coined that phrase obviously didn’t pass on his wisdom to
The Last Word who chose their old stomping ground of the Comet Club in Galaxy City to finally unleash their much anticipated debut album on the world. The band, who’s following has been swelling over the past few months as much for their off stage antics as their music, could have filled a venue twice the size. But for this self-confessed fan boy, who first heard the band make a raucous, drunken Friday night crowd stop fighting and ****ing each other long enough to witness the fiery statement of intent Slip of the Tongue eight months ago, there is no better venue for Paragon’s riot girls.

The venue, the crumbling walls seemingly held together with the faded posters of the hundreds of bands that have played there, was packed to capacity. The Hellion element usually dominant in a The Last Word crowd was present but diminished. The band has picked up a legion of new fans among students and music fans, and there was a healthy smattering of heroes among the sea of flesh. But the underlying threat of violence at a The Last Word gig, swimming beneath the sweaty excitement like a tiger shark was as palpable as ever.

But there was something else; an unspoken challenge to Diablo and company to put their money where their loud, dirty mouths are and deliver the album we all hope they are capable of.

But before The Last Word took to stage the crowd were given a tasty appetiser giving a hint that the night was going to be something special.

As the lights on stage came up for the opening act, the crowd gasped as Suzi White, star singer formerly of the Gothic Overtones stalked confidently to centre-stage. Dressed completely in white leather, from boots to long trenchcoat, she took the mic like she was embracing an old friend and without any hesitation, belted out a stunningly original version of the Rolling Stones classic Paint It Black. Her ethereal voice giving the lyrics a fresh potency as she made the song her own.

For the barest instant, it seemed as though the crowd was actually stunned by the performance as she finished, causing a half-second pause before the audience gave a rapturous response. As the music began for the next song, a hush once more descended as Suzi sang a previously unheard new number called Beyond The Dark.

A dark and heavy bassline gave the song plenty of rock appeal, but White’s soaring, hauntingly melodic voice wove pure magic into the number. If this song is anything to judge by, Ms White has grown still further as a singer and songwriter, and her next album, which the rumormill says is currently being written, will indeed be something to eagerly await.

White obviously subscribes to the motto “leave them begging for more”, leaving the crowd awestruck by her two powerful numbers, and very much ready for the main event as she said a simple thank you, bowed deeply just once and walked off stage.

The stage remained in darkness for several moments. Long enough for the crowd to get restless and vocal. Then from the darkness came one of the most familiar baselines of the last five years. The crowd seemed confused at hearing the opening Dead Birthday Clown’s Intravenous. Then the baseline stuttered and stopped. And started again before stuttering again. For many, this reviewer included, it seemed like the gig was going to come off the rails before it had really begun. Questions about the girls’ hard living lifestyle were raised in the mind before a single spotlight illuminated Dee Dee Diablo in the centre of the stage. Trademark low-slung leather trousers and even lower slung five-string bass in place.

“I never liked how that ****ing song started anyway,” she said to the audience. “This is how it’s supposed to sound.”

She launched into a thrashing, kinetic baseline that seemed to gut punch every member of the crowd. The stage lights came up and Alice Springs added thunder to thunder with her own brand of drumming by way of a machine gun.

Alice wore her traditional outfit of baggy blue jeans and suede red leather jacket, which is starting to look more and more battered with each performance. Her trademark wrap-around shades, as ever, keeping her eyes hidden away.

The Last Word has always had one of the tigh-*test*-('") rhythm engines in Diablo and Springs, from the off they raised their game to a new level with a sound that shook the building to its foundations.

The band’s new additions create a more striking overall stage presence. The Last Word always looked like a bunch that would start a bar fight – now they look like they’re capable of finishing it.

Former Human Alternative fronter Nathalie Brissaud is an imposing figure, dressed in a revealing top, Freddy Kruger red and black striped tights, leather mini-skirt and knee-length boots. She was obviously happy with her newfound band as she radiated a palpable pleasure to be on stage. Taking Hell Night more literally than the rest of the band, she had decked out her keyboards in pumpkins and stylised flying witches and cobwebs.

She played a pivotal link throughout the night, performing complex solos between songs and for an extended period when Diablo and Lady C decided to put in drinks orders with the bar staff at about the halfway point of the gig.

The other new gun was billed simply as Silvia. The guitarist, who appears to have undergone extensive body modifications and tattooing to give her a feline appearance, held her own against the more experienced members of the band. Diablo seemed to square up to her a few times, and given her labelling guitarists as “on stage masturbators” it remains to be seen whether the red-haired thrasher will last longer than previous on stage masturbator Lance Simmons.

When the band beating out the well-known refrain of Slip of the Tongue, a faint tone could be heard above the music, steadily growing in intensity. Desiree Bell, preferring to go by the name Lady C these days, entered the stage howling her presence into the microphone. She boldly strode to the edge of the stage, still keeping that high-pitched note, where she stood in a defiant stance as if to dare the audience to storm the stage. She paused, seemingly takes great pleasure from the massive pounding from the abused speakers. She caressed herself and the microphone as the band turned the intensity up to eleven. When it seemed the speakers couldn’t take any more punishment, Lady C threw the microphone into the crowd and starts to sing.

It takes balls to open a gig with what amounts to a cover version. Even bigger balls to play a song synonymous with a more successful band. But the girls of The Last Word have balls as big as boulders, and they have them pressed firmly to the wall of rock.

Almost unrecognisable from Dead Birthday Clown’s Intravenous, The Last Word’s Intravenous Redux is a boneshaking, heartstring tearing account of desperation and dependence. Stripped of the original’s emo angst, the lyrics takes on a new resonance when Lady C blasts them out with equal measures of self awareness and loathing.

The doctor says you’re killing me
But he don’t understand how you’re thrilling me
Getting more of you is how I spend every waking day
Only a fool can’t see the scars of needing you
Every breath that wants to be breathing you
But you’re the only thing that takes the pain away.

Without a second the band roll into one of the most recognisable intros from the past few months. A raucous cheer erupted in the audience as they recognised Slip of the Tongue. This is the band’s anthemic rollercoaster and tonight everyone wanted a ride. Backed by a relentless baseline and frenetic guitar, Lady C tells the now familiar tale of a one-night stand who wants to be something more. The crowd sand along to every word, competing with the vocal power of Lady C herself when it came to the hook:

What we did was fun
Won’t say it was wrong
But you and me, honey
Was a slip of the tongue.

And the ride didn’t stop there, with The Last Word ripping through Chemical Burn, Turmoil and Other Side of the Street. The dirty, frenetic bass of Diablo and the chugga-chugga guitar of Silvia grounded by the melodic platform of Brissaud’s keyboards.

If the gig had stopped there it would have been a triumphant kick in the balls to announce the band’s album. But The Last Word aren’t into half measures, and the latter half of the gig raised the stakes with new material and reworkings of two of the band’s most respected songs.

One Hell of a Night
Review of Hell Night concert by The Last Word plus support
Part Two
By Chance Mullet.

The second half of Hell Night began with a stream of overlapping news reports beneath a wavering hum of radio static. Diablo leant into her mic with the swaggering confidence of the rock icon she is fast becoming. And with switchblade syntax she speaks the opening of The Last Word’s first all new song of the night, Crucifixion Anxiety

“It’s crucifixion week on Channel 69
Now a word from our sponsors
**** you!”

With the expletive, Diablo’s partner in crime Lady C joined her on stage. By the time she reached the centre, The Last Word rock engine was firing on all cylinders and she wailed out the first new lyrics from the band in months:

Once bitten, shame on you
Twice bitten, [censored] you too

La-*test*-('") victim of your persecution
Here I am, this week’s crucifixion
Roll up, come on, come and see the show.
A two faced, broken girl, a silent rodeo

Here’s the subject of this week’s new inquiry
Tie your words in knots, but you’ll never bind me.
The truth hurts, but hell’s for you
Don’t ya know, the devil always gets her due.

Dear lord here I am, it’s my darkest hour
Would you forgive me, if it was in your power
A prayer from a fallen angel in the world of men.
But ****er you dealt this hand - and I’d do it all again.

It doesn’t take a genius to work out this song is Diablo’s right to reply to the recent mauling she took in the New Paragon Inquirer. But lines like “Momma you failed me/Hurt more than the f*ckers that nailed me” and the repeated word “crucifixion” in the chorus suggest that there are more demons are being exorcised in the song.

The tone then changed dramatically. Past the halfway mark, it was time for the keyboards of Nathalie Brissaud to take the lead. A lighter, bouncy tone, almost straying into pop, was the order of the day. But despite the tone, the song Mrs Loverboy might end up being the band’s most controversial yet. The lyrics tell the story of a girl tired of her relationship who finds new excitement and satisfaction in the arms and bed of an older woman. The track is permeated with recordings of two women at the height of ecstasy, raising the obvious question of whether the moans and gasps belong to Diablo and her rumoured lover Nene McAllister. The song features the most explicit description of two women being intimate this reviewer has ever heard, and I subscribe to several gentlemen’s magazines and websites. With Diablo in particular having a strong following among teenage girls, one wonders if the band has gone too far and given critics another arrow to fire at them. But the band seem to welcome controversy like Michael Jackson welcomes pre-pubescent boys to sleepovers; and a The Last Word song that doesn’t offend someone is unimaginable:

You say that you love me
But your mom knows how to touch me
In places you can’t even find
Could show you how to **** me
Three minutes that won’t come back to me
You’re in my bed, she’s on my mind

You showed me what it means when they say love hurts
Only thing we have in common is ****ing things in skirts
You gave me STDs, she gave me joy
So ‘til you can be a better man, she’ll be my loverboy

Gimme Hell has the same anthemic quality of fan favourite Slip of the Tongue. A diatribe against Diablo’s perceived evils of the world. Another high-octane hit, with Silvia let off the leash to perform gritty guitar solos and play a game of one-up-womanship with Diablo’s pace-setting bass.

At this point, Diablo took off her famous skull n crossbones vest and wiped it across her brow and threw it into the crowd for a future e-Bay sale no doubt. And for the first time the reviewer noticed that, in her black leather bra, this is a leaner more ripped Diablo than we’ve ever seen and there were several whoops of approval for her honed, inked physique.

Now, Mother’s Ruin is a song that divides The Last Word fans. Some think it is indulgent and lacks the musical hard edge of their other work. Others, this reviewer included, think it’s one of the ballsiest, emotion wrenching songs ever written and destined to be a future classic.

Suzi White returned to the stage, sensationally dressed in a stylish red dress and with bright red hair to join with The Last Word for Mother‘s Ruin. The crowd seemed to really appreciate Suzi’s homage to Dee Dee in the notable change of style, and again the excitement lifted to a new high as the opening bars began.

With Suzi on acoustic guitar and Dee on vocals this could have been The Last Word being self-indulgent but there was one hell of a surprise in store.

Backed by Silvia’s haunting guitar and Brissaud’s dark toned keyboards, Diablo sang the song with a desolate, dirty emotion. Not content with this, White’s distinctive vocals added new layers to the words that seemed to resonate throughout the venue like a rumour. The story of abandonment, betrayal, broken families and wasted lives hit harder than ever before, causing a few tears to be shed. And spontaneously, several members of the crowd produced copies of The New Paragon Inquirer magazine with Diablo on the cover. And with neither collusion nor discussion, they set light to them, releasing them to float into the air in an impromptu pyrotechnic show.

And then the band added a twist, cranking up the volume and energy to give the song a new rock out ending that saw the queen of alt rock White hold her own with the purple-haired pretender to the throne of punk.

Diablo seemed drained by the performance, just muttering a thank you and nodding her appreciation to the former Gothic Overtones front woman.

Lady C rejoined the band on stage, accompanied by the second guest performer of the night Nene McAllister.

Nene, vocalist and guitarist of her band The Nines, arrived on stage with her usual black 1980 Lead Fender 2 slung over her shoulder, her brown hair done in a slightly tussled and fluffy manner. The recent Capes magazine covergirl was dressed in loose fitting black hipster jeans, with a PVC halterneck top on that showed off a fair amount of pale skin and cleavage.

Nene hugged Diablo and the pair exchanged a few brief whispers before the assembled musicians fired up the Word’s perennial showstopper Place Where You Are. The rock ballad pre-amble was dispensed with, the band preferring to launch into the cacophony of noise that they regular unleash to bring the house down at the end of the night. Lady C’s vocal gymnastics were bolstered with the very different voices of McAllister, White and Diablo to create a sound that just shouldn’t have worked - but by hell it did. This reviewer stopped counting when the song had run into its eighteenth minute with nobody, either on stage or off, wanting it to end.

But end it did, with The Last Word proving that all the hype was justified and raising hopes that they can bottle thunder by capturing a fraction of what they can do on stage on the Greetings from the Gutter album.

As the band say themselves say in Other Side of the Street: “For us lying in the gutter, the only way out is up”.

Thanks to everyone that attended last night. It was cool.
The observant among you may have noticed Watchmen plot developments happening in the background of which there will be more soon.