Undead - Misfits

Sid Terror of the Undead at the Misfits show
San Francisco, 1981

1981 photo
2005 Sid Terror digitally enhanced by Steve Harlow

When The Misfits got on stage it was the same thing and I watched it all happening from next to the amps on Jerry's side of the stage. Three songs in, their road manager Rocky (Jerry and Doyle's brother) went into the crowd to tell one particular group of kids to knock it off. A scuffle broke out and the next thing I know Doyle clocks one of the kids with his guitar in attempt to protect his brother (the kid was about to let him have it with a bottle from behind). Googy jumped out from the drum-kit and into the crowd, then Glen Danzig. It escalated to a full-fledged riot from there.

Everyone from The Mifits and The Undead locked ourselves in a dressing room until the cops came and broke it up. But a lot of their equipment had been vandalized or stolen. They ended up not going back to their hotel that night because a lot of pissed off people knew where they were staying, as well as the cops who might want to make an arrest. Instead, we all went back to my place on 3rd Street (I was living at the infamous A-Hole Art Gallery, home to many artists and musicians at the time) and we watched a 16mm print of Night of the Living Dead that I had.

I woke up the next morning covered by hundreds of Misfits "Crimson Ghost" guitar picks, and they left town toward L.A. where they had some gigs with The Dickies at The Whiskey A-Go-Go. Fearing police and legal actions, I don't think they returned to San Francisco for over 7 years, until the legal statute of limitations had expired.