The Adicts at the Gramercy Theatre

Monkey

Vocalist Keith "Monkey" Warren, guitarist Pete "Pete Dee" Davison, bassist Mel Ellis, and drummer Michael "Kid Dee" Davison first formed as Afterbirth & the Pinz in 1975 in Ipswich, England. By 1979, the quartet became the Adicts. Contrary to the punk look that was so common then, the Adicts became distinctive for its resemblance to the "droogs" in the film A Clockwork Orange, complete with white shirts and trousers and black boots and bowler caps. Monkey went further by wearing joker makeup, wildly-patterned suits, and white gloves along with his black bowler hat. The band's visual look was complemented by their stage shows, shooting into the audience a series of streamers, confetti, playing cards, beach balls, joker hats, toy instruments, bubbles, and glitter. This stage show, along with the band's light-hearted lyrics, set the Adicts apart from other punk bands of that period. The Adicts had a few hit songs in Europe in the 1980s, and built an underground following in the United States. The Adicts' 10th and most recent studio album is 2017's And It Was So!

At the Gramercy Theatre tonight, Monkey, the Davison brothers, rhythm guitarist Highko Strom, and bassist Kiki Zabel walked on stage dressed in white. Monkey also wore a randomly polka-dotted suit and an oversized, similarly-patterned cape, which he twirled to the band's booming punk rock. By the second song, Monkey was flipping playing cards into the audience. As the show continued, Monkey opened and spun an umbrella rigged with lights and streamers, threw streamers and a stuffed animal into the audience, shot a water pistol into the audience, wore a "beer mug" hat and then poured two cups of beer into it and tossed it into the audience, and finally ripped his shirt into fragments and tossed those into the audience. The spectacle was like a childhood birthday party exploding into mayhem. The concert's carnival-like elements involved and rallied the appreciative audience. The visual stunts clicked because the music was equally solid. With no new music for the Adicts to promote, the ferocious sonic assault consisted of all the best high-voltage anthems from nine of the band's 10 albums. Cheeky lyrics and gang harmonies brought many of the songs to crescendos and generated mosh pits. Now 45 years old, the Adicts have managed to keep the fun alive at their concerts.

Setlist:

1. Let's Go
2. Joker in the Pack
3. Horrorshow
4. And It Was So
5. Tango
6. Johnny Was a Soldier
7. Rockin' Wrecker
8. Life Goes On
9. Numbers
10. Troubadour
11. I Am Yours
12. Give It to Me Baby
13. Daydreamers
14. Fuck It Up
15. Talking Shit
16. Gimme Something to Do
17. Crazy
18. Who Spilt My Beer?
19. Chinese Takeaway
20. Bad Boy
21. Viva la revolution
22. You'll Never Walk Alone (Rodgers & Hammerstein cover)
23. Symphony No. 9, Op. 125 (Ode to Joy) (Ludwig van Beethoven cover)