During an appearance in a recent episode of “Three sides of the coin” podcast, GREZA leader Blackie Lawless talked about what fans can expect to see on the band’s upcoming 40th anniversary tour. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “To make a 40th[-anniversary] in retrospect, I think you should be able to give them a small sample of each of those decades. But considering, I would say, half of our audience at this point never saw us in the first place… They weren’t there; they saw none of this. So to try to bring them up to speed, so to speak, we want to really take it back to where it started.
“In ’86 we made a record called “Inside the Electric Circus”“And the tournament before that, we were with him kiss on that, and when we left, one of the last days we were there on that tour, they were doing sound check, and I went up on stage and gene [Simmons] and I was talking for a minute. And the tour was coming to an end, and he says, ‘So,’ he goes, ‘it was good to have you,’ he says, ‘but I guess next year you’ll be headliner, right?’ And I just looked at him and nodded ‘yes’, because we could see where we were going. And he was right. So we were moving into arenas at that point.
“But the show I wanted to do, because it was called “Inside the Electric Circus”it was based on a 1930s-type carnival, like a free carnival—more like a kind of… I wouldn’t call it a geek show, but a very, very dark 1930s carnival.” Blackie is explained. “Well, because we were moving into arenas, the argument coming from agents and promoters was, ‘it needs to be bigger; it needs to be flashier.’ So slowly over a period of weeks, it started to evolve to where The I thought it had to go to this thing that was big, bombastic and eye-catching. And yes, it looked great in the big rooms, but that wasn’t really where I saw it going.
“So what we’re doing now is we’re doing this part 1930s, part carnival ‘Street warrior’, part of the voodoo ceremony, if you will, that has all these elements wrapped together. And when people see it, they’ll understand what the band was really going for in the first place.
“And I’ll be honest with you. And I know this might sound like a commercial, ’cause all artists say that, but… I don’t normally say that, but I’m really excited to do it this, because I I know what will this thing look like when it’s done,” Without law added. “And honestly, I can’t wait to get into it.”
GREZAHer first live performance since December 2019 took place on July 23 at Skansen in Stockholm, Sweden. A week later (July 30),GREZA also played in Forest clearing Festival in Rejmyre, Sweden.
GREZA recently postponed his 40th anniversary European tour, originally scheduled for spring 2022, to spring 2023. The new dates will take place in March, April and May 2023. All previously purchased tickets for 2022 tour will be valid on rescheduled 2023 shows.
GREZA will embark on its first US tour in a decade this fall. The tour will coincide with the band’s 40th anniversary and will include support from ARMORED SAINT AND MICHAEL SCHENKER on select shows.
Without law has led GREZA as its lead vocalist and main songwriter since its inception. His unique brand of visual, social and political commentary took the band to global heights and sold millions of records along with a legacy of sold-out shows across the globe spanning four decades. He is united GREZAThe current line-up of the bassist Mike Duda and guitarist Doug Blairwhose tenure with the band spans 26 and 18 years respectively, along with drummer extraordinaire Priest Achilles.
In a recent interview with Metal Edge magazine, Without law was asked how he plans to organize a “real deal GREZA show” to celebrate the band’s 40th anniversary “with the existence of cancellation culture and revival culture.” He replied: “That’s a tricky question you just asked. Because first of all, I won’t even think about a smart culture. This has nothing to do with my world. You know, if someone wants to do that, that’s their prerogative. Vacant place. But our fan base is our fan base. So one of the things I learned a long time ago is that if you’re going to have a real career… And when I say a real career, I’m talking about someone who does it for a living, I’m not talking about someone who it just makes records. And that’s okay too. In the pop world, that’s fine. You know, that’s what people want. But if you’re going to have a real career, I’m not talking about someone that’s about five years, or 10 years. I’m talking about someone who is about 20 years old, 30 years old, taller. What you’re saying, in effect, is that you’re going to take that fan base on a lifelong journey. And if you’re going to do that, you have to have an intimate relationship with them. And if you don’t have that intimate relationship, they’ll never feel like they know you.
“You have to be willing to open your skull and let them come in and walk around barefoot, inside your head,” he continued. “You really do. And the only way to do that is with lyrics. We can do interviews like that and it helps a lot. I mean, people get to know you a lot that way. But lyrics are where they are. I’m really going to get to know you. Because that’s what they’re listening to most of the time. And so to do that, you have to be willing to share parts of yourself that a lot of artists just aren’t willing to They let them get in there, in the nooks and crannies and find the good and the not so good.
“So to go into a culture that’s doing that, that wouldn’t do me any good, because I’m talking to specific people there. First of all, our kind of music, whether it’s us or someone else in our genre. . we’re a subculture. We’re not mainstream. We’re not the pop world, which is 50 percent of the market. We’re a smaller market, like, you know, 25 to 30 percent of that pie of possible that’s out there. It won’t do me any good to try to talk to people who won’t listen anyway. My whole job is to try to identify what I’m thinking and feeling in the moment. Because I, like everyone others, my thoughts will change from time to time.
“And so the idea is, when you take people on that lifelong journey, they look at what you wrote 30 years ago, and they say, ‘Oh, wow, look what he was thinking.’ Blackie added. “And they hear something, whatever the last thing that came out, and they go, ‘Oh, wow, look how you’re thinking now.’ So that’s that intimacy, where you take people and you’re communicating with them over this journey. So trying to do something from a socially influenced perspective wouldn’t do me any good. Or someone like me. That. You have to be true to yourself. I mean, we got into this by not didn’t give a damn about what people thought, so why should it be any different now?”
