I had the displeasure of seeing Dope live once (don’t ask). They were playing at Don Hill’s, a club here in NYC that holds about 300 people, and, to my surprise, they actually managed to pack the place pretty full. So after the band before them concluded their set, Dope kept the crowd waiting for 45 minutes while their roadies set up elaborate stage dressing fit for an arena show: extra platforms and a new PA system and lighting rig (I guess the house systems weren’t good enough for the band) and giant wooden backdrops and a chain link fence (!) and who the fuck knows what else. This kind of shit really isn’t necessary for a small club gig, but it might have been forgivable had the band come out and rocked the kids’ faces off; instead, they came out and played for… 45 minutes. To repeat: the band played for as long as they kept the crowd waiting for them to play. In hindsight, it seems clear that all the rigmarole was really because without the fancy lights and props, the band knew they didn’t have much to offer.
I’m telling you this story because Dope will be opening for Black Label Society and Sevendust on their upcoming tour, which still strikes me as an odd package – that Zakk Wylde, who once proclaimed “Fred Durst can eat a dick” on his band’s DVD, would share a stage with not one but two nu-metal bands just seems weird.
Weirder still: Wylde has now recorded a track with Dope. Let me type that again, lest you think your eyes are failing you: DOPE HAVE A SONG ON THEIR NEW ALBUM WITH ZAKK WYLDE ON GUITAR.
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