It’s a band’s worst nightmare: the death of its lead singer. That’s the predicament GWAR faced earlier this year. The band of interstellar space warriors (that’s Scumdogs to you!) were riding high on the Sept. 2013 release of the red-hot Battle Maximus, touring relentlessly and leaving a path of destruction in their wake. But it all came to a screeching halt when singer Oderus Urungus overdosed on heroin in March.
Call me obsessed, but the second thing I do every morning (after cursing my alarm to Hell) is lunge for my phone to check my text messages. In the sincerest act of vanity, I nearly set fire to my screen as my thumb races to and fro, checking with the utmost diligence to make sure I didn’t miss any action. But on Monday morning, I stumbled upon a message from my best friend, sent at 3:25 a.m., that stopped me dead in my tracks: “The singer of GWAR died :(”