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"After ten years of tearing up area clubs as Whiskey High, the band will be playing their ‘Farewell Performance’ Saturday May 26 at Nick's Fat City in the South Side. The show will be filled with surprises and it's the last chance you can pick up any of the Whiskey High releases. So stop on down for a kick ass goodbye." – from the Pittsburgh Rock Magazine "Rock ‘n’ Roll Reporter" website www.rocknrollreporter.com

Say it ain’t so!! Is MeTaL truly dead? Not the Ultimate Weekend Warriors! Not the Kings of Kick-Ass Covers! Not my favorite local band, man! Not Whiskey High!

Actually, sources close to the band say the members of Whiskey High aren’t exactly hanging it up. They got a new singer, they are changing the band name and image, and (NO!) "coverin' The Deaf Tones (sic), Tool, Fear Factory, and Korn and Coal Chamber. Damn it!! You’re supposed to stay true to your hair metal roots! They’re sellin’ aht! Look at them now!

Okay, okay. I’m not exactly one that should complain: I’ve never actually seen Whiskey High or heard their music. But if you’re from Pittsburgh, you know who they are. Like most Pittsburghers, my knowledge of Whiskey High is derived solely from their full page ads in the Rock ‘n’ Roll Reporter, which they started to buy around ’91, ’92. As time went by, metal faded out, grunge exploded, then that faded out, then you had your gothy’s like NIN and Marilyn Manson get big, then your pop-punkers like Greenday and Offspring, but none of that phased Whiskey High. Then it’s 1997, and Whiskey High is still kickin’ it hair metal style!! The year 2000 comes, and to Whiskey High, it’s still ’88 and they continue to lurk between the dark cemeteries of heavy metal and the Disneyworld of hair metal. That’s what’s called being true to your roots!

If you don’t believe me, check this out: the photo at the top of this page is not a promo shot they used in ’88 or ’89 or even ’92. It’s one they used in 1997!! That’s what Whiskey High is all about right there. Hell yeah! That’s what I’m talkin’ ‘baht!

Now, lookee here. Don’t think I’m dumping on Whiskey High. Those guys are more famous than I am. They draw people from Saltsburg to Zelienople. They probably have their own high-tech PA and lightshow. Their equipment is in tiptop condition, I would think. And I betcha they’re decent musicians who practice their "chops" every day. Unlike me, they probably have job security and health insurance and seniority with their day jobs, and every Friday and Saturday night they get to drink for free and rock till 2. AND they are SPONSORED BY MILLER BEER!!!

I’d kill for a beer sponsorship. If I had a beer sponsorship for Yinz Say Yall, I’d write something gut bustingly hilarious every damn day and you’d see a huge banner of whatever beer is sponsoring me ("eh hum- Mr. Murphy? I’m quite popular in Amerikay"), and I’d be a complete sell-out to that beer. I’d be the Duffman equivalent of Murphy’s Irish Stout. Oh, yeah! I’d wear their shirts all the time and be a complete corporate fascist or whatever the kids call ‘em these days. In fact, since Eightonefour is all Pennsylvania-centered, shouldn’t it already be sponsored by Yuengling? Or maybe Rolling Rock or Penn Pilsner. Shit, I’ll take free Iron City any day. It’d be a good, legal way for these companies to reach people outside the state and advertise to teenagers. Write your local beer corporation and tell them YOU wanna see 814 sponsored by THEIR beer. That’s the way corporate sponsorships work. It’s a democracy. If enough of you VOTE for us, than we get free beer. I think.

I may have gotten sidetracked somewheres. What was I talking about? Oh yeah: Beer.

Beer: I like it! Beer: It’s a gas! Beer: The choice of every generation! Beer: Have one or six at the office today! Beer: Everyone looks good!

I really don’t have anything else to say about Whiskey High. It’s a great name though. I never really got particularly "high" from whiskey. I got fall on my ass drunk from it several times. Whiskey Fall On My Ass Drunk would be a damn good band name as well.

But I always saw something extraordinarily Pittsburgh in the ‘High. Whether it’s the mullets, the attitude (and that would be the "I don’t care what year it is, it’s still [‘76, ‘83, ‘87] to me, and I’m still cooler than you and I know more about music than you and when you go to a concert at Starlake I’ll sit on the tailgate of my sky-blue rusty Dodge Omni and drink Beast Ice and rip on you, even though I have a short-long and am wearing JAMZ and an acid-wash jean jacket I had since high school with ‘Metallica’ written in black permanent marker spelled wrong and the lightning part on the ‘A’ backwards, because I couldn’t afford an iron-on patch because I was spending my Kentucky Fried Chicken paycheck on Beast and very seedy weed and W.A.S.P. albums, and can’t name three bands that came out after 1991" attitude), or the, yeah, pretty much the attitude.

It’s a very widely accepted attitude in Pittsburgh, one that, in America, usually remains outside hip metropolitan boundaries, or with a few lame alcoholics that hang out at the dive on the corner, one would think. In Pittsburgh, this attitude goes from yer typical blue-collar Starlake fly, to top-level downtown executives and yuppies in Shadyside and the hippest hipsters on the Southside. Everyone thinks it’s the year it was when they were 18. I don’t know, I’m just talkin’ outta my ass for filler at this point.

There’s a band called Nute from Charlotte, NC that reminds me of Whiskey High. A tad more hip. My favorite song by them is "Rock ‘n’ Roll Outlaw in a Rock ‘n’ Roll Band". They’re sponsored by a ton of people too. Every time they play here one or two guys in the band roll into town and pass out flyers like they’re campaigning for a third party candidate in the Presidential Elections. Their keyboard player plays heavy metal keyboards – his stance is akin to an inside linebacker’s, and he bangs the keys as hard as he bangs his bald head when he’s not flicking off the audience.

So it gets me to thinkin’, maybe there are Whiskey Highs all over the country.

I hope.

W.H.W.N.D.

Whiskey High Will Never Die