Sebastian Bach

Eight years ago, Sebastian Bach was the flaxen-haired bad boy of hard rock, preening and screaming with his band Skid Row for tens of thousands in packed arenas worldwide. These days he's howling for crowds of under 1,000 at nightclubs from Canada to Korea on a grueling grass-roots tour that began last November. The trek, which includes a series of Southland shows starting Saturday at the Galaxy Theatre in Santa Ana, is a comeback for Bach, who disappeared mid-decade under the grunge onslaught.

Sebastian Bach "Angel Down" (MRV) *** "Angel DOWN" is a rip-roarin' rock album. After eight years, though, you might've expected a more distinctively Bach album. Tailoring two songs to match the vintage Guns N' Roses wardrobe of guest vocalist and recent tour mate Axl Rose proves both a boost and a beast for Sebastian Bach, star of stage, disc and VH1. On the one hand, he triggers instant salivation among the legions starved for fresh GNR meat.

Talk about crossing over. For the next nine months or more, Sebastian Bach metal dude is going to be transformed eight times a week into Jesus Christ Superstar. The former singer of Skid Row cut a swath in the late '80s and early '90s as one of hard rock's most profane and unbridled wild boys. Now, at 34, he is continuing his out-of-the-blue parallel life as a star in Broadway musicals.

Sebastian Bach says his devotion to the devil's music cost him his job playing Jesus, but the producer who fired him from the national tour of "Jesus Christ Superstar" says that Bach was canned because he went AWOL and missed five performances in Columbus, Ohio.

* * Skid Row, "B-Side Ourselves," Atlantic. The Skids mark time with an EP of five of their favorite songs. The tenderness of Hendrix's "Little Wing" eludes Sebastian Bach entirely, and his Angst is out of place in the cartoonland of the Ramones' "Psycho Therapy."

Singer Pleads Innocent: The lead singer of the rock group Skid Row, which opened for Aerosmith in Springfield, Mass., has pleaded innocent to assault and mayhem charges. Sebastian Bach, whose real name is Sebastian Bierk, allegedly hit a fan in the face with a beer bottle, breaking her nose and skull, then leaped from the stage and kicked another person in the head. Bierk told authorities he was antagonized by some in Wednesday night's Springfield audience of about 9,500.

Sebastian Bach says his devotion to the devil's music cost him his job playing Jesus, but the producer who fired him from the national tour of "Jesus Christ Superstar" says that Bach was canned because he went AWOL and missed five performances in Columbus, Ohio.

Sebastian Bach "Angel Down" (MRV) *** "Angel DOWN" is a rip-roarin' rock album. After eight years, though, you might've expected a more distinctively Bach album. Tailoring two songs to match the vintage Guns N' Roses wardrobe of guest vocalist and recent tour mate Axl Rose proves both a boost and a beast for Sebastian Bach, star of stage, disc and VH1. On the one hand, he triggers instant salivation among the legions starved for fresh GNR meat.

To outsiders, most hard-rockers seem patterned after the same stereotypical images: swaggering, macho dudes living a life on the extremes--all parties, women and booze. This notion does have basis in fact, solidified and distilled as the hard-rock torch has been passed from generation to generation--from the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin down through Motley Crue and Guns N' Roses. It's the ultimate teen party music and there's a never-ending parade of new stars.

With his Top 20 album past 3 million copies in sales, his video a regular winner of MTV's "Top 20 Countdown" and his face popping up on teen-age bedroom walls everywhere, Sebastian Bach is heavy-metal's hottest new sex symbol. But will his star be dimmed by a pair of recent incidents in which the headbanger poster-boy enraged AIDS activists and was arrested after hitting a fan in the face with a bottle during a concert?

Talk about crossing over. For the next nine months or more, Sebastian Bach metal dude is going to be transformed eight times a week into Jesus Christ Superstar. The former singer of Skid Row cut a swath in the late '80s and early '90s as one of hard rock's most profane and unbridled wild boys. Now, at 34, he is continuing his out-of-the-blue parallel life as a star in Broadway musicals.

"Bach?" a fellow German composer by the name of Beethoven once snorted, preparing to land a pun on the meaning of the word Bach ("brook") in German. "Not Brook, but Ocean, should be his name!" Since the 1780s, just about every professional musician of any stature has had something similar to say.

Eight years ago, Sebastian Bach was the flaxen-haired bad boy of hard rock, preening and screaming with his band Skid Row for tens of thousands in packed arenas worldwide. These days he's howling for crowds of under 1,000 at nightclubs from Canada to Korea on a grueling grass-roots tour that began last November. The trek, which includes a series of Southland shows starting Saturday at the Galaxy Theatre in Santa Ana, is a comeback for Bach, who disappeared mid-decade under the grunge onslaught.

* * Skid Row, "B-Side Ourselves," Atlantic. The Skids mark time with an EP of five of their favorite songs. The tenderness of Hendrix's "Little Wing" eludes Sebastian Bach entirely, and his Angst is out of place in the cartoonland of the Ramones' "Psycho Therapy."

With his Top 20 album past 3 million copies in sales, his video a regular winner of MTV's "Top 20 Countdown" and his face popping up on teen-age bedroom walls everywhere, Sebastian Bach is heavy-metal's hottest new sex symbol. But will his star be dimmed by a pair of recent incidents in which the headbanger poster-boy enraged AIDS activists and was arrested after hitting a fan in the face with a bottle during a concert?

Singer Pleads Innocent: The lead singer of the rock group Skid Row, which opened for Aerosmith in Springfield, Mass., has pleaded innocent to assault and mayhem charges. Sebastian Bach, whose real name is Sebastian Bierk, allegedly hit a fan in the face with a beer bottle, breaking her nose and skull, then leaped from the stage and kicked another person in the head. Bierk told authorities he was antagonized by some in Wednesday night's Springfield audience of about 9,500.

"Bach?" a fellow German composer by the name of Beethoven once snorted, preparing to land a pun on the meaning of the word Bach ("brook") in German. "Not Brook, but Ocean, should be his name!" Since the 1780s, just about every professional musician of any stature has had something similar to say.

He was known as Dr. Death, a Michigan physician who helped his patients kill themselves. In doing so, Jack Kevorkian inflamed a nationwide debate in the 1990s over a terminally ill patient's right to die. And he served eight years in prison for second-degree murder for administering the lethal injection rather than helping the patient do it himself. Kevorkian began his crusade mindful of his own mortality. "You don't know what will happen when you get older," he said in a 1998 interview with "60 Minutes.

To outsiders, most hard-rockers seem patterned after the same stereotypical images: swaggering, macho dudes living a life on the extremes--all parties, women and booze. This notion does have basis in fact, solidified and distilled as the hard-rock torch has been passed from generation to generation--from the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin down through Motley Crue and Guns N' Roses. It's the ultimate teen party music and there's a never-ending parade of new stars.