This was the 31st year of Decadent Cabaret, but my first time to attend. The show bills itself as "A tradition of fishnet stockings and notoriously memorable musical performances", to which I would agree on both counts. It is close to musical overload, eleven bands in one long night. And, there were two other nights I didn't attend. It was a variety of music, starting more mellow early in the evening and spanning to blasting, roaring heavy metal by the end. What made it personally very cool for me, was not only my first experience at the Decadent Cabaret, but also, with the exception of Excellent Adventure, it was all new bands to me.

We arrived a touch late. The Wife had misplaced THE fishnet stockings. You know the ones. They were the fishnet stockings that tied the whole outfit together. Not THOSE fishnet stockings, or even THE OTHER fishnet stockings. She had to have THE fishnet stockings, which were finally found about the time we should have been standing in the audience. They had fallen in behind the dresser drawer. We walked in just at the end of Excellent Adventure.

Our first full band was Meridene, who played a fantastic, too short, one song, Meat Loaf set of I Would Do Anything For Love. Note perfect, vocally perfect, sadly lead singer Trevor even looked a little like Meat Loaf, but if you can get by that point, they were great. Meridene is on my must see again list.

• Check out the rest of the Decadent review (including some video) over at the Freaks & Geeks blog, originating from somewhere in Chippewa Falls, Wis.
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