TWISTED SISTER Frontman Dee Snider

TWISTED SISTER Frontman Dee Snider - "These Firetrap Clubs Are Everywhere In This World"


The following report is courtesy of Rick Massimo from Projo.com:

The organizers of next week’s massive benefit concert for the Station Family Fund say the goals of the concert are to raise money for the survivors of the fire and to keep the people and the problems left in the wake of the blaze in the public’s memory.

The Phoenix Rising concert on Feb. 25 at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center, in Providence, will bring a bill including a country segment — with John Rich, of BIG & RICH; Gretchen Wilson; Dierks Bentley; Randy Owen, of ALABAMA; and American Idol’s Kellie Pickler — and a rock segment — featuring an acoustic performance by STAIND frontman Aaron Lewis; TWISTED SISTER; WINGER; TESLA; Kevin Max; STRYPER; Tom Scholz and Gary Pihl, formerly of the platinum-selling group BOSTON; Carmine Appice’s SLAM!; Danny Seraphine and more.

According to Troy Luccketta, co-organizer of the show and drummer of Tesla, the key to putting together such a huge bill was personal connections. “It’s got to be personal or it just doesn’t make sense.”

Co-organizer and Station Family Fund board member Todd King agrees: “Going from musician to musician is a lot easier.”

“The artists are bleeding hearts,” says Dee Snider, frontman of Twisted Sister. “That’s why we’re artists.”

Snider says that five years after the fire, it isn’t a topic of conversation in music-business circles.

“When the headlines went away,” Snider says, “people thought the problem was fixed. And this problem is generational. This will go on as long as these people are alive, and the orphaned children will take the emotional scars with them. So it’s decades before you can say ‘It’s better.’?”

King agrees: “We’re afraid we’re going to become a footnote.”

“Since nobody else is doing it,” Snider says, “we have to take care of our own.”

Snider says it’s important to keep the fire in people’s minds not only to help the survivors but to remind people to remain vigilant about safety.

“These firetrap clubs are everywhere in this world,” says Snider, who once performed at The Station as a solo act and recalls a gig this month at a club in Vermont he won’t identify. “It was wall-to-wall, and the layout of the place looked like that M.C. Escher picture, with the staircases all over the place. And it was all wood. And I’m on stage going, ‘This is just another catastrophe waiting to happen.’?”

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