Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

Crash Worship

Sound description

Industrial performance art.

RIYL

Fishwife, Swans, NON, Throbbing Gristle, SPK, Mayhem, Einstürzende Neubauten, the Birthday Party, Led Zeppelin, the Stooges, Physics, Johnny Superbad & the Bullet Catchers

Inception

San Diego , 1986

Influences

Battallion of Saints, Fear, Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Black Sabbath, Blue Cheer, the Stooges, MC5

Discography

Sponsored

Crash Worship was a San Diego percussive, industrial, and performance art group. Usually featuring one guitarist, two singers, and three drummers, their music can’t be considered punk or post-hardcore. It’s more experimental and organic, featuring various instruments and, most predominantly, lots of drums.

The band was most renowned for its rowdy live shows, in which audience members were often showered in various substances such as blood, water, and honey, while band members ignited fires within the performance area. Their stage performances were a communal theatrical experience, often incorporating burning effigies, smoke, explosives, milk, and even naked women. Crash Worship was avant-garde, but it meshed well with other bands in the San Diego scene.

They formed in 1986 as Crash Worship - ADRV (Adoración de la Rotura Violenta), initially as a studio project, but soon learned the power of performing in front of a live audience. The disorder of the band's live shows often invited attention from police, who would forcibly stop the band's shows. Their often-paganist and heathen imagery also caused outcries.

Encinitas native John Goff says he was asked to join Crash Worship because he played bagpipes in high school. Honing his 'pipe skills with no less traditional an ensemble that that of Balboa Park's House of Scotland, he's also lent some skirting adornment to other arty local acts, including guest stints around town with Three Mile Pilot (he's featured on the first track of the group's second album). “They [Crash Worchip] would use fire extinguishers filled with pig blood at their shows. They would have underwater explosives that would spew house paint. I was there when part of the Ché Café caught on fire at one of their shows.”

The group released several albums and singles of both live and studio-recorded music, most of which is improvised. They rarely played any of their studio material at shows.

After much successful touring in the United States for many years, Crash Worship followed suit with two full European tours in the '90s. However, the band was deemed "unmanageable" by many labels, booking agencies, or clubs, which proved difficult to tour much afterward.

The group disbanded in the early 2000s, with the members moving to various other cities in the United States and forming their own solo and side projects. Bagpiper/drummer/guitarist/keyboardist John Goff and his brother Will went on to form the electronic band SSI, releasing albums like Pax Romana and E Pluribus Unum, on their label Chlorophyll Records. Goff also played with Johnny Superbad & the Bullet Catchers, and then Physics, as well as producing records by Rob Crow and Heavy Vegetable for his own Way Out Sound label and overseeing studio projects for the Nortec Collective. In 2016, Goff helped produce Noise, the experimental quartet that includes artist Shepard Fairey (known for his 2008 Obama “Hope” posters) and singer Merritt Lear.

Sponsored

Upcoming Local Shows

No shows scheduled

Post a show
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

This Week’s Reader This Week’s Reader