W.A.S.P.'s BLACKIE LAWLESS Plans To Give Fans 'What They Want' On Upcoming '1984 To Headless' 2026 North American Tour

During a February 13 appearance on SiriusXM's "Trunk Nation With Eddie Trunk", W.A.S.P. leader Blackie Lawless spoke about the band's recently announced "1984 To Headless" 2026 U.S. and Canada tour with KK'S PRIEST as very special guest. The tour will kick off on September 10 in California and run through October 31. W.A.S.P. will play the hits from the band's first four albums: the band's iconic debut LP in 1984, followed the next year with "The Last Command", "Inside The Electric Circus" in 1987 and "The Headless Children" in 1989.

Blackie said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "It was an idea that we had back in, like, 2018, but when we started doing the groundwork on it, we were rudely interrupted by COVID. And so all that had to be pulled, and when it was time to go out again in '22, it was time to move on because that was our 40th anniversary. So we took this idea and we put it on the back burner. And so we're gonna do it again right now.

"It's been interesting because tickets go on sale today in the U.S., but the tickets went on sale in Canada two days ago when the announcement was made," he continued. "40% of those tickets are already gone."

Blackie went on to say that "about 44" shows have been booked so far for "1984 To Headless". "But what we're expecting, because we've been hearing already complaints that there's no Michigan, things like that, we are not finished," he explained. "We are expecting that as these tickets go on sale today, that there's gonna be more promoters [who are] gonna step up. If I had to guess right now, and don't quote me on this, but if I had to guess when we finish in Anaheim, we're probably gonna go back out for another couple of weeks. That's what it's looking like. 'Cause this is a really strong bill. I'm excited about this."

Asked if he has already given any thought as to what W.A.S.P.'s setlist might look like for "1984 To Headless", Blackie said: "Oh, yeah. he best-laid plans of mice and men — you never know what's gonna happen until you get into rehearsal. But if I have my way, we're gonna start with some of the tracks off 'The Headless Children' and work backwards from there. So, I wanna establish that upfront, that you're gonna hear stuff that you have not heard probably for 39, 40 years. So, to me, like I said, I wanna establish that upfront."

Lawless continued: "It's hard, because every time you put a setlist together, you're asking yourself, 'If I was coming to a show, what would I wanna hear?' And you gotta be careful not to get into deep tracks too much, because you have to take kind of an average of what you think people wanna hear, because… And I've told this story a bunch of times as well, but it always bears repeating that you hear people that wanna hear obscure B-sides; I mean, we're talking deep, deep tracks now. And so I remember once we did that, and I thought, 'You know what? We keep hearing it. Keep hearing it, keep hearing it. Why don't we try this?' We were somewhere in Norway, and we went out and we did three or four B-sides from those early singles, and the audience stood there mortified. And no band has ever died an uglier death on a stage than what happened to us that night when we did that. And I thought, 'I don't know who talked me into doing this, but we are never gonna do anything like this again.'"

Blackie added: "Again, there's a learning curve to all that stuff. So you say, 'Okay, if I was in the audience…' You have to be careful, or the artist has to be careful, not to get too self-indulgent to do the things that they wanna do because those people… I look at it nowadays. It's not just the money for the ticket. People have been working all day. They gotta get up, get off their butts, get out there. That's the big thing. And if you're gonna coax 'em to go into those shows, you better give them what they came there to hear. So if you've got inklings of trying to be self-indulgent and playing deep, deep, deep stuff off those records, you might wanna rethink that again. Because, like I said, you got an obligation to give people what they want. Hey, they're the ones — like I said, they're not just paying for it. They're paying for it with their time to get up, get their butts ready and get to that show. It's a lot of preparation."

After host Eddie Trunk suggested that W.A.S.P.'s fanbase is composed of "an older audience for the most part", Blackie said: "Well, we've been lucky because we've been able to turn audiences over. But I would say probably a third of our audience is maybe some of the original people that were there. So whether it's them or whoever it is, I would imagine they're getting their money from somewhere, so they probably got a job. So, like I said, to get them out of the house, especially on a weekday, you better give 'em what they came for."

When "1984 To Headless" was first announced last week, Blackie said in a statement: "It's hard to express the genuine excitement I'm feeling in describing the '1984 To Headless' U.S. tour. Playing those songs from those first four albums in a combined package like this is something we've never attempted before. In addition to the songs, the entire stage show will look like the album covers from those records will come alive... right right before your eyes! Complete with all the history and bombastic live presentations that's made this band one of the great live bands in the theatrical rock world. When elements of those album covers start to come alive, right on the stage before the people, it's gonna be something they'll not soon forget!

"I'm also equally thrilled to bring KK'S PRIEST and those iconic hits onboard for all the fall 2026 U.S. shows. Both bands together on the same stage on the same night — where do I get my ticket? It's gonna make the '1984 To Headless' tour one for the rock ages!"

W.A.S.P. is again offering fans VIP tickets that give fans a chance to meet Blackie, get a personal photo with Blackie, autographs, a W.A.S.P. traveling museum with new items added since the last U.S. tour, and take part in a very personal Q&A with Blackie. VIP tickets can be purchased at waspnation.myshopify.com.

W.A.S.P. will take the "1984 To Headless" tour to Europe and the rest of the world in 2027.

Because of the extensive back injuries Lawless suffered during the European leg of W.A.S.P.'s 40th-anniversary tour, the band's previously announced 2023 U.S. tour was canceled.

W.A.S.P.'s massive European leg of the 40th-anniversary world tour wrapped on May 18, 2023 in Sofia, Bulgaria at Universidada Sports Hall.

W.A.S.P. wrapped up its first U.S. tour in 10 years with a sold-out show on December 11, 2022 at The Wiltern in Los Angeles. This marked the 18th sold-out shows for the U.S. tour, which kicked off in late October 2022. W.A.S.P.'s performances included the return of the band's classic song "Animal (Fuck Like a Beast)", which hadn't been played live in over 15 years.

W.A.S.P.'s latest release was "ReIdolized (The Soundtrack To The Crimson Idol)", which came out in February 2018. It was a new version of the band's classic 1992 album "The Crimson Idol", which was re-recorded to accompany the movie of the same name to mark the 25th anniversary of the original LP's release. The re-recorded version also features four songs missing from the original album.

W.A.S.P.'s most recent studio album of all-new original material was 2015's "Golgotha".