Puscifer Captivates in Streaming Event, “Billy D. & The Hall of Feathered Serpents”

Where music meets theatre, Puscifer has grown widely known for wrapping their audience into an experience unlike any other. Featuring a supergroup of artists, Maynard James Keenan (vocals), Carina Round (vocals), Mat Mitchell (guitar), the core trio sequels their first streaming event, Existential Reckoning: Live at Arcosanti, with a performance of their previous album, Money $hot, in full. Offering their audience a prequel set in the saga of Billy D, a frequently used character in their work, they set the stage on both a fighting ring as luchadores and the Mayan Theater, Los Angeles’ historic 1920s era revivalist theater featuring original artwork by Mexican painter and sculptor Francisco Cornejo.

The elaborate cultural landmark, with its jaw-dropping Mayan calendar infused chandelier and a lobby dedicated to the bird-meets-reptilian deity Quetzalcoatl, gave birth to the streaming performance’s title. “While looking both forward and backwards, we stumbled into ‘The Hall of Feathered Serpents’,” explains Mat Mitchell. “The perfect site to pay homage to the Money $hot album and tour.”

Just before launching the event, Puscifer released the music video of “Bullet Train to Iowa,” which creates the transition in the Billy D. plotline from the previous stream to the next. In the video, Billy wanders through the Iowa desert before hopping onto a bullet train to Iowa, hinting at the next part of the saga, where he encounters alien life in his journey.

However, “The Hall of Feathered Serpents,” shows that this performance may in fact be a prequel to the first livestream event, which makes sense, since the album they pay homage to their 2015 album, Money $hot, by playing it in full. And throughout the performance, we see where Billy D. first finds a mysterious briefcase before losing it after getting drunk at a bar and encountering a wild series of events, then finding himself sobered up in the middle of a desert, without said briefcase.

As Puscifer performed, they created a theatrical spectacle between the two stages in which they played. While audience members dressed as luchadores swarmed around and danced to their music, spotlights glimmered over the landscape and capturing the feel of a real, live performance.

About the performance, Carina Round says in an interview, “It’s super-exciting because it’s a good record, and it’s really fun to sing. We toured it for a year and a half…the last tour we did, and then the world screeched to a halt. The yearning to get back to this for me anyway just grows and grows. It [the streaming event] feels like a step back into the real world again” (1).

Tickets are available for “Billy D. & The Hall of Feathered Serpents” until April 20th and are available for purchase, along with their previous streaming event, “Existential Reckoning: Live At Arcosanti,” at the link here.

Don’t forget to stream Money $hot, available on all streaming platforms: