BY MARK ROSMAN
Staff Writer
MIGUEL JUAREZ staff Charlie Barreca, who was the sound board operator for Twisted Sister for more than two decades, shows an award that he and the band received for the album “Stay Hungry.” Twisted Sister will play a July 15 benefit show for Barreca, who has dealt with a significant health problem this year. Charlie Barreca is beginning to understand just how many friends he has.
Barreca, who has lived in Keyport since 1985, was the sound man for the rock group Twisted Sister throughout the 1970s and 1980s. Barreca was a familiar face behind the sound board during thousands of Twisted Sister concerts and he was well-known to fans who followed the band during its days playing clubs throughout New Jersey, before it hit the big time with a series of memorable music videos on MTV and sold-out arena shows in numerous countries.
MIGUEL JUAREZ staff Former Twisted Sister sound man Charlie Barreca, his wife, Laura, and sons Christopher and Charles pose for a family photo on June 18. Twisted Sister will play a benefit show in Philadelphia for Barreca, who was hospitalized earlier this year and may need a liver transplant. These days, however, Barreca, 63, is at home in Keyport with his wife, Laura, and sons Charles, 20, and Christopher, 18, trying to recuperate from a stay in the hospital earlier this year. It was then that Barreca, who has hepatitis C, ended up on his back with a gall bladder attack and was later told that his liver was in bad shape. He lost 40 pounds off his 180-pound frame.
Barreca has been home since March and said he has been told that his liver function seems to be holding its own. More tests are due in August and he still may need a liver transplant.
With medical bills piling up, his friends from Twisted Sister, who long ago dubbed Barreca the “Sixth Sister,” decided that the one thing they could do for him was rock out.
And so, on July 15, Twisted Sister will play a benefit show for Barreca at the Electric Factory in Philadelphia. His friends, Dee Snider, Jay Jay French, Mark “The Animal” Mendoza, Eddie Ojeda and A.J. Pero will do what they do best — entertain fans of all ages with their brand of heavy metal music.
The Associated Press reported Barreca’s story on June 10 and that wire service article, as Barreca found out, landed his name in newspapers all over the United States.
“All of my friends have come out of the woodwork,” he told Greater Media Newspapers on June 16. “Anything I need, they’re trying to do it for me. It’s very heartwarming, and it makes me feel good about my own life.”
He called the band’s gesture “overwhelming.”
When asked if Twisted Sister’s fans from the club days of the mid-to-late 1970s and early 1980s — fans who are now in their mid-40s and beyond — might feel a bit out of place at the Philadelphia show among a crowd of 20-something metalheads, Barreca said no, and promised that the old-timers would be well represented.
“There will be plenty of gray hair and beer bellies,” he said.
In an interview with Greater Media Newspapers, Snider said the band members believe that playing a show for Barreca is the appropriate thing to do.
“I joined the band in 1976 and Charlie was there before me,” Snider said. “He was with us for every show, every night, every town, every country. He was the first to arrive and the last to leave. He is our friend and our partner. Rock and roll is a tough life, and there is no golden parachute, no medical plan. When it’s over, you have what you put away and your memories. The roadies have even less.”
Snider said he checked into the cost of a liver transplant and found out the operation costs about $388,000. That is not the kind of money most people have lying around, he said. With that in mind, the band wants to do what it can for Barreca.
On a personal level, Snider said Barreca was there for him on many nights when situations arose that are part of the Twisted Sister legend.
“Charlie had my back” is the way Snider described the sound man who was always there for him when things got tough. “He was a fighter for the band. Ultimately, he is an inspiration on a lot of levels, one of which is to show us that getting older is not the end of the world.”
Snider, the charismatic 50-year-old lead singer of a 30-year-old band that now finds itself playing for the children of its original fans, said the July 15 show will be a chance to see Twisted Sister “old school.”
“For one last time, this is the time to share [Twisted Sister] with your kids,” Dee said, “and every penny is going to a great guy, a guy who was at the helm steering the vehicle every night.”