It’s been a whirlwind couple of days for a Greensburg couple who were married Tuesday night — almost as chaotic as the crowd surrounding them during their vows.
That’s because Chris and Erica Curtis got married in the middle of a mosh pit, as death metal legends Cannibal Corpse played at Stage AE in Pittsburgh.
With singer George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher banging his head as the band played “Unleashing the Bloodthirsty,” a protective circle formed around the pair as they shared their vows. Their friend Michael “Doc” Daugherty wrote the nuptials, which included “to be your partner in metal, horror, trust, honor and love” and “by the power invested in me, Corpsegrinder and every crazy mofo in this pit and club.”
“I honestly was not expecting more than a quick ‘do you and do you’ from our friend,” the couple told TribLive on Friday via online messaging. “He wrote the perfect nuptials, and our boys rallied to make it happen.”
The couple, who have two puppies named Stevie Nicks and Lillian “Lily” Munster, have been together since December 2020. Chris, a retired Air Force veteran and a special effects artist, just started his own mask/prop-making business last year, Brimstone & Cinder SFX, while Erica is a nurse manager, specializing in end stage renal disease/dialysis treatments.
“My sister introduced us,” Erica said. “She had met Chris at their gym, Rosensteel’s (in) Connellsville. He would go on to talk to her about metal, horror, his SFX art. She had kept saying to him, ‘You need to meet my sister.’ We talked about two weeks before our first date, and we hit off without a hitch!”
The wedding, dubbed Corrupted Nuptials as a Facebook event, started with a pregame at Shorty’s Pins x Pints.
“Honestly, we were tired of trying to plan a wedding that ended up being about everything else, not to mention the cost,” Erica said. “We had thought about the (justice of the peace), and that didn’t quite sit well with us. It just wasn’t our style. Once this tour was announced, the first thought I had was to say our vows in the pit. Carcass, Cannibal Corpse and Meshuggah … it’s an EPIC lineup! Three of our favorite bands. Once I mentioned it to him he responded ‘[expletive] yeah.’”
The support of their friends who they consider family — they singled out Daugherty, Jeremy Hillen, Brian Young, Barry T. Hatchet Mull, Michael Tuxward, Angela Mangione and Michael Honeck — made the unique location possible.
“Once we had told them what our plan was, they did everything they could to make it happen and protect us,” the couple said. “They spread the word in the mosh pit and the amount of support we had was crazy. It was all love and positivity.”
The wedding’s gone viral, with stories on music sites like Metal Injection, Stereogum and Consequence of Sound, not to mention countless social media posts.
“The reactions have been great. They are all in shock as we are with how this blew up,” the couple said. “Our (friends) were the first to send us the articles and videos going around. My boss has been supportive and couldn’t believe how fun the mosh pit looked.”