10
by M.H
Hi Bernardo,
The first thing to understand w/ this genre of rock music is that many of the big names who had the most commercial success generally blew goats. Like Kiss before them they relied on spectacle to sell a substandard product and MTV gave them a bigger audience than the live circuit would allow so they sold enough to shift the paradigm by the end of the eighties (allowing washed up whores like Whitesnake, Alice Cooper, Heart and even Kiss themselves a second bite of the cherry).
These bands basically fall into two categories:
1: Kids who mixed a curious kind of anglophilia (both for glam rock and the early punk bands) with the 70’s American arena giants (a lot of Kiss, some Aerosmith, a little Van Halen) and were attitude monsters w/ limited musical ability. Think Motley Crue, W.A.S.P, Quiet Riot and (w/ a clever T.Rex / NY Dolls mix) Poison. Twisted Sister also kinda belong here. 95% of this stuff is bad. A few catchy singles here and there, but an entire album of any of the above is a slog.
2: The better bands minimised any Kiss influence and generally mined the Aerosmith – Van Halen axis but w/ more big melodic hooks (i.e.: stuff to get the chicks singing along). This is what I’d recommend:
Ratt: Out Of The Cellar – Banger, the archetype for this stuff, though others would better it later on. Big big choruses, cool EVH chords w/ chuggy Priest rhythms. Sonically dated but the hooks and the rock still wins out. The only record where they all worked together before an unlimited supply of gash and drugs drove them insane, though the follow up is ok.
Dokken – Don Dokken kinda sucks (dude’s clearly a wuss), but he was contributing musically and masterminding the whole enterprise so he clearly had something going on. What doesn’t suck is George Lynch who plays rings around nearly everyone else in this scene so their Van Halen + melody formula works very well indeed. You can’t go wrong w/ the second, third or fourth record but IMO the live record they ended their first run w/ (Beast from the East) gathers the stronger material and strips away the studio cheese to reveal their brilliance.
Faster Pussycat: Wake Me When It’s Over – Aerosmith obsessives who made a decent Done With Mirrors rip-off debut, but the follow up is a smart, funny, groovin’, sexy and sophisticated effort – sounds killer too. Basically the record A.Smith should have made if they hadn’t sold their souls to Desmond Child or GNR minus the insane egos. Third record wanders into Thrill Kill Kult / Russ Meyer territory and is also a blast.
Extreme: III Sides To Every Story – Slightly glib and cheesy funk influence on the earlier DLR-esque stuff takes a big musical jump towards an organic, flowing funk (Nino’s maybe one of the better Hendrix channelers of the era, up there w/ Frusciante) and ‘matures’ lyrically in the dumbest way – BUT – undeniably awesome playing, oozing w/ confidence and ambition. They really deserved to break big w/ this one, but it came out 1 year too late. Pity.
Skid Row: Slaves To The Grind – This one ROCKS HARD – like, thrash intensity, way more than GNR. The debut has a bit too much Bon Jovi in the mix, but they’ve clearly spent their money from ‘I Remember You’ on hard drugs, whores and leather trousers and now they’re harder than Pantera (circa Cowboys…).
There’s some good stuff from Cinderella, Tesla, Kix, L.A Guns, Badlands and Lynch Mob, but I’d sink my teeth into this stuff first.