Any Wall Streeters on the boards?

[october]

I'm amazed and impressed by how many people from North America are still awake!

 

I can't imagine there are too many others. My sleeping pattern is insanely screwed up. I haven't gone to bed before 5 AM in 2 weeks and I sleep in between/after classes. I need to get myslelf straight...after all, the real world rears its ugly head for me in 2 short months.

 

I wouldn't worry about it, I used to lead total night owl hours during law school too, especially 3rd year when I hardly had any classes that involved classroom attendance. Enjoy the freedom while you can, you'll have the rest of your life to keep normal hours.

 

Yeah, attendance is not a priority right now. I am trying to enjoy these last days, but it can sometimes be difficult with the proverbial sword of Damocles hanging over my head.

[supapimp]

paging goldust40...paging goldust40

[delekkerste]

My cut-off of the Scorpions would totally have been at the same album!

 

No love for "Love at First Sting"? That album ruled!!!

[chromium]

My cut-off of the Scorpions would totally have been at the same album!

 

No love for "Love at First Sting"? That album ruled!!!

 

Try "Fly to the rainbow", "Virgin Killer" and "Tokyo Tapes" if you want to hear some Scorpions with a sting

[Wally's Comics]

My cut-off of the Scorpions would totally have been at the same album!

 

No love for "Love at First Sting"? That album ruled!!!

 

 

Rock you like a Hurricane!!!!!!!!!

[PedigreeMan]

no Def Leppard, -- As commercialized as they became, if you listened to Hysteria right when it came out you heard something very cool there. But one too many airings of "Rocket" and "Animal" and "Pour Some Sugar on Me" just became grating after awhile.

Def Leppard rooled on their first three albums, as part of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. But after Pyromania, they decided that it was better to appeal to 12 year old girls and they came out with that piece of pop pablum called Hysteria. Big thumbs down on that album and every album thereafter.

I missed out on the NWOBHM first run, so it doesn't hold as visceral an appeal to me as the cheeseball metal from 1986-1993 does. But that doesn't mean I don't appreciate it!

 

Coverdale will always be Deep Purple Mark III to me.

Coverdale will always be the death of Deep Purple to me. Just an Ian Gillian wannabe.

Eh, I'm weird in that I like the off-the-wall, non-mainstream stuff. I consider Stormbringer and Burn right up there with Machine Head and Made In Japan. And yes, I love Glenn Hughes, too, despite everyone calling him a wannabe soul singer.

 

no GNR -- Like Leppard, every time I hear "Sweet Child 'o Mine" I want to vomit. But I still remember hearing "Welcome to the Jungle" on Z-Rock in August of 1987 and signing the chorus all day. It was that catchy of a tune.

Dude, Appetite for Destruction was the best rock album of the 1980s!

I'm still trying to figure out the appeal of GNR. Were they good? Absolutely. Great? Probably. But certainly not "the best." They were just marketed really, really well, primarily because they weren't like 99.9% of the bands out there who sign their lives away to their record companies when they make their first album. GNR were savvy businessmen who knew how to cut a deal that forced Geffen to promote the heck out of Appetite.

 

The rise of GNR and Metallica signaled the death of the hair bands that you appeared to love so well.

Wrong! My hair bands had a peaceful co-existence with the likes of GNR and Metallica all through the '80s and into the early '90s. In fact, I would argue that bands like Beau Nasty, Roxy Blue, Rhino Bucket, Babylon AD, , were all spawned from this ever-widening pool of what was simply called "heavy metal" from about 1982-1987. GNR and Metallica (and Slayer and Testament and Iron Maiden and Anthrax and Overkill and Nuclear Assault and ) were all part of this pool.

 

Nope, the death of metal in the mainstream happened because of that freak Kurt Cobain. Smells Like Teen Spirit? More like smelled like the death of my music.

 

...

 

One other thing ... Scorpions suck!

[PedigreeMan]

Nice list of bands there, Chrom. Before I comment on them, though, everyone should remember that I grew up on disco-era KISS and that my main source of heavy metal exposure was via MTV up until about October 1986. So call me a p--y if you must, but still try and see things through my eyes.

 

Iron Maiden -- Best album: Powerslave or Somewhere in Time? Powerslave has more weaker tunes on it (Big 'Orra, the Duelist, Flash of the Blade, Back in the Village), but Aces High, 2 Minutes to Midnight, Powerslave, and, of course, Rime more than make up for these deficiencies. Discuss.

Judas Priest -- My favorite album by them? Turbo, of course!

Motorhead -- Lemmy's wart scares me.

UFO -- I've probably never given them a fair shake because of the Scorpions/Schenker connection. Have I mentioned that I really, really, hate the Scorpions?

Y&T -- Wow, which one of these bands doesn't belong on this list, Chrom? I assume your cutoff point for Meniketti and the boys was somewhere around Earthshaker or Black Tiger, huh? Somehow I can't see you banging your head to "LA Rocks" off of Contagious.

Krokus -- Everytime this band's name gets mentioned, my stepson starts singing "Long Stick Goes Boom." I then want to strangle him like Homer Simpson does to Bart.

Riot (NOT Quiet Riot) -- YES! The best proto-metal/NWOBHM/whatever band in existence! Everyone goes crazy over Fire Down Under (as well they should), but Narita is probably even better.

Twisted Sister (well the first album) -- .

Raven -- .

Scorpions (up until "Blackout") --

Tygers of Pan Tang -- .

Dio -- Up until Last in Line, of course. I usually throw Sacred Heart in there, as well, but I like the cheeseball stuff. But Holy Diver and Last in Line? Probably two of the best albums of all time.

Saxon -- Like Motorhead, I give them my respect for being the NWOBHM pioneers that they were. But I really don't like them.

Samson -- Proto-Maiden! Early Dickenson! Very cool, in a novelty sort of fashion.

Holocaust, Witchfinder General, Quartz...$ -- This would be the equivalent of me saying "Defcon," "Raddaka," and "Holland."

 

[chromium]

Some REALLY interesting facts about youth and taste are popping up

 

I started going mad about metal when I saw Motorhead playing "The Ace of Spades" live on a Saturday morning Kids TV show (can you imagine that nowadays hehe)

This must have been around 1979 - 1980. The first albums I bought were the first Iron Maiden album, Van Halen 1 and British Steel by Judas Priest.

 

The next 5 years I was a big fan and together with my 3 friends we managed to buy a new LP every week, one of us bought it, the other three taped it...

 

In 1985 I lost interest, just as Metal got more professional and got more exposure, hair bands were on their way up, Metallica was making a splash etc...

Back in the "real" metal scene, Speed metal and early thrash were taking over, a style I didn't care for, if I couldn't understand the lyrics, it wasn't for me...so I started getting in music from 1968 through to 1975 (Led zep, Jimi, Stones, Faces, Black Sabbath etc..)

 

The funny thing is, that what brought me back to new rock music was....Nirvana

 

Best Maiden Album for me is (and I'm going to get some cr*p for this) is ..Killers

Favorite Priest, can't choose between British Steel and Unleashed in the East

"Narita" Rocks!! I still have it on vinyl somewhere if it didn't burn in the fire

 

And yes, Y&T I liked when they were still called "Yesterday & Today" up until the magnificent Earthshaker (Dirty Girl)

 

When Dio made "Holy Diver" I was soooo mad he quit the band and joined Black Sabbath, but I have to admit "The Mob rules" isn't bad either..

 

Oh and I invite all Scorpions haters to try

 

"Tokyo Tapes" and "Fly to the Rainbow".... I can't stand late 80's and 90's Scorpions, "Winds of change" conjures up images of flatulence in my mind....but the first 4-5 scorpions albums and the double live one are the perfect bridge between late psychedelica and NWoBHM.... some of the songs are very Hendrix-esque (Electric Ladyland era)

 

 

I can't believe I wrote all this while Green Day's "American insufficiently_thoughtful_person" is playing in the background

[blazingbob]

Now, Now metal boys, there are more of us out there than you think

 

Accept - Come on, UDO

Armored Saint

Black Sabbath

Deep Purple - Perfect Strangers

Disturbed - Absolutely!

Drowning Pool - Had potential

Iron Maiden

Judas Priest - Unleashed in the East

MSG - Michael Schenker Group

Motorhead - Ace of Spades

Pantera

Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow

Riot - Swords and Tequilla

Slayer - Before they wrote the same song over and over

Triumph - Rock and Roll Machine

Tygers of Pan Thang - Didn't think anybody knew they existed

UFO - Lights Out

White Zombie

[chromium]

Tygers of Pan Thang - Didn't think anybody knew they existed

 

Amazingly they are still out there touring today

[PedigreeMan]

Some REALLY interesting facts about youth and taste are popping up

 

Very true, Chrom!

 

Blame the made-for-TV movie KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park for my tastes. I saw that at the wee age of four (what were my parents thinking?!?), and because we had a birthday to attend the night it was to air, my folks ended up taping it for me. Well, you know how four year olds are with watching the same stuff on tape over and over again.... I lived, breathed, ate, and dreamt that movie for the next couple of years. Yep, while other kids were watching Sesame Street repeatedly, I was watching a bad parody of a Hard Day's Night mixed with Star Wars. It's a wonder I survived my childhood at all.

 

Over the next few years I only listened to KISS. Rock & Roll Over was my first album of theirs (on 8-track!), then Unmasked (bought used at a garage sale shortly after release ), then Creatures of the Night and every album that followed. So, yeah, cheeseball metal kind of formed my musical taste.

 

By 1984, Ratt and Quiet Riot were in heavy rotation on MTV, and while I had affection for those bands, I was absorbing all kinds of other music also. I still have a "Good Videos" tape from that era and it includes everything from QR to Slade to Huey Lewis to Amy Grant. Summer of 1985 my buddy introduced me to Deep Purple (Perfect Strangers, of all things, and only because they sang about a girl being a samurai on one song! True story!) which started my lifelong love of them. Then by 1986 I had discovered the radio station ZRock -- which played everything from Motley Crue to King Diamond -- and the world opened up for me.

 

So, I only ended up hearing a lot of the NWOBHM bands after the movement had come and gone. By then, the pioneers had either adapted to the current sound (Def Leppard, Maiden) or sounded nothing like the mainstream at the time. The only band I ever really got into from that period was Riot, and I'm not sure if that was because of their more mainstream offerings at the time (Thundersteel) or something else. All that being said, though, I still place their early albums into an "outside" category from my Banshee and Leatherwolf and Heavy Bones and whatnot CDs.

 

In all reality, this lack of firsthand NWOBHM knowledge is probably why I despise the Scorpions so much. All I've ever heard from them was pablum.

 

This has been an interesting trek down memory lane....

[PedigreeMan]

Bob's a metal head!

 

Armored Saint -- I am so glad Joey Vera didn't join Metallica after Cliff died. Symbol of Salvation is one of my favorite albums. Plus, Flotsam and Jetsam got much better after Newstead left.

Black Sabbath -- A given. Although I still haven't heard the Ray Gillen stuff from the mid-80s.

Disturbed, Drowning Pool -- Fairly worthy successors to the '80s thrash scene. I also like Dope and Orgy (although the latter may just be because of the Rough Cutt connection!).

MSG -- Sadly, they will always be known as the Mcauley Schenker Group to me.

Pantera -- I get a chuckle every time I see Phil in the pre-Cowboys days with long hair and spandex.

Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow -- Am I the only one who liked the Graham Bonnet days?

Slayer - Before they wrote the same song over and over -- When the hell was this? I thought all they have is two songs -- Angel of Death and everything else.

Triumph -- Ah yes, the poor man's Rush.

White Zombie --

 

Here's some more bands: Annihilator, Badlands, Corrosion of Conformity (new album next month!), Crimson Glory, Helloween, Lizzy Borden, Love/Hate, Manowar (viking metal!), Metal Church, Pretty Maids, Racer X, Savatage, Sepultura, Sword, Thunder, & W.A.S.P.

[Postal]

Motorhead

 

Saxon Best live performance I've ever seen.

[tth2]

The rise of GNR and Metallica signaled the death of the hair bands that you appeared to love so well.

Wrong! My hair bands had a peaceful co-existence with the likes of GNR and Metallica all through the '80s and into the early '90s. In fact, I would argue that bands like Beau Nasty, Roxy Blue, Rhino Bucket, Babylon AD, , were all spawned from this ever-widening pool of what was simply called "heavy metal" from about 1982-1987. GNR and Metallica (and Slayer and Testament and Iron Maiden and Anthrax and Overkill and Nuclear Assault and ) were all part of this pool.

 

Nope, the death of metal in the mainstream happened because of that freak Kurt Cobain. Smells Like Teen Spirit? More like smelled like the death of my music.

 

Au contraire, mon frere! Your so-called peaceful co-existence during the 80s was only because Metallica and GNR were nobodies for most of the 80s. I do agree that Nirvana and the grunge scene became the final nail in the coffin.

 

Here's a little US metal timeline according to me, completely from my head and without checking on the web to verify dates, so dates might be a bit off by a year or so, but I think the general periods and sequence of events is right:

 

1. 1982 Motley Crue releases their first album (or was it an EP?) and kickstarts (pun intended) the LA metal scene, from which the vast majority of hair bands will come. I don't classify the Crue as a hair band, though.

 

2. 1983 Metallica unleashes their legendary EP, to absolutely no commercial success in the US, inspired by the burgeoning SoCal punk scene (Black Flag, Angry Samoans, Suicidal Tendencies) and NWOBHM (thanks to Lars)

 

3. 1984-86 Some NWOBHM bands start breaking through in the US, primarily Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Scorpions; Ratt, a seminal hair band, breaks through

 

4. 1985-86 Bon Jovi explodes into megastardom with "Slippery When Wet", and hair metal is in full bloom. Every American metal band discovers the power of mousse. Poison, the uber-hair band, achieve commercial success; metal-lite reigns for the next few years

 

5. 1987-88 Meanwhile, Metallica have been steadily touring and building up a fan base and finally achieve commercial success with "Master of Puppets". Dave Mustaine, after being kicked out of Metallica, starts Megadeth, which achieves commercial success with "Peace Sells..." The bare bones appearance of these bands and thrashier, heavier sound begins the backlash against the poseur hair bands. I think Slayer's South of Heaven comes out around this time.

 

6. 1989 Appetite for Destruction is released, the biggest selling debut album in history. A heavier sound than hair metal's metal-lite, but with more pop sensibilities than Metallica and the thrash bands. GNR deliberately play up the junkie look and turn their backs on big hair (which they had themselves embraced while playing on Sunset Strip). Mousse and sequins are out, greasy hair and tattoos are in. Real metal is back in.

 

7. 1988-90 Hair metal's last gasp, with your Wingers, Warrants and White Lions (what's with all the W's?) getting in one last hit album. Poison releases "Every Rose", the denouement of the hair metal era. Jon Bon Jovi cuts his hair. All hair bands are universally derided as a bunch of p y poseurs.

 

8. 1991 Nirvana is unleashed upon the world, and grunge is in. The hair metal era is officially over.

[PedigreeMan]

Here's a little US metal timeline according to me, completely from my head and without checking on the web to verify dates, so dates might be a bit off by a year or so, but I think the general periods and sequence of events is right:

 

BUZZ! Your dates and facts are all off, counselor.

 

1. 1982 Motley Crue releases their first album (or was it an EP?) and kickstarts (pun intended) the LA metal scene, from which the vast majority of hair bands will come. I don't classify the Crue as a hair band, though.

 

Too Fast For Love was released in 1981 and didn't create much of a ripple. And how in the world can you not call the Crue a hair band? They wore more makeup and hairspray than Poison did in 1986!

 

The LA Metal Scene exploded in 1983 with the double punch of Quiet Riot's Metal Health and the Crue's sophmore release, Shout at the Devil. Although history tends to lump these two albums together, QR was the real impetus for everything that was to follow.

 

2. 1983 Metallica unleashes their legendary EP, to absolutely no commercial success in the US, inspired by the burgeoning SoCal punk scene (Black Flag, Angry Samoans, Suicidal Tendencies) and NWOBHM (thanks to Lars).

 

Kill 'Em All was a full length release, not an EP. And Metallica was already quite famous on the underground scene by this time due to all of the tape trading that took place. This enables them to break out into the mainstream by 1986 with their third release, Master of Puppets (more below).

 

3. 1984-86 Some NWOBHM bands start breaking through in the US, primarily Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Scorpions; Ratt, a seminal hair band, breaks through.

 

The NWOBHM bands simply rode the rising tide of metal awareness in the States at this time. In the quest for more metal to meet the growing demand, record labels started pushing these bands more. The fact that they were decent to begin with didn't hurt, either, as it proved to the execs that they had proven material. Some, like Maiden, Priest, and Leppard, went to varying degrees of cheeseball songs during this time, much like KISS did in the late '70s with their disco stuff.

 

Ratt and Twisted Sister broke through in 1984, solidifying the hair metal base begun a year earlier by QR and the Crue.

 

4. 1985-86 Bon Jovi explodes into megastardom with "Slippery When Wet", and hair metal is in full bloom. Every American metal band discovers the power of mousse. Poison, the uber-hair band, achieve commercial success; metal-lite reigns for the next few years.

 

Slippery When Wet and Look What the Cat Dragged In both came out in 1986. However, this form of "metal-lite" really began a year earlier with the Crue again and the song "Home Sweet Home" off of Theatre of Pain. If you want to look at anything that killed heavy metal, it's this song. Seriously, look at Bon Jovi's first two albums -- they were far less poppier than Slippery. What changed between the two? The success of Theatre of Pain.

 

5. 1987-88 Meanwhile, Metallica have been steadily touring and building up a fan base and finally achieve commercial success with "Master of Puppets". Dave Mustaine, after being kicked out of Metallica, starts Megadeth, which achieves commercial success with "Peace Sells..." The bare bones appearance of these bands and thrashier, heavier sound begins the backlash against the poseur hair bands. I think Slayer's South of Heaven comes out around this time.

 

Here's where your timeline is all messed up. Thrash/speed/whatever broke through to the mainstream as early as 1986. Master of Puppets spent time on the Billboard Top Thirty without any radio airplay whatsoever. Peace Sells was getting rotation on MTV. Anthrax and Slayer were poised for breakthroughs and finally succeeded in 1987 and 1988 respectively with Among the Living and South of Heaven. By 1988, this form of music was a bona fide genre, encompassing all of the above bands as well as everyone from Testament to Overkill to Sacred Reich to Nuclear Assault.

 

And the peak of hair metal hadn't even been reached yet.

 

6. 1989 Appetite for Destruction is released, the biggest selling debut album in history. A heavier sound than hair metal's metal-lite, but with more pop sensibilities than Metallica and the thrash bands. GNR deliberately play up the junkie look and turn their backs on big hair (which they had themselves embraced while playing on Sunset Strip). Mousse and sequins are out, greasy hair and tattoos are in. Real metal is back in.

 

Way off on this date, Tim. Appetite came out in August of 1987 and GNR was beyond successful by first quarter 1988 when Sweet Child 'O Mine was released as a single.

 

Unfortunately, Axl shared a lot of the same vocal qualities as the singers in the hair metal bands you're excoriating, so GNR got lumped in with them at this time. No bands with "greasy hair and tattoos" ever became popular during the late '80s/early '90s. In fact, I can only think of two that had that look -- Zodiac Mindwarp and Slave Raider, and I think they sold a total of 5 albums between the lot of 'em during this time.

 

7. 1988-90 Hair metal's last gasp, with your Wingers, Warrants and White Lions (what's with all the W's?) getting in one last hit album. Poison releases "Every Rose", the denouement of the hair metal era. Jon Bon Jovi cuts his hair. All hair bands are universally derided as a bunch of p y poseurs.

 

Hardly hair metal's last gasp. In fact, this was the peak of the genre. During this time you had the debuts of Winger (1988), Skid Row (1988), Slaughter (1989), and Warrant (1989), continued number one albums by the Crue, Bon Jovi, and Poison, and the release of more imitations than one could shake a stick at. A&R guys were practically signing every Sunset Strip band with more than a dozen followers during this time.

 

In fact, these signings continued well into 1991, long after the success of Metallica's And Justice For All (1989), Megadeth's Rust in Peace (1990), and Slayer's Season's in the Abyss (1990). Heck, thrash was so evolved by this time it had already begat the death metal offshoot.

 

Again, a peaceful coexistence.

 

In fact, I'd argue that most record execs lumped all of these bands together. Which is why you had continued hair metal releases up to a year after Metallica's Black Album was released in August of 1991. Knowing that grunge had taken hold by the opening days of 1992, how else does one explain a sophmore release by Babylon AD (Early Summer, 1992)? Or Tora Tora (Ditto)? Or a third release by Lillian Axe (Early 1992) or Slaughter (Spring 1992)? How about Jackyl's debut (Late Summer 1992)? Or Heavy Bones (Fall 1992)? These execs saw ten million copies of "Enter Sandman" pablum flying off the shelves and conclued "Metal ain't dead yet!" Unfortunately, they were wrong.

 

BOO-YAA! (If it's one thing I know more than comic books, it's heavy metal!)

 

Alan

[adamstrange]

Pedigreeman -- re: trial of Tim.

 

I vote guilty as charged!

[tth2]

Here's a little US metal timeline according to me, completely from my head and without checking on the web to verify dates, so dates might be a bit off by a year or so, but I think the general periods and sequence of events is right:

 

BUZZ! Your dates and facts are all off, counselor.

 

1. 1982 Motley Crue releases their first album (or was it an EP?) and kickstarts (pun intended) the LA metal scene, from which the vast majority of hair bands will come. I don't classify the Crue as a hair band, though.

 

Too Fast For Love was released in 1981 and didn't create much of a ripple. And how in the world can you not call the Crue a hair band? They wore more makeup and hairspray than Poison did in 1986!

 

The LA Metal Scene exploded in 1983 with the double punch of Quiet Riot's Metal Health and the Crue's sophmore release, Shout at the Devil. Although history tends to lump these two albums together, QR was the real impetus for everything that was to follow.

 

Again, I wasn't checking back on exact dates. The fact that I said 1982 and Too Fast for Love came out in 1981 is not too bad for an off the top of my head recollection, I think. I don't view Motley Crue as a hair band because they were so over the top that I always thought of them more as an extension of Kiss.

 

I'll definitely disagree with you on QR being the impetus for the LA metal scene (which I basically equate with the Sunset Strip scene). QR had been around as nobodies for ages, and were competitors of Van Halen back in the mid 70s when they were all still playing the local scene. Don't forget Randy Rhodes was playing with QR way back when, before Ozzy plucked him out of obscurity. So if you really want to find the progenitor of the LA metal scene, it's VH.

 

Perhaps QR were the first metal band after VH to hit it big from LA, but no one else sounded like them and no one else looked like them. Pretty boys they were not, although Rudy Sarzo wasn't afraid of the mousse. Their breakthrough hit was a cover of a Slade song, for god's sake! Their influence on the LA metal scene was nil, except that they attracted talent scouts to the area. I might be willing to agree with you that Shout at the Devil was the true starting point for the LA/Sunset Strip metal scene.

 

2. 1983 Metallica unleashes their legendary EP, to absolutely no commercial success in the US, inspired by the burgeoning SoCal punk scene (Black Flag, Angry Samoans, Suicidal Tendencies) and NWOBHM (thanks to Lars).

 

Kill 'Em All was a full length release, not an EP. And Metallica was already quite famous on the underground scene by this time due to all of the tape trading that took place. This enables them to break out into the mainstream by 1986 with their third release, Master of Puppets (more below).

 

You know, this is weird. I know for a fact that I played a silver colored Metallica EP back in 1983 at my college radio station (4 songs), but checking through their discography on the net back now, no such animal. I wonder if it was some sort of import? I know that some of their songs had surfaced before Kill 'Em All was released.

 

3. 1984-86 Some NWOBHM bands start breaking through in the US, primarily Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Scorpions; Ratt, a seminal hair band, breaks through.

 

The NWOBHM bands simply rode the rising tide of metal awareness in the States at this time. In the quest for more metal to meet the growing demand, record labels started pushing these bands more. The fact that they were decent to begin with didn't hurt, either, as it proved to the execs that they had proven material. Some, like Maiden, Priest, and Leppard, went to varying degrees of cheeseball songs during this time, much like KISS did in the late '70s with their disco stuff.

 

Ratt and Twisted Sister broke through in 1984, solidifying the hair metal base begun a year earlier by QR and the Crue.

 

Don't disagree with the above. Leppard exploded after Joe Elliott lost weight and became a front man that the teeny boppers could swoon over. Pyromania alone has probably sold more copies than every other NWOBHM band put together. I have a hard time classifying Twisted Sister as a hair band, because they had been around for so long before that.

 

4. 1985-86 Bon Jovi explodes into megastardom with "Slippery When Wet", and hair metal is in full bloom. Every American metal band discovers the power of mousse. Poison, the uber-hair band, achieve commercial success; metal-lite reigns for the next few years.

 

Slippery When Wet and Look What the Cat Dragged In both came out in 1986. However, this form of "metal-lite" really began a year earlier with the Crue again and the song "Home Sweet Home" off of Theatre of Pain. If you want to look at anything that killed heavy metal, it's this song. Seriously, look at Bon Jovi's first two albums -- they were far less poppier than Slippery. What changed between the two? The success of Theatre of Pain.

 

I don't disagree with this either, but at the end of the day Crue were just a mere platinum-selling act, whereas Bon Jovi, whether they were consciously copying Crue or not, became a mega-platinum band. I don't think it's any coincidence that Poison and Cinderella became big after Bon Jovi broke through.

 

5. 1987-88 Meanwhile, Metallica have been steadily touring and building up a fan base and finally achieve commercial success with "Master of Puppets". Dave Mustaine, after being kicked out of Metallica, starts Megadeth, which achieves commercial success with "Peace Sells..." The bare bones appearance of these bands and thrashier, heavier sound begins the backlash against the poseur hair bands. I think Slayer's South of Heaven comes out around this time.

 

Here's where your timeline is all messed up. Thrash/speed/whatever broke through to the mainstream as early as 1986. Master of Puppets spent time on the Billboard Top Thirty without any radio airplay whatsoever. Peace Sells was getting rotation on MTV. Anthrax and Slayer were poised for breakthroughs and finally succeeded in 1987 and 1988 respectively with Among the Living and South of Heaven. By 1988, this form of music was a bona fide genre, encompassing all of the above bands as well as everyone from Testament to Overkill to Sacred Reich to Nuclear Assault.

 

And the peak of hair metal hadn't even been reached yet.

 

I don't think I'm so far off in terms of dates, I said 1987, maybe Master of Puppets came out in late 1986. I think we may be using different definitions of mainstream, though. I'm kind of using platinum status, everybody jumps on the train and becomes copycats, as my threshold for mainstream. Otherwise, you could say thrash was mainstream when Ride the Lightning came out and got some exposure. Megadeth could not have started getting airplay until 1987 at the earliest, because I moved to Germany at the beginning of 1987, and definitely do not remember them on MTV before then.

 

6. 1989 Appetite for Destruction is released, the biggest selling debut album in history. A heavier sound than hair metal's metal-lite, but with more pop sensibilities than Metallica and the thrash bands. GNR deliberately play up the junkie look and turn their backs on big hair (which they had themselves embraced while playing on Sunset Strip). Mousse and sequins are out, greasy hair and tattoos are in. Real metal is back in.

 

Way off on this date, Tim. Appetite came out in August of 1987 and GNR was beyond successful by first quarter 1988 when Sweet Child 'O Mine was released as a single.

 

Unfortunately, Axl shared a lot of the same vocal qualities as the singers in the hair metal bands you're excoriating, so GNR got lumped in with them at this time. No bands with "greasy hair and tattoos" ever became popular during the late '80s/early '90s. In fact, I can only think of two that had that look -- Zodiac Mindwarp and Slave Raider, and I think they sold a total of 5 albums between the lot of 'em during this time.

Okay, definitely off on my dates. But totally disagree with you on the stylistic impact GNR had. Look at the back cover photo of Appetite, and name any other successful metal band at the time that had that gypsy junkie look. Count the number of tattoos prominently displayed by rock bands prior to Axl, and after. I don't disagree with you that initially they were marketed as a hair band, after all they emerged from the same Sunset Strip scene as everyone else, and Axl had the big hair for a while too before he adopted the barrio bandana look.

 

7. 1988-90 Hair metal's last gasp, with your Wingers, Warrants and White Lions (what's with all the W's?) getting in one last hit album. Poison releases "Every Rose", the denouement of the hair metal era. Jon Bon Jovi cuts his hair. All hair bands are universally derided as a bunch of p y poseurs.

 

Hardly hair metal's last gasp. In fact, this was the peak of the genre. During this time you had the debuts of Winger (1988), Skid Row (1988), Slaughter (1989), and Warrant (1989), continued number one albums by the Crue, Bon Jovi, and Poison, and the release of more imitations than one could shake a stick at. A&R guys were practically signing every Sunset Strip band with more than a dozen followers during this time.

 

In fact, these signings continued well into 1991, long after the success of Metallica's And Justice For All (1989), Megadeth's Rust in Peace (1990), and Slayer's Season's in the Abyss (1990). Heck, thrash was so evolved by this time it had already begat the death metal offshoot.

 

Again, a peaceful coexistence.

 

Most of these bands were one hit wonders. They may have released further albums, but none were big hits. It was hair metal's death rattle, with these guys riding the crest from GNR's success but soon to come crashing down because there was no substance. Even Crue never achieved the same heights after Dr Feelgood.

 

In fact, I'd argue that most record execs lumped all of these bands together. Which is why you had continued hair metal releases up to a year after Metallica's Black Album was released in August of 1991. Knowing that grunge had taken hold by the opening days of 1992, how else does one explain a sophmore release by Babylon AD (Early Summer, 1992)? Or Tora Tora (Ditto)? Or a third release by Lillian Axe (Early 1992) or Slaughter (Spring 1992)? How about Jackyl's debut (Late Summer 1992)? Or Heavy Bones (Fall 1992)? These execs saw ten million copies of "Enter Sandman" pablum flying off the shelves and conclued "Metal ain't dead yet!" Unfortunately, they were wrong.

As I said above, yes, albums were released, but none of these were commercially successful. What's the combined sales of the albums you list above? The only metal band that still sold well in the grunge and post-grunge era was Metallica, who of course appealed to the purists out there.

 

BOO-YAA! (If it's one thing I know more than comic books, it's heavy metal!)

 

Alan

 

This has been a fun trip to memory lane. You definitely know your metal, definitely much better than you know comic books, but that's not saying much.

[RustyStaple]

What? no Ratt, no Cinderella, no Jackal, no Mr. Big, no Skid Row, no Twisted Sister

no Def Leppard, no Ozzy, no Slaughter, no Whitesnake, no Tesla, no GNR?????

 

see you in the pit!

 

 

 

Good Grief! It's the 80's lost weekend....or now known as the new classic rock..

[verygoodplus]

You know, this is weird. I know for a fact that I played a silver colored Metallica EP back in 1983 at my college radio station (4 songs), but checking through their discography on the net back now, no such animal. I wonder if it was some sort of import? I know that some of their songs had surfaced before Kill 'Em All was released.

 

 

I believe you're thinking of the "Whiplash" 12-Inch released in 1984 on Megaforce. With the following four tracks:

 

Jump in the Fire

Whiplash

Seek and Destroy

Phantom Lord

 

This was definitely issued after "Kill 'em All" (1983), but possibly only by a few months.

 

 

[PedigreeMan]

Again, I wasn't checking back on exact dates. The fact that I said 1982 and Too Fast for Love came out in 1981 is not too bad for an off the top of my head recollection, I think. I don't view Motley Crue as a hair band because they were so over the top that I always thought of them more as an extension of Kiss.

 

I'll definitely disagree with you on QR being the impetus for the LA metal scene (which I basically equate with the Sunset Strip scene). QR had been around as nobodies for ages, and were competitors of Van Halen back in the mid 70s when they were all still playing the local scene. Don't forget Randy Rhodes was playing with QR way back when, before Ozzy plucked him out of obscurity. So if you really want to find the progenitor of the LA metal scene, it's VH.

 

Perhaps QR were the first metal band after VH to hit it big from LA, but no one else sounded like them and no one else looked like them. Pretty boys they were not, although Rudy Sarzo wasn't afraid of the mousse. Their breakthrough hit was a cover of a Slade song, for god's sake! Their influence on the LA metal scene was nil, except that they attracted talent scouts to the area. I might be willing to agree with you that Shout at the Devil was the true starting point for the LA/Sunset Strip metal scene.

 

I want to emphasize one thing in particular from your above statement: Their influence on the LA metal scene was nil, except that they attracted talent scouts to the area. This is key to us coming to an understanding.

 

In 1983 there was really just "heavy metal." This encompassed everything from Black Sabbath to KISS to Rainbow to Van Halen to Y&T to Quiet Riot to every NWOBHM band to every band on the Sunset Strip. The fragmentation into "hair metal," "thrash," "death metal," whatever didn't come until the industry had matured by the late '80s. As such, the record execs that were drawn to the LA metal scene by Quiet Riot's success were simply looking for "metal" bands. I have no idea the reasons for QR's success -- maybe it was simply time for a metal band to break through after bands like VH had paved the way, maybe there was a dearth of original music at the time, maybe the economic successes of the day turned people toward "party" music again, who knows -- but it happened. And its happening was the spark for everything that followed over the next ten years.

 

Got it? There was just "metal."

 

I don't disagree with this either, but at the end of the day Crue were just a mere platinum-selling act, whereas Bon Jovi, whether they were consciously copying Crue or not, became a mega-platinum band. I don't think it's any coincidence that Poison and Cinderella became big after Bon Jovi broke through.

 

I don't know what the sales numbers were for the albums Theater of Pain and Slippery When Wet, but I do know that the video for "Home Sweet Home" had to be retired by MTV after months of being the #1 requested song during Q4 1985. Do not underestimate the power of this song. "Home Sweet Home" begat all of the "monster ballads" that came to define the "hair metal" generation. While Bon Jovi may still have written "Living on a Prayer" or "Wanted Dead or Alive" without the popularity of this Crue tune (debatable), these two songs would never have been as popular as they were without it. Guaranteed.

 

And while Cinderella probably broke through because of Bon Jovi (more because of their behind the scenes influence), Poison most definitely did not. Look What the Cat Dragged In was released only a few months after Slippery When Wet, and Poison had already built up a huge following on the Sunset Strip long before then. Again, there was a rising tide of metal during the mid-'80s and all of these bands were either the direct causes of this rise or greatly benefited due to it.

 

One more thing about Motley Crue's success: Girls, Girls, Girls (released summer of 1987) was the first "metal" album to debut at #1 on the Billboard charts. I distinctly remember this because there was a bit of a debate amongst the "music literati" at the time that some Led Zeppelin album during the '70s should have qualified for this title. We all ignored these whiny losers. So, at their peak, the Crue was really as popular as Bon Jovi.

 

I don't think I'm so far off in terms of dates, I said 1987, maybe Master of Puppets came out in late 1986. I think we may be using different definitions of mainstream, though. I'm kind of using platinum status, everybody jumps on the train and becomes copycats, as my threshold for mainstream. Otherwise, you could say thrash was mainstream when Ride the Lightning came out and got some exposure.

 

I don't see how we're in disagreement here. I don't know when Master of Puppets went platinum, but I do know that it spent a lot of time on the lower rungs of the Billboard Top Thirty, so it probably didn't take very long. In any event, they were most definitely "break-through" successes by late 1988 when And Justice For All came out (I was wrong on my earlier release date for this album -- it was actually September 1988), and especially so after their first video ("One") did.

 

As for the "everybody jumps on the train" aspect, I addressed that previously: By 1989, "thrash" was a mature fragment (re: "broken through to the mainstream") of the heavy metal movement, encompassing bands from Megadeth, Anthrax, and Slayer on the top end all the way down to Overkill, Sacred Reich, and Nuclear Assault on the lower end. And again, by 1990, "death metal" was already shooting off from this thrash aspect, so it was by no means still underground.

 

But totally disagree with you on the stylistic impact GNR had. Look at the back cover photo of Appetite, and name any other successful metal band at the time that had that gypsy junkie look. Count the number of tattoos prominently displayed by rock bands prior to Axl, and after.

 

Interesting experiment. I may actually do this some weekend when I have nothing better to do. I'll also count how many bands sported big hair, makeup, and spandex. My money would be on the spandex crowd largely outnumbering the tattoo one.

 

Hardly hair metal's last gasp. In fact, this was the peak of the genre. During this time you had the debuts of Winger (1988), Skid Row (1988), Slaughter (1989), and Warrant (1989), continued number one albums by the Crue, Bon Jovi, and Poison, and the release of more imitations than one could shake a stick at. A&R guys were practically signing every Sunset Strip band with more than a dozen followers during this time.

 

In fact, these signings continued well into 1991, long after the success of Metallica's And Justice For All (1989), Megadeth's Rust in Peace (1990), and Slayer's Season's in the Abyss (1990). Heck, thrash was so evolved by this time it had already begat the death metal offshoot.

 

Again, a peaceful coexistence.

 

Most of these bands were one hit wonders. They may have released further albums, but none were big hits. It was hair metal's death rattle, with these guys riding the crest from GNR's success but soon to come crashing down because there was no substance. Even Crue never achieved the same heights after Dr Feelgood.

 

Completely disagree with your statement that any of these bands were one hit wonders. Winger's second: In the Heart of the Young (1990); Warrant's second: Cherry Pie (1990); Skid Row's second: Slave to the Grind (1990); Slaughter ... actually, I screwed up on Slaughter -- Stick It To Ya was actually their first, and was released in January of 1990. But Mark Slaughter made great waves with Vinnie Vincent Invasion back in 1988, so I wasn't totally offbase. All of these albums were either platinum or multi-platinum and completely solidified the metal base upon which all imitators came during the 1988-1992 period. And again, this base was built from every "metal" band that had come before -- Van Halen, QR, Metallica, Poison, GNR, Motley Crue, etc.

 

Again and again, all of this points to a peaceful coexistence between all forms of “metal.”

 

In fact, I'd argue that most record execs lumped all of these bands together. Which is why you had continued hair metal releases up to a year after Metallica's Black Album was released in August of 1991. Knowing that grunge had taken hold by the opening days of 1992, how else does one explain a sophomore release by Babylon AD (Early Summer, 1992)? Or Tora Tora (Ditto)? Or a third release by Lillian Axe (Early 1992) or Slaughter (Spring 1992)? How about Jackyl's debut (Late Summer 1992)? Or Heavy Bones (Fall 1992)? These execs saw ten million copies of "Enter Sandman" pablum flying off the shelves and conclued "Metal ain't dead yet!" Unfortunately, they were wrong.

 

As I said above, yes, albums were released, but none of these were commercially successful. What's the combined sales of the albums you list above? The only metal band that still sold well in the grunge and post-grunge era was Metallica, who of course appealed to the purists out there.

 

You’re ducking and weaving here. Commercial success for any old style metal can be thrown out the window for everything post 1991. I’m talking about the simple fact that so many albums of this genre were even released with grunge running rampant all over the place by 1992. No one knew what would result from this new dialectic, so all of the record companies were going with what had worked previously (and what was still working with Metallica). Unfortunately, the musical styles between the two (grunge and metal) were so disparate that no peaceful coexistence was possible.

 

Things started to change by fall of 1992 with Warrant’s third release, Dog Eat Dog. Jani Lane and the boys moved away from the “Cherry Pie” silliness and put out a halfway decent, rockin’ album. But the ripples this change caused were not lost on us fans, who were also getting beaten bloody by Nirvana and Soundgarden and Pearl Jam and Alice In Chains and other bands that sounded like they were singing through sludge. Change was in the air. When the Crue did the heavy-as-hell “Primal Scream” for their Decade of Aggression album in 1991, we all just chalked it up to bizarre band dynamics; but when Warrant did it following the Grunge assault, real fear set in. Then Poison fell a few months later with Native Tongue, and we knew the good times were over. The final nail in the coffin? The abject failure of Winger’s third (and absolute best) release, Pull, in the summer of 1993. Bye bye hair metal, at least in the US. Bon Jovi would be the only one left to keep the home fires burning, but they were never really considered metal following Slippery When Wet.

 

Bottom line? Peaceful coexistence amongst all “metal” bands from Bon Jovi to Cannibal Corpse up until those dirty, flannel wearing, depressed, singing through mud bands came along and usurped the throne. All in all, I’m happy with the ten years we had in the spotlight, for it was a lot longer than most genres get. And it enabled the genre to live on in Europe and Japan to this day. The only difference is that CDs cost three times as much now!