Hair Metal bands that actually ROCKED (opinion war starts NOW!)

[Anonymous]

The first three BulletBoys CDs are awesome. Very underrated band.
One of my best friends was their drummer up until a couple o' weeks ago, actually -he bailed for greener pa$ture$. Said every time they played "THC Groove" he flashed back to us trolling Hollywood back in the day, when "Freakshow" was kinda the soundtrack..


First 3 Skids records are cool, too.

There's a lot of bands from around that time that were actually very good & unfortunately, not all have risen to the top of the shit-pile. Some because they weren't backed up by their recording label, others because they didn't have time before Nirvana killed entertainment forever.

Cheers! :bottle:

[chefcraig]

It's way hard to find, since it's been out-of-print since the late 90s, but John Corabi's pre-Motley band the Scream (with Bruce Boullett of Racer X who rips) was pretty kick ass too...

I honestly don't believe it...I've been talking about that band for years, and since no one else had ever seemed to recall 'em, I began to believe I'd made them up in some drug/alcohol fueled daze. (Naturally, when I went to find the CD in my collection several years ago, it wasn't there.)

Shit brother, you really are the only guy I've run into in decades that ever heard of them. Thanks for the confirmation.

[jhale667]

Happy to help...lol Loved 'em!

[jhale667]

THIS was one of my faves by them...

[Seshmeister]

Weren't those guys Sesh's old band?

Cheers! :bottle:

Less funny joke since their drummer got convicted for child pornography a few years back but I'll take it in the spirit it was meant...

[DLR Bridge]

All due to Sebastian's imaginative, insanely intense vocals.

Try to listen to only the instruments & laff (or cry, as may be the case).

Cheers! :bottle:

The entire band was responsible for how great their 3rd (and final, in my opinion) CD, Subhuman Race was.

[DLR Bridge]

I'll admit to owning Motley Crue's first two albums. Couldn't really stand them after that though. As for Mr. Big, what a damn shame to have that much talent in a band and waste it on shitty music.

Agree totally regarding Crue. Mr. Big really never had a chance with the girly voiced singer. Green Tinted Sixties Mind was their swan song and they did like 5 CDs of aimless, sub-par shit after that. Japan ate it up though, apparently.

[Terry]

As the hair metal years were happening, particularly '88 to '90, I gravitated towards a mixed bag of hair. Some for their classic rock sound, some for the cheese and sleeze beasts they'd attract at their shows. I'm sure a vet can tell which provided which:

Love Hate
Tesla
Badlands
Bullet Boys
Dangerous Toys
Bang Tango
Britney Fox
Law & Order
Xenon
American Angel
Warrior Soul
Cinderella
Extreme
King's X
Lynch Mob
Mr. Big
White Lion
Sea Hags
Vain
L.A. Guns
Enuff Z' Nuff

And probably ten or so others that escape me at the moment.

Tesla had too much talent and ability for me to consider than a hair-metal band, although I recognize that they are lumped into that category in the general public mind regardless.

Bullet Boys fucking rocked.

Cinderella, and Tom Keifer specifically...good, good band. Good songs. That they got lumped into that category and got ignored by their record company when grunge took off was a shame.

Whitesnake...I gotta say that I enjoyed the performances on the 1987 Whitesnake album. Dunbar, Murray and Sykes did a great job. The thing that kinda killed it for me were Coverdale's lyrics, which...I dunno, it seemed like he was intent on throwing in as many mundane rock cliches as he could in each song. Put it this way: if I saw some local band in a club around the mid-to-late 1980s and the Whitesnake 1987 songs were said bands originals, I wouldn't necessarily think that band deserved to be signed. However, Whitesnake 1987 was miles above the sludge that was Slip of the Tongue. Some say that Steve Vai was the only thing that made that album worthwhile, but to me Vai's playing was just as flashy yet uninspired as everything else on the record.

[DLR Bridge]

I agree Terry. I appreciated the '87 Whitesnake album a whole lot more once I saw Blue Murder in '89 and Sykes blew the doors off of Still Of The Night both on guitar and vocals, no less! Vai stepped into a cash grab (I'm having deja vu. Didn't we talk about this a few months ago?) and basically churned out already written Vandenburg compositions that lacked the oomph of the Sykes years.

[Anonymous]

Less funny joke since their drummer got convicted for child pornography a few years back but I'll take it in the spirit it was meant...

Well, I didn't know that. In fact, I don't think anybody who's not from Ireland knows that.

Anyways, I guess that rules out a reunion, so maybe you could form a super group with your country's OTHER major talent...

... I'm sure you could use the recent buzz about the film adaptation of Les Miserábles to boost sales.

Cheers! :bottle:

[DLR Bridge]

And, yeah, there's actually a lot of shit on my list. Many of those bands had only songs or just pieces of songs that I really enjoyed at the time. Tesla, Badlands, Bullet Boys and King's X are still in heavy rotation for me. The bulk of the rest was pretty disposable, mostly.

[Anonymous]

The entire band was responsible for how great their 3rd (and final, in my opinion) CD, Subhuman Race was.

That's right & luckily too, as Sebastian's lack of a proper technique had already pretty much shot his voice by then.

Oh, he still sounded amazing in all songs, but it wasn't the same as the second & much less the first.

Cheers! :bottle:

[Anonymous]

Tesla had too much talent and ability for me to consider than a hair-metal band, although I recognize that they are lumped into that category in the general public mind regardless.

Hey, you can't change the label of something just because you like it.

Cheers! :bottle:

[DLR Bridge]

My draw to Tesla was that Frank Hannon was a huge Frampton fan. The solo to The Way It Is was an intentional tip of the hat. Always liked that tune.

[Momshell]

I have to admit I did like Poison back in the day, but probably only because I thought Bret was hot (still kinda do, minus his bandanas). Still kinda like Motley Crue, Skid Row, some Whitesnake. Now that I've gotten into the heavier stuff I really need to be in the mood for cheese to listen to any of it though. Can still do old Crue but that's about it.