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Reviewing the new Crue package and tour, comparing it to Van Hagar 04':
You can blame Van Halen for this. Or thank them, depending on your view of the latest Motley Crue reunion.
Clearly, the glam-rock has-beens have swiped the to-do list Eddie and co. drafted last year:
1) Accept that nobody wants you to make a new album; 2) Realize that today's iPod-toting fans were raised on classic-rock radio and only care about your hits; 3) Put out another best-of CD and make a big deal about getting back together; 4) Hit the gym, dig those leathers out of the closet and go fleece the sheep. (Bonus points to Mick Mars for going for the optional 5) Get a hip replacement.)
Thus we have the new Crue reunion tour -- which, unlike their last jaunt in the mid-'90s, is doing booming biz. And we have Red, White & Crue, the new two-disc retrospective a la VH's Best of Both Worlds.
Assuming you haven't already bought these songs six times on all the Crue reissues, box sets and compilations over the past few years, this set is a reasonably extensive collection. Disc 1 covers their headbanging '80s heyday and the poofy-metal classics that kept them in drugs, strippers and Jack: Looks that Kill, Shout at the Devil, Girls, Girls, Girls, Dr. Feelgood, Smokin' in the Boys Room and so on, along with the odd previously issued rarity. Disc 2 -- aka The Disc No One is Going to Play -- covers the diminishing returns and revolving-door lineup that sum up the rest of their career (though we give the boys credit for being gracious enough to include tracks from their short-lived alliance with singer John Corabi). And of course, there are the obligatory Three New Tracks: The plodding, extra-strength power ballad If I Die Tomorrow; Sick Love Song, a funked-up revamp of Welcome to the Jungle; and a wah-wah-laced desecration of The Stones' Street Fighting Man.
At least you can't blame Eddie for that. Now open up and say Baaaah.
You can blame Van Halen for this. Or thank them, depending on your view of the latest Motley Crue reunion.
Clearly, the glam-rock has-beens have swiped the to-do list Eddie and co. drafted last year:
1) Accept that nobody wants you to make a new album; 2) Realize that today's iPod-toting fans were raised on classic-rock radio and only care about your hits; 3) Put out another best-of CD and make a big deal about getting back together; 4) Hit the gym, dig those leathers out of the closet and go fleece the sheep. (Bonus points to Mick Mars for going for the optional 5) Get a hip replacement.)
Thus we have the new Crue reunion tour -- which, unlike their last jaunt in the mid-'90s, is doing booming biz. And we have Red, White & Crue, the new two-disc retrospective a la VH's Best of Both Worlds.
Assuming you haven't already bought these songs six times on all the Crue reissues, box sets and compilations over the past few years, this set is a reasonably extensive collection. Disc 1 covers their headbanging '80s heyday and the poofy-metal classics that kept them in drugs, strippers and Jack: Looks that Kill, Shout at the Devil, Girls, Girls, Girls, Dr. Feelgood, Smokin' in the Boys Room and so on, along with the odd previously issued rarity. Disc 2 -- aka The Disc No One is Going to Play -- covers the diminishing returns and revolving-door lineup that sum up the rest of their career (though we give the boys credit for being gracious enough to include tracks from their short-lived alliance with singer John Corabi). And of course, there are the obligatory Three New Tracks: The plodding, extra-strength power ballad If I Die Tomorrow; Sick Love Song, a funked-up revamp of Welcome to the Jungle; and a wah-wah-laced desecration of The Stones' Street Fighting Man.
At least you can't blame Eddie for that. Now open up and say Baaaah.
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