03. He has written for Metal Hammer, Louder, Prog, the Observer, Select, Mojo, the Evening Standard and the totally legendary Ultrakill. Theyre the bands were raising a large Jack Daniels and coke to here the ones who never got their time in the neon glare of fame despite making at least one killer record. 1 hit, "More Than Words," and the album it was released off of, "Extreme II: Pornograffitti.". It caused enough friction that eventually they produced alternate covers, which featured the womens body dipped into the water, covering up her cleavage and effectively de-sleazing this record. The perfect hair metal album, and one of the last ones before the glory days came to an end. Thanks for popping by, and stay safe! It now enjoys a cult following among fans of hair. 09. Vixen was and are as authentic as they were talented. Mixing metal, punk, and glam, everything on this album just clicked perfectly. The Spandex-clad gems that turned the Sunset Strip into the boulevard of broken dreams. SPREAD EAGLE, GREAT ALBUM = TO APPETITE FOR DESTRUCTION. Connor Shelton described it as one of the few bands from the era to bring a level of depth . Guns N' Roses was that band. Wanna know the details? By that point, oversaturation was just starting to set in, and so, if you werent truly aces, you werent going to make it. Powerful, but still memorable. This, their best album contains the song "Metal Health" which is, according to Kevin DuBrow, the original FU song. Aside from the Ozzy connections with the Rough Cutt and Britny Fox albums, heres anotherAside from being the original guitarist in Ratt(! From there, Warner Brothers gave Rough Cutt one last shot, and the group recorded their next record in 1986, called Want You!, which also completely stalled. Let the bargain hunting begin, Id rec The Scream - Let it Scream, Lillian Axe - Love + War, Saigon Kick - s/t, Ratt - Reach for the Sky, Junkyard - s/t, Killer Dwarfs - Dirty Weapons, Some of my recommendations: Love Ted Poley's voice. Enter Lorraine Lewis, the frontwoman with an absolutely huge voice, who led the now mostly forgotten group Femme Fatale. Winger epitomized late 80's pop metal, and seemed to be the pinup boys for all the hatred towards hair metal with the dawning of grunge. For me, Europes Out of this World is an AOR masterpiece. Britny Fox Britny Fox was in the same league as Poison and Cinderella in the hair metal band corner of rock in the '80s. It was formed by the same dude who invented the most popular and inherently-flawed-leaving-endless-bullshit-marketing-for-upgrades-rather-than-just-make-a-great-product-in-the-first-place piece of guitar technology, Mr. Floyd Rose, who, although he did an acceptable job of producing and engineering both Q5 albums overall, did an unacceptable job of engineering the guitar sounds for both albums, and did not have enough finesse as a lead player to make his solos sound pleasing (although he wasnt awkward like Steve Howe, he was no George Lynch). Or the impeccable "Somewhere in Time," which honestly touches on a much more "authentic" level of metal or hard rock (akin to maybe Queensrche or something) with its prominent but not distracting keyboards and thought-out, composed leads? The metal press fell hard for em, setting the singer up as a leather-trousered, barefooted pin-up. Underrated hair metal songs. Well, they did. Now, this is a weird entry in many ways. Its an album that you can listen from beginning to the end, and wont find any bad song. Vinyl Writer MusicsThe Road to The Roxy: 10 Underrated Glam & Hair Metal Era Albums Part II: Their recordings were reissued on CD several years ago by Retrospect Records, howevergranted the disc is already out of print and fetching overly expensive prices on eBay. Enter Lorraine Lewis, the frontwoman with an absolutely huge voice, who led the now mostly forgotten group Femme Fatale. Best selling and most recognizable of TS's output, it is also their best. Contains one of the mostly widely recognized power ballads "More Than Words," but "Decadence Dance" is the albums killer cut. If you see it, definitely pick it up and enjoy. Hair metal with real bad attitude. Doro True At Heart (1991) For every Axl Rose or Nikki Sixx, there were hundreds of also-rans, buffoons and no-hopers who crashed and burned before they had a chance to leave any lasting mark. So, what did they do? Severely underrated, and released at a time when hair metal was just about dead. The early 90s cultural zeitgeist was unkind to this record, but present day, we have a chance to flip the script. Well, in the wake of the Hot In The Shade screw-job, the band still managed to book a nice tour of well-paying gigs and were set to depart, when Dean The Diva Davidson decided to split and make a go of it on his own. One of my favorite albums of all time!!!! We've decided to rank our 20 hair metal bands of all time. Check out the old TKO albums also, they are basically Q5 without Floyd Rose. Blue Murder - Blue Murder (1990) Iron Maiden - Piece Of Mind (1983) The biggest problem with Iron Maiden 's fourth album is that it's sandwiched between the twin juggernauts that are The Number Of The Beast and Powerslave. As "glam" or "hair metal" almost became dirty words in the early '90s music industry, a lot of bands who got labeled as such in the past (rightly or not) tried hard to disassociate themselves from the label by diversifying their sound. Besides, doesn't "Love Of A Lifetime" make the perfect wedding song? The album that kind of fused metal and glam into one. As for the comments, they ranged from things like, This album sucks all the way to, This is awesome! SPREAD EAGLE (SELF TITLED) Start to finish is frigging beast mode appetite for destruction part 2, Hell yeahhhhhhhh cant wait for that to wake people up to the best or atleast 2nd best album of that era!!! Seriouslyher lead work is some of the best of the era, in my opinion. This, along with Slippery When Wet, epitomized pop metal, and helped bring it to the mainstream back in 1986. Less popular and less keyboardy than Slippery, but much better. It has been over 20 years since I have heard it. The whole damn thing. Well, I am here to tell you that those people are assholes. Wildside is still one of my faves simply because it was so much heavier than all the bands at that time and darker too. Of course, it turned out to be a put-on Stanley was really a rich kid called Chris Stann, and the whole thing was somewhere between performance art, social commentary and plain bad taste. The Tear the House Down lineup briefly regrouped for a 25th anniversary reunion last summer, but Bruce Naumann is now working with yet another all-new lineup. Completely badass feel, and I really think they wouldve ruled the rock world if the vocalist had made a better style choice. Stay up to date with in depth music reviews, exclusive interviews and widespread coverage of whats happening from your favourite music genre. An album that is underrated though it would be their next effort, the aptly titled Hooked. All of that horse crap aside, Out of This World is actually a pretty outstanding album, and while its not The Final Countdown, as I mentioned before, I tend to prefer it. Guitarist Michael Angelo Batio is well known for his guitar instructional videos Speed Kills and he also played guitar in the band Nitro (The Double Headed Guitar!) Visit our corporate site (opens in new tab). Thanks for the excellent comment! 5 Underrated Hair Metal Albums - YouTube A response to the article on the Goldminemag website about 5 Underrated Hair Metal Albums that every record collector should. While the era of 80s Hair Metal and Glam is mostly known as being predominantly male, several females infiltrated the scene and staked their claim as well. Excellent article. In retrospect, this album came out the same year as Nirvanas Nevermind, Pearl Jams Ten, and Metallicas The Black Albumit never really had a chance. And how many comparable artists had successful tracks along the lines of "Stand Up, Shout it Out" or "Say Yeah!"!? 2) The songwriting on this album is absolutely top-notch, which is something of a small miracle, considering Ace had quit KISS in 1982, in a drunken haze, almost died in several car wrecks, and hadnt made any music in around five or so years. When I wrote Return to the Sunset Strip: 10 Underrated Glam & Hair Metal-Era Albums, I didnt really know what to expect. If I was going to put a Great White album on this list it would be Psycho City, not Hooked. This one also gave birth to the tern "pop metal," and made metal accessible to screaming girls everywhere. I quipped about hipsters sitting in cafs and dredging Hair Metal the first time around. Just great guitar shredding all over this album. What about the tactful keyboards, chorus hook, and big vocal harmonies of token power ballad "Dry Your Eyes"? Britny Foxs record company (Columbia Records) seemed to agree and unceremoniously dropped Britny Fox, effectively leaving them for dead. Louder is part of Future plc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Also, their weren't too many other guitarists from this era that could rival Vito Bratta's playing. The greatest hair meatl band album on parole with GNR??? Slaughter were hair metal and were damn proud to be hair metal. Were much better - especially live. Heavy Bones formed in Hollywood circa 1990 and featured in its ranks guitarist Gary Hoey (who later scored a surprise hit with "Hocus Pocus") and drummer Frankie Banali (of Quiet Riot and W.A.S.P.). Extreme: The thinking person's hair metal band. You cannot hear that album with seeing the menacing face of Bolo Yeung staring at you in a windows reflection. KISS Asylum (1985) Not sure why Ann from NRR sits on it to this day. Kickstart your hearts and shout at the devil because en route are more huge hooks, mighty guitar licks, and most importantly, more sleaze coming your way, faster and harder than ever. If you listen to this album, you will be singing the songs in your head for years to come. ), $2.1 million dollar record deal with Capitol Records in 1990; then ended up changing their name to Wildside due to a cease and desist related to the Young Guns movies. As far as I can tell they only made a music video for the lead track, "Wild, Young, and Crazy," but almost every song herein is better than good, and several are fucking outstanding. And while the album's lyrical content never really departed from the usual glam topics, the sheer power and utter lack of compromise found on songs such as "Monkey Busyness", "Slave to the Grind", and "Wasted Time" managed to win audiences over on their own, propelling the album to the top spot on the Billboard 200 chart. So, that does itI think. I can't tell if they're still active or not, but Wildside does have a Facebook page that's touting a remastered re-release of Under the Influence this year, and I'll be all over that if it becomes a reality. Harem Scarem - Mood Swings (1993) *this one is particularly good! Vinyl Writer Musics10 Underrated Glam & Hair Metal Era Albums: Erotic Suicide - Abusement Park & Perseverance [deleted] 3 yr. ago. Full of sleaze and attitude, one of the better hair metal albums to come out at the tail end of the 80's. 04. 10 years earlier, they would've been superstars. The result was a killer record that confused the shit out of thrashers and glammies alike. It's a very solid record, though, highlighted by the superb "Dead End St." (included above)a dark, brooding power ballad complete with emotive leads and vocals. There are albums by Bon Jovi which frequently pop up, such as Slippery When Wet and New Jersey, or if youre trying to be different, you may pick the bands self-titled debut, Because it started it all, or because, It has Runaway on it. I know that comes off as presumptuous, but its true, and you know it. Lyrics are a bit trite, but this is a great debut. The Welsh wonders second album, 1990s Berzerk, is a stone-cold classic featuring the greatest pop-metal anthem of the era in Love Bomb Baby. Looking back, its hard to pinpoint why this record failed, as it seemingly had all the ingredients to ascend to great heights. The second album shouldve just been the actual soundtrack to Bloodsport. Feelgood, Ive also learned that the devout fanbase that makes Hair Metal so special, still remains and that they too have a voice. An album of pure attitude, arriving when most glam bands were changing over to pop metal. Buy it, you will be pleasantly surprised. April 6, 2021 Connor Shelton Features, KTRM-FM, Music, Reviews. Gotta do some digging there. Its no joke that their debut was produced by Paul Northfield, the inimitable force behind Moving Pictures and the song Empire by Queensryche (just a couple of my favorites in a cool career), two completely different examples of dark rock sounding fantastic. The record stalled at #141 on The Billboard 200 and quickly fell off the charts. Vain was less poppy than most cock rock bands, and they just had a serious vibe in their sound. Appreciate the comment. These guys got popular fast and then went absolutely nowhere. That Beau Nasty is kicking my ass right now! Butas with every band cited abovethe story's the same: having been right around the time of the grunge takeover, it didn't happen and the end was near. One that I hoped to see on lists is Leatherwolf. Dream Unending: Tide Turns Eternal. Do yourself a favor and go score this record. They should have been huge! The '80s have taught us that you could expect a lot of things from Blackie Lawless, but releasing a concept album wasn't one of them. Great White was the would-be Blues-Rock band, that simply couldnt help but indulge in Hair Metal. After even more line-up shuffling, the group finally settled into what would be known as their Mk.3 line-up, which would also come to be their most successful. It was this line-up that recorded the now dusty gem Rough Cutt for the major label, Warner Brother Records. Southgang - Tainted Angel Ah, Tigertailz: the band the Manic Street Preachers could have been. Way too oversaturated with keyboards,but still catchy as hell. Now, let's begin. Some of the artists below released albums on major labels and may have done alright in their day, but they certainly don't get spoken of in the same regard as biggies like Mtley Cre, Skid Row, etc. Youll see. Simple answer underrated yes. The album was recorded at Eddie Van Halen's 5150 home studio, and Wildside was the first band other than Van Halen to record there. Warrant's biggest seller, though not quite their best (see Dog Eat Dog), but this album is what early 90's hair metal was all about. Black N Blue Nasty Nasty (1986) While its not a pure Hair/Glam record, and the band did begin to experiment a little, at the end of the day, its grimy, its sleazy, and it slays. and Classic Rock, Associate Editor on Q magazine and staff writer/tea boy on Raw, not necessarily in that order. 7800 Fahrenheit really pulls no punches, and it played a huge role in shaping the shaping of the sound that was to come for Bon Jovi. "Don't Close Your Eyes" is one of the best ballads ever written. Pure pop metal with long, stick thin blond hair X2. The band's debut album, "Out of the Silence", was recorded at Joni Mitchell's private studio in Beverly Hills, and released in 1988 on A&M Records. While I didnt intend for the KISS roots to run so deep within the article per se, I will admit that we are all subject to our own biases, and anyone who knows me will tell you I am not about to apologize for KISS influence. As heard above, "I Rule the Radio," from the Heavy Artillery compilation, is a perfect example of Real Steel at their anthemic, fist-pumping best. DLR's full length debut (after a 4 song EP in 1985). Cruella DVille - Showdown in Tinsel Town That said, surely an album with songs co-written by Ronnie James Dio is worth at least a few spins, right? But "hard rock" is just too broad, and "cock rock"? Lets go twirl some drumsticks. underrated hair metal albums. Stay tuned for a potential part 3! Vixen Vixen (1988) I got TT on 1st end LP and it's sumptuous! Perhaps more than any other group on this list, Wildside truly should have been "the next big thing" given the circumstances surrounding their debut album. Although they werent truly a hair metal band, Leatherwolfs Street Ready album has many of those kinds of sonic qualities and is packed with killer songs. An album with a nice balance of rockers and ballads. (side note, i am not including any 70's albums of Kiss because they would take up too much of this list). Michael Kelly Smiths guitar work was inspired, and as usual, Johnny Dee and Billy Childs were ever the capable rhythm section. First off, Extreme wasn't all that big on the glam thing despite being labeled as such for most of their active years, and this labeling can be even more baffling nowadays when the first Extreme song that comes to your average Joe's mind ends up being "More Than Words" in the vast majority of cases. Ive never heard Cats in Boots or Harem Scarem so Ive got some Googling to do! Real Steel (well done for resisting Reel) are the pick of the bunch for me, almost hints of Manowar circa Fighting The World on there 2 thumbs up! To sum the vibe surrounding this album up, I leave you with a quote from the bands vocalist, Janie Lane, who recalls, I walked into the foyer at our label (Columbia Records), I discovered a large, framed poster of Warrant had been removed from the wall and had been replaced by an even larger poster of Alice in Chains. Leatherwolf circa 1987, and Street Ready circa 1989 are two overlooked (or forgotten) treasures. Europe Out of This World (1988) Vinnie Vincent Invasion Vinnie Vincent Invasion (1986) Looking back, though, this record is awesome. BA1 1UA. Tyketto - Dont Come Easy To nobody's surprise, "III Sides to Every Story" followed that labeling trend as well, but what you could hear on that album was anything but stereotypical glam. "The Ballad of Jane" is one the best hair metal ballads ever. Sure, it was shallower than a puddle after a midnight shower on the Sunset Strip, but that was the point: what the hell else do you want from a band with a singer called Steve Sex Summers? Regardless of whether you think that glam metal died because it was over-exploited or because grunge killed it, youd agree that the '90s were a very bad time to be a band with a "glam" label slapped on your behind. But the public proved resistant to the hard sell, and Vain were left sitting forlorn and alone on the sidewalk while lesser groups were whisked behind the velvet rope of fame. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Most of their material follows a slower, pulsing paceat times leaning a touch more towards classic, traditional heavy metal than much of this list (notably during "On My Way," dueling leads 'n' all). When it comes down to it, the 1980s was an interesting time in general. The album that gave "hair" to the hair metal genre. Robert Sarzo (Hurricane guitarist and Rudy Sarzos brother) was to be Randys replacement in Blizzard Of Ozz, not Marq Torien. Poison's first two usually get more recognition, but this is their finest moment. Like Hericane Alice, one can only imagine that Wildside would have been an absolutely huge success had their debut hit the streets a few years prioreven more so considering the good fortune that was lining up in their favor prior to the album's release. I gotta find a copy of that CD thats not $35 or more! More so, reviewers expecting as much are generally the myopic type, who perhaps think their opinion actually matters to anyone other than themselves. Shark Who? As we alluded to in our aforementioned first article, Hair Metal and Glam are often derided and chided as genres that are less than. Well, if the article did one thing, its drawn many fellow Hair/Glam loving brothers and sisters out of the woodwork, and for that, were thankful. Brighton Rock - Love Machine Then others like RAZORMAID, PHANTOM BLUE, COLD SWEAT, GREAT KING RAT, 220 VOLT, SKAGARACK, TRASH, MASS, AMERICAN ANGEL etc. Kind of the Silverchair of hair metal, you'd be surprised at how mature these youngins sound on this, their only album. It's also worth noting that their early tracks as Young Gunns were equally awesome, and the B-sides from Under the Influence are pretty incredible (to the point of being significantly better than some of the album tracks, not that it would've made a difference in the end, sadly). Still, damn good sleaze metal. (Harem Scarem is sounding AMAZING so far, pretty damn sure Ill be scooping that up as soon as I can!) I don't consider Van Halen a hair band per se, but I swear, every guitarist in the 80's wanted to be Eddie Van Halen, and their songs would fit right into the hair metal genre. - In my personal opinion, two of the best damn sleaze bands nobody has ever heard of Thanks. They're kind of like Skid Row, the Bulletboys, and Faster Pussycat thrown in a blender. If not, let me jog your memory. Yes the vocals are an acquired taste, but, hell, I got used to Scott Jeffreys once, and I was able to get used to Steve Hayman after that. This is easily their greatest album. Q5 had two albums that would simply destroy you. Alleycat Scratch - Deadboys in Trash City This is an album that was completely buried by the Alt-Rock and Grunge craze that was sweeping the nation in the early 90s. So "glam" and/or "hair" it is.]. Both Use Your Illusion albums sold like 10 million copies in the first minute after their release.
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