Posts Tagged ‘steel horse archives’

  
Monday, October 12th, 2009

The Steel Horse Archives: Stryper, “Honestly” (1986)

by Jeff Vrabel

stryper1986STRYPER
Title: “Honestly”
Album: To Hell With The Devil
Release Date: Oct. 24, 1986

Why You Remember Them: Because at one point you stood with your fist in the air and shouted “To Hell With the Devil” like a hot banshee on fire. Didn’t you?

Alarming Sales Figures: 2 million moved for To Hell. The damn thing spent three months on Billboard’s album charts. Even the, ahem, poppier follow-up In God We Trust moved half a million, although that was mostly from older fans who mistook it for currency.

Recent News: Well, that’s the thing; evidently these fellas are on a 25th anniversary tour, according to this Press Release I have just received, which is accompanied by a very thoughtful-looking blood-red tinted photo of four guys looking downward in a pose of either deep prayer or a nap. One of them is wearing Archie’s ascot, or maybe five candy-cane ties. Whatever. All I know is, Jesus would hate this tie. (more…)

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Monday, September 28th, 2009

The Steel Horse Archives: Slaughter, “Fly to the Angels” (1990)

by Jeff Vrabel

918992c008a0bc976f888010.L._SCLZZZZZZZ_[1]SLAUGHTER
Title: “Fly To The Angels”
Album: Stick It to Ya
Release Date: January 27, 1990

Why You Remember Them: Credit Slaughter with arriving (late) to the hair-metal party without any even vague designs on rocking it. Slaughter’s tapes, available at Kmart and Venture stores nationwide, were solely prom-theme delivery machines; their attempts at lip-licking lasciviousness, mostly in titles like “Stick It To Ya” and “Up All Night,” were about as dangerous as a Tuesday night episode of Jay-Walking. “Fly to The Angels,” the video for which was made for $49.50, most of which was spent on airplane stock footage and an oscillating fan, is 50 minutes of viscous cheese puncutated by seagull sound effects, in case you were unclear about that whole flying thing. (Sorry – I’m told it’s actually only 4:30. How about that!)

Sales Figures: Stick Moved over 2 million copies, and was nominated for an American Music Award for best metal album in 1991. Yeah, I said it. AMERICAN MUSIC AWARD. Suck on that, haters. (more…)

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Monday, September 21st, 2009

The Steel Horse Archives: “Jackyl” (1992)

by Jeff Vrabel

61wShbNdWZL._SCLZZZZZZZ_[1]JACKYL
Title: “The Lumberjack Song”
Album: Jackyl
Release Date: 1992

Why You Remember Them: You cannot imagine how often, in the research of this column, one comes across the phrase “lumped into the hair metal category,” as though being a cornball Southern-rock outfit with a wacky-eyed lead singer and a schlong obsession is better. Jackyl formed in 1990 as a hair meta … ahem, Southern-rock boogie band, but if you’ve read this far you’re probably going, “The jags with the chainsaw, right?” Right.

Total Sales: Jackyl moved 1.35 million units in 1992, making me sad for 1992.

Key Tracks: “Down on Me,” “The Lumberjack Song,” “I Stand Alone”

OK, But I’m Pretty Sure Those Are Dogs on the Cover of This Album: Right, you tell the chainsaw-wielding redneck he’s got his canids misidentified.

GET THE EFF OUT OF HERE, BRENDAN O’BRIEN?: Before resorting to producing hillbilly crap by “Bruce Springsteen” and “Pearl Jam,” O’Brien ran with the big dogs. I am desperately hoping these are people who still keep in touch.

Jesse: “Brendan, it’s Jesse, listen, I have a great idea for a new track that…”
Brendan: “(interrupting) Does it have a chainsaw?”
Jesse: “Yes.”
Brendan: “Christ.” (click)

(more…)

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Monday, August 31st, 2009

The Steel Horse Archives: Steelheart, “I’ll Never Let You Go (Angel Eyes)” (1990)

by Jeff Vrabel

51PXG+0RyhL._SCLZZZZZZZ_STEELHEART
Title: I’ll Never Let You Go
Album: Steelheart
Released: May 10, 1990

Why You Remember Them: Previous installments of this award-winning series have included bands with numerous hits, if not multiple albums, to their names, but we bring that streak to a screeching, flaming halt with Steelheart, whose sole contribution to the poufy-hair zeitgeist is “I’ll Never Let You Go,” a song whose fierce, animalistic coda explodes with such visceral fury that it is entirely likely that lead singer Michael Matijevic, a man with a consonant-y name so clunky and Eastern European-sounding that I’m sure we’re related, exploded his carotid artery straining for the last note and is still lying in a pool of blood and Aqua Net in a studio somewhere. It is quite simply impossible to achieve that level of valkyrie screaming without attaching a car battery to your face.

But Suck on This Little Bit of Kevin Bacon Game Madness: Matijevic in 2001 provided the voice for the Mark Wahlberg character in Rock Star, itself modeled on the story of a Judas Priest cover band singer-turned-actual-Judas-Priest frontman. The film featured a version of “We All Die Young,” which originally appeared on Steelheart’s third (!) album, Wait. So, good for Matijevic. (more…)

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Monday, August 10th, 2009

The Steel Horse Archives: Warrant, “Cherry Pie” (1990)

by Jeff Vrabel

steelhorseheader

WARRANT
Song Title: “Cherry Pie”
Album: Cherry Pie
Release Date: Sept. 11, 1990

Why You Remember Them: Arguably, and along with Winger, Warrant for one reason or another has become something of the go-to punching-bag band of the state fair-metal universe. Scientists believe this is due to the cover of Cherry Pie, which depicts a raspberry-lipped waitress dropping a piece of the titular pie — that’s right, titular, we hear your snickerings — and the plummeting treat was photographed just as it passed her nether regions, an art-directed “metaphor” that’s responsible for making Warrant the hair band of choice among English grad professors.

Worldwide Album Sales To Date for Cherry Pie: 3 million

But Why Would Such Nice Rockers Objectify Women Like That? Well, you’d be traumatized too if you walked in on your best chick tagging some other dude, as singer Jani Lane did on “I Saw Red,” the power ballad of choice on Cherry Pie and sort of the slutty cousin of the band’s previous “Heaven.” “I didn’t need to see his face … I saw yours,” Lane howls, heartbreakingly, and though we don’t see his face, the other guy is Mark Sanford. (more…)

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Monday, August 3rd, 2009

The Steel Horse Archives: Tesla, “Love Song”

by Jeff Vrabel

steelhorseheader

0e8ff0cdd7a0b46b88908110.L._SCLZZZZZZZ_[1]TESLA
Song Title: “Love Song”
Album: The Great Radio Controversy
Release Date: Feb. 1, 1989

Why You Remember Them: This song was a decent enough hit, but it was the band’s 1990 Five Man Acoustical Jam live disc that cemented their status as a band who could successfully cover “Signs” in a way that involved several pointless f-bombs.

Worldwide U.S. Album Sales To Date: 6 million

Five Man Acoustical Jam = like paying $14 at Musicland to go to the Wild Wing Cafe: Seriously, who else would have the stones (zing) to cover “Mother’s Little Helper,” “Lodi,” “Signs,” “Truckin’” and “We Can Work It Out” all on the same album? Amazing. And they’d go on to do “Honky Tonk Women,” “Street Fighting Man,” “Do You Feel Like We Do” and countless others. Nothing in the rock catalog is safe from Tesla!

Other Key Tracks: “The Way It Is,” “Heaven’s Trail (No Way Out)”

Length of “Love Song” on that acoustic album: 9:54. Suck it, Phish. (more…)

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