Filed under: Bands, Motley Crue, Videos | Tags: hair band, Hard Rock, Motley Crue, Music, the dirt, Video
The intention with “They Rocked” is not to stay up with the news on the Ol’ Fellas of 80’s rock but this is post worthy. The new Motley record, The Dirt, will be out in about a month and their new video has been released. Back to a bit of the old Crue sound. Tell me a song that starts out with “Tonight there’s gonna be a fight” doesn’t scream of 80’s rock…
There is a video promo for the Crue Fest tour found HERE.
Filed under: 80's, Bands, Motley Crue, Videos | Tags: 80's, Hair, Hard Rock, heavy metal, Motley Crue, Music, rocked, Video
I guess it’s only appropriate to start off my “They Rocked” series with Motley Crue. Although I had listened to other hard rock bands before them, I can identify the purchase of my first Crue record as a life changing experience that kicked my hard rocking into gear.
“I rushed home and took the wrapper off the record. For the kids out there, a record was like a CD only you didn’t put it in anything, It played in open air on a thing called a record player. It’s ironic to think back now what the name of the first song on that record was. It wasn’t so much a song as it was a scary little story. I laid the dusty record needle down on the vinyl and what started playing was “In the beginning…” from Motley Crue’s “Shout at the Devil” album. Things were about to change for this small town Iowa boy.”
Motley Crue was different. I guess at this time being a boy who had been dropped into small town Iowa from Los Angeles I was different. But this was my way to be more different. The rat tail I was growing my hair out for in 1984 would never get shaped into that fine piece of minor pop culture art. No, it was my destiny to be known as the long haired rocker guy in town.
The Crue, from what I could see in small interview clips on “Night Flight” and MTV, were crazy. The photo shoots in Hit Parader and Circus magazine made their life look like a party that went 25 hours a day. Sometimes that perception may be off when we view it later. Watching VH1’s Behind the Music and reading “The Dirt” tell me that it was right on. Even more crazy than I had thought.
If you were a Crue fan and have not read “The Dirt” you need to. If you don’t read much, it’s easy to read, broken up into small sections, and has pictures. It’s interesting to hear the perspective of each member on the same events and times of the Crue history. One thing that I took away from it was that it is not fair that anyone in this world dies and these guys are still alive. Check it out and read it.
What I’m going to do now is break down some memories and thoughts as they are associated with albums. There is no chronological order to this. Not much order at all. I guess if I talk about a live show I will keep it ordered to the album that was out when I seen them on that tour. Other than that it’s random babble.
Shout at the Devil:
The first album I bought and the breakout album for them. “Looks that Kill” was the video that set it off. This was definitely an attention grabber. How could you look away? Make up, torn clothes, leather, fire, scantly clad evil chick? As far as videos go from this album I was partial to “Too Young to Fall in Love”. It was like a mini movie that made them appear larger than life. “Ten Seconds to Love” was an awesome track. Especially for a Jr. High kid who at the time was not hearing many songs so blatantly about sex.
Too Fast for Love:
This was one of my first experiences with discovering that a band had previous, seemingly hidden work out there. It was like a bonus album. I had heard about it and longed to get it. A friend beat me to it because he lived closer to a bigger town that had more than one small music store in it…hell, they had a MALL! ” Live Wire” and “Public Enemy #1″ became the new anthems in our group. I had my copy off the dual cassette recorder but did not feel complete until I had my copy. Which of course, to be different, was on record.
Theater of Pain:
This was a strange album. I guess not the album itself, but the direction they went in. The leather was traded in for a more glam look. Scarves, headbands, glitter…pink. Diehard Crue fans were kind of confused and on the fence here. Not only because of the different look, but the band that had been “their band” was about to take off to a new level. Enter video fame with “Home Sweet Home” and tons of new fans.
“Home Sweet Home” was one of the power ballads that made power ballads a mandatory thing. The recognition that they got for it could not be ignored. Piano on a Crue song? I have to say at this point I’m suspicious.
One of my memories from this time was being late for a baseball game so I could record the “World Premier Video” on MTV for “Smoking in the Boys Room”. My thing at this time was having every video recorded on VHS and being the town rocker that I was I had to have it first. When it came on I hit the record button and started running the two miles to the baseball game I was late for. Of course I was more interested in talking about the video I had recorded that nobody else had than the game itself.
The first time I seen Motley Crue live (and third concert overall in my life) was on this tour. The Japanese band, Loudness, opened in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. My cool older sister, who had recently made the move to Iowa from L.A.) took me. My little blond haired niece was dressed up like Vince Neil. Although only 5 years-old I had already turned her into a little rocker and she thinks it’s cool to this day that I talked her Mom into taking her. We had the poorly done banner we held up. There was the amazing drum solo where Tommy Lee’s drum riser went to a 90 degree angle, facing straight down. Nevermind the glitter and glam, these guys still rocked!
Favorite tracks on this album were “Louder than Hell” (which happened to be playing when the party got raided at my house) and “Raise your Hands to Rock” (What, an acoustic intro? That is kinda cool).
Girls, Girls, Girls:
Luckily for us the glam phase didn’t last too long. Back to leather and strippers. The title track has become a stripper anthem…not that I frequent the places, I…uh…was told.
There was to be another trip to Cedar Rapids for this tour. The “Wild Side” video captures this live show pretty well. Tommy Lee had to better the previous tours drum solo, this time with the cage spinning in a full circle. My jaw dropped in awe. Nikki Sixx downing a bunch of Jack Daniels and rolling around on the stage during his base solo was cool as hell for this aspiring alcoholic.
Dr. Feelgood:
The Crue hit the video jackpot on this album. Hard Rock was what seemed 75% of MTV’s playlist at the time. The title track, “Same Ol’ Situation”(good example of live show), “Girl, Don’t go away Mad”. What could have been the best one didn’t hit the air. It was later featured on a video tape release. “Your all I want” was a little too much for MTV as the video and song basically told the story of a guy killing his girlfriend in a “If I can’t have you nobody can” kinda way. Too bad they were paying attention at MTV…it was a ballad after all, I’m surprised it didn’t get put on just for that. (You can find that video below)
The trip to see them in Cedar Rapids this time would be the last for me to see them as a group. I remember picking up my girlfriend and her friend before the show. She had done the classic, leaves the house dressed proper and then sluts herself up when she gets to her friends house. It was the 80’s after all. They had a cool ass video opening going along with “In the Beginning…”. I was a little disappointed in the opening track ?All in the Name of…” as I wanted it to be “Shout at the Devil” after the intro. This year Tommy Lee’s drumset goes out over the crowd while he drums along to several classic songs(I remember Led Zepp’s “Houses of the Holy” and then “Back in Black”).
Decade of Decadence:
“Primal Scream” rocked…we have heard the rest. This marks the beginning of the demise of Motley Crue. There was also an unnecessary re-make of Home Sweet Home.
I never made it back to see Motley Crue during any of the reunion tours. I did see Vince Neal on his first solo tour open for Van Halen in Alpin Valley, Wisconsin. It was cool. I seen him in a little bar in East Dubuque, Illinois back around 2001 or 2002. He was not looking well. Vince had a thing for forgetting or leaving out words. I was concerned that he was not even going to show up as I read online the night before he walked off stage when the crowd didn’t know the lyrics to one of his solo songs when he wanted them to sing along. “Your not L.A…” he said. No Vince, I think you were in Kansas at the time.
That about wraps up this addition of They Rocked: Motley Crue. Let’s watch some videos!
Filed under: 70's, 80's, Bands, KISS, Motley Crue, Van Halen | Tags: 80's, Band, Hair, Hard Rock, KISS, Metal, Motley Crue, Music, Van Halen
80’s Hard Rock is often used as a punchline. To hear the words “Hair Band” brings a different response, depending on the age of the ears hearing it. It’s Mom and Dad’s music to the kids today. Some kids embrace it to be different as kids in the 80’s who cried the praise of The Doors led you to believe you were missing out or just were not cool enough to understand. For adults it brings back memories, good or bad. Even those that were not into it at the time inadvertently found themselves sucked in with the exposure on radio and MTV. If anyone between the ages of 30 and 40 tells you that they never sang along to ‘Wanted Dead of Alive” they are likely lying.
I dove into the 80’s Hard Rock head first…literally. In 8th grade I started letting my hair grow. I’ll be honest, the intentions were for a rat tail. Remember those? One strip of long hair hanging off the back as the rest was short? Yes, the rat tail was going to be my first rebellion tool against my mother. Then I realized it could be so much more. It was 1984.
My earliest exposure to hard rock came from a source that it did for many. Siblings. I was the youngest of five in the house and the closest one in age to me was six-years older. In the 70’s we lived in the L.A. area. Often you could find Led Zepplin, Black Sabbath, or Ted Nugent blaring somewhere in the house. My earliest memory comes from a party they had. I was lying on the couch and I remember “Stairway to Heaven” playing. Scared the shit out of me as before me was the stairs heading up. I was about 6-7 at the time. Then came a song from a new local band. “Running with the Devil” by Van Halen did not help my shivering on the couch cause. I just remember hearing the chorus over and over. No good can come from a 6-7 year-old hearing devil over and over.
In 1978 my mother transplanted me to small town Iowa. I had escaped the devil that was running up the stairway to heaven. In a few short years that hard rocking music, as Huey Lewis would put it, would return…and with a vengeance. It would become my mission to embrace it and force feed it to this community pf about 5000 surrounded by cornfields.
