A time when hard rock meant lots of makeup, the occasional radio-friendly ballad and those tight neon-green pants.
Yes, the late 1980s hair-band scene was quite an experience.
To be fair, the new band Brides of Destruction has members hailing from bands more respectable than Poison or Warrant, namely, Motley Crue (bassist Nikki Six) and Guns N Roses/L.A. Guns (guitarist Tracii Guns).
Now, don't start rolling your eyes until I've finished: The album's not bad. It's late-1980s rock, with singer London LeGrand eschewing the high-pitched screeching of Vince Neil and Axl Rose for some more modern growling and yelling. It's not bad.
The songs feature predictable but rocking riffs, with the obligatory guitar solos on some tracks. Not bad.
Yes, the song's titles and lyrics are predictably infantile … pretty bad. The opening song, "Shut the F*** Up" sports these poetic lines: "A pathetic talking head/You product of your walking head/Your war machined evangelistic mission." These guys are all fairly old, but I guess they still get their chief inspiration from verse scrawled on notebooks in junior high geometry class. What is a walking head, anyway?
But, look, the songs aren't unlistenable, and for those who need a fix of innocent 1980s hard rock that evokes middle-finger-held-high white suburban angst, instead of screaming yet sobbing, bent-over-in-pain Linkin Park white suburban angst, it's just your fix, "you misunderstood white trash rats of today." (That's from "Revolution," which also features the line "Nation/Damn nation/World masturbation.").
Brides of Destruction Here Come the Brides
