The Hair Metal Litmus Test

[PhrozenInferno]

This is it. If you crack open ‘Hair Metal’, the genre we all love so much, this is what you find - this is the pure essence and nucleus of what it REALLY is. Not Van Halen, not Hanoi Rocks. Like it or not, it’s the truth. There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels.

If you don’t like this. You’ll never ‘get’ hair metal.

https://youtu.be/czWvnYIot6k?si=iwhLFOpYcPdIVLL3

[Rocker4Real]

A D-level band?

[PhrozenInferno]

A D-level band?

D for ‘Defining’

This is what it is. Like it or not. Accept it.

It’s ok.

[Fat_Elvis]

"D" for Death knell.

[dmbrocker]

A D-level band?

More like a DD-level band, amirite? As in "DD" for Danger Danger!

All jokes aside, this isn't terrible. It's just what hair metal had become by that point, and they were just pandering to the MTV Unplugged era for at least a song.

[Rocker4Real]

Trixter sold more than Danger Danger.

[DangerZone]

so then ‘hair metal’ was just a small slice of relatively unknown bands at the tail end of 80s hard rock?

[Chip Z'Hoy]

A D-level band?

D for ‘Defining’

[PhrozenInferno]

so then ‘hair metal’ was just a small slice of relatively unknown bands at the tail end of 80s hard rock?

If you can’t defend this in a pub to your mate who despises the genre, which we’ve all done, then you don’t deserve the title of ‘fan’.

[Van Ailin']

This is what it is. Like it or not. Accept it.

Accept was most decidedly NOT hair metal.

[DangerZone]

so then ‘hair metal’ was just a small slice of relatively unknown bands at the tail end of 80s hard rock?

If you can’t defend this in a pub to your mate who despises the genre, which we’ve all done, then you don’t deserve the title of ‘fan’.

da fuq ?

[FreddyFender]

You're confused - this is a band that fits all of the worst clichés about hair metal, but none of the good stuff to go along with it.

That doesn't make them *more* hairmetal - that just means they sucked.

[Tommy2Tone84]

This is it. If you crack open ‘Hair Metal’, the genre we all love so much, this is what you find - this is the pure essence and nucleus of what it REALLY is. Not Van Halen, not Hanoi Rocks. Like it or not, it’s the truth. There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels.

If you don’t like this. You’ll never ‘get’ hair metal.

https://youtu.be/czWvnYIot6k?si=iwhLFOpYcPdIVLL3

There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels? You’ve got to be kidding me. There is a direct line from Johannsen to Michaels. If you don’t see or hear it, then that’s your problem.

Hair metal was a lot of different bands and a lot of things. It wasn’t just one type or style of rock or metal music.

Twisted Sister, Quiet Riot, Scorpions, KISS, WASP, Motley Crue, Ratt, Dokken. Queensryche, Yngwie, Stryper, Cinderella, LA Guns, were all hair metal or hair bands, I don’t care what you call it. Glam metal or glam rock. Butt rock, cock rock, shock rock, arena rock. All those bands were hair bands or hair metal.

Twisted Sister, Queensryche, Yngwie and Stryper were way more metal than Danger Danger, Poison. Warrant and Trixter ever were. I can’t call bands like Poison and Danger Danger “metal” in good conscience. But I can and do call the first four I mentioned initially here metal.

Call it what you want. They’re all hair bands to me.

[PhrozenInferno]

Not to the layman on the street. They don’t know about all that above. Sure, we all do. But they hear the term ‘hair metal’ they aren’t thinking of how it began with Quiet Riots number one album or whatever the f*ck.

They imagine something like the video I posted. They know it to be lame. That’s why the video is the true essence. Me? I love it.

"Moisture is the essence of wetness, and wetness is the essence of beauty." - D. Zoolander

[Chip Z'Hoy]

I like your passion, Phrozen; I've decided to give this a fair listen.

Full transparency: I'm not a Danger Danger fan. I get the impression that TED POLAAAAAAAY is a nice guy but "Monkey Business" is a bit much. You understand.

I'm familiar with this song, but I'm going to pretend I've never heard it. This acoustic version simplifies this trick of the mind for me--thank you.

Here goes:

If you told me this was Nelson, I'd say "Wow, this is pretty good for a Nelson song."

I don't dislike it. It's a catchy-enough bubblegum song. It's the DeFranco Family, basically. Who I like! Not an insult.

Is it GENRE-DEFINING? I don't know that I'm entirely sold but I think what we have here is an extremely good example of the Metal Edge music scene circa 1989-1991. Men who look like women (who are also cowboys) playing an acoustic version of a bubblegum metal song to prove that they can play their instruments--that is 1990 hard rock in a nutshell right there.

If we define "hair metal" as just Metal Edge music--which I'm fine with, not all that inaccurate--I think Phrozen's thesis holds water.

I co-sign.

[Mister Freeze]

Not sure that song begs for an acoustic version, but that's a solid performance.

[PhrozenInferno]

Men who look like women (who are also cowboys).

Also, thank you for wasting as much time on this debate as is required. Others could learn from you. Welcome to the correct side of history

[PhrozenInferno]

This is it. If you crack open ‘Hair Metal’, the genre we all love so much, this is what you find - this is the pure essence and nucleus of what it REALLY is. Not Van Halen, not Hanoi Rocks. Like it or not, it’s the truth. There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels.

If you don’t like this. You’ll never ‘get’ hair metal.

https://youtu.be/czWvnYIot6k?si=iwhLFOpYcPdIVLL3

There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels? You’ve got to be kidding me. There is a direct line from Johannsen to Michaels. If you don’t see or hear it, then that’s your problem.

Hair metal was a lot of different bands and a lot of things. It wasn’t just one type or style of rock or metal music.

Twisted Sister, Quiet Riot, Scorpions, KISS, WASP, Motley Crue, Ratt, Dokken. Queensryche, Yngwie, Stryper, Cinderella, LA Guns, were all hair metal or hair bands, I don’t care what you call it. Glam metal or glam rock. Butt rock, cock rock, shock rock, arena rock. All those bands were hair bands or hair metal.

Twisted Sister, Queensryche, Yngwie and Stryper were way more metal than Danger Danger, Poison. Warrant and Trixter ever were. I can’t call bands like Poison and Danger Danger “metal” in good conscience. But I can and do call the first four I mentioned initially here metal.

Call it what you want. They’re all hair bands to me.

Much like bands like Backstreet Boys in the 90s claimed to be spiritual descendants of Motown aka The Temptations / The Four Tops (what with the acapella videos they would release etc) in order to shore up badly needed clout, when in actual fact they, and the rest of us knew that was a tenuous, albeit neat link. Cheesy shit.

The same goes for these goofs in the video I posted. Nobody hears the term hair metal and thinks ‘ah yes the natural progression from 70s era glam punks the NYDs, early Aerosmith and The Sweet.

They think of this cheesy tripe. Which, again , I am a massive fan of. It’s just the way it is. It ain’t cool. It doesn’t have to be.

[Tommy2Tone84]

Not to the layman on the street. They don’t know about all that above. Sure, we all do. But they hear the term ‘hair metal’ they aren’t thinking of how it began with Quiet Riots number one album or whatever the f*ck.

They imagine something like the video I posted. They know it to be lame. That’s why the video is the true essence. Me? I love it.

"Moisture is the essence of wetness, and wetness is the essence of beauty." - D. Zoolander

The Dolls only had about 25 fans so the layman wouldn’t know or care about them anyway.

I’ve never understood why Quiet Riot gets so much credit. Def Leppard had already gone platinum in 1981 with HND and released Pyromania a month before Metal Health and sold double the amount. It was pure luck and a fluke DL had a #2 record while QR had a #1 record that year.

Pyromania > Metal Health

[Tommy2Tone84]

This is it. If you crack open ‘Hair Metal’, the genre we all love so much, this is what you find - this is the pure essence and nucleus of what it REALLY is. Not Van Halen, not Hanoi Rocks. Like it or not, it’s the truth. There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels.

If you don’t like this. You’ll never ‘get’ hair metal.

https://youtu.be/czWvnYIot6k?si=iwhLFOpYcPdIVLL3

There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels? You’ve got to be kidding me. There is a direct line from Johannsen to Michaels. If you don’t see or hear it, then that’s your problem.

Hair metal was a lot of different bands and a lot of things. It wasn’t just one type or style of rock or metal music.

Twisted Sister, Quiet Riot, Scorpions, KISS, WASP, Motley Crue, Ratt, Dokken. Queensryche, Yngwie, Stryper, Cinderella, LA Guns, were all hair metal or hair bands, I don’t care what you call it. Glam metal or glam rock. Butt rock, cock rock, shock rock, arena rock. All those bands were hair bands or hair metal.

Twisted Sister, Queensryche, Yngwie and Stryper were way more metal than Danger Danger, Poison. Warrant and Trixter ever were. I can’t call bands like Poison and Danger Danger “metal” in good conscience. But I can and do call the first four I mentioned initially here metal.

Call it what you want. They’re all hair bands to me.

Much like bands like Backstreet Boys in the 90s claimed to be spiritual descendants of Motown aka The Temptations / The Four Tops (what with the acapella videos they would release etc) in order to shore up badly needed clout, when in actual fact they, and the rest of us knew that was a tenuous, albeit neat link. Cheesy shit.

The same goes for these goofs in the video I posted. Nobody hears the term hair metal and thinks ‘ah yes the natural progression from 70s era glam punks the NYDs, early Aerosmith and The Sweet.

They think of this cheesy tripe. Which, again , I am a massive fan of. It’s just the way it is. It ain’t cool. It doesn’t have to be.

I think you’re giving Danger Danger entirely too much credit. They were good players and had a very solid if not, fantastic debut record. They weren’t much of anything as far as impact on the scene goes.

When someone says hair metal or hair band most think of bands like Ratt, Motley Crue, Quiet Riot, Twisted Sister, Def Leppard, Bon Jovi, Dokken, Queensryche, Stryper, Poison, Cinderella, Tesla, Whitesnake, White Lion, Great White, GNR (although that topic is hotly contested), Bulletboys, Skid Row, Warrant, Winger. Hell even Slaughter.

Danger Danger was a rung or two down from those bands,


Some of those bands had a direct lineage from the Dolls, Sweet, Slade and Hanoi Rocks like Twisted Sister, Quiet Riot, Motley Crue, Poison and GNR while other bands like Dokken, Bon Jovi, Whitesnake, and Winger did not.

I find it very likely boy bands from the 90s grew up on Motown. The influence, regardless of your personal feelings towards them, is obvious. Just as obvious as Motley, Poison and GNR being heavily influenced by the Dolls, KISS, Alice Cooper, Aerosmith, Slade and Sweet

[SchenkerFan]

This is it. If you crack open ‘Hair Metal’, the genre we all love so much, this is what you find - this is the pure essence and nucleus of what it REALLY is. Not Van Halen, not Hanoi Rocks. Like it or not, it’s the truth. There is no through line from David Johannsen to Bret Michaels.

If you don’t like this. You’ll never ‘get’ hair metal.

https://youtu.be/czWvnYIot6k?si=iwhLFOpYcPdIVLL3

Nah, this is too poppy. The essence of hair metal is Beau Nasty's Shake It.

[Tyketto Meniketti]

That was pretty darn good. I don't think I'd want to see DD do acoustic, but they did it well there.

Their issue was cheesy name with the two cheesy, repetitive song titles. But talent-wise, they produced good pop-metal/hard rock music.

Who doesn't love "Turn It On"? That song rules. They've got plenty of other catchy tunes, as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOt_oe79XxY