In today's review, an album full of virtuosity, melancholy and finesse: White Lion's Pride (1987). The late eighties were a time of excess where outrageous demonstration of virility were mixed with ridiculous and colorful outfits with an unhealthy amount of teased hair. Amidst a market that slowly started to get saturated and where every new band in town tried to be the new Crüe, entered White Lion.
These days, I dig more and more in the Kiss catalogue and even if they are a band that wasn't that important for me in my development as a hard rock/heavy metal fan, I am touched by a handful of albums in their discography in a way that only classic albums can touch someone.
Heading into the summer, I'll get a chance to take some records off the shelves that evoke the season for me. Ratt's first full-on LP Out Of The Cellar is one of them, thanks to an infectious series of hits that are best listened to while driving down the coastal highway under the generous Californian sunshine.
In a way, Rust in Peace was a fresh start for Megadeth. With the trash metal movement almost running out of stream and several bands moving to a more mainstream direction, 1990 was a bit of an in-between year, a transitional year even.
Coming off the lengthy "World Pieces Tour" in support of the great Piece of Mind, Iron Maiden didn't take too long to reconvene and write the next chapter of its already rich story. Considered by many as maybe THE ultimate Maiden album (an opinion I don't necessarily share), 1984's Powerslave shows a band firing on all cylinders.
Theatre Of Pain is an interesting album in the career of the Crüe. Released in June 1985, it cemented the Los Angeles quartet as one of the hottest act of the decade thanks in no small part to the Brownsville Station's cover "Smokin' In the Boys Room" and the power ballad "Home Sweet Home" that launched a trend for the remaining of the eighties.
Ah Rebel Yell, what an album! I consider Billy Idol's career a little uneven although every effort he put out from '82 to '90 contains at least one classic but his second solo album definitely is a special record. Let's see here: "Rebel Yell," "Flesh for Fantasy," "Eye Without a Face" as the obvious singles, backed by some guitar fueled killers such as "Daytime Drama," "Crank Call" or "Do Not Stand In The Shadow."
By 1982, things weren't going too well in the Kiss camp. After trying their hand at disco with the fan alienating Dynasty in 1979, and two ill fated records in 1980's Unmasked and 1981's concept album The Elder, Kiss was faced with an internal crisis.
On the cover of the January 1989 issue of NME, Joe Elliott had the right to smile. Over the course of a year and a half, his band managed to smash the sales record set by their previous effort to reach an astonishing 12 millions copies shipped.
1983 was such a great year in the history of music in general and heavy metal in particular. So many emblematic albums were released. Metallica unleashed their first album with Kill 'em All, Slayer released Show No Mercy and Dio penned his all time classic with Holy Diver. The list goes on but one record remains special and stands out from the crowd: Iron Maiden's Piece of Mind.
White Lights on Mad Music 