In today’s emasculated world of post-rock, post-irony, post-everything — which is dominated by wussy hipsters who dress like dorks to make girls think they are sensitive — ‘80s hair metal bands are considered nothing more than a horrible, distant, neon-coloured joke. The era’s now-embarrassing fashion, hedonism, narcissism and music have been buried away, repressed into distant memories, while all artifacts proving its existence have been locked away — until now. Author Steven Blush is bringing back hair metal in all its ridiculous glory with his new book, American Hair Metal.
The book tells the story of music’s most shunned rock movement through a ridiculously addictive series of photo featuring grown men, clad in such amazing outfits as neon zebra-printed belly shirts, and quotes by bands discussing how their “music is raw, nasty, sleaze” that “drips of sex.” Blush, who also wrote the much-lauded American Hardcore, says he chose the breezy format to suit the subject and its unapologetic lack of depth.
“Upon analysis [of hair metal], nothing stood up — it was shallow.
But I realized that was the whole point of it: it was about hedonism, superficiality, narcissism, alpha males, sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll,” he explains. “That’s why the book is not an in-depth analysis: it’s just a celebration of a time. It drops you into that time period and regales what’s good and bad about it.
”
And there are also the things that are so bad that they’re good again: the frosted pink lipstick, excessively huge hair, leather-studded bustiers, open-stomach spandex jumpsuits, excessive drug and alcohol use, obscene promiscuity — and that’s just the guys. But Blush doesn’t just focus on the obvious clichés and big-name bands, such as Poison and Cinderella, with American Hair Metal — he also digs deep into hair metal, unearthing the era’s massive reach and its thousands of loyal bands.
“During my search, which became more like an archeological dig, I unearthed this lost civilization,” he explains.
“You think about the late ‘80s and how big this music was, yet none of it remains. It was unbelievable to me.”
What Blush found was a lost movement that once counted millions of fans and thousands of bands as its flamboyant supporters.
“It was incredible: there were all these bands that were all so big, with MTV videos, on the Billboard Top 100, on Headbanger’s Ball, with big records. But you don’t remember these bands. They’re literally like the dinosaur,” he notes.
“There was an ice age, which was Nirvana, and I was left collecting bones.”
Blush blames the fact glam became “too big, fat and bloated” as the reason why it fell out of touch with the mainstream. When grunge rockers Nirvana showed up in the early ‘90s, a revolution was due, and it happened — as it had before when The Beatles took down the Pat Boons of the world or when Elvis changed the face of rock ‘n’ roll.
But never has a musical genre fallen so far. Hair metal died a quick, ugly death, and its remains were quickly torched in an attempt to remove it from the suddenly guilty conscience of the world.
All of the tantalizing quotes used in the book are from the hair metal days because Blush found the bands are ashamed of their roots and now unwilling to speak about their former orgy of flamboyance.
Where Whitesnake’s David Coverdale once boasted, “This is the sexiest music my guys have ever been involved in, and they are the sexist fucking musicians. When they play, it’s sex,” today you couldn’t choke a quote like that out of any of the glam survivors.
“I think I like these bands more than the artists themselves like the music,” Blush laughs.
“I just think it’s a horrible thing to be embarrassed by your art.”
Ironically, Blush says he’s seen a hair metal revival growing in the unlikeliest of places — with young girls, who were just a dirty thought in their headbanging parents’ minds when the movement first happened.
“I’ll tell you one thing: I meet lots and lots of girls who are under 25 and they just think hair metal is the hottest thing ever,” he explains.
“They’re tired of music today, which is very emasculated. Hair metal was the age of the alpha male. These guys were sex gods.
Today’s rock stars, well, turn on MuchMusic and see the Shins. … It’s so far removed from what rock ‘n’ roll is: it’s not hot, it’s not about kickin’ ass, it’s not pushing boundaries.”
But that’s not to say Blush has any delusions about hair metal making a come back.
“No, I do not think hair metal will ever come back,” he asserts. “I think it was a product of days gone by. It required a certain innocence, and we’re a much more cynical world.
In this post-tattooed, modern-primitive world that we live in, I don’t think such a thing could happen again.”
And after flipping through the glitter-encrusted, over-sexed pages of American Hair Metal, that actually seems like a shame.
News RSS