MetalSucks

Vince really likes Buckcherry, but I’ve never gotten into any of their songs that aren’t the big hits – namely, “Lit Up” (a.k.a. “the one about cocaine”) and “Crazy Bitch” (a.k.a. “the one about fucking”). Like so many bands that hoped to be the Appetite-era Guns N’ Roses of the late 20th/early 21st century, Buckcherry always just felt like they were trying way too hard to prove what a bunch of bad-asses they are. GN’R never actually used the words “cocaine” or “heroin” in a song – Buckcherry’s biggest hit finds them shouting “I LOVE THE COCAINE! I LOVE THE COCAINE!” In case anyone doubted that they were the real deal. Puh-lease.

So. Former Buckcherry bassist JB Brightman has a new band, Black Robot, and – no shock here – it’s readily apparent that they want to be AC/DC. If you’re one of those people who unironically loves retro-hard rawk that has no sense of originality whatsoever, then you will probably dig this band. And whatever you do, stay away from Loudermilk and Manmade God – bands that actually make excellent, original hard rock.

And, hey, guess what? Black Robot covered Clapton’s “Cocaine!” How original! How shocking! What a bunch of bad-asses! Now I can finally burn my copy of Appetite for Destruction!

Barf.

-AR

All is not lost in the world of metal; in fact, this past week brought some nice surprises, along with the usual mish-mash of shitty radio rock bands. Last week’s sales numbers, with our usual sardonic commentary, after the jump. (Hint: look at the tags below, and click “read more” if any of those bands interest you!).

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Nikki Sixx’s side project, SIXX: A.M., have just released a video for the track “Tomorrow” from their critically acclaimed album The Heroin Diaries. For those of you who have been living under a rock, The Heroin Diaries is a soundtrack to Sixx’s autobiography of the same name – sort of like how Saints of Los Angeles is a soundtrack “loosely” based on the Motley Crüe book The Dirt, except not exactly. Hey, remember when metal bands just made music based on, umm, music? Was there an Operation Mindcrime or Songs from the Elder book that I somehow missed? Anyway, The Heroin Diaries is actually a pretty solid album (and the book was fucking amazing), and I am looking forward to seeing SIXX: A.M., along with the Crüe, Buckcherry, et al., when they are in town next week with Crüe Fest. As far as the video for “Tomorrow” goes, it’s pretty much your standard “Hey, we’re on stage rocking your shit! Hey, and now we’re hanging out backstage and having fun!” type of thing. Oh, and if you can correctly identify how many tattoos the band collectively has, there might just be a prize in it for you. Can you say, “MetalSucks condom?”

-MSR

As the southern shores of the Texas coast were being relentlessly hammered by Hurricane Dolly, a storm of a different sort slammed its way into the Alamo City last Wednesday. Maybe those long traffic lines heading out of Padre Island earlier in the week were actually Crue fans making their way to San Antonio to catch the first annual Cruefest featuring Trapt, Sixx AM, Papa Roach, Buckcherry, and that notorious whirlwind of destruction known as Motley Crue.

It would be the first time for this Old Fart to witness the Crue since their glory days of corpsepaint and titties known as the Shout at the Devil tour way back in 1983. (See Dorks Love Metal! for more hilarity.) I had fallen out of man-love with the band right around the Dr. Feelgood-era so I was not really sure if I would enjoy myself or not. I am happy to report: CRUE FUCKIN’ ROCKS!!

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Buckcherry have a history of releasing controversial and insanely catchy first singles, and their latest effort “Too Drunk To Fuck” (download here) is no different. While “Too Drunk…” (as the PG version is called) doesn’t have the same “holy shit I need to hear this again right now” factor of “Lit Up” or “Crazy Bitch,” — the lead singles from Buckcherry and 15 respectively — it’s a catchy, bluesy rocker that will no doubt light up radio request lines across the country. Of course, it’s got some pretty racy (and funny) lyrics too, but I’m wondering why the video features a huggable fat dude instead of naked strippers. Hey, guys: boobs sell records! The unit-shifting power of drunk fat dudes remains to be proven, though Blues Traveler did manage to sell a bajillion records… so there goes that theory.

ANWAY, the track comes off of their new album Black Butterfly, slated to be released September 16. After the Cinderella story that was the success of the all-around phenomenal 15, will Black Butterfly deliver another smash for a band that everyone left for dead just 2 years ago? Check out the new video below.

-VN

[Buckcherry on MySpace]
[Official Website]

So the new Motley Crue album has a release date; Saints of Los Angeles (listen to the title track and first single at Motley’s MySpace and watch the video here) will hit the shelves on June 17th on the band’s own Motley Records. As expected, the band announced in a press conference yesterday that they will embark on a 40-date U.S. Amphitheater tour dubbed Cruefest, also featuring Buckcherry, Papa Roach, Trapt and Sixx A.M. Two of those bands make me puke; you decide which.

From what I can tell there was no mention of the rumors that Crue signed a $100-$150 million all-encompassing deal with touring giants Live Nation.

The new album is supposedly a concept piece following the same storyline as the band’s best-selling memoir The Dirt, a book which probably ranks among my Top 5 reads ever (seriously!). Will Sixx be able to strike lightning twice, having already released a concept album in 2007 about his own struggles with addiction, or is the new album just an excuse to tour that will suck and be completely irrelevant?

We haven’t led you astray yet, right? So far our rumors for Rocklahoma have turned into realities, with the exception of our Motley Crue Sunday headliner prediction which hasn’t yet been announced, but we’ll get to that in a moment.

The same anonymous tipster who correctly told us that Extreme, Tesla, Kix and many others would be announced for Rocklahoma has just alerted us that Sammy Hagar will be filling the final Friday spot. Woah! No word on whether ex-Van Halen and The Other Half bassist Michael Anthony will be playing with him or not.

In addition to that, Motley Crue, Buckcherry and Drowning Pool (which our tipster mis-spelled as Frowning Pool. Intentional or not, I love that typo) will be teaming up for a U.S. Summer tour, and the tour will make a stop at Rocklahoma to fill the remaining empty Sunday slots.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it. And now back to your usual Saturday stoniness…

-VN