UPDATED:

L.A. Guns is one of the most successful and influential bands in the history of metal, an act who music is rivaled only by Black Sabbath and Metallica for its importance to the history of the music we love. So of course, it makes complete sense for there to be two versions of that band, one featuring a guy who is clearly a poor man’s stand-in (or a “Dj Slashba,” if you will) for the band’s namesake, and another which switches vocalists so often that even the members of the band aren’t sure who’s performing with them at any given concert.

And because the world has so great benefitted from having two versions of L.A. Guns, and because the members of those two bands make so much money and sell so many records competing with one another, Great White has now decided to get in on the act: vocalist Jack Russell recently announced the formation of “Great White featuring Jack Russell” while his former bandmates soldier on simply as “Great White.” And if that doesn’t seem like a sound plan to you, well, hey, guess what? It’s cool, because the Great White that doesn’t feature Jack Russell says Jack Russell can’t just start another band called Great White.

Click to read more…

If my math is correct, the only band to ever go through more line-up changes than Guns N’ Roses is L.A. Guns. And since sometime around ’04/’05, there have been two versions of L.A. Guns in the world, neither of which seems to have a very stable line-up… although I guess, in all fairness, the version with vocalist Phil Lewis and drummer Steve Riley has the better track record, since they just keep losing bass players, and have managed to hold onto guitarist Stacey Blades (yes, the replaces a dude calling himself “Guns” with a dude calling himself “Blades”) for some time now, whereas the version with Tracii Guns himself goes through singers, drummers, and rhythm guitarists the way a thirteen year old boy goes through tissues.

But that doesn’t change the fact that, according to the most recent U.S. Census, if you are a musician living in the greater Los Angeles area, there is a 95% chance that you have been a member of a band calling itself L.A. Guns at some point in the past ten years. And if you’re somehow part of the 5% that hasn’t been in one of the bands, well, now here’s your chance, ’cause according to a posting on his message board, Jizzy Pearl has now split with Tracii Guns’ L.A. Guns:

Click to read more…

Photos by Brian Schroeter

Though hard rock has arrived at retirement age, its senior classmen are flourishing on tour. Really, these years are the first in which old metal musicians exist, and 2011′s foundation will be built on someday by geriatric Gojira, decrepit Devin Townsend, crotchety Cave In, et al. Right around 2025, those bands might look to Ronnie James Dio, who played all aces til his final days; to Metallica, who in middle age flagged fast; to Judass Priest’s withdrawal from major touring (or whatever) and to the renaissance of Whitesnake, whose recent face-blasting gig with L.A. Guns and Skid Row was like a survival guide for bands seeking to enjoy fruitful third and fourth decades! I was there and learned a lot! Check it out:  Click to read more…

Look up “bad business” in the dictionary and you’ll find two pictures of L.A. Guns, both current incarnations of the band side-by-side. Phil Lewis L.A. Guns and Tracii Guns L.A. Guns have been cannibalizing each others’ income, confusing fans and making complete assholes out of themselves in the press for years. Which version is the real L.A. Guns? Does anyone besides Lewis and Guns really give a fuck?

Italian power metallers Rhapsody of Fire are about to go the same route. Rhapsody of Fire hold an important spot in the power metal canon, and truth be told I’m a casual fan. The group has released eight studio albums over their 18-year career and stayed the course despite power metal’s perpetual un-coolness; no one can deny them that. But now they’re making a complete circus out of themselves by pulling an L.A. Guns and splitting into two versions, both of dubious credibility.

Click to read more…

So 2011 is officially underway! I mean, we’re two full weeks in — time to stop accidentally writing “2010″ as the date on shit, y’know? We started to preview some albums we’re stoked about, and will continue to do so next week. In the meantime, here’s some other fun crap we did this week:

• The Human Abstract’s A.J. Minette continued his discussion regarding the merits of creative limitation.
• We debuted new music by Deicide, Ulcerate, Owen Hart, and Roger Miret.
• We also reviewed the new Owen Hart album.
• We played a metal edition of “Marry, Fuck, Kill” with both chicks and d00dz.
• We checked out some awesome pictures from Vince and the metalgf’s vacation to Amsterdam and Paris.
• We joined the Scotty Griffin Fanclub.
• We confirmed that Tool are the coolest band ever.
• We felt bad for Mike Portnoy.
• We were upset by Wrest’s arrest for sexual assault and domestic battery.
• And while it was news to us until we heard it from Rush Limbaugh, we were apparently responsible for the Tucson shootings.

Next week brings more debuts, more interviews, and more general Suckitude. See ya then.

-AR

According to Metal Undergound, Bret Michaels announced during a Canadian solo gig last night “that in celebration of Poison’s 25th anniversary, the band will be touring with fellow American rockers Motley Crue next year, who will themselves be celebrating their 30th anniversary.” That’s great news, unless you hate fun. Even with Vince Neil being bloated and winded, Tommy Lee devoting the remainder of his career to reenacting the C. Thomas Howell classic Soul Man, Mick Mars having less mobility than a corpse, and Poison being, y’know, Poison, it’s almost impossible for me to imagine this tour being anything less than awesome. Especially if they get another great glam band (by which I mean a band like Cinderella, not a latter-day cock rock wanna-be like Hinder or Saliva), to open. Seriously, just hook the alcohol dispenser up to my veins and let me go see this show. Hell, even if the just turned out to be a train wreck of drama and shit-talking, it would be awesome.

Click to read more…

Kevin Dubrow is dead, and I think that most of us assumed he would take Quiet Riot (the seventh most-often-miscategorized-as-a-hair-metal-band of all time) with him to the grave. Those of us who did make that assumption, however, forgot that desperate times call for desperate measures, and an empty belly holds no room for dignity.

So Quiet Riot are re-forming.

Click to read more…

During Hair Metal Week here on MetalSucks, the prize for Completely Unreadable Band Logo of the Week was a mix of glam songs compiled by yours truly. I know some of the entrants wanted me to post the track listing for that mix, and now that it’s finally completed (I’m kind of a perfectionist when it comes to mixes) and the winner, Ash Patterson, tells me he’s received his prize, it’s time to publish that track list, so you can all compile your own mix at home should you so choose.

I tried to pick songs that either a) were by bands I think most people have long since forgotten about, or b) were less famous entries in the oeuvre of more well-known bands. Hopefully those of you who actually like this kind of music will dig this.

Here’s the track list:

Click to read more…

Banner Designed by Cysquatch

Welcome to “Question of the Week,” a (sometimes) weekly debate amongst the MetalSucks staff regarding a recent hot button issue.

Since it’s hair metal week here at MetalSucks, it seemed only appropriate to consider a glamtastic question. So we asked our writers:

WHICH HAIR METAL BAND FROM THE ’80s BEST STANDS THE TEST OF TIME IN 2010?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

Click to read more…

One day mankind will go extinct and the remains of our civilization will later be picked over by aliens. Though they can speedily assemble collections of most homo erectus artifacts for their alien museums, their super-brains will struggle to grasp and group the arts of Earth, y’know, for their encyclopedias and stuff. So it’s in the interest of preserving and defining Glam Metal across the cosmos that we at MetalSucks have counted down the Ten Best Must-Have Glam Metal Albums. We even tapped in to the genius of Bring Back Glam‘s Allyson B. Crawford to give it that “definitive text” feel. (Read part one, part two, part three)

Thanks to Allyson and our Anso DF, Glam Metal will live on in other worlds long after our planet has become a barren hellscape. That’s comforting. Here’s the number one Best Must-Have Glam Metal Album! So, come now children of the beast, be strong and …

Click to read more…

After grunge got so popular that MTV’s 120 Minutes and Headbanger’s Ball somehow became practically the same show, a lot of hair metal bands tried to harden and “modern up” their sound — usually to disastrous results. Herein, a few of my favorite examples, presented in chronological order of their release.

First up we have Warrant’s “Machine Gun,” from the 1992 album Dog Eat Dog. This actually isn’t all that ridiculous, and came so early in the “let’s change our sound” cycle that I suspect it was intended more as a response to the success of bands like Guns N’ Roses and Skid Row than Nirvana. Still, it’s hardly “Cherry Pie” or “Heaven,” y’know?

Click to read more…

Tracii Guns is working on his autobiography. This is easily the best news you’re going to hear all day and possibly all week or even all month, for the following reasons:

Click to read more…

A compilation that combines my love of metal with my love of bodacious, curvy babes? Count me in! A press release that just landed in the MS inbox proclaims:

Whole Lotta Love will feature all-new recordings of popular songs praising the fuller female figure, originally made famous by some of the biggest names in rock and pop music. These anthems to abundance will be performed by renowned rock & rollers from yesterday and today, along with a select few rising stars. In direct opposition to the “no fat chicks” mantra espoused by some, Whole Lotta Love will be a star-studded celebration of large and lovely ladies.

Click to read more…

The thorny history of New York hardcore pioneers Cro-Mags can’t be done justice in a pithy blog post, what with myriad lineup changes and squabbles that fortunately haven’t harmed the band’s legacy as much as, say, L.A. Guns. The current incarnation of Cro-Mags now playing gigs features Age Of Quarrel-era vocalist John Joseph and drummer Mackie Jayson, yet excludes guitarist Parris Mayhew and bassist/Best Wishes vocalist Harley Flanagan. In a recent interview with the excellent Double Cross blog, Flanagan–one of the founders of the band–had this to say about the situation:

[I]t’s all for money anyways with all these promoters and shit selling a fake band. They can claim whatever they want, it ain’t really the band, it’s some really fake shit, and all the new kids, well, they dont know any better so I guess they’ll take what they can get. I mean I understand, they’re fans of the music, so, it’s like going to see Ozzy instead of Sabbath or going to see Sabbath without Ozzy – but on a much much much smaller level. Believe me I’m not trying to compare us to Sabbath, trust me – you take what you can get. They just want to hear the songs and have a good time – they didn’t see it back in the day so they take what they can get. They dont know what they’re missing, they didn’t see it back in the day and they never saw the real shit. So they’re happy to see whatever they can and I understand.

Click to read more…

Of all the 654 singers L.A. Guns has had over the years, Jizzy Pearl is definitely the best one whose name is a euphemism for cum. He only recorded one album with the band, 1999′s Shrinking Violet, but it was such a huge success that within months of its release, the band got rid of Pearl and reunited with Phil Lewis. This was a historic happening, not because anyone was really waiting Lewis to return to the group, but because it was the first step in the process that would lead to there being two separate bands called “L.A. Guns.” Looking back at that moment now, Tracii Guns must feel like a post-Revenge of the Sith Obi-Wan Kenobi: if only he had killed that annoying kid on Tatooine all those years ago, so much tragedy could have been averted!

I assume its Guns’ 20/20 hindsight that led him to re-hire Pearl after L.A. Guns vocalist #678, David Spade, left the band. And while in February Vince reported that the latest re-incarnation of La Guns (as they’re known in France) would be recording a new album for Steve Vai’s Favored Nations label, they’re actually just going to re-release Shrinking Violet with the perfunctory new artwork/bonus tracks. I’m guessing this is because a) Violet was never really properly promoted when it was initially released, b) it’s cheaper than recording a new album, and c) the band has somehow fallen under the impression that they need a record to tour behind, when, in fact, they are the very definition of a “legacy act.” (Actually, Tracii might have some self-awareness about being a legacy act: the bonus tracks on this reissue will be include live recordings of Pearl fronting old Guns hits like “Ballad of Jayne.”)

Here’s some live footage of the Shrinking Violet track “Dreamtime.” The re-release will occur on May 25. Shrinking Violet was produced by Gilby Clarke, a.k.a. The Guitar Player Who Tour with Guns N’ Roses for Longer than Tracii Guns Ever Did but Never Got to Write or Record Any Original Material with Them.

-AR

So Rocklahoma, the once cock-rockalicious festival, may be a wash this year, but it seems that there’s already a new fest to grab ahold of the Aquanet and let us relive our youth gone wile: Rock N America, which take place from July 23 to July 25 in – get this – Oklahoma. Huh.

The line-up basically plays like a who’s who of who shoulda been playing Rocklahoma this year: Scorpions, Twisted Sister, Ratt, Warrant, Dokken, Great White, Enuff Z’Nuff, Bullet Boys, Faster Pussycat, and the Tracii Guns/Jizzy Pearl version of L.A. Guns are all the bill. More bands will be announced soon; in my imagination that will include whatever is passing for Skid Row these days, Vince Neil, Adler’s Appetite, Beautiful Creatures and/or Bang Tango, and the other version of L.A. Guns. But who knows.

It is worth noting that the fest will take place at the Zoo Amphitheatre, which a) has a smaller capacity than the giant open fields of Rocklahoma and b) isn’t just a cool name from some venue, but, rather, is called the “Zoo Amphitheatre” because it’s actually at the fucking zoo. So unless it’s always been Chip Z’Nuff’s dream to play for a crowd of zebras, this isn’t going to be quite the event that Rocklahoma was for these bands.

Still, you should visit the Rock N America website, even if you’re not really interested in attending the show, because, well, it’s like the shittiest website of 1994 and is consequently pretty hilarious.

-AR

[via Bring Back Glam]

Passover starts at sundown tonight! If you’re like me and you hate your extended family, that’s terrible news. On the other hand, I get to ask the Four Questions a-fucking-gain, since my cousins and I all refuse to grow the fuck up and have babies to replenish the family, which gets a little smaller every year as another member of The Greatest Generation goes the way of Crazy Town’s career.

On the flip side, Passover is the only Jewish holiday for which there is an appropriate metal song. (Unless you include some of that NSBM stuff. But until those dudes start writing outros with titles like “But we survived! Let’s eat!”, they’ll really only be getting half the equation.) Yes, it’s “Creeping Death” by Metallica, and yes, we talk about this every fucking year. Give us a break. It makes us happy. And it’s not like having Scott Ian and Tracii Guns on our team is such great shakes.

Just to stir shit up a little, here’s a live version of the song, filmed in 1989.

Does anyone know of a power metal cover of this song? I really wanted to do “Power Metal Passover” this year but couldn’t find one.

-AR

P.S. Yes, I know that “The Passover Story” is also known as “Exodus.” Why Exodus didn’t write a song about “Exodus,” I dunno.

I love Blabbermouth cuz it rules and it’s easier than actually going through my inbox and the bajillion press releases therein. Not only is it informative, but my stars, the entertainment value as well! Taunting sub-retards in the comments section is a Wednesday well-spent. Or if you’re the studious type, try to count how many headlines contain the words “Mustaine” and “forgive” and “David Ellefson.” Oh speaking of headlines, I think we all have played “The Blabbermouth Headline Game,” where you cycle through that little teaser box and marvel at its hilarious delusional bullshit. Let’s see, there’s usually a “Fanless Band Schedules Reunion Show” and a “Win Passes To Guns N’ Roses Guitarist Book Signing.” Those are beauties.

Then you’ve got the deceptively funny stuff, like“Band Wants to ‘Return To Our Roots’ On Sophomore Album“ or “MACHINEHEAD Frontman: ‘Our New Record Is Literally Gonna Rip Your Head Off and Shit In Your Mouth’.”

Click to read more…

Man oh man, Jani Lane’s life just keeps getting better and better. After grunge basically killed his band’s record sales, he turned into a drunken mess who would perform live while openly wasted, on top of doing everything in his power to look more like Sally Struthers And he’s been in and out of so many different incarnations of Warrant that he should just join L.A. Guns already and get it over with.

And now there’s a warrant out for him.

Yep. A warrant for the dude from Warrant. Rimshot!

Click to read more…

I really wanted to like this book. I really did.

As an old school Hanoi Rocks fan, I assumed this would be an eye-opening tell-all by the man behind the band that spawned sleaze rock which was later ripped off by Guns N’ Roses and lesser lights such as L.A. Guns and Faster Pussycat. Instead, it’s just a big ol’ mess of discombobulated anecdotes that do not enlighten the uninitiated, enthrall those already on board the Hanoi train, nor excite undiscerning lovers of rock ‘n roll.

Click to read more…