It's the stretch run, the Top 10. Put the women and children to sleep, we're bringing out the Big Guns this week.
Previous entries on this rundown....
#10: SOMETHING TO BELIEVE IN, Poison (1990) Don't be fooled - behind all that lipstick, makeup and hairspray is a powerful progressive message. How we treat our homeless, our veterans, our poor and our lonely best friends of Bret Michaels. At the very least it answers the question "Is there a Lord Above?". Negatory.
#9: MORE THAN WORDS, Extreme (1991) The Last Great Power Ballad ever released. Not long after this it was time to don the flannels, cut the hair and get serious. It was nice of Nuno Bettencourt and Gary Cherone to give a cameo to the useless members of the band waiving their lighters in the video. Speaking of which, with the general decline of smoking in general, that's the most unfortunate side effect - no more swaying lighters demanding an encore, or for effect during a great power ballad such as this. Yes, I know there's an ap for that now. But it's not the same.
#8: WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE, Bon Jovi (1986) As disturbing as it is, JBJ's Cowboy Fetish has produced some great music. You've got this classic. You've got "Ride Cowboy Ride", and you've got the entire Young Guns II Soundtrack. Sure, it's hard to shake the image of a 14 year old Jon prancing around his Sayerville bedroom in assless chaps and a Red Rider but at the expense of never hearing "sometimes you tell the day by the bottle that you drink"? Well worth the imagery. What I find a little pretentious however, is that when this song was written, Bon Jovi was hardly the global success that they are today. So really, the only way Jon saw "a million faces" when he wrote this was if he was collecting Turnpike Tolls that summer.
#7: FLY HIGH MICHELLE, Enuff Z'Nuff (1989) Told you I wasn't done honoring the lost art of hair bands memorializing overdosees in song. Drugs? Check. Lipstick? Check. Hair? Check. Girls? Yup. And really, can you go wrong writing about a Michelle? I can think of 3 Michelle classics off the top of my head. Enuff Z'Nuff never really took off and that's a shame, because this album and their 1990 follow up "Strength" were quality cuts. Maybe it's because they went for the "Poison on Acid" look.
#6: PATIENCE, Guns N'Roses (1989) This was hard for me to include in my countdown. I cringe to put GNR in the classification of "Hair Bands". The era lines up. The look kind of does, though there was very little glamor in their motif. But their track record and their sound is hardly comparable to Bon Jovi, Poison, or even the Crue. But Patience can loosely, very, very loosely, be categorized as a Power Ballad. And a great one at that. Is there a better vocal solo than Axl's wailing at the end of this? Is there a more iconic (and symbolic) sequence from a music video than Slash's snake? Do you not think about this tune every time you're partying in a hotel room?
It's a topic for another time, especially with the million different classifications one could pick, but I'm a firm believer that Guns N Roses was the Last Great Rock'n Roll Band.
See ya'll for the Top Five later this week.
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