Musical Genres: Hair Metal Bands Of The Eighties

Call me crazy, but I completely love the hair bands of the eighties!  I realize that I may be dating myself a bit by admitting it, but this has to be my favorite music of all time.  I grew up with many of the great rock bands from this era, such as: Dokken, Tesla, Motley Crue, Cinderella, and a host of others.  I still listen to all of these great bands, and I continue to see them in concert whenever they are in my area!  To date, I have attended more than 300 concerts and counting.

There are so many reasons why I love this music.  First is the fact that most of the vocalists actually sang, and you could understand the words.  This cannot be said of today's heavy metal bands, whom I like to refer to as "the cookie monster bands."  One listen to any of these bands will prove that to be an accurate description.  Secondly, even though many parents at that time objected to the lyrical content of these bands, the lyrical content of today's artists makes those offenses seem tame by comparison.

Also, being a guitar player myself, I can appreciate this music because it does take a much greater level of technical skill to play it than it does to play today's metal.  This is most clearly evident in the lack of guitar solos.  Once a staple of the heavy metal form, the guitar solo has all but completely vanished from most rock today.  Consider the work of many of the amazing players from from the Eighties, like Yngwie Malmsteen, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, or Eric Johnson, just to name a few.  The talent of men like these is monumental; in my humble opinion, the staggering level of musicianship to be found in the recordings of these artists easily surpasses anything that today's guitar players have to offer by an extremely wide margin.

They say that guitar solos have become passe; they say that they want to do other, more "creative" things.  Well, you will have to forgive me, but that argument simply won't wash with me!  Music is just like life; you get back exactly what you put into it.  And in my language, that excuse translates into only one statement: "I'm too lazy to put in the practice that it really takes to learn my instrument!"

When I listen to music, I like for the songs to make me feel something; the music of the Eighties does this.  They sang about having fun and enjoying life.  They sang about keeping hope alive when you were down.  The music had this amazing, electric energy, and a spirit of eternal youth!  When I listen to the music of most metal bands today, all I feel is depressed.  There is so much hatred and rage, so many morbid depictions of death.

I used to be an avid CD collector, and I would readily try any new band that came along.  Unfortunately, I have been let down by so many bands in recent years that I have ear-marked what little money I have in my CD budget for buying only the new releases by old bands.