Best guitar work on Hair/Glam Metal Bands

[markg5150]

Van Halen are certainly not hair/glam

How about Skid Row - they were pretty crappy

[marianozz]

GnR rocked pretty hard, but Slash is not a superstrat kinda guy

[RCB]

Originally Posted by markg5150

Van Halen are certainly not hair/glam

How about Skid Row - they were pretty crappy

Thats debatable so say the least. You tell me the difference between "When its love" or some other Van HalenBallad and a Winger ballad.... or the difference between Dreams, Panama, Jump and a DLR or winger happy song.

Van Halen fits the profile perfectly, may be not their latest albums, but around 1984 till the end of the 80s they were doing glam just like any other band.

BTW, I also like Van Halen

[RCB]

Originally Posted by marianozz

GnR rocked pretty hard, but Slash is not a superstrat kinda guy

GNR was the precuel to Nirvana and Grunge. Suddenly it was cool to play with a vintage guitar, to have a dirty sound, you didnt need to have all the chops to be on Guitar World cover, it didnt matter if your singer was lame, the music wasnt "happy" anymore.... etc, etc, etc.

Apetite for Destruction was the beggining of the end of Glam/Hair metal IMHO. May be thats why I hated it so much when it came out...

[fettouhi]

Originally Posted by jemaholic

In retrospect, and compared to the bubble-gum crap or the rap trash on the radio/tv today I would welcome them ALL back! Well, maybe not Twisted Sister, but most of them were great live......what I can remember of the shows anyway. Where's EVH is this list??!!

Can't forget good old Ed .

Regards

André

[MehYam]

Originally Posted by RCB

Apetite for Destruction was the beggining of the end of Glam/Hair metal IMHO. May be thats why I hated it so much when it came out...

I didn't respect it much either when it came out, given that I thought the guitar work was crap. But I sure was wrong. Like Extreme, G'nR's early stuff was not really part of the hair metal thing, but it is a distant cousin, and was so much better.

BTW, the hair/glam thing had nothing to do with good guitar playing. CC Deville is living proof of that! It was a coincidence that the guitar woodshedding trend peaked at the same time as the hairspray trend, so they just happen to be associated with each other.

If I had a time machine, I'd boostrap the process early by littering copies of the first VH album and Surfing with the Alien back in 1962, so that radical guitar playing would have peaked earlier and had nothing to do with hairspray.

[JESTER700]

Originally Posted by MehYam

If I had a time machine, I'd boostrap the process early by littering copies of the first VH album and Surfing with the Alien back in 1962, so that radical guitar playing would have peaked earlier and had nothing to do with hairspray.

You wouldn't have to. Hendrix peaked in 1970 and didn't need hairspray, just an afro. ;-)

Too bad more budding guitarists weren't paying attention...

[RCB]

Originally Posted by MehYam

I didn't respect it much either when it came out, given that I thought the guitar work was crap. But I sure was wrong. Like Extreme, G'nR's early stuff was not really part of the hair metal thing, but it is a distant cousin, and was so much better.

BTW, the hair/glam thing had nothing to do with good guitar playing. CC Deville is living proof of that! It was a coincidence that the guitar woodshedding trend peaked at the same time as the hairspray trend, so they just happen to be associated with each other.

If I had a time machine, I'd boostrap the process early by littering copies of the first VH album and Surfing with the Alien back in 1962, so that radical guitar playing would have peaked earlier and had nothing to do with hairspray.

CC devile was replaced by Kotzen and then Blues Saraceno. They could ve picked any other guy with lame skills just lik CC, and they didnt. Why, because Glam was incresingly being asociated with good guitar playing by the end of the 80s. Why did DLR hire Vai and then jason becker? Why did whitesnake hire Vai? This are facts you cant neglect.

After the end of hair metal, you coulnt hear any decent guitar playing on ANY form of masive media. Sure, you could by a Prog Rock album, or a solo CD (in many cases of the same guitarrists that played in hair bands), but all you could see on TV or hear on Radio was a lame junk addict who couldnt play 3 chords, or Rap. So hair metal HAD A LOT TO DO with mainstream acces to good guitar playing. And if you like Vai, you probably get to know him because he played in DLR or Whitesnake, and THEN you bought PAW. He even said that part of the reason for joining whitesnake was to promote PAW. An this is just an example. If you came to know the name of Andy Timmons is because he played with Danger Danger and got a deal with Ibanez, the same holds for Reb Beach. You know Nuno necause he played in Extreme... (and the first 2 albums qualify as hair metal in my book) the list can go on and on. Neglecting the importance of hair/glam metal in popularizing good guitar playing just makes no sense at all.

Finally, you cant say GNR is better than Winger just because you happen to like it more. Likewise I cant say that Winger is better.... but I can tell you this, the level of techincal proficency of every one in Winger surpases by far their counterpart in GnR.... this is also a fact.

That said, wich band you do prefer is matter of tastes.

[red5]

Originally Posted by jemsite

a vocal extractor would help dramatically

extreme wasn't a hair/glam band in the context of the other offenders listed above ... glen

Haha right on! And Extreme was vairy hairy metal. Listen to Extreme II...

[red5]

Originally Posted by RCB

3) Steve Stevens /Atomic Playboys

That's one of them!

Also Vai on Slip of the Tongue!

[freedom's door]

Originally Posted by RCB

Apetite for Destruction was the beggining of the end of Glam/Hair metal IMHO. May be thats why I hated it so much when it came out...

Personally, i think Jane's Addiction was the beginning of the end for Hair/Glam. Instead of a singer wearing spandex and a little eyeliner, you now had a guy in full-blown drag, looking like some insane transvestite alien.
Instead of some "8 bar gymnastics routine" for a guitar solo, you had a guy wailing like Jimmy Page on steroids.
Instead of the same old tired cliched song formulas, you had song structures that were unusual, to say the least.
Lastly, instead of banal, disposable "party" music, you had a band that tried to marry their music with (dare i say it!) ART.
Although GNR took most of the glory (and profits), i think Jane's was more responsible for the slew of bands that came out in the early to mid 90's to kill off Hair/Glam.
And i'd still rather listen to "Mountain Song" than 95% of the hair/glam catalog any day of the week.
peace

[rgr]

It took me a while to get into JA, but when I did I loved them. Listening to it in headphones, Ritual gave me the same feeling as a Zepplin disc. I also totally dug Saigon Kick, you could tell that Jason Beiler was heavily influenced by JA, whether he would admit it or not. Unfortunately, they, like post-Pornograffiti Extreme, were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Roger

[nickcoumbe]

W.A.S.P. One of the reasons I play the guitar.

Bon Jovi,

Let's not forget Tiger Tailz.

[MilkshakeFiend]

I still adore all the Whitesnake stuff, it's what got me interested in guitars! I remember I was round a friend's house when a Whitesnake vid was on the TV and there was Vai, slinging an FP about. Now, at the time, I was listening to Beastie Boys, etc, and hadn't a clue who Steve Vai was. I said 'Who's that dude with the ugly (ha) guitar?' My friend's dad peeked round the corner, frowned at me and said 'Oh, him! That's God!'

:-s I didn't believe it at the time, but I still thought he was Pretty Damned Cool

Anyway, what about Cacophony? Becker and Friedman's shred/metal/thing

[AMD1014]

Cacophony all the way. They looked awesome and not too girly like steve vai with his glitter sparkle on the eyes and the streaks in the hair...well you know. At least cacophony didnt look so feminine