Released in October of 1982, this song about a guy trying to convince himself that the girl that just left him won't find anyone better, reached #20 on the US charts. But it was the video that made this song memorable.
Based on a post apocalyptic world, the band came up with the idea for the video themselves (one of the few early bands that embraced music videos), and MTV rewarded them by playing the hell out of the video. Groundbreaking at the time in that the music doesn't start for nearly a minute into the clip, the band is only listening to the song being played on a boombox while they investigate the contents of a mysterious tent in the desert (also groundbreaking since most videos were some form of performance pieces).
Lucky for them one of the band members discovers the guitar right before the solo but this brings up an interesting note about the song.....its based around a keyboard and drum loop which was unusual for a guitar based band. Still, they got lucky he knew how to play that solo and they got lucky the fans loved the song.
Released in July of 1987, the bands major label debut was the closest thing to a perfect time capsule of the Sunset Strip in the late 1980's. The band formed only two years earlier as pieces of two different bands (LA Guns and Hollywood Rose) came together. From the first gigs played by the band it was apparent that there was little anything could be done to stop super stardom. Record labels were courting the band within months of their first show and the album was one of the most anticipated releases of the year.
Lead singer Axl Rose was one of those dynamic front men that commands the attention of the whole room. Combine that with the fiery playing of lead guitarist Slash and you had a duel attack on the crowd that usually was hard to ignore. When you add in the debauched lifestyle and attitude (and isn't that what rock n' roll is all about?) and more than a little songwriting talent and you ended up with the product delivered as promised.
The album reached the #1 spot on the US album charts and sold over 18 million copies (that buys a lot of Jack Daniels). Lets take a look at the songs that made up this amazing debut.
1. Welcome To The Jungle - Sounding like a decent into the depths, this semi-autobiographical song sets the tone for the whole album. As a teenager, a young Axl exited a bus in New York City and was yelled at by a homeless man, "you know where you are? You're in the jungle baby, you're gonna die". When he later moved to Hollywood, he felt that statement applied just as well to the Sunset Strip area.
2. Its So Easy - Describing the sad state the band found themselves in during the early days when they had to live off the groupies and hangers-on that surrounded them. Kinda sad, really.
3. Nightrain - Written as a tribute to cheap alcohol, which the band used to fuel its creativity and generally survive on.
4. Out Ta Get Me - A general complaint about authority figures, the police in particular, keeping poor Axl down......but lets face it, Axl probably wasn't a choir boy when it came to his dealings with the law.
5. Mr. Brownstone - We've had abuse of their fans (mostly the female kind), alcohol abuse and defiance of the law.....guess we need a song about drugs. This is about heroin. Interestingly, the song doesn't celebrate drug use but instead points out the negatives of heroin use.
6. Paradise City - Another song about Hollywood and longing for the more idyllic lands of their upbringing.
7. My Michelle - Written for a friend that said she wanted to be immortalized in song. The first version of the song was some sappy love song. Axl rewrote the song to more accurately reflect her actual life....she apparently loves the song.
8. Think About You - Its an attempt at a love song. But not as good as the song that comes after this one.
9. Sweet Child O' Mine - What originally started as a guitar picking exercise, would become the bands only #1 hit. Happy accidents are the lifeblood of rock musicians. While Slash insisted it wasn't a song, the rest of the band encouraged him to continue while they all added their instruments to the song and Axl quickly scribbled down a few lyrics about his girlfriend at the time. Fame and stardom was never more unintentionally stumbled upon. Its always fun to think about how the song would have changed if GPS had existed back in 1987. Listen to the lyrics after the guitar solo and you'll understand.
10. You're Crazy - All things considered.....I'm sure he wasn't a joy to live with either.
11. Anything Goes - I spent a little bit of time on the Sunset Strip, this probably worked with a few of the groupies....not that its ok, but still.
12. Rocket Queen - The tale of two women. Written about another female friend of the band who is also proud of being the subject of this song.....but its the girl heard having sex during the guitar solo whose tale needs telling. That's actually the drummer's girlfriend having sex in the studio with Axl (she also wanted to be immortalized on the record).
Lets take a look at the first video from the band, Welcome To The Jungle....please enjoy.
Released in September of 1981, the song made it to #1 on the US charts and was a huge hit for the band. They had been radio darlings back in the late 1970's but this song blew the door right off its hinges for their career and helped to make the album that the song came from, Freeze Frame, a #1 hit as well. The song deals with a guy learning that the girl he knew from school has become a centerfold model and now she's the object of everyone's desire and not just his.
The video had plenty to offer the MTV crowd. Lots of models acting like the school girls from the lyrics and dancing around in their underwear. But lets not forget a few of the moments that made this video a classic. The drummer doing a drum roll in a drum filled with milk. All the girls doing cartwheels across the hall as lead singer, Peter Wolf, runs through them. And of course, all the skimpy night gowns (sorry, I'm back to being 15 again).
But the song also reminds me of some actual people I knew. I went to high school with a centerfold model and a porn star. Traci Lords was in my English class 2 years in a row. Of course her name wasn't Traci in our school. She was Nora. This is a picture of her below.
Looks like your average 1980's high school girl. But this is what her "professional" photos looked like...
BTW this photo was not easy to find as most "professional" photos of Traci from this era are either non existent or are simply illegal.....and I can not comment on her performance in any of her films as those would also be non-existent or illegal (she's verrrryy good). As Traci Lords she made dozens of porn films and continued to go to high school. She sat next to me one year and never knew what the homework had been so I was often helping her. When it was discovered that she was underage while making all those films, lots of people got in trouble and all of the films and pictures she made immediately became Child Pornography and were pulled from sale (the picture above is NOT illegal 'cause she's not nude......just putting that out there for legal reasons...just in case). By the 1990's Traci had become a legitimate actress and a DJ and is a much happier person (I read that somewhere).
The centerfold model was a girl named Brandy but she was a year younger than me. Here's a picture of her from her magazine cover.
Brandy was of legal age when she started her modeling career, so no legal trouble here. I didn't know her other than seeing her in the halls but one of my brothers insists that he dated her. I don't remember that. Brandy became the 1992 Penthouse Pet of the Year and is now an actress and model.
Now, to be clear, I never "got with" either of the two girls (its a question I ALWAYS get asked. Seriously? I'm not that cool) but in the years since I graduated, this song has always made the memory of these two girls come to mind.
Released in January of 1981, this song made it to #5 on the US charts and was everywhere during that whole year. It was supposed to be the ninth video ever shown on MTV but the video went black after only a few seconds and didn't continue playing. So, early cable fail.
But this song has special meaning to me. Music has the ability to recall memories and take us back to moments and places that are key to our lives. This particular song always reminds me of a place called Seaside Lagoon in Redondo Beach, California where I grew up. It was basically a concrete-lined, three foot deep community pool surrounded by beach sand a few feet from the sport fishing pier in a parking lot.
It was where we spent most of our summer days in 1981 before we realized the actual beach was not very far away.....like two blocks. But one thing I liked was that they played music over loud speakers that carried across the whole area. They played this song about once an hour, everyday, all summer in 1981. This song always takes me back to this place and this time in my life. Skateboarding to the beach. The smell of the nearby pier. The sounds of the breakwater, mixed with jr. high school girls I was just starting to notice and this song.
Released in 1982, it would be the second version of this song...only this time in English (well, most of it, at least). The original version of the song (recorded in German) was released in 1981 by Austrian rocker, Falco and became a huge hit for him all across Europe. British rock band, After The Fire, re-recorded the song with new English lyrics and released it to.....well, not much of a reception in their home country.
Then MTV got involved. The video (which was about as average a music video as you could get back in 1982) at least gave the band an image and a boat-load of airplay. Before long (in 1983), the After The Fire version began to climb the US charts, eventually reaching #5, and along the way, began pulling the Falco version up the US charts as well. Falco's version made it to #10 but on the disco charts...who knew that was still a thing in 1983?
After The Fire didn't even get to celebrate their accomplishment in style as the band broke up on stage one night while opening up for Van Halen (imagine David Lee Roth trying to top that) before the song started its climb up the charts.
Here's the video, please enjoy the woman putting her lipstick on....but they reversed the film so it looks like she's taking it off. Kinda cool? Maybe.
First of all, This is not really the type of song I would have listened to back in 1983 when this was released. It reached #2 on the US charts so someone was listening to it.....a lot. But its crossed my radar in the years since and it always makes me laugh and I'll explain why.
The song starts off with a bit of easy piano and then the singer comes in and he's going to tell you about everything he knows. Ok. Then the chorus kicks in and he doesn't know a few things. And then a choir comes in and they're singing half the title of the song. And now he's getting all over dramatic about her eyes and the stars. There's a guitar solo that's completely out of place for this song and this band. And now he's telling us about all the things he can make and all of them are sports analogies. Here comes the choir again. I'm starting to suspect that he can't say Making Love.
I'm not even going to go into the terrible video......its bad on many levels. And I'm not sure why this song was such a big hit but here it is.
Released in January of 1981, this was the first single from their third album. It reached #10 on the US charts and was a big hit for the band. The song deals with an infatuation between a teacher and a female student (which we all know is wrong and inappropriate) and its possible outcome. Prior to being a world famous musician, Sting, the lead singer, main songwriter and bassist for the band, was a school teacher (he says the song is not autobiographical, just mental role playing).
The song is my favorite Police song but not because of the lyrics. It just so happens to be the song I lost my virginity to. The girl I was dating at the time was a huge Police fan and she had a mix tape of all Police songs. This was the song that was playing when IT happened. Yes, the song is only 4 minutes long. Give me a break, I was 15. I'm lucky to have made it that long. I'm also lucky that it wasn't the very next song on her mix tape: When The World Is Running Down, You Make The Best Of What's Still Around. A bit tougher subject matter. At least this song was sorta about what we were doing (we were both 15 at the time).
The video has always been a classic. Sting reprises his role as a teacher. Drummer, Stewart Copeland, is smoking in the classroom. Sting is wearing a t-shirt from the band The Beat! (known in the US as The English Beat!) and that was cool. Stewart is throwing paper at the teacher (he's naughty) and later in the song, Sting takes off his shirt and coat while grading papers......not sure what that's about but it gets a nice reaction from guitarist, Andy Summers.
Please enjoy and don't picture me having awkward, first time sex.
