Stranger- chapter five: Nothin' but a Good Time

Living in The Village Apartments in 1985 may not have the best environment for an impressionable twelve-year-old boy knocking on the door of puberty. It was the perfect fertile habitat for a preteen male to indulge in various cultural curiosities. Long gone were the days of hanging out in the backyard with the squirrels, turtles, rabbits, and deer.  Yet we had simple rules: As long as we stayed within the fence line; we roamed anywhere on the grounds we pleased. That only guaranteed a speeding car barreling down Raymond Road at 50 plus miles an hour wouldn’t smash us. Yet even with that concern as elementary kids, we walked to school every day. 

           If we had to walk to the store, we did; and we made the trip frequently. Cigarettes cost at most $1.10 and we always scrounged up enough change to grab a pack. The stores had no problem selling to kids. No laws existed to prevent them from doing so.

           If we had trouble coming up with a buck ten, we had The Little Big Store. I would take an old record off my dad’s shelf he hadn’t listened to in years and the shop owner would give me a dollar no matter the shape... but never more than a dollar.

          Her place was unique; one we loved to hang out in, but we never had enough money to buy anything.  I’m sure it annoyed her more often than she would admit, though she never tried to keep us out. It happened to be the only place in town I knew of for a music enthusiast to thumb through stacks of used records. 

           I also admired the novelty items she sold. Behind glass cases she kept various spiked leather wristbands, dangling earrings, concert pendant necklaces, and vintage collectibles such as old ticket stubs and authentic concert set lists.  

          Her revolving collection of bootleg concert tapes fascinated me. Everything from Ozzy to Kiss to Iron Maiden, she would come up with many recordings. I got the impression she had a “guy”. I listened to one or two. Lackluster in quality, they always sounded as someone stuck a cassette deck down their pants and hit record (most likely the case). Women’s handbags did not go through an evasive checkpoint upon entry to concerts back then.  Guys didn’t get patted down either. The need for a saturation of concert security didn’t exist. People went to see a show. Not to carry out some nefarious massacre.

          Band and concert tees happened to be a specialty of The Little Big Store. It’s easy to imagine why adolescent boys found her place fascinating. The posters in the windows alone beckoned to anyone with a rock-and-roll or heavy metal curiosity. When you walked through the door and the pungent scent of foreign incense assaulted your olfactory nerve as deep cuts of anything from Frank Zappa to Traffic to Yes to Black Sabbath blasted over the big stereo speakers, you knew you had stepped into a different world. And we always wondered about the mysterious “back” behind the counter separated by none other than a beaded curtain. Sometimes we hung out for hours.

          I never felt as bad going in with my friend from the neighborhood Jerry. I don’t remember how we became friends, but I questioned often whether it was a good idea. Jerry had divorced parents, so I only saw him during the summer. He always had cash from his dad. But it was nothing for him to wait until his mother came home plastered drunk and grab a few extra fives from her purse to help facilitate his plans. If she missed it the next day, Jerry’s fox-clever ways could convince her she told him to take it. Two things would happen: she wouldn’t remember telling him and she would feel guilty for getting blackout drunk. With that extra ten to twenty dollars, Jerry and I would head to The Little Big Store and he would purchase himself some new bracelets, bandannas, gloves, or even a hat. He was the most metal-dressed twelve-year-old in the neighborhood. He even wore an earring which his older sister Cookie took credit for piercing. Not older than eighteen herself, she influenced Jerry’s sense of style. I don’t recall a time when she did not wear spandex or faux leather pants, bangle bracelets, and spiked hair. Patience was not one of her stronger virtues. Playing the role of an angry teen fit the metal facade, and she did it well.  Often I saw her threaten to put Jerry through a wall. Jerry being a cocky loudmouth himself, watching him back down told me all I needed to know about Cookie. I made sure she had her space.

          None of this deterred me from being Jerry’s friend. Even though his family conditions made me uncomfortable, I still had the incentive to hang around. 

          One of our sleepovers was a big turning point for me. Jerry stole twenty bucks from his mom’s purse to finance our weekend diet of pizza and soda. I would then get an introduction to Cookie’s record collection.  Despite what I knew about Cookie, we somehow had her approval. Records are sacred and fragile. I had ruined my share. But Jerry had more experience in handling vinyl. She had coached him well. He knew what to do. I studied him as he handled them with much finesse. 

          We gave Pink Floyd The Wall a spin, but it didn’t quite deliver the rock-and-roll gut punch either of us sought. I expected an hour and a half of Another Brick in the Wall. Yet I found myself confused by its oddness. I had yet to grasp the meaning of a concept album with its overall operatic rather than rock appeal. Never did it dawn on me we were listening to one of the greatest rock albums of all time. Watching the movie first may have helped. I saw it years later and loved it. 

          Jerry’s problem with it was different than mine. I found it awkward. Jerry found it boring. We both had one thing in common: We needed a punch.

          “Have you ever heard of Motley Crue?”

          “A what?”

          It did not register with me this was a band. Yet when he pulled out the record and showed me the cover, I understood. I recognized the pentagram right away, and it made my Christian conscience nervous. Never mind what my parents would think. My concern was with Mamaw. I feared not chastisement as much as just disappointing her. I preferred not to put my standing as a good boy in jeopardy.

          The record cover folded out into a big portrait of the band. Never had I seen such vikings; three with raven black hair and one platinum blonde standout. Not just long hair, but styled hair. And by styled I mean it looked as if someone spent an inordinate time pulling and teasing and shaping and spraying. Almost every wave seemed deliberate. And the makeup; lots of makeup; accented cheekbones and highlighted lips, and the dark gypsy mystique of the eyes caked with eyeliner and mascara. Habiliments of spikes, black and red leather, and fishnet material offset the feminine headshots. No one dared crack a smile. They promoted not joy but indulgence. 

          Once the needle dropped, I braced myself. I knew not what to expect but readied my soul for something beyond heavy. This forbidden fruit had a solemness to it that deserved my respect. The opening dialog of In the Beginning set the mood. An apocalyptic narration builds and crescendos into one anthemic line:

Those who have the youth

Have the future

So come now, children of the beast

Be strong

And shout at the Devil!

          After a short silent pause, heavy guitar chords struck and drums thundered just as I hoped they would. The sound of pounding bass and drums accompanied by loud, compressed, chorused, distorted guitar riffs invoked its listeners to raise a fist and bang heads in anthemic unity.  Motley Crue came to change the game and rewrite the playbook.

          Despite all this, I didn’t get the impression of being exposed to anything pernicious. I guess I imagined the great Satan’s motives and strategies to be a bit less comic book-like. This did not strike me as steal, kill, and destroy music, but more like get rich, get laid, and party music; very indulgent.

          This theory would prove true with their next album: Theatre of Pain. The pentagram reimagined, but not front and center as before. The Crüe boys replaced their leather and spikes with hot pink, spandex, and almost circus side-show attire. Everything became softer and less devilish. The Crüe also unleashed upon the world the metal power ballad with Home Sweet Home. I recall watching the video as number one on MTV’s daily request countdown show (Dial MTV) for months.

          This less-edgier powdery image began a trend of a more accessible style of metal music to housewives and suburban teenage girls. The power ballad sent the message: “Yeah, we have a distinct badness to us. But we have a softer side. We are velvety and emotional.” While metal bands such as Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, and Metallica seemed to appeal to the angst-filled alienated teenage/young-adult male, the market expanded its appeal beyond this stereotypical demographic.

          It seemed like a win for the long-haired bad boy. We found a polite welcome in the homes of our debutante cheerleader girlfriends. Dad’s skepticism was ever present, but mom had a way of romanticizing things. Regardless of the façade, the moms looked for the ballad in our hearts.

          Bad boys are bad boys, regardless of the pretty song of the day. The party still raged. As I have mentioned, I worked hard to emulate my teenage hero. Amidst the many Jim Morrison bios I ingested, I took note how he never turned down a drug. If someone handed it to him whether pill, joint, paper, liquid, or powder form, he took it. No wonder his life ended at twenty-seven. Nostradamus had predicted world nuclear destruction by 1996; a mere four years' difference in my mortality. I had time to party. Might as go out with a bang.

          My attitude seemed to fit with the spirit of the day. Kiss taught us to Rock-and-roll all night and party every day. Van Halen took off runnin’ with the devil. Scorpions wanted to rock you like a hurricane. Tesla boasted as modern-day cowboys, Ratt were wanted men while Jon Bon Jovi was wanted dead or alive. Skid Row represented the youth gone wild. Twisted Sister were not gonna take it. Def Leppard urged us to rock, rock til we dropped. According to Guns and Roses, it’s all so easy.

          Whatever stimulated the senses and fabricated euphoria if only for a minute. Anything antithetical to this was just unacceptable. Our culture embraced indulgences whether sexual, material or emotional. 

          Poison portrayed this method of coping with the mundane and directionless cog machinery lifestyle of “go to work, get married, have kids, and die” in their video for the song appropriately titled: Nothin’ but a Good Time. 

          We begin with the scene in a restaurant kitchen. A young adult long-haired male washes dishes as he ironically listens to Poison’s cover of Rock-and-Roll All Nite. The Manager/Owner/Boss representing all things capitalistic and evil bursts in and abruptly turns off the radio.  As expected, he harshly reprimands his iniquitous employee by accusing him of “moving in two speeds: slow and stop!” reminding him he is “being paid to wash dishes. Not listen to that... Rock-and-Roll!” thus threatening such gainful employment if he doesn’t meet a higher standard of acquiescence. At this, the young delinquent out of frustration rips off his apron, throws it down defiantly and kicks open the double swinging doors to reveal a multi-level arena stage lit up in various hues of green and blue with sparks flying revealing C.C. DeVille, Bobby Dall, Bret Michaels, and Rikki Rockett in full rock star array. Again: Not quite the scene one would think of when you hear the term: Heavy Metal. But the message appealed to the laboring, working class; those who couldn’t afford Disney World or the beach and who lived paycheck to paycheck and still found it hard to make ends meet despite struggling to do things the right way. It urged us to find reward by throwing up our hands and welcome the gratification of the moment by any means available. Such was the meaning of life.

          At the end of the video, we find Mr. Boss cocked and loaded for another rant busting back into the kitchen only to find all the dishes washed and put away and a look of joyful satisfaction on our young hero’s face.

          So you see? Just have a good time. Everything else will take care of itself. Because life is short and laboring sucks. We are all going to die, anyway. Have fun while you have the chance. 

Themes of indulgence, success, passion, and manufactured euphoria were somehow more consolatory to conservative households than the earlier times of spikes, leather, pentagrams, and darker imagery. 

Personally, I interpret this deliberate “softening” of metal music as a response to the tide of pressure being applied by Tipper Gore and the Parents Music Resource Center. a.k.a. The PMRC.

                    Somehow in this, the ends were to justify the means. The lifestyle camouflaged itself with the occasional boy-girl love song. But there had to be even more. The PMRC had frightened the apron strings off of every mother in America. There had to be a safer and more appropriate alternative.

          Enter Christian metal pioneers Stryper.

Christian music had itched to break away from the traditional church organ hymnal sound for some time.  But there was always a hesitation for fear of sounding too worldly or being too good. Virtuoso music is vanity. But somehow, Stryper had the guts to throw caution to the wind. 

          As I sat on the bleachers during gym class in eighth grade, I heard them for the first time. As a rare occurance,  we were allowed to bring our Walkmans to school. I sat next to a sincere Christian girl whose parents closely monitored what she listened to. She was a kind and sweet friend, despite that my bad boy sensibilities had already taken root. She brought along the new Stryper cassette- To Hell with the Devil. The band had become an unavoidable topic in my junior high world. And if you were a young man with longer than usual hair, a conversation about music would always parlay the question: “Ever heard of Stryper?”

           So, to ease my curiosity, I asked if she would mind if I gave it a listen. Without hesitation, she handed me her player. I expected just another watered-down saccharine-laced one-calorie diet version of the savory, heavy, ballsy meat and potatoes metal I knew. But that’s not what I got. Instead, I got Michael Sweet hitting banshee-metal vocal high notes that went against God and nature. My ears met an assault of thundering drums and an explosive chorus of: “To HEEEEEELL WIIIIIITH THE DEVIL!” I got complex and impressive double lead solos. Nothing I expected and everything I loved reverberated in my head. Whatever their message, their talent could not be denied. 

          And so scandalous eighties metal now had a safe alternative. Churched kids could still enjoy the rock-and-roll sights and sounds without the sin. Not everyone bought it. Hard core evangelical preachers lined up to condemn their image and sound as trying too hard to mimic the world therefore drawing kids towards that lifestyle. 

           As mentioned earlier, they still dispelled stereotypes about the bad boy headbanger with long hair and earrings. With the look no longer the pariah, parents opened up and accepted the trends of the times and allowed their good church daughters to date the bad-looking boys without reservation. In a lot of cases, this was a bad decision. But in others, there was the opposite effect.

          Good and sensitive boys grew their hair long and started wearing earrings. Metal became softer and more accessible. Stryper released power ballad megahit Honestly, and other secular bands followed suit. Slaughter sang about Flying high to the angels. Firehouse finally found the love of a lifetime. Whitesnake asked: “Is this love that I’m feelin’?” Def Leppard concluded that love bites. Bon Jovi urged us to never say goodbye. And Poison got in on the game with their metaphorical Every Rose Has Its Thorn.

          The power ballad became the standard. The rebellious image and lifestyle had lost its way among record executives as an image that only targeted one small demographic: middle class angst-driven white teenage boys. But nothing could have sunk the dagger further into the gut of hard rock than the incarnate twin sons of sixties teenage heart throb Ricky Nelson; simply identified as Nelson. Enter the daring pure marketing trailblazers for bands like Hansen. With the success of MTV, seeing your music was as important as hearing it. With their long, straight, clean, well kempt hair; their soft, delicate, colorful clothing, they smiled or pouted for photo ops as they exclaimed a message that fit their image: “I can’t live without your love and affection”.

          And thus began a brisk decline of eighties hair metal.