March 1986
METAL CONTENTS
CHAINMAIL
I’ve been waiting a long time (six years) for this to happen and it’s been worth the wait. Finally, somebody in America—a rock journalist by the name of Mary Anne Hobbs—has seen the light. Bernie Torme is without a doubt the best guitarist in rock ’n’ roll.
URIAH HEEP, NOT HEED!
Andy Hughes
As the '80s proceed, modern music becomes an increasingly mediamotivated hoopla where youth and speed are all-conquering, the concept of having “paid your dues” with any degree of longevity isn’t even sneered at, it’s just not even in the plan.
Features
THE ULTIMATE OZZYY!
Sylvie Simmons
“There’s never been a 60-year-old rock star. Maybe I’ll be the first.”
AC/DC THE BIG CRUNCH
Jim Farber
Here we are in one of the garden spots of the Western world— the outer reaches of Manhattan’s “Alphabet City,” a section of town zoned against anyone who doesn’t have track marks. The neighborhood does have its charms, of course (water bugs love the place), though on certain blocks you won’t find such conveniences as sidewalks, streets or buildings.
BRITMETAL: No More Bucky Beaver
Sylvie Simmons
These are desperate times, what with herpes scares and AIDS scares and rockstars demanding medical notes from groupies; hell, even Freddie Mercury’s teeth have gone straight!—the most glorious vocalist in the universe forked out over a thousand (pardon the expression) bucks to have a London dental specialist ensure that he can no longer eat spaghetti out of a beer bottle.
RECORDS
Gary Graff
For the intelligent among us, AC/DC is a guilty pleasure. Anyone with brains knows this is a band you should hate. The Australian quintet’s outlook on life is irrevocably sexist; take “Big Balls” from the best-selling Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap album, or “Sink The Pink” and “Playing With Girls” from the new Fly On The Wall.
KISS Metal Legends of the Taaastiest Kind
Sylvie Simmons
The perfect meritocracy. Gene Simmons does not pout, Paul Stanley doesn’t stick his tongue out, they each do what they do. How much is real anymore, how much habit, how much the musical equivalent of that curious wave the Queen Mother does that looks like she’s pleasuring a corgi in midair, something that has to be done regularly, in other words, and with a certain show of professional enthusiasm if you wanna keep the beans on the table, the gold in the coffers and the picture in the press, I couldn’t tell you.
DON'T FEAR THE REAPER
John Neilson
Every so often in this business of music, the Powers That Be sit back, take stock, and take time to give credit where credit is due. Bands who’ve spent years slogging it to the top of the heap, with nothing more to show for it than a lot of money, can look forward to those few precious moments in the glow of celebrity, with envious eyes of the world upon them, and the long-coveted Grammy finally in their hands...
METAL MANIA: THE '80s (SO FAR) & INTO THE '90s!
Rick Johnson
Did anybody get the license number of that decade? The 1980s, I mean. Can you believe they’re already half over? After all those years of waiting to see what 1984 would be like it turns out to be a mere Van Halen album! I must admit that, before I hit the Archives (repeatedly with an impact wrench) I didn’t think anything had happened in the '80s.
DAVID (O) AND CONQUER
Richard Riegel
No sooner had I finished my last monthly curse of MTV for its lack of video variety, than those same clever market researchers tossed me and all the metal fans a crumb of sorts. MTV’s Metal Mania show was a whole hour of nothing but metal vids, hosted by Twisted Sister’s Dee Snider, one of the champion electronic fish callers of our time.
HEAVEN METAL
Anne Leighton
Heaven’s Mitch Perry and Alan Fryer are hanging out at the Hard Rock Cafe giving the waitress April (as in six months ago or so from now) a hard time...or maybe she’s giving them a hard time. “I’ll have a BLT,” says Perry, former guitarist for Talas, now lead guitarist for Heaven, “with melted swiss cheese and no L and T.”
WHAT DID YOU PUT IN THAT PUNCH?
Anne Leighton
The other day, semi-retired CREEM writer Trixie A. Balm, who now sings folk songs in Greenwich Village, remembered a day at CBGB’s that happened about 10 years ago. “Helen says, Trixie, let’s dye your hair today.’ I said, ‘What a strange idea.’
NUTTY NORDIC KNIGHTS
Harold DeMuir
“I hate to sound over-confident,” says Tony Harnell, American vocalist with the otherwise-Norwegian quartet TNT, “but I really think that this band is going to be big. The general consensus of the band is that someday we’d like to be known as the biggest band in the world, or at least the biggest band doing this type of music.
ODIN IN THE WAY!
Sharon Liveten
There is an alarming trend afoot among rock bands—they are getting younger and younger. (Bite your tongue—I am not getting older.) At this rate, Messrs. Page and Van Halen should soon be out finding nice peaceful retirement homes. Take Odin, for instance. The band is one of Los Angeles’ brightest metal newcomers. But of the four band members, bassist Aaron Sampson, guitarist Jeff Duncan, his brother drummer Shawn Duncan and the band’s singer/face/teeth, Randy “0,” the latter two are the group’s old men—topping the chronological ladder at 20.
THE SACRED HEART OF RONNIE JAMES DIO
Moira McCormick
"I want people to know,” says Ronnie James Dio, “that all albums have positive values. I care about people, I really do, as individuals and as collective society. If I can help just one person, in any way, shape, or form, through my music, then I’ve done what was put on this earth to do.”
CRUE-SING JAPAN
People the world over, it seems, have a yen for Motley Crue—and the same is true in Japan, where the guys recently honed their show for literally many of their Oriental fans. What a spectacle it was!... mere words are inadequate in describing the glory that is Motley!
MAGNETS
Say it loud and say it pround—METAL be back! We're back with this spectacular issue, of course, and we plan to be back even more next issue! It, like life itself, is great! And you can bet your bottom dollar that next issue will be a METAL the likes of which you've never seen!