Dr. Feelgood

Yes, it's Motley Crue, the Bad Boys of L.A., and the epitome of all of the cliches associated with the '80s. Flashy hair put up 10 feet high, at least six layers of makeup on faces, and almost all of the songs revolving around sex, love, and the rock n' roll lifestyle. It's the sort of thing that dozens of bands followed in the mid to late '80s (most of which never made it into the spotlight), hoping that one day, they will play in front of millions of people in arenas. These bands consisting of White Lion (ugh) Winger (UGH) and Autograph (AAAARRGGGHHH!!!!), and they all followed Motley Crue aboard the '80s bandwagon of imagery that got really old, really fast. If all of these cliches could be piled up into one album, its name would be "Dr. Feelgood".

The members of Motley Crue lived excessive lifestyles in the '80s, so it's hardly a surprise that they liked to write songs about them. For instance, the theme of sex is prevalent on almost all of the songs on this album. I mean, what can you expect from songs entitled, "Slice of Your Pie" or "Sticky Sweet"? Not much, other than getting laid, I suppose. It gets to the point where it gets quite redundant, even annoying. Look, there could be other things that they could write songs about, and the Crue knew that. Their earlier albums at least had songs dealing with things other than sex (eg. "Stick to Your Guns" on their "Too Fast for Love" album is about standing up for what you believe in). Here, 90% of the songs on here are sex-related. It's a sign that Motley Crue got WAY too famous, and decided to use that lyrical theme as a sort of cash cow. The choruses to their songs are also dull and repetitive. They're just there so that it would be easy for the teenybopper audience to sing along. The worst example is the chorus of "She Goes Down", which consists of "She goes down, she goes down, she goes down, down, down, down". Yeah, they really didn't try to hammer the song's title into people's heads when they wrote that one. It's the reason why some songs get stuck in people's heads, and not in a good way, though to be fair, Motley Crue aren't known for writing choruses that are more poetic, but still, repetitive choruses are ANNOYING, and are a trademark of awful pop musicians, especially in the '80s.

And now, let's talk about the music itself. Their songs really aren't much to listen to, for they were pretty generic, even at that time. Songs like "Kickstart My Heart" and "Same Ol' Situation (S.O.S.) pretty much sound like every song from every glam band you've ever heard. They're unoriginal and lame and they really didn't require much to get popular, just some moronic high school jocks and cheerleaders to buy their stuff. And then there's "Rattlesnake Shake" which also sounds like a typical glam song, except it's got a saxophone mixed in. That totally reminds me of Raven's sellout album, "The Pack is Back" album, cos two of its songs had a horn section. I'm pretty sure Motley Crue stooped reeealy low to have a saxophone in there, cos I'm pretty sure that they thought they'd make a lot more money with a jazzy, sexy sound in that song. The only thing that really interests me about this album is the fact that Mick Mars uses a "talk box" in "Kickstart My Heart". But here's the thing, talk boxes are meant for hard blues rock, like the kind of music that Joe Walsh and Jeff Beck make, not metal bands.

Oh, and then there's the "power ballads". We can't really forget about those, can we? Cos "even the bad boys have their soft side, right?" Right. The only reason why they wrote "Without You" and "Don't Go Away Mad (Just Go Away)" is to specifically make the album sell, and sell it did. Like most power ballads at the time, these songs didn't have a lot of thought put into them, they just had to have some syrupy, sugary-sweet lyrics about love and affection and a sweet sounding piano riff thrown in, and the cheerleaders mascara would run with their tears. BLECH! These songs are just as heartwarming as an episode of "Glee". They're just as inspiring as anything Stephanie Meyer would have written. They're songs that really aren't worth listening to cos they're so pretentious, they'd make Tina Turner want to head straight to the bathroom to puke!

Now, don't get me wrong, not all "glam bands" are bad. I much enjoy Dokken, Lizzy Borden, and maybe a little Skid Row, but why couldn't we have more bands like them? Why couldn't glam bands be just as creative and original as Lizzy Borden? Why did "power ballads" have to exist? Why did Motley Crue create this stupid album, anyway? The answers to these questions can be answered with one word; MONEY. Motley Crue did it aaaaaaaall for the money, not even caring much for the structures of their songs, they just wanted to keep the money coming. The result is an invasion of cliches that can be easily stopped by just simply ignoring this album in favor of albums from bands that made music more for the love of music, than the dough.