W.A.S.P. is a shock metal band that I first heard in 1989; however they had been around most of the 1980s. The song that caught my attention from their 1989 "Headless Children" album was "MEAN MAN". This album featured ex-Quiet Riot drummer Frankie Banali. The song "Mean Man" had the coolest lyrics I had every heard at that time: "Chewbacca in the rye, the water of fire, A terror in the flesh, a killer for hire". Awsome! Below is a YouTube video/audio with the lyrics to Mean Man. W.A.S.P. had to be one of the most successful shock metal bands of their time selling over 12 million albums worldwide.
Below is a biography, or more like a summary, of W.A.S.P. This bio is from Starpulse.com, so it is opinionated with the successes and failures of the band. W.A.S.P. released an album as recent as 2009, "Babylon". I have also included live videos of early hits "I Wanna be Somebody" and "L.O.V.E. Machine". It's fitting that W.A.S.P.'s first single "I Wanna Be Somebody" is ranked #84 in WH1's 100 Greatest Hard Rock Songs. - Kenny Leibow
Warning: Videos below contain profanity
W.A.S.P. - L.O.V.E. Machine (LIVE)
W.A.S.P. Mean Man with Lyrics
W.A.S.P. I Wanna Be Somebody (1984)
W.A.S.P. Biography
One of the heavier bands to come out of the early-'80s L.A. metal scene, W.A.S.P. quickly rose to national infamy thanks to their shock rock image, lyrics, and live concerts. Unfortunately, once the novelty and scandal began to wear off, the band found it difficult to expand, or even maintain, their audience by relying only on their music.
Leader Blackie Lawless (bass/vocals) was already a rock & roll veteran when he relocated to the West Coast and founded W.A.S.P. with guitarists Chris Holmes and Randy Piper and drummer Tony Richards. The band soon established a reputation as a ferocious live act, thanks in large part to Lawless' habits of tying a semi-naked model to a torture rack and throwing raw meat into the audience. And with the release of their self-explanatory independent EP, Animal (F**k Like a Beast), W.A.S.P. became impossible to ignore.
They signed to Capitol Records, and with songs like "I Wanna Be Somebody" (an absolute anthem to blind ambition) and "L.O.V.E. Machine" leading the way, their self-titled 1984 debut was an instant success. W.A.S.P. took their horror show on the road, and their momentum continued to build with the following year's The Last Command, which featured new drummer Steven Riley and the band's biggest hit, "Blind in Texas." Later that year, the band gained even more prominence as one of the biggest targets of Tipper Gore and the P.M.R.C. (Parents' Music Resource Center), a group of Washington housewives leading a crusade against violent, sexist song lyrics. Though the incident (which included Senate hearings on the issue with guest speakers as disparate as Frank Zappa, John Denver, and Dee Snider from Twisted Sister) would cause more publicity than actual results, it served to make W.A.S.P. a household name -- for good and for worse.
Ironically, the band toned down their act for 1986's Inside the Electric Circus, a lackluster, repetitive album which saw Lawless switch to guitar (replacing the departed Piper) and the hiring of bassist Johnny Rod. The blood and guts were largely gone (as were the good songs), and despite releasing a strong live album entitled Live...In the Raw the following year, the band's popularity began to plummet. The all-time low arrived with the release of Penelope Spheeris' heavy metal "rockumentary" The Decline of Western Civilization 2: The Metal Years. An expose about the L.A. metal scene, the film's most dramatic and depressing sequence showed an inebriated Chris Holmes drinking himself into a stupor in full stage gear while lying on a float in his mom's swimming pool. In a movie filled with debauchery and decadence, this scene was by far the scariest.
1989's Headless Children (featuring ex-Quiet Riot sticksman Frankie Banali) was a return to form, but it couldn't revert the band's slump and W.A.S.P. disbanded soon after. Lawless eventually returned as a one-man show for 1993's The Crimson Idol, an ambitious rock opera/concept album billed as Blackie Lawless & W.A.S.P. Resurrecting the band's old shock rock antics, but alas, not fame and fortune, the album flopped, and the following year's greatest-hits set, First Blood...Last Cuts, seemed like their last chapter.
But the resilient Lawless returned once again, luring guitarist Chris Holmes back into the fold and recruiting bassist Mike Duda and drummer Stet Howland for 1996's Still Not Black Enough. This lineup has continued to tour and record for a number of independent labels, with their albums including 1997's K.F.D., 1999's Helldorado, and 2001's Unholy Terror. The band released Dying for the World in 2002, an exceptional collection of unusually serious material inspired by the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. It was followed in 2004 by the conceptual Neon God, Pt. 1 and Pt. 2, with Dominator arriving in 2006. Eduardo Rivadavia, Rovi
1 comment:
This way my pal Wesley Virgin's report begins in this shocking and controversial VIDEO.
As a matter of fact, Wesley was in the military-and shortly after leaving-he unveiled hidden, "SELF MIND CONTROL" tactics that the CIA and others used to get everything they want.
These are the same secrets many famous people (notably those who "became famous out of nowhere") and elite business people used to become wealthy and successful.
You've heard that you utilize only 10% of your brain.
That's really because most of your BRAINPOWER is UNTAPPED.
Perhaps this conversation has even occurred INSIDE your very own head... as it did in my good friend Wesley Virgin's head about seven years back, while riding a non-registered, trash bucket of a car with a suspended license and with $3 in his bank account.
"I'm so fed up with going through life paycheck to paycheck! When will I finally succeed?"
You took part in those conversations, right?
Your success story is waiting to be written. All you need is to believe in YOURSELF.
UNLOCK YOUR SECRET BRAINPOWER
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