Welcome to another “Album by Album Challenge.” For those that are new here, the “Album by Album Challenge” is where I take a band’s entire discography and listen to every album in order of release from front to back. With my unforgiving and well-aged ear, I call it how I hear it. In some cases, I find that what I once thought was good is actually pretty crappy and sometimes crap manages to age into something pretty kick ass. And in some cases, face melting is still just good ol’ face melting.
This time around we have a two parter as we dive into the W.A.S.P discography. W.A.S.P is a band that put out a couple of albums that I absolutely loved. After the release of their 1989 album The Headless Children I just kind of lost touch with the band and never really paid their later albums much attention. This was a really exciting challenge for me as I was hearing the majority of these albums for the first time and in their entirety. This was a really fun and really rewarding challenge for me as I discovered some of the best metal albums that I never knew existed.
For Part I we’ll start with the band’s 1984 self-titled debut and take an intermission after 1997’s Kill Fuck Die. Are you ready? Let’s do this.
W.A.S.P
Release Date: August 17, 1984
The Good: I Wanna Be Somebody, L.O.V.E Machine, The Flame, B.A.D, School Daze, Hellion, Sleeping in the Fire, On Your Knees, Tormentor, The Torture Never Stops
The Bad:
The Indifferent:
Wow. It’s really hard for me to believe that this album is 30 fucking years old. There are a lot of hard rock/metal albums that 10 and even 15 years YOUNGER than this album that today sound dated, tired, and flat. This W.A.S.P is definitely not one of those albums. “I Wanna Be Somebody” is so fucking good and that intro drum roll just hits you in the face. “The Flame” has to be one of the catchiest songs of the genre and still makes me wonder to this day why this band wasn’t bigger. Maybe it was the overall image of the band that held them back but as dark and ominous as their image was, the music on this album stands feet upon feet above that of many of their peers.
“L.O.V.E Machine”, “B.A.D”… I’ll never quite get what it was about spelling shit out for these guys but that aside, these songs are so fucking good. W.A.S.P definitely stood out from the pack as a much heavier and even darker band than the peers of their time. Songs like “Tormentor”, “School Daze” and “Hellion” had a more NWOBHM sound which is probably why this album is so timeless sounding. There’s also a darkness to the lyrics. While bands like Motley Crue and RATT did very little to hide the corniness of singing about sex, drugs, and being a bad ass, W.A.S.P did so in a more dark and sinister way. 30 years later I find myself enjoying this album as much if not more than I did when I first heard it in 1984. This was no real surprise to me as I never stopped loving and listening to this album.
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The Last Command
Release Date: November 9, 1985
The Good: Wild Child, Fistful of Diamonds, Widowmaker, Blind in Texas, The Last Command, Running Wild
The Bad: Ballcrusher, Jack Action, Sex Drive
The Indifferent:
I don’t know really what it was about this album but with The Last Command W.A.S.P nearly missed the mark completely. The debut album was so monstrous and so fucking good but it seemed like with this one they were trying desperately to keep up with their peers instead of standing outside of the pack. The album opens up with “Wild Child” which I feel like is one of W.A.S.P’s best songs and it’s a really strong one. It almost feels like a growth from the debut then all of the sudden here comes “Ballcrusher.” This song is so bad it’s barely tolerable. The lyrics are just so not even good. At least on the debut when Blackie was singing about sex and what not it was a bit dark and even sinister. This time around it just sounds like a heavier version of Ratt and even though they hadn’t arrived yet Poison. Songs like this one, “Jack Action”, and “Sex Drive” (I wonder what those are about) are just down right embarrassing.
The other thing is that while those songs are so flat out horrible, songs like “Fistful of Diamonds” which basically addresses corporate greed and “Widowmaker” are such strong songs. “Blind in Texas” would go on to be one of W.A.S.P’s biggest songs and I still feel like it’s a lot of fun to hear and it’s a great fucking song. If Blackie & Co. would’ve just abandoned the idea of trying to be a hip, successful Hollywood band and just stuck to their guns this album could’ve been a really strong follow up to that monstrous debut. At least the album as a whole isn’t a dud. Just skip those three lame ass tracks and you have a really strong EP of sorts. The good songs on this album are fantastic and the bad ones are atrocious. That’s it in a nutshell. Huh huh… I said, “nut.”
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Inside the Electric Circus
Release Date: September 1986
The Good: Inside the Electric Circus, I Don’t Need No Doctor, Restless Gypsy, I’m Alive, Easy Living, Mantronic, King of Sodom and Gomorrah
The Bad: Shoot from the Hip,
The Indifferent: 9-5 Nasty, Sweet Cheetah,
Inside the Electric Circus definitely showed a bit of growth for Blackie & Co. The opening song is such a stellar track documenting the excitement of being on stage and at a W.A.S.P show. It’s an age old concept that bands have done in the past but when done well it never gets old. The cover of the Ashford & Simpson classic “I Don’t Need No Doctor” has pretty much become a staple of their live shows over the years and once again show that if you take a cover song and make it your own it can be a really cool fucking thing. They also included a cover of “Easy Living” by Uriah Heep which also kicked a bunch of ass but really? Two covers? Are you running out of ideas? Well, from the sounds of the rest of this album, the answer seems to be a big ass “yes.”
The other 3 songs or so that are “good” are pretty just that. “9-5 Nasty” and “Sweet Cheetah” didn’t flat out suck but at this point it just felt like they were trying to get blood from a turnip. I mean, c’mon guys. This shit gets a little old and basically had them going into Poison territory. “Shoot from the Hip” was absolutely atrocious and had me reaching for the skip button. Supposedly this was the album that was going to break W.A.S.P but if by break they meant to make them look like buffoons that it totally worked. The good songs on this album were good but there wasn’t really anything great besides the title track. At least there wasn’t anything as horrible as “Ballcrusher” or “Sex Drive.”
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The Headless Children
Release Date: April 15, 1989
The Good: The Heretic (The Lost Child), The Real Me, The Headless Children, Thunderhead, Mean Man, Mesiphisto Waltz, Forever Free, Rebel in the FDG
The Bad:
The Indifferent:
Three years must have been plenty of time for Blackie Lawless to really decide what he wanted to do with W.A.S.P. It’s really amazing what that time off did because it’s like in that time he made the conscious decision to not go the route of cock rock ala Poison. For The Headless Children, Blackie really showed the world that he could not only write a great song here and there but that he could create one of heavy metal’s all-time greatest albums. Everything about this album is monstrous and it’s sad that this album gets overlooked for being the epic masterpiece that it truly is.
Listening to this album now is quite an amazing listen. It really stands the test of time both production wise and song wise. The cover of the Who classic “The Real Me” never gets old and songs like “Forever Free” and the title track have never lost their edge. I even found songs that I kind of glazed over back in the day such as “Thunderhead” and “Rebel in the FDG” to be great songs. There isn’t a bad song on this album and as of now this is Blackie’s masterpiece. Can we also talk about how great Frankie Banali’s drumming is on this album? Who the fuck knew that the guy from Quiet Riot was such a great fucking drummer? This album just kills.
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The Crimson Idol
Release Date: May 24, 1993
The Good: The Titanic Overture, The Invisible Boy, Arena of Pleasure, Murders in the New Morgue, The Gypsy Meets the Boy, Doctor Rockter, I Am One, The Idol, Hold on To My Heart
The Bad:
The Indifferent:
So I’ll be honest. By the time that this album was released I had pretty much forgotten all about WASP. I had started getting into other kinds of metal and other kinds of music in general so to me WASP was a nostalgic piece of my past that I just let go. For this challenge, this is the first time I listened to this album in it’s entirely and I have to say that I was absolutely blown away by how great this album was. My first thought was, “Really? A WASP concept album? Why?” Well, the answer is because it can be done and it was done really well.
Blackie totally showed off just what a huge WHO fan he is by creating his own metal version of Quadraphenia and it surprisingly worked. At times, I found myself wondering if a lot of the concept was somewhat autobiographical with some pieces of former members of WASP combined into one character. As a whole, the album is pretty fucking amazing. There isn’t a bad song on the album but while there are a lot of good songs, The Crimson Idol also boasts some of Blackie’s greatest pieces such as “Murders in the New Morgue”, “The Idol”, “Hold on to My Heart”, and his magnum opus “The Great Misconceptions of Me.” That song right there just may be not just one of his best pieces but one of the greatest unsung moments in metal. What an amazing album and what a great surprise. This is one I’ll be revisiting.
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Still Not Black Enough
Release Date: August 1996
The Good: Still Not Black Enough, Somebody to Love, Black Forever, Scared to Death, Goodbye America, I Can’t, No Way Out of Here
The Bad:
The Indifferent: Keep Holding On, Rock and Roll to Death
Before this challenge I had never heard one single note of this album. “Still Not Black Enough” was a great way to head into this album and I found myself really digging the songs. The production is a little on the digital sounding side but I could get past that. Their cover of Jefferson Airplane’s “Somebody to Love” was spectacular and once again had them taking a great classic song and making it their own. “Goodbye America” was probably one of my favorite moments. I loved Blackie’s spoken dialog and I also loved the fact that Blackie really seemed to have found his place as a songwriter. It’s such a shame that this is the material that the masses didn’t get to hear. It makes me wonder if this kind of stuff in the very beginning would’ve taken W.A.S.P in a different direction. Regardless, these are some great songs.
There are a couple of misses on this one. “Keep on Holding On” is Blackie’s Air Supply moment. WTF was up with that one? “Rock and Roll to Death” was also a what the fuck moment for me. It sounded like he was trying to capture another “Blind in Texas” moment. Maybe it was a tongue in cheek moment that totally went over my head but either way, that song was fucking stupid. “Breathe” is yet another example of just what an amazing balladeer Blackie Lawless is. This one is right up there with “Forever Free” for me but it was “I Can’t” that without a doubt is the highlight of this album. This is Blackie’s “Blaze of Glory” and as of now has to be one of his greatest moments. This album was such a great surprise and I will totally be re-visiting this one without a doubt.
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Kill Fuck Die
Release Date: April 29, 1997
The Good:
The Bad: K.F.D, Take The Addiction, Little Death, U, The Horror
The Indifferent: My Tortured Eyes, Killahead, Kill Your Pretty Face, Wicked Love
Ok, so I’m really not sure what the fuck I just listened to. I remember hearing a lot about this album but again, I never gave it a listen. Unlike Still Not Black Enough, I wish I would’ve left it that way. I pretty much chalk this album up to Blackie just trying to explore the world of techno industrial metal. First off, he was about 3 years too late on this one and second, he proved that he’s just not good at this at all.
There are some really shittastic songs on this album but what really bums me is that there are some well written songs on here. Songs like My Tortured Eyes, Killahead, Kill Your Pretty Face, Wicked Love are all great songs but they are completely ruined by the delivery. If they would’ve been played and recorded in the vein of the previous albums I think that they would’ve been fantastic listens. The majority of these songs are just totally unlistenable and making it through them was painful.
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