You know when those first licks come storming in on 'Eat Me Up Alive' that you're likely in for a real treat of some kind, but who would have expected Ratt of all groups to actually come together long enough to put together an album that rivals their mid 80's peak? Especially since, you know, Robbin Crosby bit the bullet back in 2002? I know I sure as hell didn't, but that's what the world got four years ago in the form of Infestation. It was their first studio outing in 11 freakin' years and it sounded like a million bucks. It's a coked-up shot of adrenaline to a dying breed of metal, devoid of the self-parody that Steel Panther revel in or the excessive theatricality of The Darkness and their ilk.

In other words, Ratt are really fun and heavy in equal measure here, and they haven't done an album this consistent since..well, ever. You've got the snarling 'Lost Weekend', the face-stomping yet bluesy 'Look Out Below' and even a few Sunset Strip hook-laden throwbacks like the AOR-tinged 'Best Of Me' and the spacey ecstatic closing fireworks of 'Don't Let Go', but the highlights are numerous. The choruses are so well put together that you wonder if Stephen Pearcy has been *gasp* going through something resembling vocal rehabilitation since the late 90's. Who woulda thunk it?

That being said, as of 2014 it doesn't look like we'll be seeing any new Ratt for quite some time due to Pearcy's choice to leave forever. But hey, if that's how the curtain falls on one of the Sunset Strip's biggest bands ever, then they couldn't have ended on a better note with these songs. Great revivals like this are rare in any genre, but for sleaze enthusiasts like myself it was a godsend.

At first analysis, the idea of modern metalcore colliding head on with the sleazy fun of W.A.S.P., Ratt and Kix is something that would give even the most open-minded metalheads a moment's pause. They'll scratch their heads and think "...how the hell would that even work Ant-man? Do they have breakdowns with a few gang choruses or something? Do they do meth and coke at the same time? Could my GF jam to dis sheet?"

I can give a tentative yes to the first of those things (and maybe that last one too), but that's only one of many interesting blends between these highly variable classes of headbang that you'll hear on Feel The Power. Tru-metal it ain't, but this album brings glam into the 21st century better than anything else I've had the pleasure of stuffing down my earholes, and that deserves a healthy stack o' kudos, because party metal this good is NOT something you'll find just lying around.

The two best examples of what I'm talking about here are illustrated oh-so-succintly in slam-dunk opener 'Deathwish' and the anthemic stampede of a closer 'Sleepless Nights'. The former's led by a deliciously layered call-and-reponse refrain and a helluva double kick and the latter is a near-Iron Maiden level melodic gallop that erupts into two utterly sublime guitar solos at the midpoint bridge.

Anyway, what separates this gem from the rest of the rockpile is the curious yet engrossing contrast between two very different paradigms of metal (contemporary metalcore and 80's styled hard rock/glam) and how these elements manage to play off one another in unexpected ways from song to song. Sometimes you'll get a chorus straight out the Killswitch Engage book of hooks set up against a Def Leppard wall-of-sound musical green screen, and sometimes you'll get something that sounds like Slave To The Grind meets Darkest Hour. Love it or hate it, you gotta give credit to these pioneers for taking ingredients that would normally sit rather awkwardly together on your musical shelf yet managing to make a pretty scrumptious sandwich out of them anyway.

As I said before, there's only a handful of really great modern AOR and glam groups around today to keep the flame alive, but this band is a wonderfully inventive example of the sort of fun you can have with some good songs and a great musical premise to play with. Now get to 'em!

For all intents and purposes, "hair" metal (and AOR as far as the mainstream were concerned) was completely dead in the water by 1994. Those longstanding L.A. Sunset Strip acts that had been snorting coke off strippers while swimming in giant jello pools only four years earlier were trying to change with the times and it wasn't working out so well (see Ultraphobic from Warrant or Dawn from Danger Danger). And the super players like Ratt and Guns N' Roses? Either on hiatus or scrambling to find somewhere to fit themselves in the wake of the new grunge/alt. rock/boy band paradigm.

However, if one kept an ear to the ground long enough...signs of life could still be heard. Glam only had the barest hint of a pulse at this point in the decade, but almost all of it was because of great outfits from other parts of the U.S. that simply didn't give a fuck about what was charting or what wasn't. Bands like Texas's resident sleaze pranksters Dangerous Toys for instance!

Having a heavier, blues-rock n' roll edge to their sound than their Californian neighbors, these boys had one of the best debuts in the glam metalverse back in 1989. Led by the spastic, high energy vocals of Jason McMaster (founding singer of progressive thrash metal band Watchtower back in 1985) and one hell of a backing rhythm section, they would continue to kick ass all the way up to this album in 1994...albeit with some very bitter feelings toward the music industry and the "ADD riddled" population by the time they arrived to Pissed. Less polished and noticeably "heavier" than their debut and sophomore albums (which is ironic considering Pissed was produced by frequent Yes collaborator Billy Sherwood) this was an excellent bronze age set of headbangers that was let loose unto the world...and then promptly ignored by radio stations and the media.

But hey, that's cool. Great music gets forgotten all the time. Half a century from now when glam comes back in style, people will look back on facesmashing classics like the title track, 'Paintrain', 'Illustrated Man' and the smooth pickin' 'Hard Luck Champion' as the masterpieces they are, and everyone and their robot clones/overlords will be covering them at an H.R. Giger bar near you. I'll even bet you that space freighters truckin' between here and Jupiter will be blasting their Trans-Ams to the flow of 'Oh Well, So What!" and its flesh eating punk-blues riff as they charge their hyperdrives.

And I, in my cybernetic wheelchair-car as an elder statesman for all that is heavy metal, smooth jazz, progressive rock and chocolate covered ants, will probably still be jamming this as a harem of beautiful women descend their pleasures upon me....and make me forget, at least for 40+ minutes, that I'm living in a future full of robot clones.

A brilliant beginning to a story that ended far too soon, this funk metal/glam metal hybrid slice of awesomeness is a true blue example of what happens when you bring a beer keg three hours late to the party. It may be the best friggin' brew on the planet, but by the time you arrive there everyone has already had their fill. And in the world of contemporary heavy metal, 1992 was very late indeed to be trying to combine the majesty of Queen, the production of Def Leppard and the funky fire of Primus into a singular, muscular sound that radio audiences could still eat up.

Still, you can't help but be a little bit amazed once you take a bite out of T-Ride's one and only LP. For starters, you have Geoff Tyson on lead guitar...the ONLY person on the planet besides Steve Vai to graduate from the tutelage of Joe Satriani with flying colors. You also had Eric Valentine on the drums and producing, a really talented guy who would later go on to work with Queens Of The Stone Age, Slash and even Third Eye Blind on their '97 debut. Couple these two powerhouses with the snarling machine gun vocals and bass skillz of Dan Arlie...and that's some sweet mofo magic you just can't top easily.

Furthermore, this is a bona fide glam metal album you can dance too without any problem whatsoever...and yet it's still heavy as ****, as the propulsive pair of 'I Hunger' and utterly delirious 'Hit Squad' demonstrate in spades. Despite the vestiges of a reverby 80's production job threatening to smother the proceedings, the sheer manic glee that these three virtuosos brought to the studio is infectious, and nothing overstays its welcome. Even the power-pop tinged opening number 'Zombies From Hell' is only 4 and a half minutes long...and that's the longest thing you'll find here. Brevity may not always be desired in an album, but with the whole album only clocking 35 minutes from start to stop, you can appreciate how they can maintain a high level of energy and throw in some cool details for variety's sake simultaneously.

Even if early 90's funk/alternative metal doing the tango with super slick L.A. hair metal seems like something you'd care to do without, I assure you all that this sucker has so much going for it that you'd be doing yourselves a disservice if you don't give it a fair shake. Do you really think it would make it to #3 on this list otherwise? Party on!

Some people tell me I don't give enough of my ant-eating love to Canada. And...they are probably right. But I'll let you folks in on a little secret: my favorite glam metal album from the 90's onwards, which is also one of the best hard rock albums that nobody seems to know about...is, in fact, the sophomore release of one of the better non-Rush Canadian bands to come out of that era.

That 1993 release, Mood Swings, is a truly strange outing that managed the difficult task of bridging the excess of the 80's with the then in-vogue grungy "alternative" rock that was dominating radio at the time, and as far as I know its one of maybe two or three albums from the first half of the 90's that really nails that elusive middle ground. It only charted high in Canada and (interestingly enough) Japan, but the ingredients for the album's appeal are obvious from the first time you spin opening number 'Saviors Never Cry' or the "big" single 'No Justice' that immediately follows: huge guitar dynamics, propulsive and immediate hooks and a surprising amount of variation going on throughout the low-end. Lead vocalist Harry Hess (formally of heavy metal band Blind Vengeance) and his virtuoso guitarist counterpart Pete Lesperance have a killer songwriting and performance chemistry. Out of the 11 songs here, only one isn't an immediate winner...and that's pretty rare considering there are "classic albums" out there that fall into average territory once you take out the key singles that got them attention in the first place.

Perhaps the funniest thing about Mood Swings though is that even twenty years later, Harem Scarem themselves haven't been able to recreate it nor top it. Hell, just this past year they re-recorded the album for no reason and released it as "Mood Swings II". And, as you can guess, it's pretty meh. Despite having state of the art production values, you can't bottle lightning twice. Hell, most bands can't even bottle it once...

Just take my word for it, check out a few songs, and pick this album up amigos. Heavy yet poptastic perfection like this shouldn't be forgotten!

Whether you realize it or not, you subconsciously have a pecking order in your mind for the genres and music scenes you care about. Perhaps you are someone who loves modern thrash but doesn't care for blackened grindcore. Maybe you follow the comings and goings of various European DJs in progressive house. Maybe you are someone who only loves outlaw country and noise pop but can't stand progressive rock...or albums like the one I'm about to review here.

Whatever your poison, we are all aware of the bands and artists in their little stylistic corners of the world that stand heads and shoulders above others in the arena. Maybe they have an energy that eludes their peers, or perhaps there's something special to the songs themselves or even the way they put on a live performance. You rank them & prioritize them in your head without even realizing it. But all you had to do was hear them once and you knew they were magic. It didn't take 20 listens. It just took one.

For AOR and 80's-centric rock enthusiasts like myself, Work Of Art were that magic bullet in 2008. They formed in 1992 in Sweden, but didn't release their debut album Artwork until founding guitar virtuoso Robert Sall managed to convince an unknown but insanely talented singer named Lars Sasfund to quit his day job and front the music he was writing. It took fifteen years of fanagling, but eventually stars aligned and Lars decided to throw in his lot with the band. Things got moving quickly after that: The suits at Frontiers Records only had to hear a single demo before immediately signing them in 2007.

It only takes a few seconds into opening number 'Why Do I?" to make you think that fifteen years of Sall painstakingly sharpening his songwriting as he fruitlessly tried to recruit Lars into the fold was actually to our (the audience's) benefit. These guys have a terrific, absolutely cracking sense of melody, and its only made better once Lars and his charismatic voice take the spotlight. By the time 'Maria' and the fantastic 'Camelia' arrive, the band's source of musical inspiration suddenly becomes very clear: its late 70's/early 80's Toto! It really is an uncanny resemblance to the nth degree, and you kinda want to applaud them: Toto are a MUCH harder group to emulate than, say, Journey or Survivor.

If the songwriting was weak in any way, such a comparison would be fairly eerie, but Work Of Art managed to beat the masters at their own game here in two specific ways. Firstly, some of the stuff here is heavier than their primary influence: listen to that spacy, surprisingly modern axework on 'Cover Me' or the swaggering 'Lost Without Your Love'. Secondly, Toto never put out an album from start to finish besides their self-titled where the killer hooks just kept comin' from beginning to end. Hell, Artwork has so many stellar choruses and bridges from song-to-song that its almost overwhelming the first time you spin it, but that's such a great problem for an album to have ya know? Normally people complain about the opposite (too many songs, not enough memorability). Hell, they even save the best for last: with it's ominous chords and huge riff, 'One Hour' is one of the coolest closing songs I've ever heard on a non-concept record in any genre.

In closing: this album (and more specifically this band) is the pinnacle of AOR in the modern era, and while they manage to keep topping themselves (2011's In Progress is also a melodic monster, and this year's Framework is going to kick ass too), nobody else comes close.

Of all the feelings I could feel when watching a movie for the first time, nostalgia is definitely among the rarest. I've seen director Jim Mickle at work before, but this is the first time he's pulled off something near-magical behind the lens. Watching this Michael C. Hall led thriller vehicle (which also features the magnificent Don Johnson and a surprisingly taciturn Sam Shepard), the feeling that I'm watching some lost collaboration between early 80's John Carpenter and the Coen Brothers is striking indeed. The fever dream cinematography, unsettled pacing and synth-heavy score are such obvious calling cards to the former that I had to pinch myself a few times to realize it wasn't one of my favorite directors at work, and yet there's a strange quirky balance between the unfolding drama, violence and understated dialogue between the cast to make me think just as much of the Coens. And let me tell ya, it's not a bad blend at all.

Without spoiling too much, Hall plays a Texan family man in 1989 who wakes up one night to find a masked intruder in his house. After shooting and killing the intruder, he becomes the talk of the town and eventually runs into the man's father...who has just gotten out of prison and isn't happy that his son is dead. You think you know the rest of the story from this point on...and yet you really don't. Things get quite interesting from here on out.

One thing I really love about this film is how it really nails the late 80's in mideast Texas to a T. The look, the way people dress, the music on the radio...they really turned the clock back to '89. The script, while not perfect, is also played out without your typical plot contrivances to drive the story. Very organic without making too much of a fuss about transition. When the violence does arrive, it is rather striking in it's bloodthirstiness, and you like it because it wasn't announced with a thousand trumpeting harbingers beforehand. You don't need to be sold some imitation of tension to believe there's lives on the line: you get it without having to be told.

Special kudos really need to be given to Johnson here: he really steals the show once he comes into the overall picture. I've seen him in a lot of things, but his charisma is just bleeding out like crazy here.

I'm not really cut out to be a film critic truth be told, but a movie with this much inner vitality and composure is a treat when the moon is right. I lament that Carpenter himself hasn't done a film like this in what feels like eternity, but I suppose the vengeful ghost of one of my favorites eras is better than nothing at all in 2014.