tricky leppard blushing to hell and back

Tricky Woo
"First Blush"
Last Gang Records, 2005

The Darkness
"One Way Ticket To Hell...And Back"
Atlantic Records, 2005

Def Leppard
"Rock 'Til You Drop"
bootleg, 1983


It's the year 1900 and 99 or so, and I'm a wee tot in college. A freshman or some such shit. I was getting deep into the denim dudes of Turbonegro and needed more, more, more from that food group. I was rock-starved. Pop-punk had lost its appeal and felt quite ballless. A Canuck on the Screeching Weasel board and the advent of Napster introduced me to this band called "Tricky Woo," which seemed like a way fuckin' stupid name. It still sorta is. But man, were the songs I'd found fantastic! I heard some records and they were cool, but I never found them in this distant land to theirs. And after "Les Sables Magiques" was totally flat and terrible and un-rocking, I'd given up on them.

Fast forward to present. Band resurfaces and releases a record MORE ROCKING than "Sometimes I Cry." As the display on my phone reads, "dude, WTF?" What you got is this: heavy groove, psychedelic imagery, hippie innuendo, and total KISS meets Priest rock slabbage. We call it Hard Rock. Vocals touch on Steven Tyler and David Lee Roth territory. The guitar solos are way, way over-the-top and soaring. "Mistress of the Mountain" may be the jam to end all jams.

And we thought it all but dead.

Lots of bands had started bringing back the '70s staple that fell to the background behind punk, '80s metal, and other "guitar-oriented" rock (dude, WTF? Grunge?!). But they were getting lumped in elsewhere - and for good reason, as many had outside influences that made lumping them into other categories easier - Gluecifer, The Datsuns, etc. But The Darkness, now when they came out, there was no denying their "hard rock-ness."

"Permission To Land" brought lots of bonafied hard rock influences into a new hard rock package - sounds of Queen, AC/DC, Aerosmith, Def Leppard. Yep. It rocked serious ass, in a tongue-in-cheek fashion. Irony? No. But the band certainly wasn't stupid.

Now "One Way Ticket To Hell...And Back" drops and boy, what changed? The record lacks all the things I loved about the last one. There's way, way, waaaaay too much emphasis on the power balladry, and not enough attention paid to kicking eardrums in. "One Way Ticket" is a classic tune about cocaine, and "Knockers" is pretty good, too. But shit like "English Country Garden" has gotta stop. The record is weak, weak, weak in the overall. Not really worthy of repeated spins unlike the first one. So if anyone wondered how long the novelty of the Darkness would last, the answer is: one album. And maybe an EP.

Arguably, the band took the worst parts of one of the late '70s/early '80s best hard rock acts, Def Leppard. In cranking up "High And Dry," "Pyromania," and especially "Rock 'Til You Drop" - a bootleg of an LA arena show from 1983 - it's pretty damn easy to see the things that made the Leppard extremely popular. Amazing hooks, but driving rock songs that you could pump your fist to. Good guitar, and Joe Elliott could shred his throat with the best of 'em. Unfortunately, the Darkness saw fit to borrow liberally from "Hysteria," the steaming pile that made dudes scratch their heads and 13-year-old girls cream their panties thinking about the hot English rockers. Well, except that one-armed drummer...what a creep!

With "Rock 'Til You Drop," you get a soundboard show of Leppard in its absolute ripping prime. All the best songs from the first three records, a crowd going apeshit, and total schlock-y arena rocker stage banter. Cheesy, for certain, but the band hits on so many highs that the cheese is almost cool. A must-listen for any fan of hard rock music, from a band that is unfortunately too often remembered for the bad rather than the good. In 1983, you couldn't fuck with that band, and you still can't touch those records.

Bottom line: Tricky Woo is the new wave of hard rock, and the Darkness probably never was. Avoid that new record like AIDS. And if you don't know and need an education, pick up the Def Leppard records up to "Pyromania" and have your head twisted a little bit. YEAH, they really were THAT DAMN GOOD.

-Mike

www.trickywoo.org
www.thedarknessrock.com
www.defleppard.com