Spread Eagle hit the scene in 1990, just as the Hair Metal
\nExplosion (HME) was about to get hit with Nirvana. Too late to ride
\nin on the coattails of Poison, Winger and Skid Row, who by this
\ntime had established themselves as headliners, Spread Eagle only
\nhad the last few Saturday nights of
\nHeadbanger’s Ball<\/i> to get their message across.<\/p>\n
If only more people had been turned onto them. I remember first
\nseeing this band on
\nHeadbanger’s Ball<\/i>. Their video was for the 7th track
\n“Scratch Like A Cat.” The video was a performance video, complete
\nwith a black backdrop and a large logo on the stage a la Poison.
\nThe band scorched its way through its short song with enough
\ninteresting licks and drum parts that made me go out to the record
\nstore the very next day and lay down my money for this tape.<\/p>\n
The tape starts out with “Broken City,” an epic ballad type
\nsong, complete with slow parts and then more aggressive parts.
\nVocalist Ray West does a very impressive Axl Rose squawk when he
\nwants and while recording this track, he must have wanted to sound
\nlike Rose. “Back On The Bitch” continues the momentum. Third track
\n“Switchblade Serenade” was\/is my choice for a second single. It’s
\nsomewhat poppy hook, chorus and lyrics “I gotta wicked woman\/ Woman
\ngot a vicious tongue\/ Late at night I come home a little drunk\/ and
\nwe go one on one\/ Sittin’ in the kitchen\/ Listenin’ to your
\nbitchin’ \/ Every night of my life . . . You ain’t the same girl\/
\nSame girl I used to know\/ Love and hate seems to be our fate\/ And
\nit cuts me to the bone.”<\/p>\n
The raunchiest track, “Hot Sex” is a laughable attempt at being
\nlewd and crude with lyrics like “Hot sex\/ push it to the limit\/ Ah
\nyeah, do it till we’re satisfied.” Yawn. “Suzi Suicide” gets things
\nback on track with an all-out thrash song with lots of double bass
\npounding and guitarist Paul DiBartolo pulling licks out of his
\nstrings that, 10 years later, leave the listener impressed.<\/p>\n
Side two of my tape brings the band full-circle, expressing
\nindecision in a relationship in “Dead Of Winter.” “Scratch Like A
\nCat” still is the stellar track on this tape. “Thru These Eyes” is
\nthe band’s ballad, but even here, the band didn’t confine itself to
\nstupid sentimentality. Sure they walk the borderline with these
\nlyrics, “Love’s passed by and left me here\/ You’re so far away\/ and
\ntime’s brought on a change.”<\/p>\n
“Spread Eagle,” easily the band’s anthem, is about an exotic
\ndancer as West explains, “In a stripper bar, ready for hot T&A\/
\nDirty li’l lady thrown down in my face\/ Show me all the things you
\ncan do.” Raunchy stuff here.<\/p>\n
The tape ends with “Shotgun Kisses,” which would be my candidate
\nfor third single. It’s story about “Daddy’s little baby made my
\ndreams come true” appeals to the bad girl motif that blanketed the
\nearly 90s metal scene, Winger’s “Seventeen” coming to mind.<\/p>\n
In the end, Spread Eagle is a band worth revisiting. Their
\nfollow-up CD sucked so bad I won’t even peak your curiousity to
\nseek it out. Instead, find their self-titled disc for some
\nexcellent epoch metal. Some of the material sounds a bit
\nclich\u00e9 10 years later.<\/p>\n
But the overall essence of this band is not the lyrics or the
\nsleaze attitude. Instead, check out this band because of guitarist
\nPaul DiBartolo and drummer Tommi Gallo. They steal the show with
\nprecision and power examples of playing their respective
\ninstruments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":25283,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6258],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-36489","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-spread-eagle","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36489"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36489"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}