Don't Go Away Mad, Just Go Away. With Girls, Girls, Girls, Motley Crue ditched the pink and tried to remake themselves as bikers that like strippers. The results were rather goofy, but the album managed to go double platinum at the time on the strength of the title track and "Wild Side". They were a pop metal favorite with a couple of catchy singles, but a pretty mediocre album. When it came time to record their next album, the scene was offering two vastly different options to them. They would never be a thrash band, but could they rock as heavy and with as much attitude as Guns N' Roses? Not likely and if they tried, no one would have taken them seriously. So the other option was taking the final leap down the pop road that they had started on so long ago. A road paved with Bon Jovi platinum by this time. They picked the perfect producer to take them the final leg on the pop highway. 

Bob Rock to that point didn't have too many credits to his name. In late 1988, he helped The Cult make a major crossover into a hard-rock band with major pop polish, but prior to this his biggest credit was the much derided Zeppelin rip-off band Kingdom Come. Rock ended up being the man that Motley needed to kick their popularity into overdrive. But that choice would have major repercussions on the thrash movement as well. 

On Dr. Feelgood, Motley Crue tossed away any semblance of metal they had tried to cling to up to that point. With the aid of Bob Rock's lush production, the Crue were now a heavy pop band in the tradition of Bon Jovi and Def Leppard. It took them fully into the pop mainstream and left their previous double-platinum success in the dust by giving the band the most successful album of their career. It landing them at No. 1 on the album charts and eventually sold over six million copies in the US(according to the RIAA.) Going softer and softer had fully paid off. 

The Unforgiven Metallica spearheaded a movement within metal; while the genre was going more pop, they were taking it in the opposite direction. After the tragic death of Cliff Burton, the band roared back with the heavy hitting And Justice For All. But their previous aversion to making music videos was lost, and with the release of the video for "One," the MTV mainstream got a taste of Metallica and loved what they saw... thus establishing them as a major MTV band. 

Motley Crue helped take metal pop while Metallica thrashed away with the heaviest music that many people (outside the underground of metal and punk) had ever heard. So it was ironic that Metallica would take inspiration from Motley Crue when it came time to record the follow up to And Justice for All. Lars loved the sound on Dr. Feelgood, so the band hired Bob Rock to mix their next album, but Rock soon assumed the role of producer and Metallica was never the same again. 

Bob Rock's influence is infused in every note of the Black Album. Metallica abandoned thrash for a more MTV friendly sound. To be fair, every Metallica album evolved musically. The raw intensity of Kill Em' All gave way to the more polished heaviness of Ride The Lightning, which turned to the melodic thrash of Master of Puppets, which led to the controlled intensity of And Justice For All. But the Black Album was a major shift. The heaviness and jamming were replaced with the vocals far more prominent in the songs, providing a platform for James to show off his "new" vocal style. Hardcore fans hated it, but once MTV got a whiff of it a new--much larger--audience was there to embrace the band. And embrace it they did. The Black Album hit the stratosphere and put Metallica in the mega-platinum universe occupied by Bon Jovi, Def Leppard and Guns N' Roses. In fact, they would go on to surpass Jovi and Leppard and come just short of the dizzying success of Guns N' Roses. 

In the end, the two different roads for mainstream metal, which seemed to have such a vast distance between them for most of the 80s, converged in the early 90s. While the more pop orientated pop metal bands like Bon Jovi and Def Leppard have enjoyed continued platinum success, Motley Crue and Poison suffered a deep decline in popularity once the glam bubble was burst by the grunge movement. Both bands can still attract half arena crowds with nostalgia, but it's nothing like the fame they enjoyed in the 80s. Motley Crue's studio albums after Feelgood, the self-titled album and Generation Swine, have only gone gold (500K in sales). Their last studio album, New Tattoo, didn't even sell enough copies to go gold. Poison had only one gold studio album after grunge exploded. 

(This was written before Motley's latest album Saints of Los Angeles was release. So here is where this article gets updated from the version that was posted on Zane's blog).

Motley Crue did enjoy a slight rebound with the 2008 release of Saints of Los Angeles, which enjoyed 99K in first week sales but soon declined after that. 

Guns N' Roses, now down to just Axl Rose as the sole original member, continue to grab headlines and fill concerts despite going over a decade without a new album. Their greatest hits album went triple platinum. The long in the making Chinese Democracy hit Best Buy stores in late 2008 with little promotion or fanfare but was certified platinum in February. 

Metallica are still enjoying the fruits of the audience that the Black Album brought them. In the wake of that album, new fans delved into their back catalog and years after release those titles were going multi-platinum. The band's studio output following the Black Album has met with a barrage of criticism for a departure from the band's signature metal sounds, but that hasn't stopped those titles from selling millions either. Load has sold over 5 million copies and the follow-up Reload sold over 3 million copies. The cover tune comp, Garage Inc, and their live symphony album, S&M, have both sold in excess of 5 million in the U.S. Their 2003 studio effort St. Anger went double platinum. Their 2008 effort Death Magnetic, where they finally ditched Bob Rock and went back to their roots, moved 2,466,000 copies in the U.S. during the last three months of the year to land as the fifth largest selling album of the year, ahead of Kid Rock's mega-successful American Jesus and mega-hyped boyband of the moment: the Jonas Brothers.

So in the end, it was the bands that originally took the heavier, less commercial road, that have sustained the greatest success. Though Metallica did lose some fans over the years for their stylistic changes, they had retained enough credibility with millions of diehard fans that those fans still line up at record stores to buy the new Metallica albums when they come out. Motley Crue can't even attract 500,000. Nikki Sixx's solo band only moved 10,600 copies of The Heroin Diaries the week it hit stores, despite a major "mainstream" press push. 

This should be a big lesson to the suits at the record companies. The road less traveled may just be paved with gold and platinum and lead to far more riches then jumping on a bandwagon in hope of cashing-in on a fad. You may enjoy some instant gratification and short term success, but in the long run when you sell your soul and credibility, success can not be sustained. Guns N' Roses and Metallica didn't set out to be multi-platinum bands by using a keen ear towards creating music based on "what sells". They instead made the music that they believed in and the masses embraced it, not just for its quality, but for its honestly. Motley Crue and Poison went after the "what sells" market and did enjoy some success, but in the end their appeal slid right along with the popularity of the fad they were chasing. Remember there is only one letter difference between fad and fade.

Take a good look at any major label roster today and you see a lot of bands chasing today's trends like Motley Crue and Poison did. What you will not find are new bands like Metallica or Guns N' Roses, who don't pander to the mainstream or "what's hot". It may give the labels some short term gain, but in the long run it's a losing game. Remember this the next time you hear a record exec complain about a drop in sales. Their new products aren't selling, but strangely enough old releases from Metallica, AC/DC and Guns N' Roses sell more copies today then most of the hyped, next-big-thing-bands that the record companies are pushing. If they had only gone with the Motley Crues and Poisons a generation ago and passed on the Metallicas and Guns N' Roses, these labels would have tossed most of their profits out the window and deprived millions of fans of music that has withstood not only the passing of fads, but also the passing of time. 

At least Nikki Sixx will be able to entertain his grandkids; not with his music, but by showing them his old press photos. Those should be good for some laughs around the holiday table, even though they once almost brought my friend Rob to tears. 

Now playing: Songs that sound as good today as they sounded 20 years ago. How many songs from 2009 will we still be listening to in 2029? 

Footnote: AC/DC 2008 return Black Ice was released as a Walmart exclusive and sold an amazing 3,418,000 copies by the end of the year. 

[Note: Before you fire off hate mail to me, bitching that I went after the Crue for selling out while going easy on Bon Jovi, I'll explain why. Bon Jovi never jumped on bandwagons or chased trends, they help create trends. They started out with a commercial friendly sound, and while many will fault them for that, they never claimed to be something they were not and then changed when popular taste did. That's a big reason why they have retained their fanbase loyalty. I know you'll say, "what about the country album?" But is that really much different then "Wanted Dead or Alive?" I've never been a Bon Jovi fan, I don't own any of their albums, but I will defend them in this comparison because, love them or hate them, Bon Jovi has never tried to be anything other than Bon Jovi.

As for Metallica selling out, that's still a rather heated and open debate. I see both arguments in that one, but for the record I don't own any of their albums after And Justice, (written before Death Magnetic was released) and to me the Metallica that I loved was buried with Cliff. They were not the same band without him. But that's just my opinion, and as I pointed out in the article they still have a HUGE fanbase that buys their new music. And if anything, they alienated more people with their musical changes on each new post Black album. Not a very smart way to sellout if that was their goal. The Black album on the other hand...] 

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