Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Shirley You Can't
Be Serious Podcast. I am here today with my black
cowboy hat, my mass scara, and my leather buttlss pants.
Speaker 2: Jason, Hey, I've got.
Speaker 3: My stubble going, I got my cowboy, have got my
sunglasses on, I got some lipstick on.
Speaker 2: Dale. I'm ready to go. I've we've got the fire
technic set up here.
Speaker 3: And we're ready to go. That is awesome, everybody.
Speaker 1: We are here for our very special episode on Poisons
album Open Up and Say Ah, released thirty five years
ago this month. We are super excited to be talking
about that and we are super excited to have our
special guests for the day, mister Dale Selby Dale, how
you doing man?
Speaker 2: Thank you guys, appreciate it. I love love being here.
This is really exciting. Great to be back in Oklahoma.
Big fan of the show since day one, proud Patreons
porter of you guys, and really excited to be here.
I anticipate nothing but a good time as we break
this album down.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Dale has mentioned that he is a Patreon member. Guys,
if you want to join up on our Patreon page
and then say hey, can you guys have us as
a co host by all means, yes, we are willing
to hoore ourselves out.
Speaker 2: And just like the backup singers for Poison's.
Speaker 3: First tour, Dale is a good college buddy of mine
and so it's good to see him.
Speaker 2: And he's back in town.
Speaker 3: And I guess the three of us all went to
OU and it's a little little Sooner reunion.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Sound a good time?
Speaker 3: Yeah, all right, guys, you guys are ready to talk dirty.
Speaker 2: Yes, let's talk dirty.
Speaker 3: Okay, before we get going, Dale brought us a present.
Speaker 2: I can't come and empty handed.
Speaker 1: The man Patreon subscriber, co host gift giver. I'm pretty
sure that we're gonna you know, this is really cool,
cry tough hearness.
Speaker 3: Okay, let's see what we got here. Oh nice, Yes,
we have a pop Rocks Brett Michaels with the vandana
and everything he's got thrown up the little horn sign.
This is greatbody.
Speaker 2: My son collects these. He tends more towards the Marvel
and Star Wars kind. But I saw this the other
day and I thought this after we talked, and you
guys invited me up here, so I thought, what better
gift to bring you guys, maybe have a little Bret
Michael's watching over us as we.
Speaker 1: Have this Funko pop shall be the first Funco pop
on the studio shelf over here.
Speaker 2: Fantastic. Thank you, buddy, you appreciate that. That's nice. Okay,
thank you for bringing me up.
Speaker 1: Well, you've definitely primed the engine. We all are now
remembering what we were listening to back in nineteen eighty eight. Yes,
and so May of that year. I can remember going
to Hastings Records with my mom because I was like,
new Poison album is out. I didn't buy very many albums,
and so I was like, we're going I would love
to go and get this and she's like, sure, I'll
take you. And then I realize, oh crap, this doesn't
have talk Dirty to me on it.
Speaker 2: That's the old album that has talked dirty to me.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh my gosh, I don't know which one
of these I get right, And my mom was like,
why don't you get both?
Speaker 2: Nice? That was a memorable day.
Speaker 1: Ready to go look what the cat dragged in and
open up and say, oh, same.
Speaker 2: Day double taper.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Hastings Records in Central Mall, Fort Smith, Arkansas.
Speaker 2: DLLE, What about you? Did you on this album? I
owned this album. I think I got mine at sound
warehouse in Oklahoma City. I think if Memory Service was
at the corner of Rockwell and Northwest Highway maybe in
Oklahoma City. Nice.
Speaker 3: Okay, now here's my question. Did you guys own the
original cover?
Speaker 2: Yes, day it came out, so don't remember. I don't
think I did. Okay.
Speaker 3: So I got mine as a birthday gift from my
buddy Dax Junker down the street, Daks. If you're listening,
hit us up on email, hit us up on Facebook.
My fifteenth birthday would have been May fourth of nineteen
eighty eight. This album dropped May third of eighty eight,
and I remember he came over to my house gave
it to me as a birthday gift, and it was
the original model with the giant tongue. What do you
think about this album cover?
Speaker 2: Well, it's interesting.
Speaker 1: The size of the tongue leads you to believe that
there's some other bodily part that suggested other than a tongue.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: The album title adds to that belief. Yes, And then
you got the question of who is this guy? It's
a girl or girl or girl?
Speaker 2: Yeah, what is she supposed to look like? Is this
a cat? Is this a demon?
Speaker 4: Is this?
Speaker 2: What is this exactly?
Speaker 3: It's like a tiger girl thing, right, you know?
Speaker 2: So do you have an answer for us? Well, here's
what I know.
Speaker 3: I know that they changed the album title to open
up and say Ah. The original album title was called
Swallow This. A little more suggestive then, right, So I
think that they said, you know what, let's clean that
up just a little bit. Although I think they should
rename this album. I don't like open up and say ah,
but I think an album title like nothing but a
Good Time would have been and a better title rather
than open up and Swallow.
Speaker 2: This, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: So that's just my personal opinion. By the way, this
episode drops May second of twenty twenty three, this album
will have just turned thirty five years old.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, all right.
Speaker 1: I don't have a lot to go into on the history.
We've got some incredible songs to cover, and I'll throw
some tidbits in as we go through.
Speaker 2: I'll give you a very abbreviated history.
Speaker 1: So these guys were from Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. Brett Michaels Ricky
Rockett who were not born Brett Michaels and Ricky Rockett.
Speaker 2: You got their original.
Speaker 3: Names for me, Sir Brett Michael Sycheck so.
Speaker 2: Cc Deville was Bruce Anthony Johannson, Bobby Doll, Robert Harry Kaikendahl.
Ricky Rockett was born Richard Allen Reim. Ricky Rockett gets
more girls.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So both Brett and Ricky had been involved in
bands before they got together. They got together after Brett's
first band, which I believe was called Laser.
Speaker 2: Is that right?
Speaker 3: Brett had a band and started like in the sixth
grade and called him Laser. Yeah, and then Ricky joined
and they were called the Specters. The Specters. Do you
think it was a James Bond thing. I don't think so.
Speaker 1: No, Okay, something about ghosts. Anyway, they didn't stick together
with that band. They decided to branch out because they
had more They had bigger dreams than the rest of
the band seemed to have. And one day they run
into this guy who's calling himself Bobby Doll in a
I think it was a dairy queen. They met him
at a dairy queen and he had the same ambition
that they had.
Speaker 2: He had just been playing in garage bands.
Speaker 1: But I think his words were, these guys had day jobs,
and I wanted to play with guys.
Speaker 2: Who wanted to do only this, right.
Speaker 3: I want somebody dedicated and who wants to be a
rock star.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so they got together with a guitarist and
his name.
Speaker 2: Was Matt Smith.
Speaker 3: Matt Smith, he needs to work on his stage name
a little bit.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, I don't know, it seems I don't know
when these guys came up with their other names. I
think it was probably when they moved out to Hollywood,
but I'm not sure. But you know, you look at
bands like Guns n' Roses, who obviously wasn't wasn't a
thing yet, right, But it seemed like that was the
thing to do once you get to the Hollywood strip,
was rename yourself.
Speaker 2: Right. Sure, Matt Smith probably didn't hang around long enough
to get his stage name. It doesn't sound like I
think he got frustrated as the band was making their
rounds around La. Yeah, here's the deal.
Speaker 3: So he went out to LA with him in eighty three,
and he left in eighty five.
Speaker 2: Right before they hit They hit it big in eighty six.
Speaker 3: Right right, Jim Matt just the wrong time to jump
off that train.
Speaker 2: Buddy, My gosh. Now I will give him credit.
Speaker 3: He realized he had got his girlfriend pregnant, was like, crab, guys,
I'm not gonna leave my son fatherless. I love rock
and roll, but I'm going to go back and be
a father to my son.
Speaker 2: So all the cred in.
Speaker 3: The world this guy left the Hollywood dream and the
rock and roll lifestyle to be a dad.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so now they're without a guitarist and the guitar
and Matt Smith was kind of the centerpiece of the
music of the band.
Speaker 3: I mean he was he was in charge of the music.
Speaker 1: Bobby Doll was kind of in charge of the business
of things, and Ricky and Brett were like.
Speaker 2: Let's do the band image.
Speaker 1: And so they're without kind of their main music guy.
And so they start auditioning local guitarists and basically it
comes down to two guys. C. C. Deville, Yes and Slash.
Speaker 3: Can you imagine Slash from Guns N' Roses and Poison,
I can't.
Speaker 1: It is a fit that doesn't fit, and I think
that was kind of the primary issue. I mean, Slash
is kind of an easy going, not glamorous guy. And
CEC de Milt they didn't like it, Like even at
the audition they didn't like it.
Speaker 2: They're like, this guy's kind of a dick. Wasn't playing
what they asked him to play. The other right, he's like,
I don't want.
Speaker 3: To play your music, listen to what I've got.
Speaker 1: And now that being said, what he had was talk dirty,
that's right, because he had come from a band screaming Mimi's,
screaming Mimi's and had that song in his arsenal. And
I mean you got to say, hey, that's not a
bad idea to come in with that song and play
it strong.
Speaker 3: Well, here's the thing. I think that may been the
main reason why they brought him on board.
Speaker 2: You think it was because of that song.
Speaker 3: Well he could play, yeah, But so all three of
them thought, this guy's obnoxious.
Speaker 2: He's loud, he's rude, he's I don't know if he's
going to fit in. He rubs everybody the wrong way.
He's very New York.
Speaker 3: He's from Yeah, he's from Brooklyn. But he's got this
song right and it's great. Yeah, and I think we
can do something with that song.
Speaker 2: And he had the glam look that they were going for.
Speaker 1: He had grown up watching the New York Dolls and
was into that kind of idea of glam metal lily Yeah,
and that fit with what these three guys had going.
Speaker 3: So I read Slash's autobiography right, and I remember when
he auditioned for Poison, he had these like come up
to your knee moccasins, and Bobby Doll said to him, so,
would you like wear those type of shoes? Slashes like,
what's the matter with my shoes?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 3: He's like, yeah, we don't really like those type of shoes.
So they were much more interested in their image that
Slash was not going to be a part of them.
Speaker 2: So I think everybody ended up where they were supposed
to end up. I totally agree. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3: By the way, C C. Deville almost ended up in Striper.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that would have been weird. That would have been
a Christian rock band. Ye.
Speaker 3: Well, hey, Striper, people forget this. Striper was a big
name on the on the Sunset Strip and they did
have some success. They had a big selling album on MTV.
Speaker 2: They were big junior high years.
Speaker 3: They were they were now then they have not sustained
that success.
Speaker 4: But C. C.
Speaker 2: Deville has since become a.
Speaker 3: Born and green Christian, so maybe he would fit by.
Speaker 2: Now than he did at that time.
Speaker 1: Okay, so these guys became popular on the Sunset strip yep,
popular with the girls especially. They had girls who were like, Hey,
can we come clean your apartment and bring you groceries
just for the opportunity to hang out with the pretty
boys in the band. Sure, the pretty boys who, like
the other bands we've talked about, all were crashing together
in the same writty apartment. But they weren't successful enough
to pull a major record label. What they got was
this smaller record label called Enigma.
Speaker 2: That's a mystery to me. That joke.
Speaker 1: You knew it was coming. And so Enigma is the
one that puts together their very first album, the album
we just talked about.
Speaker 2: Look what the cat dragged in.
Speaker 1: Now, this album was made for thirty thousand dollars. That
I mean, if you just imagine how much is spent
on so many other albums that we've talked about, and
the success of this album to think that they did
it all for thirty thousand, a lot of which they
paid for themselves, right right.
Speaker 3: They didn't have the benefactor that.
Speaker 1: Like all of the other bands we talked about, these
guys invested in themselves and it paid off. They started
touring with Ratt and Cinderella and suddenly, little by little,
the album.
Speaker 2: Started to take off.
Speaker 3: First single off of that album was cry Tough, Right.
Speaker 2: I pointed out to you.
Speaker 1: Guys, you know I'd been a while since I listened
to it from the beginning, and we went into detail
on a song that was a major factor back in
the sixties by the Ronettes called My Baby. Same drum
and drum, same drum introduction, right, but here we come
in with this metal awesomeness in the guitar and it's
a totally different song.
Speaker 2: But it's not that single that does it for him.
Speaker 1: It's the one that CC brought to the band, that
makes them who they are.
Speaker 3: Okay, So here's the thing. When they released Krytop, it
had a little bit of success. They released it on MTV.
I don't remember it being a success.
Speaker 2: I don't either, And the.
Speaker 3: Record company said, hey, for your first record out of
the gate, you've done pretty well. You've sold two hundred
and fifty thousand copies. That's pretty good. Let's go back
in the studio, let's make album number two and they're like,
what are you talking about. We've got other songs we
want to release. They're like, no, it's too expensive. And
so Brett had to beg varrow and steal and basically
fund that video for top Dirty to Me. He's like, listen, guys,
we need one more single out of this. And so
they scraped together seven thousand dollars, They invited all their
friends out and they filmed talk Dirty to Me and
it goes through the roof.
Speaker 2: I remember when this was a huge song on MTV. Yeah,
seven thousand bucks. That's nothing back in the day.
Speaker 3: So this album goes on to become the most successful
album for Enigma in all of its history.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and Talk Dirty to Me is the song that
made me want to go out and buy the album
that we're going to talk about today, which is their
second album, Open Up and Say.
Speaker 3: Aw Before we go track by track, I've got a
little bit on Open Up and Say Awe.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 3: This album sold eight million copies worldwide, peaked at number
two on the Billboard two hundred chart, behind behind Faith
by George Michael.
Speaker 1: If you haven't caught that episode, go check out the
Shirley Can't Be Serious podcast episode on George Michael's Faith
versus in Excess Kick.
Speaker 3: That's right, so listen to this. The week that it
topped out at number two was June eighteenth of nineteen
eighty eight. Okay, Number one was Faith, Number two was
open Up and say Ah. Number three was Hysteria. We've
also covered that. Number four was Dirty Dancing.
Speaker 2: We've covered that.
Speaker 3: Number five is o UA one two, which we're going
to cover in about a month. Number nine is Appetite
for Destruction. Number ten is Bad. Out of that top ten,
we will have knocked out seven track by track albums.
Speaker 2: Three more to go, We're awesome. Yeah.
Speaker 3: This album was originally supposed to be produced by Paul Stanley. Okay,
now he got wrapped up in his own album at
the time, Crazy Crazy Nights, But he was a hero
to them, and in fact, Bobby Dall has that bass
with Paul Stanley's face on it and he plays it
through all these videos.
Speaker 1: The other interesting thing is that they covered rock and
Roll All Night for the Less than Zero soundtrack, Right.
Speaker 5: Mister Rocket, thanks you.
Speaker 2: That song also makes an appearance in the video.
Speaker 3: It does good time, it does, Yes, it does Tom
Mormon produced this album?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Tom Mormon is the guy. He's worked with Motley Crue
like he did Shout Out the Devil, he did Girls,
Girls Girls. Yep, they got a legit producer. You know.
I heard Brett talk about how look what the cat
dragged in was just a glorified demo.
Speaker 2: Took him twelve days to record that. Wow. So this
one they.
Speaker 3: Actually dug in, got a real producer, produced a real album,
and it's all parties and limousines.
Speaker 2: All right, guys, are we ready to jump in? Track
by track?
Speaker 3: Let's do it, man, I'm ready.
Speaker 2: Let's go all right.
Speaker 3: First song out of the gate is a song called
Love on the Rocks.
Speaker 2: Now right out of the box. Great opening guitar riff,
just hits you right in the face. Track one. This
is the perfect opening song for the album. I like
the line in there.
Speaker 3: I think I told you guys earlier that the original
title of the album album was called Swallow This, and
you've got that She's my poison, So why don't you
swallow this right? Call back to the original title there.
Speaker 2: I love the fast paced nature of this song. I
think this might have been another single perhaps for them
to release.
Speaker 3: It's a great one, right, this one begs to be
thumped out of my speakers driving down the road.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a tempole.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you're gonna put some tent poles on
the beginning of the album and then the album, this
is a great.
Speaker 2: Song as your first one out of the game.
Speaker 3: Poison had its own way of snagging groupies. So Bobby
Doll anytime he licked his fingers and pointed, that was
his clue to the roadies, that's the girl. Brett Michaels
would point out his selection, either during the drum solo.
Speaker 2: Or during the guitar solo, even some time to look around.
Speaker 1: Less likely to have a mistake that way too, Like
you're pointing, you're licking your fingers and pointing.
Speaker 3: To a crowd, right, and then like this one, how
about that one?
Speaker 4: This one?
Speaker 2: This one? Are you serious? Now?
Speaker 3: Listen, here's what Ricky Rocket would do. He would throw
his drumsticks at the one. He You know, Dale, you
and I were talking before we started recording. Poison always
advertised that they were all about having good time and
rock and roll.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this checks all those boxes we talked before. This
is not you two, This is not the Beatles. This
is fun, ear candy rock and roll, kick ass a rock.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not Living Color. Right, we're going to talk
about Leaving Color next week. Living Color is a great
rock band, but they're more political, they're more conscientious. There's
you know, intelligent, smarter, Yeah, better musicians. Yes, so that's
gonna be an interesting comparison. But this is just straight
fun rock and roll. Okay, we're ready to jump into
track number two. Let's go to maybe the single greatest
party rock song of the night eighties. This song is
called nothing but a Good Time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is a fantastic song. I think the opening
is a great guitar riff, maybe second only to Talk
Dirty to Me. I think this was the mega hit
that really established them as super rock stars. Yeah.
Speaker 3: This was the first single off of the album.
Speaker 1: This was a combination of a guitar riff by Ceci
and a chorus by Brett.
Speaker 2: They go together seamlessly. It is perfection.
Speaker 3: It's a song for the working people, the people that
are breaking their backs every day. Right, Yeah, it's totally relatable.
It's for the working man. We've all had jobs that
we hate and we just want to turn on the
rock music.
Speaker 5: Hands don't do it or wait, hand you can hear me.
Speaker 4: This is what I'm saying.
Speaker 6: Good time, that's what the guys back in the mechanics bird,
that's the thing, that's exactly right.
Speaker 3: I definitely would say this is the greatest party rock
song of the eighties. It is everything that Poison advertised
themselves to be.
Speaker 2: See uh reasons.
Speaker 5: Breaking a bone, The good laps a crab.
Speaker 3: It's a great crunchy lick. The chorus is singable, something
we can relate to.
Speaker 2: The guitar solo is fantastic, and.
Speaker 3: Then you got that like pumping drums in the middle
of it when it kind of breaks down.
Speaker 2: It so fun. Love it by the way.
Speaker 3: He was released an April of eighty eight, made it
to number six.
Speaker 2: On the charts.
Speaker 3: Do you want to hear them?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 2: I definitely want to hear them. Yeah? What beat? What beat?
This song?
Speaker 4: Out?
Speaker 3: Here are the five songs that are better than nothing
but a Good Time in eighty eight. Number five Dirty
Diana by Michael Jackson.
Speaker 2: That's fair. That is honestly, that's a fantastic song. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Number four New Sensation by an Excess like it.
Speaker 2: Well, it's a good it's a really good song.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Number three Pour Some Sugar on Me, well obviously, okay.
Number two Mercedes Boy by Pebbles.
Speaker 2: Well, now we have our loser.
Speaker 3: I like Pebbles and I like Mercedes Boy, but come on,
nothing but a good time, no way. The number one
song this week in nineteen eighty eight by let that's
July of eighty eight is the Flame by Cheap Trick.
Speaker 2: Great, something wrong my bag? But yeah, I can understand
that that was a huge, huge song back then.
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, can we talk about the video for a second.
Speaker 1: First, let me say the video starts off with that song,
just like you said, It starts off with Conroll Night, Yes,
the one that they had covered off of from Kiss
And there's a guy washing dishes listening to this song.
That guy was the same guy who was in the
Motley Crue video You're all I need.
Speaker 2: I was hoping to blow your mind.
Speaker 1: So, but that being said, I'm shure I'm going to
show you guys this. I mean, I'm sorry you know
podcast audience that you can't see this, but look at
the cover for the single for this song.
Speaker 2: Right right now, I'm going to show you the cover
for the single for wow song. Like they're identical.
Speaker 4: Guys.
Speaker 1: If you want to go check out the You're All
I Need single cover versus the nothing but a Good
Time single cover, they may very well be standing in
front of the exact same curve, like literally, the arms
are around each other in.
Speaker 3: The exact same way.
Speaker 1: Like it is uncanny, how alike these two albums are crazy.
Speaker 3: That's the song You're All I Need, the one I
said was the best song off Girls, Girls, Girls that
you ripped me for last summer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's terrible. It is still terrible. No, it's so good.
Speaker 3: So that's the guy who kills his girlfriend and You're
All I Need video. Yeah, okay, I just want to
play something for you, all right. I want to play
you the song Deuce by Kiss. You think first five
notes are the same five notes?
Speaker 2: Okay? I thought it sounded pretty similar.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's It is definitely very It's a variation on
a theme, I would say, But.
Speaker 2: I would say Cec pulled it off better. Yeah, I agree.
It's more of a beat version of that riff.
Speaker 1: He twists it up instead of letting it kind of
they let the air out of it on Kiss. But
I'm also not the biggest Kiss fan, so you're probably
not gonna they can convince me otherwise on that one.
Speaker 3: So the director on this video is a guy named
Mark Ryshevski.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: This was only his second directing attempt. First one was
a band called bond Iron Sleeping Alone.
Speaker 2: This is his second one.
Speaker 3: The next one was Britney Fox Girls' School.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Britney Fox.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Then he did Cinderella Coming Home, which is we're gonna
be covering later on this year Cinderella versus LU eight
one two right, yep. And then a couple videos later
he was doing skid Row I Remember You, which we
covered on our Motley Crue Versus skid Row combination from
what was it last year?
Speaker 2: That was two years ago?
Speaker 4: Wow?
Speaker 2: Crazy.
Speaker 3: That's a pretty good string of hit songs right there,
hair metal hits coming Home maybe my favorite song off
of Long Cold Winter. You have to stick around and
listen to that episode to find out. Okay, So in
this video you and I were talking about how this
is a theme that Poison has throughout their videos. There's
number one constant movement, high energy, flashy clothes, tons of
clothing changes, tons of different guitars, bright colors.
Speaker 2: Big hair, especially on cz Big Hair.
Speaker 3: Those pyrotechnics, they get too close to him. Yeah right,
Case's got a giant school guitar.
Speaker 2: That's really cool.
Speaker 3: You have tons of pyro and it all finishes off
with loads of confetti. It's like they're inviting you to
have fun with them. Yeah, but I love that in
the middle of this video they're all holding their guitars
over their head and they're they're kind of doing this
pump action, and then the pyro is going off behind him,
and you know, Ricky's patting the drums. It's just so
much fun.
Speaker 2: I don't know how anybody can resist this song. Yeah,
I've said it over and over again. It's candy for
the ear. You know, it's a guilty pleasure and it's
a fantastic song.
Speaker 3: I defy Cameron Ecker to say this is not a
great song.
Speaker 2: We love you, Cameron. All right.
Speaker 3: We done with this one, guys, thanks, So yeah, all right,
We're onto the next song. This song is called Back
to the Rocking Horse.
Speaker 2: This is a definitely a toe tapper, a pencil tapper song.
That's great, great, great drunk track. This is easy to
listen to.
Speaker 4: For sure.
Speaker 2: That cow bell is infectious.
Speaker 3: Right, I got a feva, you got Cazi's guitars, You've
got that catchy chorus.
Speaker 2: This is a level down.
Speaker 3: From nothing but a good time, but it's still a fun,
good time rock and roll song.
Speaker 2: I like that chorus where they kind of bring in
a little harmonization to it as well. They do that
on another song or two on this album too. I think, yep,
it's kind of fun. I'm with you.
Speaker 3: I think that the line my parents think I'm crazy
and the doctor says I've cracked was kind of appealing
to me as a fifteen year old. Sure, you know,
I think this is a great name for a podcast,
Back to the Rock and Horse, because that's what we
do here at the show that you Can't Be Serious podcast.
We go back in time to the time where we
didn't have any responsibility and all we had was time
and fun.
Speaker 2: Back to the Rock and Horse. Okay, we're good, all right, good.
Speaker 4: All right.
Speaker 3: That brings us to the next song. That song is
called good Love.
Speaker 2: This is a good song. It's not my favorite one
on the album. I do like how they brought in
the harmonica there at the beginning. That's pretty unique to
this album.
Speaker 3: It's like they invited Hugh Lewis on this album.
Speaker 2: Right, It's not my favorite, but I still like it.
It's not a skipper.
Speaker 3: I definitely think it's got that bluesy feel.
Speaker 2: It's more more aerosmith, almost like a southern rock feel.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's Brett Michaels who's playing the harmonica on this one.
Speaker 2: This is kind of a hidden gym for me. I was.
I was pleased to hear them do this more bluesy sound.
I dig it.
Speaker 1: It's a nice standard blues mix, and yeah, I agree
that the harmonica coming in is pretty cool.
Speaker 3: I heard Glover from Living Color talk about how hip hop, rock,
heavy metal all.
Speaker 2: Has its roots and blues.
Speaker 3: It's kind of interesting that you get Poison on one branch,
Living Color on another, and then Beastie Boys on another.
So okay, I've got some interesting medical history on Brett Michaels.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 3: First of all, at age six, they found out that
he was insulin dependent diabetic.
Speaker 2: He said, at age six he was feeling really terrible.
He actually stayed in the hospital for three weeks.
Speaker 3: Throughout his career, he has constantly given himself injections. He
even had to run off stage one time three songs
into a set, but listen to this. So in nineteen
ninety four, after a night of partying, Brett crashed his
Ferrari into a telephone pole, knocked out all of his
front teeth, messed up his face, broke his nose. In
two thousand and nine, he was hit over the head
with a prop while performing Nothing but a Good Time.
In twenty ten, had a whole bunch of pain, realized
that he needed to have an emergency appendectomy. From that appendectomy,
he had a blood clot that worked its way to
his brain, so he had a major brain hemorrhage that
almost killed him.
Speaker 2: I remember that.
Speaker 3: I mean he was knocking on deak door, had to
have brain surgery, and then in twenty eleven they found
out he had a birth defect, had a hole in
his heart. It hasn't all been nothing but a good
time for Brett Michaels. Kind of an interesting medical history then, yeah,
all right, so now we are getting ready to talk
about the song Tearing down the Walls. Okay, guys, this
is my favorite of the non singers. Oh wow, yeah,
so I.
Speaker 2: Love this song. We were talking earlier. You don't really
like this so much? It's not my favorite. I think
it starts out a little slow. Once you get to
the bridge through the chorus, I'm in yeah, but it
doesn't have the kickstart that some of these other songs
do on the album, so maybe I'm I'm spoiled by that.
Up to this point, it's a little more low key.
Speaker 1: I kind of I like the guitar riff at the beginning.
Inn At I dig that beginning, And then you were
saying that you like it where a bridge is into
the chorus, right, so let's listen to that here.
Speaker 4: Street.
Speaker 2: That's great. I like that too.
Speaker 3: I think my favorite is when they kind.
Speaker 2: Of break it down and do the drums.
Speaker 1: It's very foursome sugar on Me style of you know,
you're just singing over that kicking drum beat. That's my
favorite parts. It's a cool little ditty that I'm surprised
didn't come out as a single.
Speaker 3: Me too, right, This is the song that I used
to thump going to baseball practice from the high school
parking lot to the baseball field.
Speaker 2: I don't know. We just, for whatever reason, we love
this one.
Speaker 3: When he says you're my silhouette, ecstasy like sex on
the beach. As a fifteen year old, we were like, heck, yeah, man,
sounds great. Sign me up, but drinking or doing I'm in.
Speaker 2: There.
Speaker 4: You go right, turn.
Speaker 2: Party time, rock and roll.
Speaker 3: I hate to leave this one so early, but maybe
I'll just play it.
Speaker 2: A little longer when I do the edity process. Okay,
so that's the end of side one.
Speaker 3: Hit stop on your tape player, kick it out, flip
it over side two and we start off with look
but you can't touch?
Speaker 2: All right. This is another one with a great, great
guitar intro. I love it. I love how it goes
from the opening riff to c C to drums to vocals.
How it just layers on that transition. I think it's fantastic.
This is a song about a girl. It tells Brett
Michael's note kind of a rare thing. I might have
to write a song about this.
Speaker 1: Am I remembering Rath that he had a reality show,
yes about him telling other girls know he did well
sort of back in two. I think I watched one
episode of that, and it was when it was down
to the last two and one of the two thought
the way to seal the victory for herself was to
open up and say, ah, if you will.
Speaker 2: I kind of thought all of them did that. Well,
it didn't work out, really, it did not. Did he
turned down?
Speaker 1: Yes, he was, and so much as to say, well
I already know what's in this package. I'd like to
go see what's in that other package.
Speaker 2: So one of them was a stripper. The final two
one was a stripper, one was more wholesome. I guess
you could say, uh huh. And there was all this discussion, wait, wait,
good girls go to heaven, bad girls go to hell. Yeah,
so there was a lot of talk amongst the girls.
I remember this because my wife and I watched this
series together and there was a lot of discussion about, Okay,
he's not gonna pick you because guess what the song
Every Rose Has Its Thorn is about. It's about a
stripper who broke Brett's heart. Why would he pick you?
And so there was all this kind of cat fighting
going back and forth. Yeah, yeah, on who he was
going to pick anyway, was so you picked the good girl,
he picked the good girl, and later the good girl
they it didn't work out, shock right right. The good
girl actually came back and said, you know what, Brett,
you should have picked the other one. You should have
picked her with her than you would have been with me.
Speaker 3: Wow. Wow, So she did tell him though she did, yeah,
write a song about that.
Speaker 2: I think this one could have been another single. I
don't know how the Tipper Gore faction would have thought
about this song and terms of its lyrics and its ideas,
but so I agree with you.
Speaker 3: I think this could have been a single. It does
tell a story about the girl. You know. Look, but
you can't touch. The equivalent to this song from Look
What the Cat Dragged In to Me is I want action.
It's goofiness and it's fun, and it's about sex and
strippers and funny lyrics, crunch of guitars, killer guitar solo,
a lot of fun again, constantly rock and roll fun.
All right, onto the second song, Side two, huge song
from Summer nineteen eighty eight. This song is called Fallen Angel.
Speaker 2: I've probably watched this video for the last few days.
I probably watched it twenty times.
Speaker 4: I love this video.
Speaker 2: Okay, coolantastic?
Speaker 4: All right?
Speaker 2: Now what do you think?
Speaker 4: Man?
Speaker 2: This is my favorite song on the entire album. What
I Spike in the Football.
Speaker 1: For Me?
Speaker 2: Great guitar intro, again, I'm gonna take back what I
said earlier. This is my second favorite guitar intro for
Poison after Talk Dirty to Me. Wow, it's strong. It
is strong right again, they're going with the layering as
you know. It goes from intro guitar, drums, CC, and
then the vocals. It's fantastic. I like how they do
the harmonizing in the chorus where they singing the word angel.
It's a fantastic guitar solo at the end by Stac
as well.
Speaker 3: So you've got that great hook opening the song up,
You've got a fantastic chorus. The song tells the story.
It's mature songwriting. Cec kills it with the guitar solo.
If it were not for the absolute next level of
another song we're going to talk about here in a minute,
this would be the best song on the album.
Speaker 4: Okay.
Speaker 3: So I absolutely love this song and for me lyrically,
this is their most mature works on the album. This
song was their second single, made it all the way
to number twelve correct number twelve on the Billboard Hot
one hundred. Now then I've got a list for you.
I just want to pop this off really quick. The
eleven songs that are better than this. Don't Be Cruel
by Bobby Brown, Please Don't Go Girl by the New
Kids on the Block, Not a Chance right, What's on
your Mind by The Information Society.
Speaker 2: Good song.
Speaker 3: I Hate Myself for Loving You by Jone Jet That's
a winner. I'll Always Love You by Taylor Dane Ouch,
Groovy Kindle Love One Good Woman by Peter Setara, Don't
Be Cruel by Cheap Trick. We got two Don't Be
cruels ahead of this. Don't Worry, Be Happy, red red Wine,
and Love Bites. This was the week that Love Bites
hit number one.
Speaker 1: Red Wine is on my Doug Gray list of I'm
Gonna Pull My Ears Off a terrible song.
Speaker 3: Yes, all right, we got to talk about the video.
The acting at the beginning is awful. So you have
this girl named Susie Hatton who was a singer, songwriter, actress,
Brett's girlfriend. Brett's girlfriend. She's the fallen Angel and at
the beginning she's like, Dad, I got something I want
to tell you.
Speaker 2: What else it? Honey?
Speaker 3: Dad, I'm moving to California and I want to leave tonight.
Oh no, And he looks over and Mom's overacting to
the fullest.
Speaker 7: Dad, there's something I want to talk to you about, true, Ronnie,
what is it?
Speaker 5: Well, I've decided to move.
Speaker 3: Move where to California?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's bad acting.
Speaker 3: So you got Anthony James in this, he's her handler.
Speaker 2: Okay, I've got it. I've got info on Anthony James. Ny,
let's have it. Okay. So you pointed out to us
earlier in the week that he was in Naked Gun
two and a half.
Speaker 3: He's getting ready to assassinate Priscilla Presley while she's in
the shower.
Speaker 2: Right, and he starts singing the way we were. Yes,
he was also, all right, the proprietor of the saloon
slash billiard establishment and unforgiven how about that skinny And
unfortunately he's no longer with this. He died in twenty twenty.
He was aged seventy seventy died of cancer. But yeah,
very recognizable face. If you saw it, you'd be like, oh, yeah,
that's that guy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he is a definite that guy.
Speaker 2: Now here's the thing.
Speaker 3: When he's dragging the Fallen Angel, you know, she leaves
the dinner party, goes out to grab her, kind of
roughs her up a little bit. She kicks him in
the balls, I mean it's three stooges like performance.
Speaker 2: Grabs his nuts, falls over.
Speaker 3: And then of course she gets on Brett's Hollywood taxi.
Speaker 5: Job, puts him on the hill.
Speaker 4: Whirl right.
Speaker 2: So you have to look really quickly because it's a
very quick shot of the gas tank on his Harley Davidson.
It's a heritage soft tail Harley Davidson motorcycle. Okay, painted yellow.
It's got some black and white checkering stripes, which typical
of the taxi cabs of the day. Yes, so Brett
rolls up in this thing. It also makes appearances in
other poison videos Unskinny Bop and also ride the wind
both off of flesh and ble. Yeah, this particular motorcycle
is not on the road anymore. I can see it
if you want to interesting. Okay, we're gonna go to Mexico. Yeah, okay,
We're gonna go to a town. And so there's a
town on the Yucatan peninsula. It's called Puerto Aventuris. Yeah,
I've been to Puerto Aventurists before. We did not stay
at this particular hotel, which is a hard rock riviera.
They have a suite there called the Bret Michaels Rockstar Suite. Wow,
get out of here. Inside the suite I sent you
guys a picture of it earlier this week. There is
a glass encasement inside this suite that has the Hollywood
Taxi nice. Hanging next to it is the guitar from
the video for Every Rose Has Its Thorn that Brett
is playing at the beginning. They get me acoustic guitar
he's playing at the beginning. It's hanging right next to it.
I called this hotel to see if they could talk
to me about it. I was asking about Ray. Yes,
they didn't really want to tell me. I think it's
one of those suits where if you have to ask
how much it is, you can't afford it. Yeah, it's
nine thousand square feet. Oh my gosh, has its own gym.
It's got a beautiful veranda looks out over the Gulf
of Mexico. So you and your significant other, your girlfriend
wife can go there and stand in front of this
big glass encasement and do whatever you want to do
in the privacy of your own hotel room.
Speaker 3: All right, Shirley fans, The challenge is, can you send
the three of us to the hard rock Riviera. I'm
just kidding that that would be awesome. I'd love to
stay in there and see the Hollywood taxi.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you fly to Cancu, you drive south on I
think it's Highway three oh seven there, right right along
the coast.
Speaker 1: So this video Fallen Angel. The director had directed a
video right before this video called Angel the Band, and
he was hot off of a three set of videos
that he had done for a band that we've covered
and is probably responsible for making sure that this band
was a success. Okay, this singer had his girlfriend in
the video and showed up with his Jaguire that wouldn't run.
Speaker 2: You got it?
Speaker 1: White Snake, You got it? Marty Colner, Yeah, I'm responsible
for HBO and It's success. Who's responsible for a ton
of videos.
Speaker 2: And this was early on in his video career.
Speaker 1: Had just finished up doing his White Snake run and
started hit Scorpions, hit Aerosmith, and here we are with
Fallen Angel.
Speaker 2: His first video for Poison.
Speaker 1: He would go on to do Every Rose has Its Thorn,
Unskinny Bop and something to Believe It.
Speaker 3: I just listened to our episode on get a grip
on Aerosmith and he did the Crazy video and he
was the guy responsible for bringing liv Tyler in. Hey Steven,
I want your daughter to be a stripper in this video.
Speaker 2: Is that cool? So how about that? There you go? Okay?
Speaker 3: Now, then we've done with Fallen Angel, Yes, because we
were about to embark on what D says is the
greatest rock ballad of the nineteen eighties, stand by it.
This song is called every Rose Has Its Thorn.
Speaker 2: That's great. I can name that song in one side.
Speaker 1: So we talked about the song when we did our
best of nineteen eighties we did. You said it starts
with a sigh and was inspired by a cough.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: And you mentioned a little bit earlier dating a stripper,
and it was a guy in the stripper's bedroom that
Brett Michaels overheard on the phone as he was calling
per to to see what was up, and he was
realized we both got.
Speaker 2: To go our separate way.
Speaker 3: Why is there a guy in your bedroom at three
o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2: He was in a laundromat in Dallas, Texas. That's right, yeah,
my town. Yes, or he made that phone call.
Speaker 3: Uh huh right after a set at a country bar.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, this song.
Speaker 1: First radio station to play this song was a country station,
and we talked about in our Best of eighty eight episode.
It topped the rock charts, it topped the Hot one hundred,
and it topped the country charts, and He's crazy.
Speaker 3: It was the last number one song of nineteen eighty
eight and the first number one song of nineteen eighty nine,
their only number one hit. And you were talking about
his girlfriend, Tracy Lewis. Yes, I heard Brett talk about this.
I listened to his story today.
Speaker 2: He called back. She answered the phone.
Speaker 3: She's acting sleepy, trying to dump him on the phone,
like I can't talk right now.
Speaker 2: I'm really tired. Call me tomorrow.
Speaker 3: And he hears a in the background and it was
a mail cough and that at that moment, his heartbreaks,
and I want it.
Speaker 4: Soon be here right now, every road as it's dull, and.
Speaker 3: I think it's so cool that you have rockstar guy
can have any girl in the world, still manages to
get his heartbroken. We can all relate. And that relationship
he said they were they went everywhere together and they
were best friends and then all of a sudden.
Speaker 2: So yeah, that's that's the theme song of the song.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 2: You can have all these things as a rock star, girls, money, drugs, whatever, right,
but there's always something that can that can hit you,
that can prick you like a like a like a like.
Speaker 3: That's all right, that's funny.
Speaker 2: We'll leave it in. By the way.
Speaker 3: Tracy Lewis is her name. She's an exact dancer. They
dated from eighty four to eighty seven. She was sixteen
when they started seeing each other, and rumor is that
she was with another band member from the La Strip
scene at that moment, and that Brett knew him personally,
but he has never released his Name's got an idea, yeah,
and Steel, I mean it could be Vince Steel, right,
maybe definitely possible.
Speaker 2: You and I both had this in our top five
of eighty.
Speaker 1: Eight, and you still turn up the radio when it
comes on. This is in that pour some Sugar on
Me category. It does not get old.
Speaker 3: I told you that when I when I had the tape,
it said had a little sticker on it says contains
the hits nothing but a good time, fallen Angel and
every Rose has its Thorn. And I remember when I
got that tape, I was like, how did they.
Speaker 2: Know that it's going to be a hit.
Speaker 3: I mean, they're they're calling their shot with that one.
But it's interesting because the record company did not want
to release this song. They said it's too cowboy, it's
too slow, it's not poison, and Brett was like, no,
I believe in this song. We need to release it.
We've played it live, it works live, and the guys
in the band back him up on it. And I
think he has mentioned that Ceci wasn't really a big
fan of the song initially, but stood up for Brett,
stood up to the record company, and they agreed to
release it as the.
Speaker 2: Third single I'm bringing. Brett's an emotional guy. He poured
his feelings out in Something to Believe in Flesh and
Blae on the Flesh. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: There's a couple of things in the video I want
to point out.
Speaker 3: Okay, First of all, Bobby Doll looks like he's about
to die in the video.
Speaker 2: Oh He's like passing out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and they're like haul of his dead bones off
the stage. Yeah, And every time I see that, I'm like,
what what what happened there?
Speaker 2: How he lived through nineties? Seriously? Yeah?
Speaker 3: And also there is a shot where Brett is throwing
a towel at somebody as he's walking off stage, and
you see this kind of big samoan looking fellow next
to him.
Speaker 2: Yeah that's his bodyguard. Yeah, that's the guy who died.
Speaker 3: Correct, And Something to Believe In was written about that guy?
Speaker 2: How about that Ceci's sad guitars in This gets me
every time. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's not speed metal. It doesn't need to be speed metal.
It is soulful, beautiful, hits you right in the fields.
Speaker 3: Song about getting dumped.
Speaker 7: Yeah, been there, done that all right? Now, then that
brings us to the song your Mama Don't Dance, Your.
Speaker 5: Mamma Don't Dance and Your Dad and a rock.
Speaker 2: I think this song maybe more than any Earth, at
least as much as any on the on the album
showcases CCS talents right from the beginning.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a cover of an old Loginson Messina song.
We talked about Kenny Loggins a little bit when we
did our Footloose episode as well as our Top Gun episode.
Speaker 3: That's right, and his.
Speaker 1: Relationship with Messina and how they kind of fed off
of each other. But you're right when the intro sounds
very similar, little you know, a little heavier on the
guitar at the intro, but then Ceci comes in with
that lead and you're like, oh no, this is poison.
This is not the folk rock of Loginson Messina. This
is glam rock that we love.
Speaker 2: From the eighties.
Speaker 3: You know, when we did use your Illusion one with
Guns N' Roses, they did a cover of Live and
Let Die, And I remember at the time Slash and
Axel were listening to old songs that they could cover
that they thought sounded like hard rock songs that needed
to come out, And I think the same thing here,
Like when I listened to the original version of this,
I'm like, it's kind of a bluesy rocky song, but
it's a hard rock song waiting to be born again,
you know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, they say that you got it, You're out, you
bring it on.
Speaker 3: Late Big from nineteen seventy three. This one actually got
to number ten, So I wanted to talk about that.
This is the fourth single reach number ten in April
of eighty nine. Now, I won't read through the songs
that are that are better than this song, but I
did want to point out something to you. In this
top sixteen, there's a song that we talked about before
called Room to Move by an Emotion.
Speaker 5: That song, well, that song.
Speaker 2: Lead singer on that song.
Speaker 3: Cynthia Rhodes, Star from Dirty Dancing from His Penny Wow. Yeah,
that was when that song peaked.
Speaker 2: Out on the chart. Also star of the Rosanna video.
Speaker 3: Absolutely one hundred percent. That does not have Patrick Swayze.
Patrick Swayze, I'm not sure about great song love It Fun,
good Time.
Speaker 2: Again.
Speaker 3: They took a song that was just kind of bluesy
rock it turned it into a great pop rock song.
Speaker 2: Alright.
Speaker 3: That brings us to the last song on the album.
This song is called bad to Be Good.
Speaker 4: Walk as.
Speaker 3: The Okay, So this one's really a showcasing Bobby Doll
at the beginning.
Speaker 2: It's nice bass riff coming in here. It's strong.
Speaker 1: You don't see him coming out as kind of the
showcase in any of these other songs, but it really
he comes out in the song.
Speaker 2: I think it's a great job. I like the song.
It's not my favorite on the album, but not a skipper.
I think it's a good I think it's a good song.
Speaker 3: This is the only song on the album that I skipped. Wow,
this is the only one and it's not because it's
not a terrible song. It's just I'm ready to get
back to love on the rocks.
Speaker 2: That was awesome.
Speaker 1: Before we like completely leave the album, I wanted to
show you guys something, so I grabbed this picture off
of a video. This is this is CC's guitar and
you see that it's a little fuzzy, but can you
see that face?
Speaker 2: Okay? Yeah, might remind you of anything? No, which guy?
Speaker 1: Okay, So it's buy an artist named Patrick Nagel and
we've talked about him before.
Speaker 2: Yes, the Deuranderan Rio cover.
Speaker 1: So CEC has a guitar that has the same artist
that had created the cover for the Rio album. Same
artists created the face that is on his guitar.
Speaker 3: Awesome, all right, So that wraps up the album. Let's
talk reception real.
Speaker 2: Quick, okay, okay, Yeah, so I found something on this
Rolling Stone Magazine nineteen eighty eight review. Let me just
read you the first paragraph. We'll see where it goes
from there. The sole positive attribute of Open Up and
Say ah is that it very neatly illustrates the folly
of banning album artwork. When the first pressing of AHWA
Shift the hanchos at Walmart took one look at its
grotesque cover featuring a hellion and tiger stripe makeup with
an ob sanely long tongue, and refused to stock it
on their pristine racks and act carried out in finest.
Save the children to tradition the sole positive attribute of
this album. Yeah, Wow, Rolling Stone was not a fan.
I don't care what they say. This is a pop
rock masterpiece. I agree. We're fifteen years old. You and
I are fifteen at the time. I think you're probably twelve.
D Yeah, this was a fantastic album for the teenager. Yeah. Right,
Is this going to change the world?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 2: Is this gonna make people think?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: Is this gonna make people have a good time?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: That's what it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean this is these guys were hanging on
to the glam still. I mean, you'd gone through with
the seventies glam rock, You've gone through it with Kiss.
Motley Crue brought it back in by this time. He
By this time Motley Cruz started to take off their
makeup and drive their motorcycles with the stubble to the
strip club. But these guys are still hanging on to
the glam and for the MTV generation, the pop metal guys.
Speaker 2: It is a definite hit.
Speaker 4: I love it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is literally nothing but a good time. Like
we're gonna talk later with the album that we're going
to compare to. This album is the album by Living
Color called Vivid, and it is not necessarily nothing but
a good time.
Speaker 3: It is.
Speaker 1: It is much much more than that. But the question
is at the end of it all, are we going
to grab the one that makes us feel good? Well,
we're going to grab the one.
Speaker 3: That well, we'll just see how Vivid makes us feel right,
absolutely all right. We'll come back next week when we
break down Vivid track by track by Living Color.
Speaker 2: See you guys then, Dale, thanks so much for joining us. Dale,
good to see you, buddy. Thank you for being here,
man for inviting me. Appreciate it. I had a lot
of fun. We will see you guys next week.