Night Songs
This blog has taken a turn to the worship of the forever underappreciated hair-metal era.
A massive album of that unfairly-hated time was Night Songs by Cinderella. Released 40 years ago this year, in the glorious year of our lord 1986 A.D.
We lost the guitarist Jeff LeBar a few years ago, I was aware of that. And I also knew they were from Philly, far away from the epicentre of the hair-metal scene in the Sunset Strip LA. What I wasn’t aware of was how much of a battle from beginning to end their career was.
As this 13 minute video-documentary from the excellent youtube channel guitar-meets-science details, they had a flash of supreme popularity that they managed to sustain from 1986 through to about 1991 before getting burned away by grunge. But even that brief moment in the spotlight was hard-won and sustained through a lot of grit and against strong headwinds, and not with exactly the happy ending that say, Def Leppard, experienced with the 80s rock saga.
This is afterall, a Cinderella story. The fairytale Cinderella was also a hard-luck story, but also with a moment of fleeting glory.
It was only in watching that doco above that I just suddenly realised how much I’ve listened to this album over the years and how widely loved, yet forever under-appreciated and somehow out of the mainstream, it is. It’s certainly not a band I’ve ever spoken to anyone about with in good’ole Straya. I suppose this is not how ACDC were marketed. Cinderella if you’ll observe, are quite unashamed in their feathered hair, zebra/leopard-patterned leggings and cowboy boots. Most people in this country probably wouldn’t dare touch it from the cover alone. What will people say? What’ll it do for my tough working-class bloke image? Get tha FUCK over yourselves, you fuckin’ dumbas knuckleheaded blokes. Seriously. It’s still rock’n’roll. And this is not Stryper.
Night Songs is an amazing album. I’ll admit that a lot of hair band albums were packed with some repetitive filler, but somehow Night Songs just sustains itself from start-to-finish. Its fun, dark, punchy, eery, sexy, gothic, haunting. Kindof everything. It’s getting clawed in the face by an angry cat.
The full album can be heard here, at a very digestible 36 minutes.. I have long been the proud owner of a vinyl copy.
Cinderella - Classic Lineup:
Tom Keifer – lead vocals, guitar, keyboards, saxophone, harmonica, steel guitar, mandolin, dobro (1983–2014)
Eric Brittingham – bass, backing vocals (1983–2014)
Jeff LaBar – guitar, backing vocals, slide guitar (1985–2014; died 2021) +++***RIP***+++
Fred Coury– drums, percussion, backing vocals (1986–1991, 1996–2014)
Also RIP to their one-time touring keyboardist, Gary Corbett, who died on the exact same day as Jeff: July 14, 2021.
****
The lyrics are Tom Keifer, who as the doco details, battled serious medical problems with his throat right through all the band’s active years. Did he push himself too hard with the growling in this debut? I guess thats what the medical evidence says. The damage seems to have seriously handicapped the rest of their career.
Was it worth it? Fuck, that’s an eternal question. What’s the price of great art?
There is no filler on this album. All these songs are bangers and once you’re in love with them you’ll actually be singing along to them, as though in your own private club or stadium. And thats what good 80s hair metal should be.
And dancing. Yes, you might even be dancing. Dancing to Metal. In fact I might even call this the most danceable metal album ever, though it’s got some challengers, (and they are pretty much also all hair-metal). Do it when you’re drinking at home in the kitchen. Go on give it a go. Or Sober if you have to, in light of what I wrote the other day. Sober’s fine, there’s nothing wrong with sober. Don’t forget your lighter as well for the ballads.
Shake Me was their scrappy bluesy overlooked debut song
Nobody’s Fool is the epic haunting Ballad that shot them to fame and probably their most famous song.
Nothin’ For Nothin’ was a ripper song credited in the liner notes as having been writtend by their good mate, and the man responsible for discovering them in a Philladelphia Bar, none other than Jon Bon Jovi.
Somebody Save Me is another interesting song on the album I’ve always pondered, with direct lyrics about the tedium of the pre-scripted anonymous middle-class suburban life and its hidden perils. (“And the shit you ate for breakfast will only get you cancer…”)
Hell On Wheels is the obligatory biker tribute that closes Side A.
As a matter of fact this would be a great biker-bar-fight-on-the-outskirts-of-town type album to listen to if you were ever to find yourself in that situation.
The production is amazing. The riffs are crunching and the bass is solid and heavy. The raspy lyrics growl, the lead guiatr lines squeal and distort. The drumming has a a kind of midtone clanigness to it, with a lot of snare and cymbals from what I can tell.
Anyway, the bands follow-ups aren’t without merit. There seems to have been an increasing tension between the demands for a big epic balld and bluesy rawness. THey’re not bad, but the balance is just never quite right as it is in their debut. The pressure of the road, the health issues, the mass popularity, label execs, and beleive it or not, geo-politics in playing the Soviet Union as Communism’s collapsing and trying to tour Europe as the original Gulf War and Grunge were exploding on the scene just kind-of shot everything to shit in the end. What could’ve been….
But Night Songs just locks in the best of the era they represented so perfectly maybe it’s enough, and many people would envy just one product like it as a legacy.
Anyway, what else. Today I joined One Nation. I hate leftwing people. If you’re leftwing stop reading this blog. I hate you.