{"id":9556,"date":"1994-03-15T00:00:55","date_gmt":"1994-03-15T00:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=9556"},"modified":"2013-06-01T15:09:33","modified_gmt":"2013-06-01T15:09:33","slug":"album-review-motley-crue-motley-crue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-motley-crue-motley-crue\/","title":{"rendered":"M\u00d6TLEY CR\u00dcE – M\u00f6tley Cr\u00fce (1994) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

M\u00d6TLEY CR\u00dcE
M\u00f6tley Cr\u00fce<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nElektra (1994)<\/span>
Rating: 7\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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I never saw it coming \u2013 one of my favourite metal bands of all time emerging from the shadows of the crusty grunge invasion without Vince Neil. For me, Vince had always been the archetype hair metal front man \u2013 the looks, the voice, the lifestyle \u2013 but M\u00f6tley Cr\u00fce<\/a> circa 1994 was a different metallic beast, a serious, heavyweight dinosaur keen to impose itself on the current music scene.<\/p>\n

Fronting the band was journeyman John Corabi, one of metal\u2019s most underrated frontman, a chap who never seemed to hit the big time with his big voice and so maybe, just maybe, Cr\u00fce was the horse he needed to ride.<\/p>\n

Sadly, a majority of the fans couldn\u2019t deal with a Cr\u00fce bereft of blonde bombshell Vince and the album was poorly received. Despite hitting the Billboard at #7 it didn\u2019t sell well and critics believed that Cr\u00fce\u2019s time was finally up.<\/p>\n

However, years later I\u2019m looking at this record from a new perspective, hoping to separate it from other Cr\u00fce albums rather than compare it, which in the 90s so many people did. Maybe the band should have gone under a different name, because although there are a few Cr\u00fce trademarks here, particularly Mick Mars\u2019 riffs, this is very much a different sound.<\/p>\n

M\u00f6tley Cr\u00fce<\/em> is a dense, dark and formidable record, bereft of thrills and spills it almost labours from the speakers. Corabi\u2019s vocals are mighty, masculine in their venom, and there\u2019s no denying his soul, but time and time again I hear myself saying, \u201cbut is it Cr\u00fce?\u201d, and of course I have to say \u201cno\u201d.<\/p>\n

Album opener \u2018Power To The Music\u2019 chugs in on an unremarkable riff. Corabi is a top notch vocalist, but there\u2019s nothing here that grabs you. Sadder still, this five-minute opener already takes a quicksand hold and I\u2019m gagging by the time it\u2019s out. Second track is the moody \u2018Uncle Jack\u2019 with its cutting grunge-tinged riff. Tommy Lee\u2019s drums pound but again, like everything else on this record, there\u2019s no sparkle.<\/p>\n

M\u00f6tley Cr\u00fce 1994 is a band attempting to fit into the scheme of things, and I never thought Cr\u00fce would find it necessary to follow trends. Third track, \u2018Hooligan\u2019s Holiday\u2019, is more boisterous, the band still finding the need to drag these songs out. The riffs are ponderous, Corabi\u2019s choppy raps, despite being bold and bolshie, fail to find any identity amidst the dense riffs which clog up proceedings, drowning Nikki Sixx\u2019s bass in the process.<\/p>\n

There is something gargantuan about the whole concept of this record. Again, it seems aware of the trends, but we\u2019re offered a respite with the magnificent \u2018Misunderstood\u2019, which I still think is one of Cr\u00fce\u2019s greatest ever songs. The track wisps in on a Beatles \u2018Dear Prudence\u2019 (from 1968\u2019s The Beatles<\/em>) style vibe, swirling and swaying as a psychedelic ballad given a spine with the strings and Lee\u2019s solid drum. It boasts a cracking soulful chorus but comes into its own just over two minutes in with that chainsaw riff. It\u2019s my favourite track on the album, dropping colour into the muddy textures.<\/p>\n

\u2018Loveshine\u2019 is equally uplifting; it has a strong rootsy feel, wafting in on the breeze with its shuffling acoustic and this is where Corabi really comes to the fore. There\u2019s no way these songs would have suited Vince Neil, but then these are two different vocalists. Corabi\u2019s meaty approach is able to drag itself out of the thick smog, where Vince would have been swallowed within minutes.<\/p>\n

\u2018Poison Apples\u2019 keeps up the quality, a short and sweet rocker featuring a bouncy piano and real glam rock sleaze edge. It\u2019s just a shame the band revert back to that quagmire time and time again. \u2018Til Death Do Us Part\u2019 mesmerizes at first, then spirals into a cumbersome oath of as track, as is the trippy \u2018Welcome To The Numb\u2019.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no real variation here, with the band all too keen to create grunge-tinged episodes that clatter along like a treacle train. That\u2019s not to say that this isn\u2019t a decent record, but under the Cr\u00fce moniker is just doesn\u2019t work. It\u2019s certainly less messy than 1997\u2019s Generation Swine<\/em>, but a track like \u2018Dropping Like Flies\u2019, with its Alice In Chains-style swoon, pretty much sums up this gluey opus.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve seen and heard constant comments from people saying how John Corabi is a stronger vocalist than Vince Neil, and that can\u2019t be argued, but of all the M\u00f6tley Cr\u00fce albums this is probably the most dated in the sense that it is clearly trying to fit in with the grunge style of sludge. Many will disagree and say this is the band\u2019s best opus, but I\u2019ll always respond the same and ask, \u201cbut is it Cr\u00fce?\u201d, and put simply, it\u2019s not. And so it\u2019s time to end this review before it becomes as laborious as the record.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

M\u00d6TLEY CR\u00dcEM\u00f6tley Cr\u00fce Elektra (1994)Rating: 7\/10 I never saw it coming \u2013 one of my favourite metal bands of all time emerging from the shadows of the crusty grunge invasion without Vince Neil. For me, Vince had always been the archetype hair metal front man \u2013 the looks, the voice, the lifestyle \u2013 but M\u00f6tley […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[485],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-motley-crue"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9556"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9556\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12147,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9556\/revisions\/12147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}