I Wanna Rock: The '80s Metal Dream

Kip interview, take three.

Common mark.

What's it feel like to be a goddamn rockstar?

Being a rockstar is fucking amazing.

It's fucking amazing. -

What you live for is the moment you walk out on stage,

and you hear the crowd roaring.

Thank you very much!

The energy of all the people

and the noise they're making.

They're there to see you.

There's nothing like it, man. Nothing like it.

It's the highest high of all highs.

See you next time, all right!

I have a deep sadness in me

because, you know, I did not get enough of that.

The music business can be very hope-shattering

and faith-shattering.

But for that moment in time

where the band that you're managing is on the rise

and they're it...

there's nothing that quite matches that feeling.

I pick the bands that really, like, craft a good song.

It was September, 1984.

My friend said, "There's like this great new band.

They're fresh in town from Pennsylvania.

Do you wanna come to the showcase and check 'em out?"

I'm like, "Well, what's their name?"

I loved Poison.

It was so fun.

So I started courting them

and ended up becoming their manager.

Poison was the hardest working band in Hollywood.

They all lived in a two bedroom apartment.

They showed me videos when they were called Paris,

and they did all these Moötley Cruüe covers.

But I was like, never show this to anyone.

They never had a plan B,

and so they knew they had to succeed at this.

And I worked out a deal with the Troubadour

for Poison to play there every month, once a month,

and that the Troubadour would pay Poison's rent

and phone bill.

We had a meeting with Wes Hein who ran Enigma Records.

He offered them like $25,000 to make a record,

and they decided they wanted to do that.

They just didn't wanna do that cheap of a record.

Little did I know, you know, a few months later...

I kinda knew that Poison would do pretty well.

Did I think they would be as big as they were?

No.

Poison got mostly women in the early days.

And that's kind of a difference, the appeal.

You know, it has to do with the music,

but also clearly the image.

Their debut album, Look What the Cat Dragged In

has just racked up its first million styles.

Yeah, it's great. -

The rise of metal really began in the huge commercial,

you know, magazine's way

withLook What the Cat Dragged In

andSlippery When Wet.

Bon Jovi and Poison,

rock band with good hair,

rock band with great image and big hair.

I would not kick Jon Bon Jovi out of my bed.

Never.

And that was really

the breaking open of the gate

of metal becoming commercial.

Give me a list of the biggest bands of the era.

No, I'm not gonna do it. I won't go on record.

So...

Quiet Riot, Great White.

Twisted Sister.

WASP.

Moötley Cruüe.

Bon Jovi, Poison.

Warrant.

I can do better, hold on.

RATT. LA Guns. Guns N' Roses.

Autograph.

Stryper.

Def Leppard. Def Leppard were the best.

Cinderella and White Lion.

Faster Pussycat. Europe.

["Final Countdown" by Europe plays] -

Get that outta your head for the rest of the day.

MTV brought energy into the whole market

of metal going from pop music

to then suddenly grabbing onto metal 'cause they

could see the energy that you could see the enthusiasm.

They were able to market that and show people the clothing

the styles, the energy, the direction, the lifestyle.

You went from directing Michael Bolton...

to Moötley Cruüe.

Yeah, to go from Michael Bolton and "Everybody's Crazy",

even though I'm really proud of the video and the graphics

and everything we did. I just imagine

what he thinks of now when he sees that

and that look and that genre that he was attacking.

Moötley did "She Got the Looks That Kill".

I look at "Looks That Kill and I just start laughing

at the overdramatic it's almost like they're making a silent film.

It'sNosferatu, you know, it's like, the girls are...

are leaning back and screaming.

There's an absurdity to the whole concept.

It was funny but in a positive sense.

It's not funny to laugh at, going, you guys are idiots.

Funny going, "Yeah, that's what it's about."

Guys doing their guitar poses

or their guitar player fuck faces.

The music, the concept,

the groove is all fun energy.

"Smokin' The Boys' Room",

I said look, you guys can run over here.

You bust through this wall and run over here.

And Nikki looks at me and goes,

"Rock stars don't run,

we're not gonna run somewhere,

we're not afraid of anything." Just, no.

["Home Sweet Home" by Moötley Cruüe plays]

Coming backstage with Moötley when we're doing

"Home Sweet Home", Tommy in fishnet stockings

and other weird shit and makeup.

The absurdity of their outfits,

the absurdity of their hair,

the absurdity of what they're doing.

You know, they're not walking

down the street wearing that shit.

MTV would seed your visibility with a heavy track.

But they blow you up...

With gigantic...

...ridiculous...

...wind machine driven ballads...

...silly outfits...

...bombastic stupid videos.

The thing to do is to do the power ballad.

And I was like, we don't have one.

I'm not a, I don't write power ballads, you know?

I never wrote songs for a label telling me you have to

write this or write that.

I just wrote a song until I liked it.

"House of Pain". You know, I thought it turned out pretty good,

especially when you got Aerosmith

saying that's their favorite song.

And I was like, you rock.

Really quickly after I first joined the band,

we went in and started recording, was in the basement

of the Capitol Building.

The famous Capitol Records building

and that was a real eye opener there.

I'm gonna go in there and sing a couple songs,

it's a big deal.

It was a very big deal.

We thought we were finished recording the album.

Our label wanted to make sure that we had radio

friendly songs, we needed singles.

We had met Richard Marx.

He was like, "Oh, yeah, yeah, maybe we should work together."

The record company had told him we need a first single

for Vixen.

He's super talented

and he knows people.

He totally knew how to get the best out of all of us.

That's when he came up with "Edge of a Broken Heart".