For a brief moment in the early eighties, Kix’s Steve Whiteman did the impossible–he wrested the crown as funniest guy in metal from David Lee Roth. He did so on Kix’s 1981 eponymous debut, which included “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah,” a tale of seduction gone awry when the target of his amorous intentions–whom he’s softened up with a case of Heineken, a quaalude, and a bottle of Jack Daniels–throws up all over the floor, leaving Whiteman with his dick in his hand.
“Every time I go woman huntin’” he ad libs, doing a dead on impersonation of everybody’s favorite frustrated cartoon duck hunter, “it blows up in my face,” adding pensively, “I’m a nice guy. I bathe.” If Diamond Dave’s a smart ass who always gets the girl, Whiteman’s Rodney Dangerfield.
Unfortunately, a very unfunny thing happened come Kix’s sophomore LP, 1983’s Cool Kids–the band lost its collective sense of humor. Amongst the scientific community this is known as “the Dictators Phenomenon,” after the band of the same name, who followed their 1975 laugh riot Go Girl Crazy! with the tragically short on chuckles sophomore LP, 1977’s Manifest Destiny.
It’s hard to say for sure, but it’s my suspicion that Kix didn’t lose their sense of humor so much as sublimate it, for the simple reason that glam metal–unlike, say, heavy metal–is a girl’s preserve. Your glam girls don’t want give it up to losers, and Kix suffered accordingly in terms of sales. Turns out being a loveable loser makes you a loser once over, that is if you’re looking to make a buck. And who isn’t?
Cool Kids Kix didn’t just mark a fall-off in the funny department–its songs simply aren’t as good as the ones on its predecessor. Of its ten tracks, only four–the title track, “Mighty Mouth,” “Restless Blood,” and “For Shame” live up to the high standard set by the band’s debut LP.
Kix’s cover of Fran Golde’s “Cool Kids” is the best of ‘em. Whiteman’s as hungry as Iggy Pop–for action, a cigarette, a dime bag, a situation, a girl, a place to go, anything to escape. Like Pete Townshend he sings the kids are alright, and so for that matter is the song. “Mighty Mouth” is a jet-fueled stutter rock classic about a scrawny kid from a nowhere town who can shout the walls down.
On “Restless Blood,” Whiteman borrows Robert Plant’s pipes for the evening, the boys channel Cheap Trick, and the hey hey heys are to die for. “For Shame” is a great power ballad that brings the great Ronnie Lane of Faces fame to mind, which is quite extraordinary seeing as how Lane was anything but a glam metal progenitor–he went on stage in earth tone sleeveless vests, for Christ’s sake.
That said, I could do without “Love Pollution” (major cause of global warming) and their cover of Nick Gilder’s “Body Talk” (Kix turns Japanese and sucks up to Thomas Dolby). “Loco-Emotion” is the hair metal equivalent of the Talking Heads’ “This Must Be the Place”; “Get Your Monkeys Out” is okay but I wish Whiteman would lay off the danger zone stuff–who’s he think he is, Kenny Loggins?
I could scream sellout and accuse Kix of having gone commercial, but that’s bullshit–Dylan received the same when he went electric. But Dylan didn’t sacrifice a single iota of his a genius–he took it all with him. On Cool Kids, Kix gave up the very thing that made them cool to begin–the sound of a band having fun.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
B
