In the failing, last few screeching days of what Ricki Rachtman, Adam Curry, and the major record labels falsely referred to as 80's "Glam" poisoning civilians against the word forever; there were still a couple of real shining stars still twinkling proudly through the twilight's last gleamings...Right before grunge and alternative and "riot grrls" mercifully sounded the death-knoll on all this vapid, Velveeda cheese food secretary rock masquerading as "Glam". Glam was not the Bullet Boys or Winger or Slaughter. Glam was Ziggy Stardust, T.Rex, Mott The Hoople, Alice Cooper, Slade, Gary Glitter, and the Sweet. NOT these wretched cock rocking corporate poseurs like Bon Jovi, Poison, and Skid Row. Ever since the drug smuggling McGhee Mgt. Cartel had spent millions keepin' their prized "peroxided sewer rat" Fat Vince free after the accident that killed one, seriously injured two others, silenced Hanoi Rocks for 18 some years, and the embarrassing Moscow Peace Festival that followed, there was precious little authentic glam trash to be found outside of remote regions on the other side of the world like Finland, or Denmark, which were still birthing true rock'n'roll bands galore with those irresistible 70's punk and glitter rock influences like SMACK and 69 EYES and D.A.D., ...unless you were willing to settle for all that Warrant and Winger, D'Molls and D'Priest bullshit.

Originally conceived as "Disneyland After Dark" our plushy stalwart Copenhagen lonestar kings were rechristened D.A.D. after the MOUSE GESTAPO, who are as notorious as Gene $immon$, about having NO sense of humour when it comes to any remote copyright infringement, threatened to sue. (Remember Gene hassling White Zombie and King Diamond and Bozo the Clown and various geisha girls all throughout the 80's?)

So I was delighted when I had the pleasure of rediscovering them for 39 cents. Back whenever, I was just so, so oversaturated by all those got tired quick Faster Pussycat style cowboy boot bands that by the time I was first introduced to D.A.D., my patience for anything that smelled even vaguely of Jack Daniels and Aqua-Net was really waning. One of my many former bandmates (who also SWEARS by Def Leppard's "Hysteria",  you gotta understand...and Stone Temple Pilots!) was always trying to lift my sullen spirits by forever playing D.A.D.'s bombastic lead-off track, "Sleeping My Day Away" for me, whenever I'd end up sloshin' down the case of Milwaukee's Best Ice with him on one of his girlfriend's couches, but I think I was put-off by it's Mutt Lange style corporate hit, hairmetal polish and, like I said, my own perrenial, boiler room rock crit smugness. Sorry D.A.D.dy-O's.

I do vividly remember first reading about them in some overseas metal mag, and then seeing a live review penned about them in the glossy Flynt Publications 80's metal-bible RIP MAGAZINE. It was written by current CREEM MAGAZINE scribe, and Sweet Justice bassist, the ubiquitous West Coast rock-write mainstay, S.L. DUFF, who compared their gothic tinged, rockabillyish, lead guitar sound to Duane Eddy, or Link Wray, or somebody, which should have been another clue that they were far from just another faceless, assembly-line wank metal band. But like I've underscored elsewhere in these ongoing Flash Metal monologues, "authenticity" was a CRUCIAL, if highly subjective, thing in the snotty realm of our glam-trash-punk "ulatra-undergrond", back then, and even today, I suppose, and I wasn't the ONLY ONE who really tended to split hairs on why one motley lot of wicked gypsies seemed like total phonies- "gimmick hungry yobs digging gold from rock'n'roll" , while another mangy crue of scarf wearers were our mondo-beloved, much revered Tattooed Beat Messiahs.

In retrospect, the coolest thing about D.A.D. is that in addition to all their fizzy banging choruses and 70's style Saturday Morning Cartoon cereal commercial/melodic sugar-high's...they ALSO, simultaneously, conjured up that whole scrounge-y SMACK/UNCLE SAM/COMATONES/BARBED WIRE DOLLS (the original Barbed Wire Dolls-trashy punk-metal band from from Ohio) pursed lipped, middle finger kinda vibe. Remember when we shamelessly celebrated the "high-octane", frenzied, teenage joys of gratuitous live for today spontaneity and head out the window, thrill seeking, intoxicated daffy duckery?

It's painfully clear to me now, in this unholy hour, in the bleak shadows of Hunter S. Thompson's suicide and the stark and unforgiving brutality of the evil empire's prying-eyed police state, that D.A.D. were both genuine fuck-ups and genuine artists, both, highly endangered classes of people in this current cold war climate of surveillance and control, demanding we conform. These Copenhagen cartoon characters, D.A.D. were unapologetic risk-takers creating their own manifestoes and mythologies instead of being content to eat the vomit of yesteryear's rock heroes, they wanted their own wave, they were writing their own codes and pursuing their own fantasies...we don't see enough of that kind of fearlessness in what passes for rock'n'roll rebellion in the malls and I-Pods of today. Remember that feeling we all got the first ten thousand times we ever heard Hanoi Rocks, or even, Guns N Roses' "Reckless Life"? Hearing D.A.D. again after all these years, is the closest I've personally come to tapping into that youthful, anything-is-possible, faith fuelled, hopeful consciousness, in a long, long time. (Or at least since the first ten thousand times I heard "Ramshackle Day Parade" off of Joe Strummer's "Streetcore"!) I NEED more rock'n'roll in my life like this, and chances are that you do, too.

People tell me it's all over, it's all gone, and it ain't never comin' back again. That's why I've had to quit listening to people and resumed listening to songs like "LORDS OF THE ATLAS", "SIAMESE TWIN", and "GIRL NATION". D.A.D., Four Horsemen, and Flesh For Lulu have all significantly been improving my outlook lately, so maybe I'll keep staving off everyone's nagging demands that I finally succumb to them government prescribed anti-depression happy pills for awhile longer.

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I've always been a glutton for gigantic pop hooks played with reckless abandon by lunatics and oddballs with that dangerous glint in their eyes, and personally, find most everyone of these objectionably well-scrubbed mall-punk teeny-bop radio bands insufferably offensive to the once proud spirit of real rock'n'roll. ("Bad TV that insults me freely/Still, I know what I'm dyin' to see..."-Iggy Pop) D.A.D. are the perfect soundtrack to some debauched springtime lunacy in the afternoon. One of those great, under-appreciated bands, who were mostly ignored in their time, but whose sound was so timeless that it comes off as especially vital in this grey day of cheap product, greedhead cheesewhiz, high-gloss mediocrity, and the careerist social climbing of Jack White, Kid Rock, etc., that's still being pedaled to naive youngsters as "rebellion". It's sickening, innit?

D.A.D. were like all the good bands, just years and years ahead of their time, apparently, I wasn't even ready for 'em... but they should have been huge-they had the whole package, really. Shit-even the literal PACKAGING, itself, was/is a blast to behold, with these little caricatures of Jesper, Stig, Jacob, and Peter, and the lyrics all hand scrawled out in Jesper's larkish, child-like print - shades of Tyla. You get the feeling that D.A.D. were fans of the Dogs D'Amour.