The Erotics- All that Glitters is Dead
Albany’s
own sons of the apocalypse The Erotics are the greatest sleaze rock band
of 1991 chewed up by some half-assed time traveling gizmo and spat out into the
entirely wrong decade. Believe me, if these cats had formed in the heady days of
the Dogs D’Amour and the Wildhearts and Uncle Sam and the
Sea Hags, you sure wouldn’t need me to tell you about them. Their
propensity for home-wrecking hijinks alone woulda secured them a few meaty
features in RIP, and fledgling rock and roll burnouts all over the
Midwest would’ve blasted their profane glam-punk anthems while sluicing down the
highway in beat up El Caminos. They’d probably all have coke habits instead of
drinking problems, and girls in Sleez Beez half-shirts would be
waiting in line backstage at L’Amour to service them. But alas, alack,
and double-goddamn, it ain’t 1991 at all. The grand illusion of punked-out
glitter metal insurrection has soundly shattered into a million pieces. David
Lee Roth lost all his hair, Guns N’ Roses are never gonna get back
together, nobody even remembers Motorcycle Boy, and Vince Neil, it
turns out, is nothin’ more than a fat, aging drunk that beats up hookers. The
odds of Carmen Electra showing up at an Erotics show grow slimmer
everyday. But don’t cry for these cats, baby. The Erotics are well aware that
they are men out of time (notice the title of the album), and they do not care.
They are hopelessly addicted to sleazy rock and roll (among other things), and
they will continue on their mission to spread the good word about bad fun with
rip snorting shock n' roll, regardless of the consequences. “All that
Glitters” is their latest report from the trenches, and it is a complete and
utter motherfucker. Mike Trash not only has the best Alice Cooper
snarl this side of 1972 and the kind of million dollar guitar riffs Hardcore
Superstar sold their first-born for, but his stellar songwriting skills and
knack for pulling insanely catchy pop-hooks right out of the gutter is
unparalleled. He’s the fuckin’ Desmond Child of degenerate rock, and
every track on this album is a jukebox-worthy, solid gold easy action hit.
Really. Mike is well aware of this, too, which is why all the songs are laced
with acidic, nihilistic stabs of black humor. When he says “In my town, the
devil always wins” on “Bullet”, he’s speaking from experience; and
when he says “I got a bullet for a superstar/Gonna watch you bleed in your
caviar” in the same song, he’s only half-joking. The Erotics have news for
all the has-beens and wannabe’s lousing up mainstream rock music, and the
headline is this: not only is real rock and roll alive and well, but it’s coming
to piss on your parade. This might seem like a tall order to fill from a band
with no money, youth, or Swedish blood to back them up, the underdog always wins
in the rock and roll, doesn’t it? Besides, I wrote the liner notes to this
record, and I choose my culture well, baby. I’d never let you down, and neither
would the Erotics. You love rock and roll? Prove it. Pick up this record and
then do somethin’ nasty while it’s on. That’s what it was made for, after all.