“Girls on Bars”
Bret Michaels
Written by Luke Laird and Bret Michaels
I’m a few years too young to have taken Poison seriously.
Now, I always leaned more toward pop and country anyway, but I listened to the rock and the hip-hop of my day, too. So if I was five years older, I probably would’ve listened to Poison.
Now, every generation thinks that the music of their formative years was substantively better than the ones that came right before and right after.
But sometimes a generation happens to be right.
Nirvana. Pearl Jam. Green Day.
That was the stuff.
Rock from around 1992-1996 was like country from around 1989-1997 and hip-hop from around 1988-2001. Just way, way better than what came before and what came afterward. The music from my youth killed it.
Now, I’m sure that those who are a little bit younger than me want to claim the same.
But sorry, late nineties kids. I remember Creed and Limp Bizkit.
Oh, and Kid Rock, who keeps wanting to do country music.
And I’m sure that those who are a little bit older than me want to claim the same.
But sorry, poor eighties kids. I remember Motley Crue and Warrant.
Oh, and Poison, with the lead singer who keeps wanting to do country music.
(And you can shut up about Darius Rucker. Hootie doesn’t count. They were for that white bread college kids and we were still in high school when they had their one hit album.)
All that and I forgot to write about the song.
Well, “Girl on Bars” could’ve been a Poison song 25 years ago. Just throw in louder guitars and some bad perms and there ya go.
So, unless you were in junior high school in 1988… it stinks.
Grade: D
I actually was in high school in those days (1987-89), and I really disliked the arena-rock that Poison represented with a purple passion. I have to agree with the “D” here.
“D” sounds about right although I wouldn’t argue if your grade had been “F”. My high schools day were 1959-63. I never heard of Poison but that’s probably because the decade I know the least about is the 80’s. My kids were very young then.
The song sucks, but there was a lot more to ’80s metal than Poison and Motley Crue.
https://thesouthtexaspistolero.wordpress.com/2015/06/01/monday-music-musings-1-6-15/
(And I am by no means an oldster. I graduated from high school in 1996 and didn’t really discover that stuff for another 13 years or so.)
Along those lines, I’ve said it before and will say it again: It’s worth asking why you see the likes of Bret Michaels and Steven Tyler doing this sort of thing (that is, “going country”) as opposed to, say, Rob Halford or Bruce Dickinson.
Quote by the pistolero:
Along those lines, I’ve said it before and will say it again: It’s worth asking why you see the likes of Bret Michaels and Steven Tyler doing this sort of thing (that is, “going country”) as opposed to, say, Rob Halford or Bruce Dickinson.
Well, the first two are American, while the last two are Brits.
There’s something else that Brett Michaels and Steven Tyler are: Opportunists. They’re trying to cash in on a style of music they know practically nothing about, only because they can’t adjust to a pop music world that considers them passé.
Well, the first two are American, while the last two are Brits.
I think nationality might well be an unknown factor as far as that goes, as if you’ll remember both the Beatles and the Stones were fans of American country music to an extent, but point taken. Substitute James Hetfield and Tom Araya if you like.
The second thing, though, is exactly what I was getting at — that and the latter two have always appeared to have at least some modicum of self-respect with regards to what kind of music they make.
(Aerosmith was great up until about 1982, but I never could get into Poison. I tried to back in middle school but it never happened. God, the things self-conscious social misfits will do to try to fit in…)
A flaming F. Enough said about the song itself.
As for your preamble on music and generational clashes, I liked (and still like) Pearl Jam, but have to disagree with you considerably on Nirvana and Green Day. I’d consider them two of the five most overrated groups from that era.
I’d much rather listen to Hootie & The Blowfish any day than Nirvana, and most of the time over Green Day. At least they never tried to promote themselves as anything more important than they really were: a neighborhood bar band that got an insanely lucky break. And when you dissect their discography, there are stand-out songs that have had genuine staying power with me including “The Earth Stopped Cold At Dawn”, “Not Even The Trees”, “Desert Mountain Showdown” and “Bluesy Revolution”.
Darius Rucker’s output now is often a letdown (though “Southern Style” is a respectable album, cliched its lyrics might be), but Hootie & The Blowfish deserve more credit than they generally receive. They, along with Counting Crows, Phish, Dave Matthews Band, as well as power-pop, defined my listening experience as an adolescent when I wasn’t on the country dial.
Quote by the pistolero:
I think nationality might well be an unknown factor as far as that goes, as if you’ll remember both the Beatles and the Stones were fans of American country music to an extent, but point taken.
In the case of the Beatles and the Stones, I think it’s clear that their appreciation of country music was quite genuine, especially when compared with Tyler and Michaels; you can’t help but think of the Beatles’ version of “Act Naturally”, or the Stones doing the Hank Snow classic “I’m Movin’ On.” Neither of them ever really sounded like honky-tonk bands, really, but they knew their way around the genre just the same, given that rock and roll has always had a country music base as well as an R&B one.
But what you hear in both Tyler and Michaels are arena-rock opportunists trying to survive by going into a genre that neither of them has a clue about, but where their former style has basically been swallowed into by bro-country acts like Florida-Georgia Line, Jason Aldean, and Luke Bryan. It’s so dreadful to listen to, and, in my opinion, dishonesty at its worst.
Oh, I absolutely agree. Not to mention just embarrassing, especially when Michaels talks about growing up listening to classic country and Tyler talks about his slingshot and pet raccoon…
Quote by pistolero:
Oh, I absolutely agree. Not to mention just embarrassing, especially when Michaels talks about growing up listening to classic country and Tyler talks about his slingshot and pet raccoon…
That is bad, especially of Tyler; it just ratchets up the stereotype of a typical country music fan as an inbred redneck rube, and, as with so many stereotypes, it isn’t the whole story, not by half.
Of course, the Beatles and the Stones each did their own country-influenced material; one can’t help but think of the Beatles’ “I Don’t Want To Spoil The Party” or “I’ve Just Seen A Face”, or the Stones’ “Wild Horses” and “Dead Flowers.” But again, it comes from their knowing the genre and how to do it right without resorting to cornpone clichés, something that neither Michaels nor Tyler can do without shamelessly tripping over themselves (IMHO).
Also see “Honky Tonk Women” and its perhaps lesser-known “original version.”
This is way off topic, I know, but really, the lesser said about the song that was reviewed, the better…
It’s not quite that bad but in giving it a D+ I’m hardly endorsing it. I doubt Bret Michaels ever gave country music any serious consideration until his rock career started fading
Both the Rolling Stones and the Beatles featured artists who knew a lot about certain other genres of music. Stones drummer Charlie Watts is a bona fide jazz & big band expert and Beatles drummer Ringo Starr knows a lot about country music and American classic pop – Ringo is also a decent songsmith even though he’s a dreadful singer (but one who thoroughly knows his vocal limitations). Both Jagger & Richards have strong blues roots
Hey, now. Yo! Bum Rush the Show, Paid in Full, Criminal Minded, came out in ’87!
(Those are pretty much the only three major omissions, though, haha)