W.A.S.P. - The Last Command

His name was Blackie Lawless. Part red headed stepchild of the LA metal underground and part Freddy Krueger, the stuff of nightmares for Senator's wives, concerned about the evils of rock and roll. Blackie paid his dues for over a decade, but he never surrendered. Finally when hair metal bands were all the rage he got signed by Capital records. Soon all of his rock and roll dreams would come true.

If there's any redeeming quality about Mr. Lawless it's the outrage that he caused Tipper Gore and the other Senator's wives with his bloody codpieces, chunks of meat and bones on stage, as well as his songs, one of which had the memorable title of "Animal (I F*ck Like A Beast)." While Alice Cooper's 1970's theatrics were meant to shock, they were also done with a nod and a wink to his audience. The guy had a sense of humor. Blackie Lawless and company just seem out to shock, and the whole thing comes off as incredibly juvenile. Hell, I even thought this at 13 years old when I was still playing Twisted Sister records.

Okay, so let's press play on this thing:

Here we are again with the Dolby notes. It takes quite a while to get a cassette to start playing. First the leader tape, then the Pentium-like greeting. More blank tape, and we're finally into the music.

Well, if you can call it that. The tape is playing this time, but it sure sounds like crap. Compared to mp3's I would think that tapes might even be superior in sound, but maybe not when they've been sitting in a trunk for this long.

I can't remember where I got this one. I always thought W.A.S.P. was a joke, so I know I didn't run out and buy it. I'm pretty sure I borrowed it from a friend. It may have been several years after it came out as a guilty pleasure. I did have a friend in college who used to love to crank them up once in a while when he was drinking. I don't know, but if anyone reading this can lay claim to The Last Command, I'll happily give it to you.

In 8th grade I sat down at my desk one day and saw "W.A.S.P." written on the chalkboard. It was a few minutes before class was to start and some kid in a jean jacket with Metallica and Iron Maiden patches on the back went up and wrote "sucks" under it. When class started the American History teacher was quite impressed, thinking that he was teaching a class well educated about White Anglo-Saxon Protestants and their role in our nation's history.

Rock and roll was seductive, but there was nothing remotely cool about W.A.S.P. for me. This wasn't David Lee Roth or even Vince Neil. I could have stood side by side with Tipper Gore and critiqued them for looking like a bunch of idiots. Sure Blackie Lawless seemed to make it his mission to try to out do even the most outrageous rockers with his stage theatrics and provocative song titles. He was repulsive, but more than anything he just looked like a dumb ass.

This music is about as bland as you can get. There's nothing memorable about it. The whole thing sounds like it was recorded with metal by the numbers production. Hundreds of other hair bands of the 80's adopted this same sound, and the bulk of them never learned to write a decent song along the way. While most of these songs don't stand a chance of getting stuck in my head, "Wild Child" is somewhat catchy, as is "Ballcrusher" with it's ridiculous lyrics:

Stole the rent and drank all my J.D.

She went and hijacked my brand new car

I say A.C. she says D.C.

The damned bitch is just too bizarre

Bye bye bye Ballcrusher

then later:

Before I go and leave her in the dust

I'm going to (lyric omitted in liner notes) her till she can't stand up

Nice guy, that Blackie. Around the time of this record I remember reading that he wanted to get into politics and maybe run for office someday. At the very end of the cassette insert's microscopic type he alludes to their song "Blind In Texas" by saying "Don't Drive Drunk...in Texas or anywhere else." So I guess he was already tackling the important issues.

Blackie and band sound like they're about to die. The tape is going to snap. They're dragging as badly as the Wilson sisters now that we're on side 2. I think it's the song "The Last Command." Yikes, and I thought backward masking was supposed to be scary.

And now the tape has stopped. I guess this is as far as I get. I have noticed that Heart and W.A.S.P., as unlikely of a match as it might seem, were in fact label mates. (Can you image the possibilities of a joint tour?) Both of these records were put out by Capital and have the "XDR" label on them: expanded dynamic range. Maybe this has something to do with the tape problems.

So I have to prematurely pull the plug on Blackie. Bye bye bye ballcrusher.