u/Agent_Kozak

Inspired by a Keel discussion on here a few days ago. I personally feel Keel never had the songs to be big. Even with massive opening slots - they never went Gold. Any other bands that many say "should have been huge" but you think really did hit the limit of what they could do?

So I've been thinking about this today. In the early 90s you had a bunch of hairy bands that didn't really fit into either category that existed in this transitional period in the music industry.

For these bands, gone were the overt sleazy lyrics and hedonistic imagery and in were more experimental themes and sounds (such as funk). But they weren't really full on alternative and grunge either.

They still kept things like poppy choruses, thin guitar sounds and shredder style soloing. Today this has been sparked by discovering a band called Hash. They released one album stateside on Elektra records. They were the former rhythm section of White Trash (you know the guys who had a minor hit with the song Apple Pie). White Trash sorta crossed late stage hair metal with a ska band - very unique. So you had White Trash/Hash. There was also the (probable) king of this little niche - Saigon Kick who definitely played genre roulette with both 80s and 90s rock sounds. They leaned pretty alternative - especially on songs such as Hostile Youth but then we're pretty glam adjacent on their massive ballad Love Is On The Way. There were other bands like Bang Tango who had big funk themes.

There are a host of other bands such as Animal Bag, Mindfunk, Flesh, Motherland, Kingofthehill, Life Sex & Death. I could go on

What are you thoughts on this era? These bands? And did you think at the time that this was able natural evolution of the 80s rock scene or a gimmick?