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Various Artists: Metal Mania Stripped Across America Live! (DVD)

"This is a rock show, man. Don't be fooled by the 12 string." So quips Kip Winger, trying to rouse the crowd during his gruff but splendid acoustic performance of "Madelaine" at Hollywood's Key Club on Feb. 7, 2005. But fans who attended the CD-release party that night for VH1 Classic's Metal Mania Stripped – a CD collection shamelessly named after the best show on cable's best network – can be forgiven if they didn't know how to respond to the sight of their aging hair-metal heroes singing acoustic versions of their biggest hits. Seven of those performances are captured on the first 32 minutes of this DVD, although it's frustratingly unclear why the producers didn't simply film and include the whole show.

Winger, who also sings "Seventeen" and appears ever-so-casual in a ratty shirt and jeans with about three days of facial scruff, looks perfectly normal compared to the gutter glam of L.A. Guns ("Ballad of Jayne"), the portly presence of Alias' Freddy Curci ("More Than Words Can Say"), and a bespectacled, bleach-blonde Jani Lane (Warrant's "I Saw Red"). But a black-turtlenecked Mark Slaughter, whose band is the only one to play drums during this segment of the DVD, blows everyone away with a gutsy, blues-infused version of "Fly to the Angels." Great White's performance of "Save Your Love," given two years almost to the day after a horrific fire during one of the band's concerts killed 100 fans in Rhode Island and embroiled singer Jack Russell in legal problems, is also surprisingly effective.

The second half of the DVD consists only of 16 minutes from the first night of the Stripped Across America Tour, filmed on Halloween night 2005 at Myth in St. Paul, Minnesota. Lane is there again, doing a robust unplugged version of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" and an uncomfortable dirty ol' man's take on "Cherry Pie," as is an unhealthily thin Stephen Pearcy (Ratt's "Back For More"). Firehouse, like Slaughter in the previous segment, emerges with the strongest performance in "Don't Treat Me Bad," a song that wasn't even that good the first time around. A bonus clip of a barefoot Mike Tramp singing White Lion's "When the Children Cry" to a goofy Japanese television audience, though, along with the haphazard editing of the two main sections indicates that this collection was hastily assembled. Why? The opportunity to show the world that most of these guys still have the chops to play, despite how pathetic they may appear or how far their careers may have fallen, should have been celebrated with a DVD that – including bonus features – lasts a lot longer than one hour.


Live From The Key Club:
1) Madelaine-Kip Winger
2) Ballad of Jayne-L.A. Guns
3) More Than Words Can Say: Alias
4) Save Your Love: Great White
5) I Saw Red: Jani Lane
6) Fly to the Angels: Slaughter
7) Seventeen: Kip Winger

Stripped Across America Live From Myth:
1) Back for More: Stephen Pearcy
2) Uncle Tom's Cabin: Jani Lane
3) Don't Treat Me Bad: Firehouse
4) Cherry Pie: Jani Lane

Bonus material includes White Lion's Mike Tramp in Japan, TV promos, behind-the-scenes footage and photo galleries.

Added: August 20th 2006
Reviewer: Michael Popke
Score:
Related Link: Metal Mania Stripped
Hits: 3284
Language: english

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Various Artists: Metal Mania Stripped Across America Live! (DVD)
Posted by Ken Pierce, SoT Staff Writer on 2006-08-20 16:28:16
My Score:

Filmed at both the record release party as well as during the actual tour comes the Metal Mania: Stripped Across America DVD. The idea was a pretty good one, and played off the once popular MTV Unplugged idea by taking a number of classic 80's performers and putting them on tour together. The tour featured such performers as Kip Winger, Great White, Slaughter and Stephen Pearcy (former Ratt) among several others and each musician would play acoustic versions of their hits. I was sad to not attend this tour when it came through town but one cannot hit every show which makes this DVD of some interest to people who had the same thing happen to them. Yet as I looked to it and hoped to find a comprehensive document of the performances, I admit that I felt let down by only finding a single DVD and one that ran a mere 12 songs. The DVD medium is taking over a large amount of ground on the CD and I felt that a lot more could have been included to make this something incredible for the buyer. Most of the performances are top-notch and I have to lend some kudos to Jani Lane, as the former singer of Warrant does a terrific job especially. Lane has had some well-publicized fall-downs and I think the quality of his playing should help him realize that life's obstacles can be overcome. Slaughter performs their staple track as a full band which to me is not quite stripped but sure sounds good. Winger's two of their three hits are performed and he does this with no one helping him but his twelve string guitar. The bonus features are several TV Spots, backstage footage segments but little else to speak of. In-depth interviews from the players on their music and doing this tour would have been interesting to see. This could have been an incredible release had it spanned two DVD's and included more of the set that each performer did. Instead it serves as but a teaser for the next time around should this happen again next year.






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