Finally, Tesla's version of "Signs" (originally recorded by the Five Man Electrical Band) appears on one of Sidewinder Music's three Metal Mania Stripped releases. After all, that's the song that practically launched the unplugged movement and created an entire genre that has kept Eighties rock alive for the past 15 years. Metal Mania Stripped Vol. 3 boasts 15 reworked (mostly live) songs written at the height of the hair-band era, including stand-out performances culled from such previously available but hard-to-find recordings as Dokken's One Live Night and Firehouse's Good Acoustics. There also are three previously unreleased recordings from MTV's Unplugged show, including lesser-known cuts by Queensryche and Ratt, plus a questionable presentation of Poison's "Unskinny Bop."
But real credit goes to the artists who actually made new recordings for this collection: Kip Winger gives "Headed for a Heartbreak" a delicate rearrangement complete with strings, Tommy Shaw and Jack Blades offer a tasty take on Damn Yankees' "High Enough," and Cinderella's Tom Keifer sings "Nobody's Fool" in an octave better suited to his voice these days. On the other hand, Accept's mournful, cabaret-style version of "Balls to the Walls" is practically unrecognizable, and Jani Lane's new recording of Warrant's "Heaven" sounds shaky at best and downright sad at worst. (Oh, how it pains me to write that.)
If you want to put a collection like this into perspetive, simply consider its concise, respectful liner notes penned by Eddie Trunk (the man behind VH1 Classic), who makes this astute observation: "You probably have ... been ridiculed over the past 15 years for being into this stuff (even though almost everyone owns albums by half of the artists on this CD)." Good point, sir – why can't you sound that sensible when you host VH1 Classic's Hangin' With? Add in the printed recollections from some of the artists represented here about their contributions to this record, and Metal Mania Stripped Vol. 3 is almost as enjoyable as its predecessors.
Track Listing:
1) Unskinny Bop-Poison
2) High Enough-Shaw/Blades
3) Signs-Tesla
4) Headed For A Heartbreak-Winger
5) In My Dreams-Dokken
6) When I Look Into Your Eyes-Firehouse
7) Way Cool Jr.-Ratt
8) Heaven-Jani Lane (formerly of Warrant)
9) Turn Up the Radio-Autograph
10) Nobody's Fool-Tom Keifer of Cinderella
11) Don't Close Your Eyes-Kix
12) Just Take My Heart-Eric Martin of Mr. Big
13) The Killing Fields-Queensryche
14) Up All Night-Slaughter
15) Balls to the Wall-Accept
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