Untitled Document

The huge success of “Blackout”, which had almost immediately become platinum in the US, was just a proof of what the Scorpions were capable of. Concerning the inside of the band, this success gave them the motive to work harder and with more concentration and dedication on its follow-up. The band spent most of the year 1983 recording the new album. But that wasn’t just due to the recordings… The rhythm section of the band had even left the band for some short period. Herman Rarebell had already been spending a lot of time away from the rest of the guys and he wanted to do a solo project (he had already recorded “Nip In The Bud” for EMI) and Francis Buchholz had started getting tired from the continuous tourings and the general obligations that were the natural consequence of being a member in such a big band. Some rumours wanted Bobby Rondinelli (drums) and Jimmy Bain (bass) to replace them. Notice that both of them are “discovers” of Ritchie Blackmore! These rumours were somehow true, because Rondinelli and Bain were indeed hired, but only as session musicians, just in case the original members would want to come back. And so it happened! Actually, the fact that the band immediately hired new musicians was to prove to the guys that had left that they were absolutely unstoppable and thankfully this worked. Rarebell and Buchholz returned where they belonged and after erasing the Rondinelli/Bain parts, the recordings normally continued to bring the result we know. The recording procedure, apart from the members’ departures and returns, had been interrupted also because of the band’s participation in two huge festivals: one was in Dortmund Festival on December and the other was in the US Festival of San Bernardino in Los Angeles in front of a crowd of 300.000 people, which was their greatest live moment until that time.

The new album, entitled “Love At First Sting” (a paraphrase of “love at first sight”), hit the stores in the beginning of 1984. Its cover is a photograph of the worldwide famous German photographer of Hollywood, Helmut Newton, which was a work that caused lots of reactions back then. The band had more or less followed the same way of “Blackout” concerning the production and the sound matter. Dieter Dierks was again the producer and the result couldn’t be but very interesting. This album has brought some big success to the band with songs they play live until today, like “Bad Boys Running Wild”, “Rock You Like A Hurricane”, “Big City Nights” and, of course, the very successful ballad “Still Loving You”. By the way, it’s interesting to note that “Still Loving You” was an song already 8 years old, written by Rudolph Schenker while Roth was still in the band, but they didn’t use it back then because it simply didn’t fit to the whole style of that period. Except for these big well known hits, the whole album includes very good moments like “Coming Home” or “As Soon As The Good Times Roll”. The band sounds to be in a very good shape and mood, but of course this is not the album that will reach the top among the majority fans. Except for the classical high-quality work, some weak moments in songs like "I'm Leaving You", “The Same Thrill”, or "Crossfire" somehow ruin the whole impression of the album, which otherwise is very good. “Love At First Sting” was the last studio album of the so-called “second period” of the band and it’s a very good recording worth to be owned by all the Scorpions’ fans.

KJP / March 2004

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I‘m not precisely sure about later, but this was the most successful tour the Scorpions ever made until then, according to the language of statistic. During the 70’s they had built a huge name in Europe and Japan, but in the first half of the 80’s, after conquering America too, the band created a myth in the rock history. “World Wide Live” could fairly be characterized as the best possible epitome of this golden period that entered the Scorpions into the big rock stars pantheon. Let’s see some numbers from this monstrous tour:

Live gigs: 203, from which 169 were sold-out.
Total crowd: 2.100.000
Road crew: 63
Equipment weight: 36 tons
Guitar strings: 9.600
Drums’ baguettes: 1.000
Distance covered: 73.000 km

The tour started in January 1984 and lasted 13 whole months. The Scorpions appeared in Europe, Northern and Southern America, Australia, Japan and Eastern Asia. The Scorpions was the only band in the USA that all of their shows were sold out, while in the same time there were on the road acts such as Kiss with Bon Jovi as support, Dio with Queensryche as support and Iron Maiden with Mötley Crüe as support! The tickets for the Chicago show, which was the first one in the US for that tour, were all sold within 6 hours and the Rock In Rio festival of 1985 had the hugest crowd they ever appeared in front of. Nevertheless, the band was still requested for live gigs after the ending of the normal tour and therefore they played in the huge Knebworh Festival of England, as a second name under Deep Purple on 22nd June 1985. They also played in another very big open air festival in Malaysia and in August of the same year they performed in front of 80.000 people in Texas Jam, under Deep Purple again. Unstoppable success!

This entire insane situation is printed in this recording. Except for the music, if you open the booklet of the CD (or, even better, the gatefold vinyl) you will see a sea of people in front of the stage, which is the greatest crowd I have ever seen in a photo from a live gig. The album opens with “Coming Home”, a typical hard rocking Scorpions song with a great live vibe that its lyrics talk about how much the band loves being on stage, since they consider the stage to be their “home”; fairly enough, because this live album sounds incredibly good. It contains everything one can ask from such a release, it makes the listener feel the rhythm of the gig and it creates the desire for him to be in those shows. Just like most of the live albums of these older days, it includes magic! The incredible passion and appetite of the band is always present and obvious. And what can one say about the set-list, which as a whole is a highlight: “Blackout”, “Bad Boys Running Wild”, “Make It Real”, “Coast To Coast” (where Klaus plays the rhythm guitar), “Rock You Like A Hurricane”, “The Zoo”, a seven minutes version of “Dynamite” and the adrenaline hits the red line! The two ballads “Holiday” and “Still Loving You” work also very well inside the whole thing. No songs from the Roth-era are included here, probably because you can find them in the first live album of the band, “Tokyo Tapes”, but, nevertheless, the band was only playing “In Trance” live from that period, so it’s not a big deal. “World Wide Live” is a must have for every fan. And a buying tip: avoid getting the old CD version, because it includes 4 songs less when compared to the remaster and especially the fantastic vinyl version.

KJP / March 2004

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It had already been three years since the last official discographical step of the band and four years since the last studio album! “Savage Amusement” was the first album of the so-called “third period” of the band and in the same time the last album for which they worked with their actual sixth member, the producer Dieter Dierks (who had been doing the productions for the band since 1975!). Recorded at the Dierks studios, it somehow marked a more commercial turn of the band towards a wider group of people.

Even though the restless hard rocking spirit was still here, it didn’t have the bright shinning of the previous works and something cheesy was in the air for the first time so intensely. On this album the band experimented a lot more with the vocals than in previous times, for there are many points where lots of vocal lines are recorded over each other. And for my own taste this becomes too much some times, like in “Media Overkill”, a below average song. The lack of simplicity on this specific matter ruined some moments that could have been one hundred times better, in my opinion. Generally, it’s an unequal album that includes some very good songs, like the classical “Don’t Stop At The Top”, “We Let It Rock… You Let It Roll”, “Every Minute Every Day” (where Peter Baltes of Accept sang together with Rudolf the vocal lines included in there) and the beautiful melodic ballad “Believe In Love”, songs that can definitely stand on their own in the big Scorpions back-catalogue and on the other hand there are songs such as “Passion Rules The Game”, “Media Overkill” or “Love On The Run” that make the listener feel a bit confused about the whole thing’s success, since they don’t manage to escape from mediocrity. Commercially the album was of course successful, just like anything the Scorpions would release from now on and it also gave birth to three singles: “Rhythm Of Love”, “Believe In Love” and “Passion Rules The Game”. I guess it’s also a matter of tastes, but I think that the expectations from a band like the Scorpions shall be way higher that what they offered in this album.

KJP / March 2004

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Now things got pretty tough here… Maybe I shouldn’t even bother to review “Eye To Eye”, because it’s got absolutely nothing to do with rock in general. Even the electric guitars are used in a poppy way with the exception of a few seconds, maybe. The Scorpions claim that they wanted to experiment a lot on this album and that they realize the fact that they went too far with this. Thankfully, I say, because if they liked this recording I would have the right to guess bizarre things about them.

On the technical matters, we have to say that Peter Wolf did the production (a man that knows nothing about hard rock, never mind his value on other styles) and it was recorded at Little America Studios in Austria. I remember when I got the first single “To Be No.1” before the album’s release and the shock I faced. Poppy bits, ugly melodies, flat vocals and lyrics that were talking about the blowjobs of Monica Lewinsky on the US president Bill Clinton!!! Jesus! I was hoping for that to be just a bad joke, but my hope was not fulfilled. And damn, when you have one of the most well-known and recognizable American drummers in your permanent line-up, James Kottak, why the hell do you turn his sound into stupid soulless beats in a great part of the recording? Absolute and total failure! The only songs I can afford listening, are probably “Skywriter” and “Mind Like A Tree”, where the ex-drummer Hermann Rarebell does some backing vocals. Even these two are not really good, but at least I don’t bother listening to them. The rest of the album sucks big time. I wonder how could their record company release five (!!!) singles out of this humiliating album. There’s nothing more to comment on this one. I’ll try to be really generous this time and the result is a brave…

KJP / March 2004

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New record company this time and a new producer for the first time since 1975, mister Keith Olsen! The album was recorded at Goodnight L.A. Studios in Los Angeles of California. Many people would fair enough wonder where these changes could lead the band after an album like “Savage Amusement” that was not really good.

Well, the fact is that this album rules! In here you’ll get some melodic hard/heavy metal from an experienced band that still has the spirit with it and can come up with some first quality rocking stuff! Keith Olsen has done a magnificent job on the production of this record and I personally find it really tough to pinpoint a weak song, or even moment in this wonderful recording. No, it’s not something that can be compared to “Blackout”, but it’s an album that is aware of the fact that the heavy Scorpions logo lies on it and makes sure to absolutely respect this. “Crazy World” is an album that makes the listener feel damn good with its great atmosphere. It has a fantastic positive vibe, it feeds the fan with an appetite for partying and makes one want to rock! The guitars sound renewed and fresh, heavy and loud and they have the first role in the production that’s quite metallic. Also, something that surprises is the lead guitar solos that are present in most of the time on the background, apart from the normal solos, making the whole thing sounding even cooler. And Klaus Meine also sounds in a very good shape, with his vocals being crystal clear, powerful and steady. “Wind Of Change” is the shinning ballad this time and it would be true to say that this is their most popular and famous song ever, probably together with “Still Loving You”. The record includes another ballad too, “Send Me An Angel”, which is an awesome tune and I personally think it’s much better than “Wind Of Change”, for it’s more emotional and honest, as far as I can understand. Apart from these, tunes like “Tease Me, Please Me”, “Restless Nights”, “Lust Or Love” (one of my favourite melodic metal songs ever), “Hit Between The Eyes” or the slow and heavy “Money And Fame”, which successfully follows somehow the recipe of “The Zoo” compose a record full of great moments. Finally, it’s interesting to note that a guy from outside the band appears to have a big role for the first time on the composition role: Jim Vallance, the man who played the keyboards on “Send Me An Angel”, is a co-writer of the music on “Tease Me Please Me”, “Don’t Believe Her” and “Kicks After Six” and has also a big participation on the lyrics writing on many songs.

KJP / March 2004

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After the end of their cooperation with Dieter Dierks, the Scorpions seemed to be experimenting on every step of theirs concerning the production. “Face The Heat” was recorded at Little Mountain Sound Studios in Vancouver of Canada and the production is the result of Bruce Fairbairn and the band themselves. Also, a permanent change in the line-up took place after 14 whole years: Francis Buchholz, the bassist of the band since August of 1973 had left the band and was replaced by Ralph Rieckermann. If we leave the ballads out, this record is one of the heaviest the band has recorded during the last years.

While the album plays the first seconds, it’s hard to believe it’s the Scorpions. “Alien Nation”, probably the heaviest and bulkiest song they ever recorded: a mid tempo rhythm with the bass lines very front in the production and an insanely good guitar riff composed the most interesting song of the band for the whole 90’s decade, in my own personal opinion and one of their greatest ones since the departure of Roth. But this album, just like “Savage Amusement”, is quite unequal. On the one side there is “Alien Nation”, the absolute highlight of the album and also songs where the band followed a way that was drawn since the “Crazy World” album, something to be proved through nice and interesting songs like “No Pain No Gain”, “Someone To Touch” (a very good one this is), “Taxman Woman” (where the slap bass has a leading role) and “Ship Of Fools”. And on the other side, the album contains too many commercial ballads like “Under The Same Sun”, “Woman”, “Lonely Nights”, “Destin” and “Daddy’s Girl” (these last two appear only on the CD version) that may not be that bad after all, but are all these ballads really necessary? Apart from that, some mediocre hard songs fill the rest of the recording, such as “Unholy Alliance” (with the ugliest refrain they ever recorded until then), “Hate To Be Nice” and “Nightmare Avenue” that decrease the listener’s positive opinion on the whole thing. The Scorpions could still offer a decent album, after 21 years of career, and it’s actually rather admirable that they still record some heavy shit, but in this album something from their magic was missing again in a big part or it.

KJP / March 2004

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Even more changes in the Scorpions camp! Hermann Rarebell, their drummer since 1977 left the band, the Scorpions got signed to the multinational EastWest Records (which is a part of Warner Music Group) and the production was on Erwin Musper and the band. They didn’t hire a steady drummer this time and the drumming and percussion are played on this album by Curt Cress and Pitti Hecht. Unfortunately, things are not nice at all in here. The whole “Pure Instinct” album is a radio-friendly recording from all views and it marked the most flat on inspiration recording of theirs, fatally in the same time being the most uninteresting thing they ever released until then. Our good old familiar Keith Olsen (producer in “Crazy World”) was exclusively the producer behind the opening track “Wild Child” and I think that this is one of the very rare interesting moments in the album, but nevertheless it doesn’t manage to save the whole thing, which generally lies on the fields of mediocrity and lack of inspiration. The other somehow interesting song I can dig is “Soul Behind The Face”, which is a nice, serious and well done ballad. Otherwise, “Pure Instinct” is a quite representative example of the claims of those who attack the Scorpions, accusing them for loss of inspiration and an inexcusable turn towards the mindless listeners of commercial radio. And they managed quite well on that last one with the famous ballad – for once more – “You And I”, a composition of Klaus Meine, which also became a successful single release, together with four more songs that were also released as singles. The album is tragically filled with useless mellow love ballads or even ballad-like songs again.

What’s with the Scorpions of 1996? Hit hunters? Written-off old rockers? Hopefully nothing close to these characterizations is valid, but it’s hard to believe the opposite, judging from “Pure Instinct”. The album might actually sound a bit nice when having a coffee with a nice company at some café, or when doing jobs in the house, but I want to believe that the Scorpions is something more than a band that releases albums just to be played in the background.

KJP / March 2004

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I was incredibly skeptical about this release after the fiasco of “Eye To Eye”, but buying the single “Hurricane 2000” somehow calmed my thoughts. The self-titled song is an excellent arranged rock hymn and the presence of the orchestra provides absolutely successfully an extra power on it that makes it finally rather interesting and good. You know, I was somehow like “hey, the Scorpions still remember how to play the guitar!”. On the other hand, the ballad “Moment Of Glory” in the single is what confused me, since it’s in the well-known uninspired vein of the last albums, being totally away from any worth. The complete album didn’t delay to come and things were clear now. The Scorpions are back!

Together with the Philharmonic of Berlin, a worldwide famous orchestra, they rearranged some of their older classics and recorded two new songs. In contrary to the majority of the rest of the “symphonic” rock albums, this is a studio recording, something that is absolutely positive, in my opinion. Additionally, it was produced, arranged and conducted by Christian Kolonovits. The final result is absolutely fine and worthwhile.

The opening song “Hurricane 2000” (the remake of “Rock You Like A Hurricane”) gets the listener right to the main point with its powerful arrangement. “Moment Of Glory” is, as aforementioned, a below mediocrity mellow ballad, a composition of Klaus Meine with uninteresting lyrics. “Send Me An Angel” doesn’t change a lot on the matter of arrangement, but it takes some bonus because of the presence of the orchestra and the great vocal support of Zucchero. “Wind Of Change” is interesting too, the orchestra just makes it a bit more “dramatical”, maybe, but I prefer the original any time. “Crossfire” (originally from “Love At First Sting” album) is intensely changed and it opens with an intro written by Solovev Sedoj. The present version is instrumental and becomes a really great song! It’s excellently arranged with very inspired combinations and exchanges between the band and the orchestra and the resumed feeling is more than great. Right after this very good warming up, enters the absolute highlight of the album: “Deadly Sting Suite”. It’s a shocking instrumental medley of the songs “He’s A Woman, She’s A Man” and “Dynamite”. As you can imagine, these two songs that are extremely powerful on their own, when performed with an orchestra, give out a result that can even cause shivers! Restless hard rocking feeling, an atmosphere that reminds a soundtrack of some action movie and the listener is stuck on the wall! It had been a long time since the Scorpions offered such a magnificent song! After this fantastic surprise, “Here In My Heart” enters, ruining it all just like that. The most interesting thing in this ballad are probably the vocals of the fine-looking Lyn Liechty. Without being that bad, this song could have been a ballad of some pop singer (it personally reminds me of Celine Dion) and it has no place in a Scorpions album. “Still Loving You”, one of their most famous ballads, that follows, is just interesting, without offering something special. Again, the ghost of the original haunts it. The great “Big City Nights” that follows, warms the blood again! Sang almost exclusively by Ray Wilson (Klaus participates only in the refrain), who has a really cool and dirty rock voice, it becomes a highlight for this recording. Also, the intensive orchestral passage before the end is quite nice. The album closes with “Lady Starlight”, a ballad originally from “Animal Magnetism” album. To be honest, I never really liked too much this song and the present orchestral version didn’t change a lot my mind. In the summary, “Moment Of Glory” is a worthwhile recording, with the only negative point being the two new ballads and maybe the sound of the drums at some points. On the other hand, “Crossfire” and “Deadly Sting Suite” are so damn good that shall be a motive to get it!

KJP / March 2004

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