Younger readers may have trouble believing it but there was a time when pop-metal wasn't simply a vehicle for thirty-year-old millionaires to complain that their parents don't understand them or that they can't get a date to the prom. For about a decade prior to the birth of grunge, metal ruled the charts with an unabashed devotion to hairspray, catchy tunes and excess. Of course, most of the bands were rubbish and almost all of the biggest stars completely objectionable in one way or another but some of the stuff released in the period still stands up quite well today. It's the kind of music The Darkness try to do with such an irritating "ironic" wink and Lordi recently revived much more amusingly for their Eurovision win.


As an earlier posting of Apoptygma Berzerk's Fade To Black showed, i'm a sucker for electro-pop covers of rock classics. Flatpack's Sweet Child Of Mine is just as good. This is the Mylo remix.





Flatpack - Sweet Child Of Mine (Mylo Remix)




I couldn't make up my mind whether to post the original version of Living After Midnight by Judas Priest or the cover by The Donnas. In the end, i went for the 1980 one. The group's something of a rarity in the "conservative" world of hard rock in having an openly gay lead singer, Rob Halford.

Living After Midnight - Judas Priest

Incidentally, click here if you want to see what The Darkness would look and sound like if they came from Mexico City rather than Norwich.