As commercial hard rock rounded the corner into the ’90s, new bands like Nelson, fronted by the uber-photogenic twin sons of country music celebrity Ricky Nelson; Trixter, a group of fresh-faced New Jersey kids barely out of high school; and Winger, a supergroup consisting of seasoned sidemen and prog-rock refugees, were still getting record deals and releasing pop-flavored debut albums that kept the request lines at Dial MTV jammed at all hours of the day and night, especially if you knew how to game the system. “I had what we called the Boiler Room back in Denver, where we put ten telephones in an apartment building,” confesses Kip Winger. “When ‘Seventeen’ came out, I paid people to call and request that fucker. We had ten people calling radio stations and MTV and Headbangers Ball. That’s really how we climbed the charts, and then the public caught on.”
Less-resourceful latecomers, like L.A.-based groups Bang Tango, Tuff, and Pretty Boy Floyd, had all the pieces in place for pop-metal success but still struggled to generate major excitement, even in the halls and conference rooms of the labels that had signed them. “There were so many songs that sounded the same at that time that you really had to stick out. And we didn’t stick out,” recalls Howard Benson, who produced all three of the aforementioned bands’ debuts. “There wasn’t anything on the Pretty Boy Floyd record like a ‘Youth Gone Wild’ or ‘18 and Life.’ We handed it in to the label and I think the radio guys kind of yawned at it.”
Meanwhile, on the East Coast a handful of gritty New York City bands like Law and Order, Spread Eagle, and the Throbs, who emerged from a tight-knit scene that encompassed clubs like L’Amour, the Cat Club, and Limelight, also managed to snag major-label deals but failed to capture the mainstream audience’s imagination.
Even established acts like Cinderella struggled to maintain their momentum, falling victim to top-heavy marketing plans and a desire to evolve musically that did not necessarily conform with their fans’ expectations or desires. “The songs on the Heartbreak Station record were so well crafted, and it wasn’t caveman rock. It was something special,” says Cinderella drummer Fred Coury. “It just wasn’t the hard rock Cinderella that put the band on the map.”
Of course, it wasn’t just the bands who were outgrowing their fans. The opposite was also true, and it would prove to be a disastrous confluence of events.