Oh the 80's Power Ballad, how it is missed. I don't know about you, but the long mournful tones of Love Bites by Def Leppard and the epic Every Rose Has its Thorn by Poison still get heavy rotation on my iPod. These gems, that became a part of an entire new musical genre, came from out of the darkest depths of frenzied high energy guitar grinding drum thumping metal albums. Like a beacon of brightness amongst a world of darkness, they stood out from the accompanying songs and helped take the albums they were a part of to a new height in terms of sales and popularity which had thus far been unobtainable for these types of bands with their big hair and way-to-tight leather pants. Metal was suddenly oh so cool, popular, and even saleable.

The 80's power ballads topped off their respective metal albums like a smooth liqueur finishes off a good desert. But something went oh so terribly wrong. The power ballad, created so well, in that it offered some sense and meaning, some soul and purpose, amongst all the high energy madness and noise, ended up turning on that which had created it, and it feasted.

The 80's metal album devolved into an album of filler music with pointless dispassionate riffs sandwiched in between ballads. The bands and their producers focused too greatly on that which was making them rich and famous, namely the power ballad, and forgot that which had helped create the power ballad and had made it so brilliant; the 80's metal thrash and anger music that built up to these power ballads. Soon there were four or five of these ugly monster ballads to one album, and only a few hard and fast songs squeezed in amongst them. The point of these slow melodic songs was lost.

Without good thrash, without anger, angst, ear-shattering guitar solos amongst frantic drums pounding building louder and louder and harder and harder until the power ballad suddenly breaks through the noise like the sword Excalibur comes driving out of the lake, the power ballad is nothing but a whining piece of over self-indulgence.

And so the power of the power ballad fades, and with it, metal music and metal albums slink off into the darkness from where they came. Suddenly Kirk Cobain raises his head, like a messiah for all suicidal metal fans filled with loss and about to cut themselves in order to help ease the pain. Kirk growls and roars out such a set like nothing heard before in the music scene. Nevermind blasts onto the charts and so does the grunge music scene of Seattle. We have anger again, angst, noise, hard and fast riffs, and pounding angry music. We have 80's metal in a new guise, no ballads in site. But never fear. The grunge ballads were simply waiting around the corner, ready to pounce on and destroy this genre as it did the last. And so it goes on...

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