Sweet - VI (AKA Water's Edge_
August 1 1980
Sweet
VI (aka Waters Edge)
Genre: The very end of 70s glam.
3.25 out of 5
Highlights:
Getting in the Mood for Love
Give the Lady Some Respect
Steve Priest died last month, as of this writing. RIP, Steve.
My band had a choice: Cover Rick Springfield’s “I’ve Done Everything for You” or Sweet’s “Hellraiser”. I got a chance to perform the former with The Piper Downs at a show and that cured us of wanting to add it to our repertoire. It’s a GREAT song but it didn’t play to our strengths: hyper theatricality, unbelievably excellent backup singing and a lead guitarist who could play any lick and solo and absolutely crush it.
So we went with the latter. We even recorded it and, dammit, I think it’s as good as Sweet’s if not better.
We played it at a concert at Dragonfly one night. We were on the bill with Dalton Grant (Who’s “Happiness in New York City” ranks as one of my favorites of that decade). After our show someone came up to me and said, “What was that Motley Crue song you guys played?? The Hellraiser one???”
And that’s how I realized the link between 70s Glam and 80s Glam. I never corrected the guy. Cuz, fuck it, I own it, I love early Crue. I didn’t know it but I must have because I name checked them in “Another Hoop” and I consciously begged the band to learn this song.
I guess the reason the guys opened with “Sixties Man”, a proggy-smelling Styx rip off written by outside authors is that they must have been searching for a hit/relevance. In doing so they completely abandon everything I liked abut them. That lunacy that bedazzled “Ballroom Blitz” and “Hellraiser” is shorn and instead they are targeting the middle of the road audience that, I guess they believe has…grown up?
They’re wrong here. What we want from Sweet is that delicious Glam that they helped usher in with “Wig Wam Bam” and “Little Willy”.
You can hear traces of it on “Own Up” but that has to sit side by side with their penchant for trying to ape ELO.
“Getting in the Mood for Love” is the moment that you realize that they could have been Crue but they ran away from it. Damned shame.
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPZw14oK9rE&list=PLlvn8uktX5LvxwFPwDEyICorLVIxXT0c9
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