L.A. Guns guitarist Adam Hamilton reminisces about songs off 2002 album ‘Waking The Dead’
L.A. Guns guitarist Adam Hamilton reminisces about songs off 2002 album ‘Waking The Dead’
L.A. Guns guitarist and former bassist Adam Hamilton was interviewed by Hall Laurel for the book Soundtrack of Our Youth: History of Hair Metal Music, which was recently released and is available in Kindle and paperback formats.
The book Soundtrack of Our Youth: History of Hair Metal Music chose L.A. Guns‘ 2002 album Waking The Dead as its top album for the period from 2000 to 2017.
Hamilton was asked during the interview if he remembered anything cool about the following three songs from Waking The Dead: “Don’t You Cry,” “Lost In A City Of Angeles” and “Revolution” which Soundtrack of Our Youth: History of Hair Metal Music respectively ranked as the #1, 4 and 8 songs for 2002.
Hamilton replied (with slight edits): “That album was magic to make on so many levels. I was a member of LA Guns and every day was like a dream. I would go out in Hollywood at night and jam with Steel Panther and party on the Sunset Strip and then wake up late the next day and work on demos for a new LA Guns album.
Life was so good and I was living the dream x10. Those three songs were three of mine that I demoed and brought in for Waking The Dead.
“Revolution”, the music was all but finished and we worked it up as a band and Phil wrote the lyrics. Done.
On the other two the music was close and we as a band finished them up and Phil again did such great lyrics. “Don’t You Cry” and “City of Angels” were kind of similar in sound because that is where my head was at during that album. Driving, dark yet melodic sounds. Riffs that get stuck in your head. I am not a great lead guitarist so what I write ends up being simple but simple is best for rock and roll. They all added their touch and they became magic. I think the stand the test of time. I like hearing them today.
What was so cool about the guys was that they all are so confident and secure in who they are and their talents, they never felt the need to change things just so they could add or take away things. If it was good and almost finished, great! Less for us to have to do! I only wrote lyrics for one song on that album. “The Ballad.” Phil took what I had and expounded on them and made them something special. That song was written about Bianca Hallsted from Betty Blowtorch. She died during the making of our album and it is a bit of a tribute to her.
Kinda like “The Ballad Of Jayne” is about Jayne Mansfield. We worked with Andy Johns on that album. You can imagine how cool that was. He was amazing and I will never forget those sessions.”
You can read the rest of the interview with Hamilton at the Hair Metal Music‘s Facebook page or the book Soundtrack of Our Youth: History of Hair Metal Music.
Sleaze Roxx stated the following in its review of Waking The Dead: “Waking The Dead was the follow-up to 2001’s Man In The Moon by legendary sleaze rockers L.A. Guns. Not only did this CD contain Tracii Guns‘ last appearance alongside Phil Lewis — who were still able to co-exist with each other — it also delivered a number of surprisingly good tracks.” Sleaze Roxx concluded in its review: “Take the last two numbers, along with “OK, Let’s Roll” and “Revolution”, and you have an album that quite frankly is the best thing L.A. Guns had done since their 1989 classic Cocked & Loaded.”
Amazon describes the book as follows: “More than 450 pages celebrating the history of the hair metal / sleaze rock music era. Book includes more than 50 interviews with superstar musicians like Billy Sheehan and members of bands from Warrant, Twisted Sister, Winger, White Lion, L.A. Guns, Dokken, Danger Danger, Tora Tora, Junkyard, Dangerous Toys, Autograph, Pretty Boy Floyd and several others. We’ve done an extensive year-by-year breakdown of each year between 1981-2017. Also included are rankings of the top 1,000 songs of all time and the top 350 albums of all time. As well as several other features stories on the hair metal / hair band genre.”