Hair Metal's slight return

Play it: Nonessential Hair Metal Records I Really, Really Like (by Chuck Klosterman, from his book Fargo Rock City)

Tomorrow Hair Metal revivalists The Darkness release their sophomore release (One Way Ticket To Hell... and Back, play the advanced single "One Way Ticket") and I thought it would be interesting to get back in that hair metal frame of mind again, so I re-read Chuck Klosterman's excellent (brave) book on the era, Fargo Rock City, told from the perspective of Middle America.

Now, Klosterman's always ripe for lists (and hubris) and this book has plenty to mine (but I'm not a clear-cutter, so one will do.) The Nonessential Hair Metal Records list has all sorts of rules, one of which isn't a span of time for the record to fall into. No Led Zepp, no KISS w/ makeup, no Ozzy-era Black Sabbath, no early Van Halen, no grunge... let's just say the rules help shape what you'd already probably considered 'Hair Metal.'

Klosterman doesn't stop there, though, he also lists an amount of cash (Jack Factor) that it would take to get him to never listen to said album again. These run from $66 (Van Halen's 1984) to $5001 (Guns n' Roses' Appetite for Destruction.) I've listed the Jack Factor w/ the list's tracklisting in the comments.

tags: playlist, music, the darkness, hair metal, chuck klosterman, fargo rock city