Chuck Klosterman's Favorite Hair Metal Albums

By Ben Westhoff Tue., Dec. 6 2011 at 11:44 AM

See also: Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: The Complete List

It's hair metal week on West Coast Sound! And it's hard to imagine a greater enthusiast for the genre than Chuck Klosterman. His 2001 music memoir Fargo Rock City does an exemplary job of examining what was great about the cock rock era. (It might well be the only serious book-length treatise on the subject.) It also gets into his one-time obsession with Lita Ford, above, who "made me think about sexy women as people -- not just as the subject of some long-haired guy's lyrics."

In the process of putting together our top 20 hair metal albums list -- which we're counting down this week -- we compiled suggestions from writers around the country. We were honored to get input from Klosterman, and you can see his top 25 below. Oh, and check out his most recent novel, The Visible Man, which concerns a character possessing the technology to make himself invisible. Does he use it to visit Lita Ford in her boudoir? There's only one way to find out.

Chuck Klosterman's top 25 hair metal albums

25. Junkyard
Junkyard (1989)

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Chuck Klosterman, The Visible Man, Top 20 Hair Metal Albums

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Roundtrip

Don't necessarily agree with the entire list but love me some Chuck Klosterman. Read his book Fargo Rock City. No author has put forth a more cogent defense of this oft-maligned genre of music than Klosterman. Only Eddie Trunk carries the torch more publicly.

That said, Chuck, how about Kix's Midnight Dyamite, Dirty Looks' Cool From The Wire or D:A:D's No Fuel Left for the Pilgrims. Three brilliant records that get no love in the mainstream.

NoShoes

I wish Lester Bangs was still alive so we could see him pummel Chuck with a Smith-Corona Galaxis Deluxe.

Rob Thornton

And what is Living Colour doing in this list anyways? They are not hair metal for the following reasons:

1. The band was from New York City. And they were no New York Dolls.2. They did not specialize in white trash decadence.3. They covered an ANTI-party song (Talking Heads' "Memories Can't Wait") on Vivid.4. Corey Glover mentioned Ghandi in "Cult of Personality" and probably knew who he was.5. The band was in no way linked to LA hair metal and obviously they had no reason to be. The instrumentalists in Living Colour were all highly trained pros with tons of experience (think the Police) and I'm sure they are all doing quite well as NYC studio musicians. So where is Poison's lead guitarist now?

P.S. Sorry for the reply, NoShoes. This was my first post here. BTW, I know of Bangs and concur heartily. However, I would prefer forced exposure to Metal Machine Music for 24 hours straight.

Clatrv

I am an MN/Fargo guy, here in LA now...lived metal as a younger. Here is a vid for you:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

Claytv

Wow, VInnie VIncent huh?! "Love Kills" was a pretty damn good song though. Big ups on the Britney Fox but not so much on the Ace Frehley. What about Pretty Boy Floyd? Leather Boyz with Electric Toys was a great hair metal album! Missing some Kix, Danger Danger, L.A. Guns, and Cinderella's "Night Songs"...so good!

Busytimmy

Really? Gn'R never ever was hair metal. Neither was Ozzy. Where's Van Halen?

Live From SoCal

A very broad definition of hair metal. Not the greatest list about Hair metal, even though most of the albums are very good, the title of the article should be changed and Vinnie Vincent should never make a "Best of" list.