They Just Seem a Little Weird

"A veteran music journalist explores how four legendary rock bands--KISS, Cheap Trick, Aerosmith, and Starz--laid the foundation for two diametrically opposed subgenres: hair metal in the '80s and grunge in the '90s"-- In the mid-'70s four flamboyant bands reveled in revved-up anthems and flaunted a novel theatricality. Brod offers an eye- and ear-opening look at a crucial moment in music history, when rock became fun again and a gig became a show. He seamlessly interweaves the narratives of KISS, Cheap Trick, and Aerosmith with that of Starz, a criminally neglected band whose fate may have been sealed by a shocking act of violence. Brod shows how these distinctly American groups-- three of them now enshrined in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame-- laid the foundation for two seemingly opposed rock genres: the hair metal of Poison, Skid Row, and Mo tley Cru e and the grunge of Nirvana, Alice in Chains, and the Melvins.-- adapted from jacket