Ladies and gentlemen, boys and
girls, children of all ages, Rave Up Music is proud to present to you its first
ever month-long celebration of music and professional wrestling that we call “WRASSLE-PALOOZA!”
Greetings everyone! Barius here,
and if you could not guess already, I am a pretty big fan of professional
wrestling. I have been watching wrestling since 1991, when I saw my first
pay-per-view on TV, then-known as World Wrestling Federation’s Summerslam event.
I originally started watching because my brother watched, but slowly I grew to
love and admire the larger-than-life characters I saw on a weekly basis.
Whether it is WWE, WCW, ECW, ROH, Dragon Gate USA, or Chikara Pro, I really do
enjoy the various scripted forms of sports entertainment.
On April 6th of this
year, the WWE will present its 30th incarnation of its industry-changing
event, Wrestlemania! To celebrate this momentous occasion in professional
wrestling, we here at Rave Up Music are going to take a look wrestling’s
connection to the music by looking at some actual music albums released by some
of the biggest names throughout professional wrestling history, and who better
to start these reviews off than the man who is perhaps the biggest name ever in
professional wrestling? That is right; I am talking about the Immortal Hulk
Hogan!
Similar to many young wrestling
fans of the 1980s and early 1990s, I was indeed a Hulkamaniac, and it is easy
to see why. Hulk Hogan (real name Terry Bollea) presented this larger-than-life
persona that many kids wanted to emulate. He was energetic, spoke of never
giving up, training hard, eating your vitamins, and saying your prayers. He
also represented good American values, battling some of the greatest villains
ever. Plus, being a music nerd, his entrance music, “Real American” by Rick
Derringer, is still one of the greatest and catchiest songs I have ever heard,
and I still kind of geek out whenever I hear it.
Try getting that main guitar riff out of
your head…
Today, I will admit that my
admiration for the Hulkster has waned a bit over the last few years. He is
somewhat of a shell of his former self, and his personal life has become thing
of headlines over on TMZ. Still, the character I grew up watching, being both
the American hero and the lead of the NOW still remains a big part of my
childhood, including a very odd music album that Hulk released in 1995,
entitled Hulk Rules.
Hogan can multi-task by playing bass
guitar and ride a motorcycle at the same time…
Believe it or not, before Hogan
was the wrestling legend he is today, he was a bass guitar player in a few
groups throughout Florida. The music career was put to the side for wrestling,
but Hogan would return music after being inspired to write a song as a tribute
to a young fan in the United Kingdom who passed away before he could see Hulk
wrestle live. From here, Hulk collaborated with long time friend and fellow
wrestling personality Jimmy Hart, musician J.J. Macguire, and his then-wife
Linda to form the Wrestling Boot Band, and release Hulk Rules in 1995 on Select Records, the same record label that
brought as the comedy groups The Jerky Boys, Kids ‘N Play, and a few solo
albums from the members of the Wu-Tang Clan. This album made the top ten of the
Billboard’s children albums charts, despite incredible negative criticism from
music reviewers.
As a kid, I actually owned this
album. Heck, I am actually looking at it right now as a write this review. And,
I can say without any hint of cynicism in my voice: this is a REALLY
bad music album, whether it is intended for children, adults, or a general
music listening audience. How bad is it? Well, for the ten of you in
attendance, for the couple of hundred of you reading this around the world,
let’s get ready to rumble!!! This is Wrassle-Palooza: Hulk Hogan – Hulk Rules!
ALBUM
COVER:
Wow, just look at the cover.
There is nothing that would make a kid to want to buy this album more than the
image of Hulk Hogan with a constipated look on his face. Although, judging by
the position that Hogan is doing on the cover, it look Hogan is about to go
Number 2 on the American flag. A Real American Hero, ladies and gentlemen;
dropping a load on a cherished American symbol! Honestly, even if I were to see
this terrible album cover as a kid in 1995, I probably would have bought it
simply because Hogan was on the cover. In fact, I did… As an adult in 2014
though, it is just really awkward to look at right now.
SONGS/TRACK
LIST:
“Hulkster’s
in the House”
The album starts with your
standard party rock anthem, and no, I do not mean LMFAO. “Hulkster’s in the
House” is the first of many tracks on this album that is written about how
super-special-awesome Hogan is. With such ground breaking lyrics like “The Hulkster’s in the House, Check him out!
Check him out!” and “When the going
gets tough, the tough get rough,” I could have totally seen this one
winning the Grammy for Record of the Year in 1996. But sadly, that honor went
to Seal for “Kissed from a Rose” off the Batman
Forever soundtrack. Oh, such a cruel world we live in when the musical
talents of Hulk Hogan are ignored…
“American
Made”
The second track was Hogan’s
entrance music when he was in World Championship Wrestling, aka WCW. I will
admit, this song got me hyped up as a kid to watch Hogan wrestle some of the
great wrestlers in WCW. Honestly, it is a very solid, well-written song. The
riffs are catchy, the lyrics really create the image of a great, pure American
hero, and that guitar solo in the middle of the song really cooks.
The only down side to that song
is the fact that it is a COMPLETE RIP-OFF of Hogan’s previous
entrance music in WWF(E), “Real American” by Rick Derringer. The main guitar
riffs are the similar, the song structure is exactly the same (intro-verse-pre-chorus-chorus-verse-pre-chorus-chorus-guitar
solo-pre-chorus-chorus), and the theme about being a true American are exactly
the same. This was intentional because Hogan could not use “Real American”
since it was licensed out to the WWE. So, when he came to WCW, he and J.J.
Maguire wrote this song.
Heck, the similarities between
the two songs are pretty obvious that if you go on YouTube, you will find a few
mash-ups of the two songs together.
This one here is pretty good…
Regardless of the intended
ripping off of the previous theme, in my opinion, “American Made” is the best
song on this album, and I would gladly listen to it over and over again,
especially mashed up with “Real American.”
“Hulkster’s
Back”
You want to know something I
thought I would never hear in my life time? Hulk Hogan rapping about how
awesome he is. But, we get that with the track, “Hulkster’s Back” (like he
actually went away). The main synthesizer riff supporting the song is a bit
catchy, and admittedly a bit cheesy, too. This song perfectly captures the
music of the 1980s. The only problem with that idea was it was released it the
mid-1990s! Heck, the grunge rock scene had pretty much ended and we all moved
on to alternative rock music. Plus, the lyrics and female singers backing up
Hogan on this track are really annoying! This song is really
a pain to listen to.
“Wrestling
Boot Traveling Band”
Honestly, this is a bizarre song
to feature on an album intended for children. The lyrics are about a guy in a
band who is courting a young lady. The musical style of this song feels like
something I would hear in the works of Jimmy Buffet. Because when you are
marketing an album for kids, having a song that reminds you of “Margaritaville”
is the work of a genius.
This song was sung by Jimmy Hart,
a professional wrestling manager, who in his own right is a very accomplished
musician. He is actually quite a good musician, and I wish he would have done a
lot more music on his own. Sadly, I feel like Hart’s talent is kind of wasted on
this song. The song feels awkward to listen to, and I bet Jimmy felt a bit
awkward singing and playing on it.
“Bad
to the Bone”
When I read the title of this
track back in 1995, I thought it was going to be a cover of George Thorogood’s
classic rock anthem. Boy, was I WAY off on that one. This is a
generic rock tune about going on a ride on a Harley motorcycle, because all
little kids ride on Harley Davison and Kawasaki bikes. Though I think Jimmy
Hart sounds great on here, the song is kind of bland to listening to and there
is not really anything to say about it.
“I
Want to Be a Hulkamaniac”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-GDy65ZYsI
(Follow Link to Video)
(Follow Link to Video)
This is just a weird song. The
recurring chorus is annoying, and it will get stuck in your head. Hulk is
rapping again, this time about what you need to do to be a Hulkamaniac. The
lyrics are a bit uncomfortable to listen to knowing Hogan’s personal life in
the last several years. Two of the lines in the lyrics are as followed:
Always
be good to your family and friends,
They’re
the only ones who will be there in the end.
Yeah, if there are any of you do
not know this by now, Hogan and his wife Linda and divorced. His son was jailed
for a brief period time for driving under the influence and crashing his car,
leaving his friend paralyzed. And then, there is Hogan’s daughter Brooke…well,
I will get to her another time…Also, there are other things about Hogan that I
will not go into details on here because this is a semi-“PG” rated blog.
The point is that while the
message of the song is a good one, the people performing it may not exactly
follow that message. But, back in 1995, it did not matter since the image of
Hulkamania was so big that we did not care that the people telling it to us
were not being true to the message. But, listening to it now in hindsight, I
really do feel weird about this song.
“Beach
Patrol”
Whenever a song starts off with a
record scratching sound, it means one of two things: You are going to hear a
rap song, or a cover of the Fat Albert theme. But, knowing that this is a Hulk
Hogan music album, it is a very bad rap song. The song is just nonsensical, and
really I have no idea why I should even care about this Beach Patrol. Plus,
having Hogan say the phrase, “Whoop! There it is,” just makes me cringe. If I
never hear that again for the rest of my life, I will be a very happy man.
“Hulk’s
The One”
You know, reviewing this album
nearly twenty years after it was released makes it really hard to not point out
the irony in a song like this one. “Hulk’s the One” which I believe is sung by
Hogan’s ex-wife Linda Bollea, is a song about how Hulk’s the only man for
Linda, even if he is a bad boy and no good for her. Yes, Hogan’s ex-wife, singing
about Hulk’s the only man for her, even though she divorced him…
Anyway, knowing that about the
personal lives of the Hogans/Bolleas makes this a very hard song to listen to.
It is a love ballad out of the 1980s, and it has some really questionable lyrics
that I really do not feel comfortable discussing about since, again, this is an
album intended for children! I think I am just going to go onto the next song.
“Hulkster
in Heaven”
(Follow Link to Video)
We finally get to the song that inspired
Hulk Hogan to write this album. As mentioned in the introduction to this
review, this song was inspired by a young fan of Hogan’s who passed away from a
terminal disease. This ballad is a bit cheesy, with its synthesized brass hits
and strings. But I really cannot really be too critical on this one since it is
about a little kid who died from an illness. All I am going to say just check
out the song for yourself. Trust me, it is worth it.
“Hulk
Rules”
After a ballad about dying young
fan, the album ends with a song that is designed to stroke the ego of Hulk
Hogan. I am not sure if this song is a hard rock song or a really bad hair
metal tune, but it is really hard to listen to. The song follows the theme of
most of the songs on this album about how great Hogan is. The music is really
atrocious to listen to. Plus, that saxophone solo near the end of the song
really makes my ears bleed. As a saxophonist myself, I am deeply offended by
that performance and if the inventor of the saxophone, Adolph Sax, heard that
solo, he would of slap the performer in their face, and tell them to never play
the saxophone ever again.
OVERALL
IMPRESSION:
Back in 1995, I was a very proud
Hulkamaniac who bought Hulk Rules since
it was by one of my heroes. Now, as an adult, I feel very embarrassed, not only
for myself for buying this garbage, but also for Hogan and everyone else
involved in producing it. Very rarely do I find an album by an artist where I
can find something enjoyable on it, even if it only a few songs on it. But,
that is not the case with Hulk Rules.
This is one of Hogan’s most poorly executed ventures. It is as bad as his
restaurant “Pastamania,” that close only after a year of operations.
“What’cha gonna do when Pastamania makes
spaghetti and ravioli for you?”
Almost every song on here it
poorly executed, and feel like they are not fully developed songs.
Nearly every song praises the god
that is Hogan, and how he can do no wrong. The only song I actually enjoyed on
the album was “American Made” and that is because I knew the song in advance
before I bought the album. Plus, it really does rip-off “Real American.”
One of the biggest problems with Hulk Rules is that it has no set musical
tone. Some songs are rock songs, some are rap song, some are really poor
throwbacks to the 80s pop scene, one is a poor man’s attempt at Jimmy Buffet,
and one is very odd ballad about a dying Hulkamaniac. The lyrics on the album
have so many themes and ideas to them that I cannot pinpoint who this album’s
target audience is. Is the album for kids, adults, wrestling fans, or
non-wrestling fans? It is not clear at all.
If there is one word that
describes this album, it would be “awkward.” It is awkward for the audience to
listening to, it awkward for the musicians to perform, and it is awkward in its
presentation. Heck, this album so awkward that would rather go watch Hogan’s
performance in Mr. Nanny one hundred
times on a continuous loop instead of listening to this album over and over
again.
Overall, I can only recommend
downloading “American Made” off of iTunes instead of purchasing Hulk Rules. It is badly produced, has under-developed
songs, and it is really is more of a quick-buck for Hogan and company than an
actually legitimate attempt for Hogan to have a music career. Hogan, I loved
you as a wrestler/sports entertainer, so please just stick to that, and I will
forget Hulk Rules even existed.
Well, that brings us to the end
of the first review of Wrassle-Palooza here
at Rave Up Music. Join us next week as we take a look at an album from one of
Hogan’s former friends and greatest rival. Hopefully, it will be a lot better
than this hunk of junk. Until then, I am Barius, and I please, keep on rockin’,
BROTHER!
NOTE: All material and media
featured in this blog are owned by their respected copyright holders, and are
only used for purposes of review, commentary and satire under the terms of Fair
Use. Please support the official release of all media used in this review.
No comments:
Post a Comment