Customer Reviews

Theatre Of Pain

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I bought this when albums were still being sold. I listened to this every day then all my albums got stolen. I just recently started getting all the albums I had, but in CDs. This is classic crue.

When you list the best Hard rock bands of the classic era, I mean
the top bands, you have a handful of groups that stand out. The bands that you have to love to be a classic metalhead. Zeppelin,Aerosmith,Sabbath,AC/DC,the Who,Purple,Van Halen,KISS,Cooper,the Stones. But the one "Hair band" that truely deserves a spot in this elite group is Motley Crue. I love all the hair bands and some of them are great, but Motley was the best of the 80's. They were not that great at songwriting,but then AC/DC aren't either. They were not as great a group of musicians as Van Halen, but The Stones couldn't play their way out of a wet paper bag. But greatness is measured in Legend, and Motley Crue have been the subject of some of rock's most infamous legends. This is their best album. It's not as rough as Shout at the devil, but it showed a band that had developed into a tight unit. They took their influence from Aerosmith, and Van Halen, and it shows here. This is a must for classic metal fans. This was what metal was like before Thrash and all that garbage took over. Buy it. You won't regret it.

This album is another unfortunate product of the direction glam metal took a competent rock band during the 1980s. In 1985 the Crue were poised to release the follow-up to the metal classic "Shout". Instead of a great album fans got a great single, the MTV ballad "Home Sweet Home".

Much of this album is tiresome. Silly chants that could have come from a scribe with much less skill than Nikki Sixx. But it fit the era of glitter and make up. I'm just thankful they gave up that ... before "Girls Girls Girls"

I love Motley Crue for what they started with and what they later became. I honestly don't know how this disc was ever really noticed. The songs are simplistic, the musicianship is thoroughly non-impressive and the production sounds poppy and dated even then. Out of the now 15 songs on this disc, only three are tolerable leaving 80% of the songs as pure filler. I find it nearly impossible to believe that this disc ever won a following when other bands like Iron Maiden, Judas Priest were releasing metal epics. Theatre of Pain was a profound disappointment. This cd, for me, really spelled the end for metal as it was known. If this cd was my first exposure to the Crue, then I'm sure that I would never have followed them. It's painful to listen to even now.

Theatre of Pain.

*

Motley Crue's venture into the mid 1980s. Gone for all intents and purposes is the heavy brash sound which populated SATD and TFFL. You get Motley Glam. Its a sad joke compared to the two prior releases.

There are people who love this album. I am not one of them. The music loses the edge, power and feracity of earlier output.

For all intents and purposes the Motley Crue of legend disappeared sometime between 1984 and 1985. Replaced by a drugged out band resorting to cliched MTV ballads, lame lyrics and the occasional cheesy cover. From here they never recover the greatness they flashed in the early years.

Thinking about buying this? Don't. Shout at the Devil or Too Fast for Love are THE albums to buy. After this fughetabout unless you like cheesy cliche 1980s rock.

I wrote a previous review and gave it a 3, but just yesterday I gave this album a real listen and thought it was good. The sound is a little muted and the guitar has the same sounds on each song, Vince's voice is herrendous, and Tommy's drums are o.k, but all bad things aside, this album has it's good sides too. For the most part the lyrics are good, and the songs are kept short before they get boring. The music is sort of bluesy, which is a plus. The best songs are City Boy Blues, which has a great bluesy feel to it, Smokin' in the Boys' Room, which is a pure fun song, Louder Than Hell, which has great lyrics, Home Sweet Home, which is the Crue's first ballad and it scores, Use It Or Lose It, which is a pounding song, and Raise Your Hands To Rock, which has a pretty cool acoustic riff to it. The rest are o.k songs. Like I said before, buy Dr. Feelgood before you buy this, but this album is a good representation of the old Crue, and a hint of the Crue to come.

THIS IS NOT A BAD ALBUM, CITY BOY BLUES AND LOUDER THAN HELL AND SAVE OUR SOULS ROCK. THIS ALBUM IN MY OPINION WAS OVER PRODUCED. IT IS NOT AS HEAVY AS TOO FAST OR SHOUT. THEATRE OF PAIN IS A BLUESY ROCK ALBUM.

I was 15 yrs old when this "Record" hit the stores. I was a huge Crue fan with heavy anticipations for this new Crue collaboration. TOO FAST FOR LOVE, and SHOUT AT THE DEVIL were loud, rebellious, and all around heavy. My first impression was the bands new appearance, my reaction, "Oh man! What did they do?". The songs did not meet the expectations I had either, although there are a couple of great songs like LOUDER THAN HELL, TONIGHT(WE NEED A LOVER)"90,000 screaming watts, Honey drippin' from her top"(A classic opening line to a song). But all in all, this CD is not their best..although it was a good effort to get airplay, and MTV ratings. It brought forth a new generation of Crue fans to follow. If you want loud, raw, and fast metal, see TO FAST FOR LOVE, AND SHOUT AT THE DEVIL.

Motley Crue and in particular Vince Neil like to slag this album for all its worth, but while it's not their best work, it's certainly an entertaining album. I suppose when your lead off single is an uninspired (but fun) cover of Brownsville Station's "Smokin' in the Boys Room", it does kind of expose your album as being weak. But weak is a relative term when you're talking hard rock in the year 1985. This was the year when Tears For Fears and Wham! were the flavors of the month, folks. The Crue, Ratt, and Night Ranger were virtually the only hard rock bands (to my memory anyway) to log albums in the Billboard Top Ten that year. This was a breath of fresh air for 1985, and at the time it certainly didn't play like a letdown after their previous gem "Shout At The Devil". Time has definitely been kinder to "Shout", but this one still gets a few spins in my disc player every year, if for no other reason than because most of the songs aren't beaten to death on the radio like they are on "Dr. Feelgood".

In fact, the only thing that really ruins this album is the poor production value. In the years immediately following Quiet Riot's "Metal Health" album, some bands seemed to want to cash in on the recorded-inside-a-tin-can sound (the drums sound like more like the sticks are being bashed on top of empty cardboard boxes). I thought it stunk then, and I still do.

Other than the obvious choices of "Smokin' In The Boys Room" and "Home Sweet Home", top tracks include "Louder Than Hell", "Keep Your Eye On The Money", and "Raise Your Hands To Rock" (which is partially acoustic and therefore somewhat inappropriately titled!). I can't comment on the bonus tracks since I only have the original, but seeing as how they're nothing more than demos or alternate takes of other tracks on the album, they're just typical marketing hype to try to get people to buy what they already have.

This is Crue's weakest album. It has 2, maybe 3 decent songs, but honestly, the album is quite boring. Shout at the devil/too fast for love are awesome. Girls/Dr feelgood are good. This one is just too dull.