Pat Boone Sells Out, or
Granny Kills Self While Listening to "Heavy Metal" Album
(Re-released from the vaults)
Review by Matthew Webber
I can’t decide what’s more nightmarish: A) a shirtless, gold-chain- and earring-wearing Pat Boone with a freakishly luminescent eye on the front cover of an album, B) a denim-clad, sunglasses-wearing Pat Boone on a Meatloaf-sized motorcycle on the back cover or C) the fact that Pat Boone, his management, his family and his friends thought an album of Pat Boone’s singing heavy metal songs was a marketable - or good - idea.
The resulting album, In a Metal Mood: No More Mr. Nice Guy, might just make you wet yourself. Not because of how scary the Deep Purple, Ozzy Osbourne and other heavy metal bands’ cover songs are, but because of how giggle-licious they are. Pat Boone’s late-life crisis album is the accidentally funniest CD since any Wesley Willis album.
I’d call Pat Boone’s crossover attempt laudable -- but then I’d change that D to a GH. I mean, nobody should cover a classic like “Stairway to Heaven,” especially a fart who wouldn’t know Led Zeppelin from Alice Cooper if his daughter committed suicide because of one of their backwards Satanic messages, but Pat Boone went ahead and oiled his chest (!) anyway.
The only people who would kill themselves while listening to this album are fans of the original heavy metal bands, grannies and gramps at various nursing homes whose idol just sold out (at least Lawrence Welk keeps it real) or anyone who enjoys good music in general.
In the liner notes, ol’ Patty claims he’s “ a product of the whole rock revolution” and that his fans “would buy anything [he] did.”
Hee hee hee.
Imagine an album full of you and your buddies getting drunk on a Tuesday night, cranking up “Enter Sandman” and “Paradise City” on your karaoke machine and pretending to sound like a sober Frank Sinatra, and you’ve successfully imagined In a Metal Mood and probably wet yourself.
In other words, you absolutely must find yourself a copy of this album!!!
