Cry Tough
I Want Action
I Won't Forget You
Play Dirty
Look What the Cat Dragged In
Talk Dirty to Me
Want Some, Need Some
Blame It on You
#1 Bad Boy
Let Me Go to the Show
Recorded for just $23,000, Poison's Look What The Cat Dragged In is an instant, disposable trash metal classic. Intoxicating while it lasts, some find the record too flimsy to withstand close examination, yet it perfectly captures its time.
Poison paid for the recording of the album themselves, then licensed the album to Enigma. It began selling immediately, and by the time they had reached 30,000 copies, Capitol signed them up, acquiring the rights to Look What The Cat Dragged In as part of the deal.
The rest was simple: they made videos that looked as good as the album sleeve and had some hit singles: Cry Tough, Talk Dirty To Me, I Won’t Forget You. Poison sold four million records. Those throwaway songs became the soundtrack to a year’s-worth of Saturday nights.
They were a cheap date, and by the end of the night you knew you’d had a lot of fun. The subsequent Open Up And Say… Ahh was bigger, but Look What The Cat Dragged In said the same things faster and just as well.
Every week, Album of the Week Club listens to and discusses the album in question, votes on how good it is, and publishes our findings, with the aim of giving people reliable reviews and the wider rock community the chance to contribute.
Other albums released in August 1986
- Kicking Against the Pricks - Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
- Slippery When Wet - Bon Jovi
- True As Steel - Warlock
- Fore! - Huey Lewis and the News
- Dangerous Games - Alcatrazz
- Fahrenheit - Toto
- Graceland - Paul Simon
- Press to Play - Paul McCartney
- In the Army Now - Status Quo
- The Sport of Kings - Triumph
- Vinnie Vincent Invasion - Vinnie Vincent Invasion
- High Priest of Love - Zodiac Mindwarp
- In the Pines - The Triffids
- Nasty Nasty - Black 'N Blue
What they said...
"It was derivative and formulaic, to be sure, but Poison wholeheartedly embraced that formula from the beginning with a conviction often missing in their peers, and it's that ridiculous, good-time excess that keeps Look What The Cat Dragged In's catchiest songs, especially the party anthems Talk Dirty To Me and I Want Action, just as much fun today, if not more so. (AllMusic)
"If you’re in a mood for some light-hearted, fun-loving music, you could do worse than to procure this record. As long as you don’t expect the height of intellect, disregard the ridiculous drag queens on the cover, and get past some of the lyrics, you will manage to have a blast with this album, which is the perfect epitome of its decade: flashy, boisterous, full of swagger, and ultimately a lot of fun." (Sputnik Music)
"Poison knows what its role is, what it’s there for, and why DJs keep twirling Every Rose at Midwestern weddings year after year after year. They’re just the guys who hit on a thing and are gonna ride it into the sunset, while the other cowboys are left to sing their sad, sad songs. For that reason, the Poison reissues make it onto my CD rack, nestled comfortably for that day when I, too, need nothing but a good time. Except Cat Dragged In. That one’s shit." (Pop Matters)
What you said...
Chris Elliott: It's just fun. Bounces along and it's over before the appeal fades. Back before metal took itself seriously.
Mike Canoe: A guilty pleasure. Like watching a friend's band play. Silly, sloppy fun
I damned them as false metal back when this album came out while secretly loving Talk Dirty To Me and the title track. Look What the Cat Dragged In both suffers and benefits from "Star Wars Syndrome." Please, allow me to elucidate.
Say that the first Van Halen album is the breathtaking and groundbreaking "Star Wars" of the Sunset Strip. Mötley Crüe's second album, Shout at The Devil, could be "The Empire Strikes Back": darker, angrier, with an ambivalent ending. Then comes "The Return of the Jedi," or, as my dad called it, "a damn Muppet movie." That's Poison's Look What the Cat Dragged In.
But compared to what came after, much like the Star Wars prequels and sequels, Poison isn’t so bad. As glam metal bands became poppier and sloppier (the sequels) or, alternatively, sleazier and greasier (the prequels), Poison suddenly seemed like, if not innovators exactly, elder statesman of the scene.
Look What the Cat Dragged In is inessential, but, with the benefit of hindsight, more essential than much of what came after.
Gus Schultz: Hair bands and the like were not on my radar then or now. I find it very hard to be impartial to this album. I just found this and most of those bands as pop music trying to disguise itself as heavy metal with a touch of glam, think New York Dolls but without the musical talent. What else would you expect from the 80s?
Yet many people bought and enjoyed it which I can understand because I think the 80s was all about image and marketing as well as hair metal becoming a fashion trend. I'm sure a lot of these musicians had talent and maybe showed so long after this genre was gone and were perhaps a product of the times and record companies. I can't really find anything I like about this LP or any from the genre, I'm just glad grunge came along to turn the knife in its back to end it. But that's another story!
Gary Claydon: Poor, even by Poison standards, which tells you just how bad it is. It sold in decent numbers though, so what the fuck do I know? Was gonna give it 2/10 but I'm deducting a mark for that godawful cover.
Chris Downie: Before Nickelback earned the dubious honour of most-hated band in rock, long before grunge rode roughshod over 80s excess and before social media memes were the norm, we had the equally polarising crew fronted by now-TV celebrity Bret Michaels. Even more divisive than Jon Bon Jovi and co., Poison epitomised the hair metal genre; pompous, sexually charged, straight-ahead 4/4 rock, replete with cliches and cheesy power ballads.
Looking back at this album, it's easy to see why it elicited strong reactions on all sides of the fence; to many who favoured simple, good-time rock'n'roll, it was the logical conclusion of the Twisted Sister and Motley Crue formula. To others, particularly those seduced by the likes of Master of Puppets and Peace Sells... that same year, it exuded style over substance and a creative nadir for heavy metal.
In truth, it sees a band not devoid of talent; on the contrary, the title track still packs a punch today and Cry Tough is a decent, feel-good rock anthem. They are just buried in a mass of hairspray and cosmetics that threatened to knacker the ozone layer altogether.
Ultimately, even the passage of time will not alter perceptions. For those who dug deeper, however, beneath the veneer of the girly image, they went on to produce some impressive work, particularly the third album Flesh And Blood and its follow-up Native Tongue, with Richie Kotzen on lead guitar. However, this debut, though spirited, does pale by comparison. 6/10.
Brian Carr: The 80s were my high school years and I was all into the guitar solos and flash. Towards the tail end, there were some late-arriving bands to the scene I didn’t like much, but at the time, I thought Poison was a fun band. (The fact that hot girls liked them was a bonus.) They probably weren’t in my top five (or ten?) groups of the time, though, and I can totally understand why they would be loathed by many.
Into my adult years, my musical tastes shifted and expanded during different periods of my life and I mostly stopped listening to Poison. I like them okay, but can point to a couple of things that made me sour on them, one external and one internal. The external was the dreaded burnout factor as Talk Dirty to Me and especially Nothin’ But a Good Time from their second album entered the realm of “never need to hear this song again” territory. As to the internal problem, so much of their music sounds so stiff to me now. I’m reminded of Eddie Murphy’s observation about white people’s butts being real tight when they walk. For the most part, Poison sounds rhythmically stiff to my older ears.
All of that said, I can still listen to their debut and enjoy it for what it is. The title track, Look What the Cat Dragged In is still my favorite track on the record. Play Dirty and album closer Let Me Go to the Show are decent rockers as well.
Andrew Cumming: Ah Hair Metal. What a weird old time that was. I was pretty much in. I could happily argue the relative merits of Ratt vs Motley vs Cinderella vs Faster Pussycat etc. But for some reason I couldn't get going with Poison. Memory tells me weedy vocals and songs that weren't good enough. Fine excuse to revisit 38 (yes, 38!) years later and see if that still holds true.
Well, the first thing is the vocals aren't that annoying. I mean no more so than, say, Vince Neil. And the sound is pretty good. But, I'm afraid the songs do generally let this record down. The title track is pretty good, Talk Dirty To Me is a stonewall classic and I Won't Forget You is a serviceable ballad. But that aside the songs are mediocre to poor and just not really very listenable (especially at 38 years distance).
To be fair it is pretty hard to make this era's songs stand up well at this distance. But the fact is Motley Crue rocked harder and did have some top-drawer songs. Ratt had some good tunes too. Cinderella were nicely bluesy, which makes them more enduring. Poison sadly just sounds badly dated and pretty unlistenable now.
Maybe we need to have a crack at the Faster Pussycat back catalogue and see how that stands up?
John Edgar: There were some pretty darn good blues-based rock bands that came out of the hair metal period... but Poison ain't one of em'. Bargain basement stuff, at best.
Greg Schwepe: So, this is going to be called my Don’t Judge A Book By Its Cover review of Look What The Cat Dragged In by Poison. Going to listen and write my review as if I’d never seen the cover of this debut in the record store back in the day. Because, knowing the musical tastes of many in this esteemed album review group, I’m guessing none of you (me included) saw the hair-sprayed and makeup-laden band on the cover and said “Oh, I’m totally buying that album!” More like “Um, no…” followed by a phrase that would be extremely politically incorrect in this day and age. Same thing many of you did when you saw that this album had been selected this week! Right? Ironically, many of us probably have albums by David Bowie, T.Rex/Marc Bolan, Roxy Music, and Queen with just as much makeup shown on the cover… and bought those right on the spot!
But hey, it’s all about the music, so I’ll focus on that and give Look What… a fair review. Cry Tough and I Want Action lead this album with somewhat lighter glam metal fare. Not enough grit in Bret Michaels vocals to get my attention.
I Won’t Forget You comes next with Poison’s initial entry into the power ballad sweepstakes. While many may loath these lighter-waving songs, they’re hard not to sing along to. Poison got this one half right, but totally nail the power ballad on their follow up.
Next comes Play Dirty and from that point on the band seems to put the “metal” in their glam metal. Chugging riffs and C.C. DeVille finds his whammy bar useful and provides plenty of dive bombs. Does he have the chops of other Sunset Strip guitarists? Nope! But probably doesn’t need to for this band. Bret Michaels' vocals are a little more snarling and gritty from this point on as well. My favourite song is probably the title track; Talk Dirty To Me has an 80’s Kiss vibe to it. The remainder of the album rocks along in a harder vein than the first three tracks.
To be fair, had I heard this back in the 80s and judged it on the songs and musicality alone, I probably wouldn’t have been waiting at the record store when their follow-up came out. This might have stayed in my cassette player for a week or two then got relegated to the back seat of the car when something more exciting came along. Fun, party rock'n'roll...that’s it. There are a handful of Poison songs I will crank up no matter who might be in the car if one did come on the radio. I did eventually buy one Poison cassette, Flesh & Blood, after hearing the catchy Unskinny Bop 20 times in one week. And that album featured no band photos on the cover! 6 out of 10 on this one for me.
Robin Jordan: I bought this back in the day thinking it might possibly be the next Motley Crue, based upon Cry Tough. Sadly, as the years have passed from 1987 on, I've realized how terrible the writing is, only to be overshadowed by the talentless singer, maybe the lowest example of vocals in the genre? The cover is still possible jack shack material. I do appreciate the live, amateur enthusiasm though.
John Davidson: When I think of glam rock it evokes memories of Slade, Sweet, T Rex, Mott the Hoople, Roxy Music and David Bowie's Spiders of Mars phase, and the glam 'pop' of Suzi Quatro, Mud, Gary Glitter (long disgraced for paedophilia), Bay City rollers and Alvin Stardust.
Poison sit firmly at the glam-pop end of the spectrum but sadly lack the irony and self-knowledge that made the better artists at least listenable without the shimmering cloak of nostalgia to wrap around my shoulders.
The UK punk scene that emerged from the scuzzier end of glam, prided itself on a "fuck you" attitude over musical talent, but Poison's attitude is far too obviously preening to claim such pedigree. Utterly bereft of charm, this is neither good enough to be worth listening to anyway nor bad enough to wear as a badge of iconoclastic pride. 1/10.
Julian Preedy: Some great songs, but they were quick to drop the glam look by the time of the next album. By the mid-eighties many were adopting the electric gypsy look pioneered by Hanoi Rocks and Faster Pussycat.
Philip Qvist: I could already hear the groans of despair when this one appeared as this week's album - and I guess there is some justification for that. This music is definitely B-grade stuff - and it certainly picked up more than its fair share of criticism both at the time and now.
I guess "disposable rock that would never take music to the next level" is a good way of describing the music of Poison, not to mention many of their contemporaries at the time; while lyrics about girls, sex and having a good time will hardly be classified as great poetry. And the less said about the fashion and the hair the better.
But having said all of that I did listen to Look What The Cat Dragged In with a very open mind, and I actually enjoyed it. Yes, the production is basic at best, particularly the drums and bass, but as singer Bret Michaels pointed out, it was a "glorified demo" that was basically self-funded by the band and their friends and family. Considering that it went on to sell over four million copies that's not a bad return at all. Which leaves me asking a rather interesting question: if hair metal was so unpopular and so hated, then how did these records all sell by the truckload and who was attending all those packed concerts?
CC Deville is actually a decent guitarist and there are some good songs on the record - and at just shy under 35 minutes it doesn't outstay its welcome.
It's certainly no intellectual masterpiece and it definitely isn't an album or band to be taken seriously either - but as already mentioned, it is a fun album that I enjoyed, even if I'm unlikely to add it to my next Playlist.
Pete Delgado: I actually like this album. It was fun.
Joe Cogan: Hair metal was ridiculous to begin with, and it has aged about as well as a gallon of milk left in a car over a summer weekend.
Richard Cardenas: Entertaining record. My wife loves it so it has value to me. 6/10.
Will Prewitt: I didn’t hate this era or genre, but I hated this band. Are negative scores possible?
Jim Barger: I listened to this album a couple weeks ago after not listening to it for years and it is a fun album. Poison is a party rock band. Their music is a fun escape for people who need one. Catchy riffs and choruses.
Mark Herrington: Symptomatic of the mid to late 80s deterioration in much hard rock. Those raised on 70s /early 80s heavy rock looked on bemused at such material, or we cast around to goth or suchlike. Thankfully, the likes of Master of Puppets still carried the torch, the same year that this came out. However, the critical mass of the volume of this stuff was approaching, and it was only a matter of time until the inevitable vacuum spawned grunge.
Tony Cruse: Good pop rock trash. Fun songs! Was pretty fresh when it was released! 8/10.
Chris Layton: Been a fan since day one. Are their songs simple? Sure. I can play every song on guitar. Are they thoughtful lyrics? No. However, they're catchy and they're fun. Who doesn't sing along with great gusto to Talk Dirty to Me? They got better on Open Up and better still on Flesh and Blood, but for a debut release, it's raw, unpolished, and unapologetic, just like some of the great debut albums out there. Listening takes me back to Jr. High, experiencing something just a tiny bit more exciting than the pop on the radio at the time, with more attitude and big hair.
Tony Cruse: It’s a fun pop-rock trash album. It wasn’t supposed to change the world. Open a bottle and put it on!
Final score: 5.13 (134 votes cast, total score 688)
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