Headed for the Slaughter house

Lisa Ferguson

Tuesday, Aug. 26, 1997 | 9:42 a.m.

As the saying goes: What goes around comes around.

And to hear Dana Strum -- bassist for the Las Vegas band Slaughter -- tell it, heavy metal music is on its way back around.

You do remember metal, don't you?

Leather-clad, makeup-wearing, pretty-boy rock bands with names like Poison, Trixter and Firehouse. During the late '80s, they monopolized MTV with their guitar-heavy tunes and lyrics proclaiming that they didn't "need nothing but a good time."

And arenas full of screaming, teenage girls to egg them on, of course.

But by the mid '90s, most of these perfectly-coiffed groups had fallen by the wayside, when angst-ridden grunge bands -- including Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden -- surfaced.

So how is it that Slaughter, which Strum co-founded with locally born-and-bred frontman Mark Slaughter in 1989, is still alive and kicking?

Timing.

"I think people got bored with the negativity" of grunge music, Strum said recently from La Crosse, Wis., where Slaughter was on tour with the groups Dokken and Warrant, and the granddaddy of the hard rock genre, Alice Cooper.

The quartet of bands play the Aladdin Theatre for the Performing Arts on Wednesday.

"I think people were bored of seeing groups that look like backyard mechanics," Strum says, meaning the frumpy flannel shirts and knit caps that characterized grunge couture. "I think in the last two or three years, there was just a lack of enthusiasm."

Except when it came to Slaughter, Strum contends.

The foursome, whose 1990 CD, "Stick It To Ya," featured the Vegas-inspired anthem "Up All Night" and went platinum within months of its release, continues to play about 300 gigs a year.

Apparently, they're as popular as ever in other parts of the world, with legions of fans in South America, Indonesia, Japan and Mexico. "We've done the world. Everywhere we've played has been standing room only," Strum says.

"Unfortunately, when the mass popularity (of the music) is not in the country in which you live, people either think that the band is no more or that you don't play as much as you used to."

But they're starting to gain ground with their stateside fans again. When the band first peaked, 38-year-old Strum explains, most of Slaughter's fans were in their late teens.

"They've gone to college and they're in their first career positions," he says of the fans today, "and they're coming out of the woodwork saying, 'This is what (type of music) I like; I'm not gonna not support it.'

"There's become a newfound openness for rock music ... and to quit lumping (bands) based on their haircuts or lack thereof," he continues. "Good-time rock 'n' roll always has its place ... and if Slaughter is synonymous with music that makes you feel good, that's what we (started out) wanting to do. When we walk out on stage, there's a certain level of audience respect ... because we're the same people and because we enjoy doing what we do."

Even if it has been a little tougher -- geographically speaking -- to do it lately.

Mark Slaughter, a 1982 Chaparral High School graduate and father of a toddler-aged son, moved from his large Green Valley home to a one-acre parcel of property in Nashville last year for "family reasons," Strum says.

"It's nice," says Strum, who has visited the new digs. "He seems to enjoy the peace and serenity. The reason why it sometimes draws confusion is that people think, 'Wow, is he into country music now?' Mark's face was synonymous with Vegas. He didn't really think much about that when he decided to move."

The group recently released their fourth CD, "Revolution," which Strum and Slaughter co-wrote, produced and arranged. It was recorded at Strum's De Le Casa recording studio in Green Valley, where he, guitarist Tim Kelly and drummer Blas Elias still reside.

The recording schedule, Strum says, "was not the easiest thing." Where the bandmates once lived near each other and could call on one another whenever inspiration struck, this time around "definitely took more scheduling. It was a set agenda ... to be as creative as we could be."

The result was a 14-track CD, which includes a cover of Joe Walsh's "Rocky Mountain Way."

"It's not bad," says "Big Marty," music director/DJ at local rock station KOMP 92.3-FM, where "Revolution" is on "feature rotation. It's a different style than what they have done before. It's like with any band, as the years go by, their styles change, the way they hear things and perceive things changes."

The disc's first track, "American Pie" -- not to be confused with Don McLean's pop standard -- is seeped in psychedelic imagery and resonates with a '60s sound.

"Jesus says he loves you and that's outta sight/Now you say it's rainin' but the sun is so bright/You're so cosmic, got naked on the moon/And you're lost in Lucy's garden but you're still in the room."

With that tune, Strum says, "We wanted to remind people that music goes (in) cycles and we feel that the cycle for upbeat, positive, fun music is probably about to come back again.

"We also tried to mix and match some of the band's growth without running away from what we do. We're proud of what we do."