Rocktober Deep Cut Artist #5: Trixter

For the criteria for bands and artists to be considered "deep cut artists," click here.

Band or artist:  Trixter

Where from:  USA (New Jersey)

Years active: 1983-1995, 2008-present

Number of studio albums:  5

Highest-charting single on the Billboard Hot 100:  "Give It To Me Good" (#65)

Highest-charting studio album on the Billboard 200:  Trixter (#28)

This Rocktober's first Hair Band Friday deep cut artist is Trixter.  You'd probably be amazed at how many hair bands had enough chart success that they don't fit within my criteria for a "deep cut artist."  But thankfully for you, my love of hair bands runs deeper than most, so I won't let you down.

Trixter was a New Jersey-based band that came along kind of right as the hair band era began its sad, but inevitable, decline.  They released their self-titled debut album in 1990, and it got to #28 on the Billboard 200 album charts and spawned the band's only two songs that charted on the Billboard Hot 100 –- "Give It To Me Good" (#65), "Surrender" (#72), and "One In a Million" (#75).  

Like other bands around then, most of their songs were hard rocking, but their ballads or acoustic songs ended up being the ones that were put out as singles.  Trixter's three singles are evidence of that.  "Give It To Me Good" is kind of an acoustic/electric song, but catchy and worthy enough to garner a lot of time on the Dial MTV video countdown.  "Surrender" is your classic hair band power ballad, and it frankly surprises me that it wasn't a bigger hit.  "One In a Million" isn't a ballad, but it's a little softer and radio-friendly than some of their other stuff.  

Unfortunately, by the time the band released their second album, Hear!, in October 1992 -- about five months after the last hair band album to top the chart (Def Leppard's Adrenalize) had fallen from #1.  Grunge was in full effect, so Hear! faltered, topping out at #109 on the Billboard album chart and failing to produce any charting singles.

Admittedly, I only own their first album, but I think it's pretty good.  Had it been released a year or two earlier, it probably would have been much bigger.  In addition to the three singles mentioned above, they have some good rocking hair band tunes on the album ("Bad Girl," "Always a Victim," "Heart of Steel," "Ride the Whip," and "You'll Never See Me Cryin'").  I'm going with "Always a Victim" because I think it's a catchy, rocking song that captures the hair band sound as good as any of their songs did.