LOCAL / REGIONAL BANDS THAT SHOULD'VE BEEN BIG, BUT WEREN'T

[alandhopewell]

     This Cleveland band had one national hit, "He Can't Love You (Like I Love You)"; ironically, it wasn't sung by the usual lead singer, the guy the band was named after....

Michael Stanley Band - He Cant Love You

Michael Stanley Band - Lover

Michael Stanley Band - Midwest Midnight

Michael Stanley Band - Heartland

[Jack]

I think these guys had three albums out but I don't know if they were ever much of an attraction outside of the Twin Cities.

Slave Raider - The Black Hole

[retrorussell]

I thought Portland's NU SHOOZ and QUARTERFLASH were both very talented husband-and-wife groups that only had one or two hits.  Shame.  Quarterflash played in my neighborhood park last summer.
NU SHOOZ- I Can't Wait
Nu Shooz I Can't Wait
QUARTERFLASH- Harden My Heart
Quarterflash - Harden My Heart

[Umaril Has Returned]

We had a band in New Jersey named Monroe who had a singer who was part Steven Tyler, part Vinnie Vincent with some Paul Stanley thrown in.  They had regular appearances on a pre-cable station called U-68 (The Underground) out of Newark, N.J. and I'm surprised they never got picked up by a major label!  Here's a clip:

http://youtu.be/YzrmL0m_rOg

[Allhallowsday]

I remember QUARTERFLASH well...  

Who remembers BIG STAR?  Like lots of people, I love them now, but I didn't know their records then... in fact, the cover photograph of the red ceiling and light bulb unshaded fixture (their second album) is much more famous than the great album it comes off of...  BIG STAR were formed in Memphis!!!  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlS2ZrZIK2Q

[HappyGilmore]

The Dead Milkmen. 
The Dead Milkmen - Punk Rock Girl HD

[ER]

The Raisins, an Ohio band that deserved to be big. They gave me one of my favorite sayings, the title of this song: "Fear is never boring."



The Raisins : Fear Is Never Boring

[Umaril Has Returned]

I don't live in Michigan, but I'm throwing one in for Michigan:
I have relatives in East Lansing, and back in 1986 or '7, I went to see them, and we wound up seeing a great little band called "Ded Engine" at a local bar. 


These guys should have been greater than they already were! Also, their bassist, Marky DeSade, was the bassist for a short-lived band called called Smashed Gladys, that I'm sure many of you remember well.

http://youtu.be/FWK3yS436kg

[The Burgomaster]

THE FOOLS - A very popular Boston club band back in the 1980s.  "Psycho Chicken" was their parody of "Psycho Killer."  They're still playing live shows locally.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZQ4I2RB_Ek


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpv9vFpHK1o


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnBlst3T7bY

[FatFreddysCat]

I remember a lot of the bands in this thread (Monroe, Ded Engine, Quarterflash, Slave Raider)!

New Jersey's Bad Biscut were a sleazy punk/hard rock band that was a pretty big draw on the local circuit when I was in college in the late 80s/early 90s, I saw them a bunch of times opening for Joan Jett, the Ramones and others. I always described them to friends as "imagine Skid Row and Guns N Roses doing bong hits together at a Ramones show."
Bad Biscut, Blowin Smoke

Their cover of "Highway to Hell" won an MTV contest that got them to open for AC/DC, and their one and only album (The American Dream?, 1994) was released by a label owned by one of Jon Bon Jovi's relatives.
Bad Biscut, Highway to Hell

For whatever reason they never really caught on outside of the New York/New Jersey area and eventually fizzled out by the mid 90s. The lead singer, Keith Roth, is in a band called "Frankenstein 3000" nowadays and is also a DJ on Sirius/XM satellite radio last I heard.

I wrote a long, drooling fanboy piece about my love for their one and only studio album on my blog a while ago:

http://fatfreddyscat.hubpages.com/hub/Forgotten-Albums-Bad-Biscut-THE-AMERICAN-DREAM-1994

[Umaril Has Returned]

And of course New Jersey also has the infamous Richie Knuckles and Knuckle Sandwich.   Here's a clip of Richie's earlier work, his cover of Bon Jovi's "Runaway".

http://youtu.be/zamhtuWzuhQ