Review Summary: The biggest "METAL MOVE" of the entire Glam Metal era...young, dumb and full of rum!
“It had been written…’Those who have the youth have the future’. So come now children of the beast, be strong…And Shout at the Devil”
Young, Dumb and full of Rum, Motley Crue’s sophomore statement is a departure from Too Fast For Love’s bubblegum Glam Punk, opting instead for a beefed up chunk of dumbed down Judas Priest style heaviness. Shout At The Devil was the biggest “Metal” move of the 80’s Sunset Strip scene, checking every box on the P.M.R.C’s “naughty list” while courting pre-pubescent posers with cotton-candy Satanism, woman objectifying music vids and an image that merged Maybelline overkill with Mad Max’s apocalyptic wasteland. It was as brilliant as it was brainless…which was probably the entire point.
Following a minute plus Nikki Sixx sermon where cities fall to slums and evil stands strong, we get the title track’s boot stomp shout along chorus line. It’s the kind of 7th grade rebellion that drives parents to comb through a kid’s first mullet looking for some sign of the apocalypse. “Looks That Kill’s” chorus is even better, the Crue playing “intimidated” by a razor sharp vixen while plowing forward with driving mid-paced riffs and solid dynamics. “God Bless The Children of the Beast” is an ill-fit throwaway instrumental aping “Hotel California’s” pretty bits without 1% of its intestinal fortitude. But it does leads in to a cover of The Beatles’ “Helter Skelter” which adds a set of brass balls to the original; throwing some Charlie Manson in to this meat-headed menagerie (and why not?).
“Red Hot” is the hardest, fastest slobberknocker in the Crue’s playbook; Tommy Lee, already the group’s secret weapon, propelling things along hitting anything and everything in sight early and often. “Too Young To Fall In Love” equates the “L-word” to both dynamite and a guillotine, while “Ten Seconds To Love” simply equates it to one-and-done puns about loaded guns with quick triggers. “Danger” is a dark ballad where Vince Neil actually comes across sincere…pushing himself to prove a point; painting a picture that trying to exist in Hollywood isn’t all the glitz and glamour it’s cracked up to be. It’s almost poignant. Meanwhile they dedicate “Knock ‘Em Dead, Kid” to the LAPD. Go figure.
