| The band settled into the studio for 3 months, recording their second album. When asked if the "sophomore jinx" was a factor for the band, Donnie confidently replied, "No, we've got hundreds of songs. We pulled a fast one. They told us to go in and record ten songs and we recorded 22 on the same budget. We ended up putting 15 on this record. It says 14 but we put two together ("The Way Home/Coming Home") and slipped it past you." Some of the extra recordings would be later released on albums ("Style" on Tweaked, "Kitty" and "Let It Go" on Peach Fuzz). With the extra studio time, the band gets increasingly experimental. The band hires Derek's father Johnny Frigo to play violin on some tracks. Donnie uses an E bow on the track "Blue Island," which he describes as "Sort of like an electric violin, only it's actually a guitar." They incorporate a mellotron on "The Way Home" |
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| and "Strength." Donnie described the eeriness of the situation. "We used the same one they used on 'Strawberry Fields.' On John Lennon's 50th birthday, we had the mellotron in here." |
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Peers invited into the studio from L.A. Guns, The Quireboys',
and Cheap Trick are blown away by what Chip and Donnie play for them. Cheap Trick's lead singer Robin Zander offers to sing the
last track "Time To Let You Go" as a duet with Donnie on the album. The band, who idolizes Cheap Trick, is
flattered but turns Robin down. As it turns out, "Time To Let You Go" had been sent to rock
legend Paul McCartney, who loved the track and agreed to sing with Donnie on it.
Unfortunately, that falls though, so the band chooses to keep the song as it is. Enuff Z'Nuff
starts promoting their album, a 15-track masterpiece that ebbs and flows from metal to pop, an
album that remains a fan favorite.
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The band's efforts pay off. Strength gets released to critical acclaim, Rolling Stone calls Enuff Z'Nuff "Hot New Band Of The Year," MTV Europe starts running mini-specials on the album on Headbanger's Ball, and The King-Of-All-Media Howard Stern invites the guys on his radio show. The band and Stern hit it off, marking the start of a long mutual friendship. The band gets invited to the NBC Studios to appear on Late Night With David Letterman. The band happily accepts and performs "Baby Loves You," complete with Paul Shaffer and Anton Fig on drums (Vikki Fox had to settle for playing air guitar in the background!!). Everyone loves the song (which, ironically, is a track the band unsuccessfully fought to keep on the first album), Dave becomes a fan and in the future will invite Enuff Z'Nuff back on his show. Enuff Z'Nuff plays the prestigious Radio City Music Hall and goes on tour |
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with The Nelson Brothers. The ball is rolling, but trouble seems to follow the band.
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Strength does well, but doesn't tear up the charts like the band's
debut had. The video for the first single "Mother's Eyes" turns out cheesy and as a result their
follow up single "Baby Loves You" gets buried by MTV.
The band's track for the soundtrack of Home Alone 2:
Lost In New York got cut out, a Christmas gem called "Happy Holiday" that would eventually
surface on a future album. Someone on the inside starts ripping off the band left and right
financially. As Chip put it, "(We found ourselves) a million dollars in the hole despite
selling over half a million! We knew it wasn't a ton of records sold, but it was enough for
us to have thought we saw something to grow on." The future of ATCO suddenly is up in the air.
Management advises the band to file bankruptcy and leave the label. Suddenly finding themselves broke, and without a record deal, the band got depressed and started to self destruct. As Donnie would later offer on a VH-1 special, "We watched ourselves go from 40 with a bullet on the charts to the next week...nothing, it was all the sudden gone, it all happened too fast." Drugs and alcohol became major problems with the band, especially for Donnie and Derek, the latter of which soon earned the moniker "Kurt Fang" for his sudden mood swings. Internal strife ran rampant. Derek quit the band.
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Although the band spent a short period of their lives up in the air,
they soon regrouped. Derek came back, and they started recording demos and label shopping again.
Suddenly inspired, they quickly recorded 70 new songs, and got offers from Capitol, Epic, and
Arista. The band decided to go with industry great Clive Davis (Janis Joplin, Santana,
Aerosmith) at Arista Records. Donnie had quit the drugs cold turkey. "I didn't go through rehab, I didn't use methadone like all these Beverly Hills guys," Vie said. "I sat there shaking and aching for three weeks, most of the time wishing I was dead. As we were recording the demos for the album, my leg didn't work and my left arm went numb. We had to do some live shows where I was standing on one foot pretending nothing was wrong. I couldn't play guitar. Slowly it came back." With Donnie's body still in a state of withdrawl, the band started recording the album Animals With Human Intelligence. When describing the recording of the single "Innocence," he had this to offer. "The vocal was done during this horrible time. I was sitting in a chair, out of my mind. I couldn't stand up. I was singing into a bass drum microphone in the corner, pressing the buttons in the dark. It sounds weird. I never intended for that to be the |
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vocal track. But
Clive loved it. He thought it had a character to it, a feeling. I thought I could have
perfected things a bit more. But he didn't want letter-perfect." The band was in for another shock. Without warning, drummer Vikki Foxx quit Enuff Z'Nuff to join ex-Motley Crue frontman Vince Neil's band. Vikki had already recorded Animals With Human Intelligence with the band, but was airbrushed out of the cover picture. The band started taking promo shots as a 3-piece while frantically looking for a new drummer for the tour. In the meantime, the album is released and is once again met with rave reviews. Rolling Stone editor David Wild writes the liner notes. Guitar legend Slash from Guns N' Roses fame plays an uncredited sitar on the track "Takin' A Ride." The band was again invited to Late Night With David Letterman. Letterman described the band as "The best. All you need in rock n' roll." They perform the first track of the CD, "Superstitious,"--a track written way back in the mid-80s with Gino when he was still in the band. They rock hard, sounding heavier than ever. Their performance shows every nay-sayer that Enuff Z'Nuff is once again at the top of their game.
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| Part III |