Music
Reception
The album sold modestly well at around 300,000 units,[13] and was favored by heavy metal fans, but did not achieve significant mainstream success.[14] Three of the album's singles, "Little Girls", "Kid Ego", and "Mutha (Don't Wanna Go to School Today)", received medium airplay on Headbangers Ball.
Extreme was met with mixed reception. AllMusic gave the album three stars saying,"Extreme's first album shows the band struggling to shed their influences, particularly Van Halen, and develop a style of their own; consequently, it's wildly uneven, but guitarist Nuno Bettencourt is always worth hearing".[1] In his review for Extreme II: Pornograffitti, Bryan Rolli called the album "rote glam metal".[9] Rolling Stone writer Kim Neely gave the album three stars, but called it an "extremely good listen".[3]
Track listing
All songs written by Cherone & Bettencourt, except "Mutha (Don't Wanna Go to School Today)" by Cherone, LeBeaux & Hunt.
Title |
---|
1. | "Little Girls" | 3:47 |
---|
2. | "Wind Me Up" | 3:37 |
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3. | "Kid Ego" | 4:04 |
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4. | "Watching, Waiting" | 4:54 |
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5. | "Mutha (Don't Wanna Go to School Today)" | 4:52 |
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6. | "Teacher's Pet" | 3:02 |
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7. | "Big Boys Don't Cry" | 3:34 |
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8. | "Smoke Signals" | 4:14 |
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9. | "Flesh 'n' Blood" | 3:31 |
---|
10. | "Rock a Bye Bye" | 5:57 |
---|
11. | "Play with Me" (not present on any vinyl releases except Australia and New Zealand) | 3:29 |
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Total length: | 45:00 |
---|
Personnel
- Pat Badger – bass guitar, backing vocals
- Nuno Bettencourt – guitar, synthesizer, piano, backing vocals, percussion, orchestration, mixing
- Gary Cherone – lead & backing vocals, design, logo design
- Paul Geary – drums, percussion, backing vocals, logo design
- Additional musicians
- Production
- Mack – producer on all tracks, except 2, 3 and 4, engineer, mixing
- Bob St. John – engineer, mixing
- Nigel Green – mixing on tracks 2, 3 and 4
- Howie Weinberg – mastering at Masterdisk, New York
- Jeff Gold – art direction
- Harris Savides – photography
Charts
Album
Singles
Year | Single | Chart | Position |
---|
1989 | "Kid Ego" | Mainstream Rock[5] | 39 |
Accolades
Publication | Year | Country | Accolade | Rank |
---|
Guitar World | 2008 | US | Top 20 Hair Metal Albums of the Eighties[10] | 8 |
References