American Hardcore

American Hardcore is the fifth L.A. Guns studio album, released by CMC International on 29 October 1996. It is the first record after Vertigo / PolyGram, and from here the band moved between independent labels. BMG Funhouse issued the Japanese edition on 21 November as BVCP-984. Thirteen songs, about forty-seven minutes. It takes the mid-nineties head on: programming and an industrial surface, and a deliberate distance from the Sunset Strip sound of the eighties. Song titles like "Kevorkian" put the period's news directly into the record. It is the most divisive album in the catalogue, which is another way of saying it knows exactly what it is. Phil Lewis left the band after it, and Jizzy Pearl sang on the next record, Shrinking Violet.