Trixter

Trixter is the debut four kids from Paramus, New Jersey took seven years to reach. Steve Brown started the band in 1983, aged twelve. With Pete Loran (vocals), P.J. Farley (bass) and Mark “Gus” Scott (drums), the line-up built a local following while sharing stages with Kix and Skid Row, and signed to MCA in May 1989. That September they recorded in Hollywood with producer Bill Wray. “Ride the Whip” and “Only Young Once” were carried over from an abandoned 1988 session. “Line of Fire” went to rock radio first, and then the video for “Give It to Me Good” lit the fuse on MTV. The clip for “One in a Million” sat at number one on the channel's countdown for three weeks, and the ballad “Surrender” kept rotating too. From the straight drive of “Heart of Steel” to the lightness of “Bad Girl” and the close of “On and On,” the songs do nothing difficult. They simply stack bright choruses and hooks you remember. The result was number 28 in the US and a gold disc for over half a million copies — the band's only gold record, and the one that reached furthest.