Why a hair-metal band sometimes isn’t really hair-metal

Enuff Z'Nuff bassist Chip Z'Nuff performs onstage at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre on August 15, 2015. (Photo by Scott Dudelson/Getty Images)
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Every record label passed on their demo tape, which included a song that would later become an MTV hit. “But our management had an idea,” says Chip Z’Nuff, bassist and cofounder of Chicago-based band Enuff Z’Nuff.

Management wanted to bring in guitarist Derek Frigo, from another band called Le Mans, to play guitar solos on the demo. Z’Nuff wasn’t sure because he’d heard Frigo had a “propensity to get in trouble at any single moment.” But management assured him they’d keep an eye on the guitarist. Just let him come in and cut the solos, they said.

“So he (Frigo) came down one night about one o’clock in the morning,” Z’Nuff says, “and we plugged him in and he played four or five solos on different songs. Then we took that demo tape and shopped it, and we had every single label wanting to sign the band.” Just like that.

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Enuff Z’Nuff’s two main songwriters, Z’Nuff and singer/guitarist Donnie Vie, weilded keen pop sensibility. They were much more into Cheap Trick than, say, Bon Jovi, though. But this was the late ‘80s, when pop-metal not power-pop ruled the Earth.

“‘You guys are nothing but the Bay City Rollers,’” Frigo used to tell Z’Nuff, Z’Nuff says. “And maybe he’s right. We were a pop band. We certainly didn’t have what Derek brought to the party, which is incendiary guitar playing and a real attitude. It was his guitar playing that caused a commotion and brought those songs to life.” Frigo became Enuff Z’Nuff’s permanent lead guitarist, rounding out a lineup of Vie, Z’Nuff and drummer Vik Foxx.

Songs on that demo included “Fly High Michelle,” a paisley-daydream power-ballad. “Fly High Michelle” was released on Enuff Z’Nuff’s 1989 self-titled debut album for Atlantic Records subsidiary Atco Records. A psychedelic music video made for the song saw significant rotation on MTV and cracked the top half of the Billboard 100 singles chart. The 10-song “Enuff Z’Nuff” album also boasted “New Thing,” an electrifying opening track that also connected with MTV viewers. The band scored synchs of their songs on hit shows of the day, like “Northern Exposure” and “Beverly Hills, 90210.”

Enuff Z’Nuff’s tuneful and less metallic 1991 sophomore LP “Strength” was a better overall album, although it didn’t have haymakers quite like “New Thing” or “Fly High Michelle.” Still, the single “Goodbye” summoned Badfinger-meets-Nilsson lovely-melancholy. Rolling Stone cited the group as their 1991″Hot Band Of The Year” in that quintessential rock magazine’s annual Hot Issue.

After grunge hit, it was tough sledding for Enuff Z’Nuff. As it was for nearly all bands lumped in with hair-metal, even the genre’s biggest acts. Enuff Z’Nuff parted ways with Frigo and Foxx, brought in new members, continued releasing solid albums and going on tour. In 2004, Frigo died of a drug overdose at age 36 in Beverly Hills. Eventually Vie discontinued touring with the band, although he still contributes intermittently to Enuff Z’Nuff studio albums, a pretty rare arrangement in rock. In addition to Z’Nuff on bass and vocals, Enuff Z’Nuff’s current lineup features lead guitarist Tory Stoffregen, guitarist Tony Fennell and drummer Daniel B. Hill.

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For the last eight years or so, Z’Nuff has been the group’s lead vocalist. His fizzy rasp certainly evokes the sound on the early albums. While Enuff Z’Nuff were never massive their classics are still beloved by fans. Their latter day albums have attracted an interesting array of guest stars, including Smashing Pumpkins mastermind Billy Corgan, Ozzy Osbourne guitar legend Jake E. Lee and late great Warrant frontman Jani Lane. In 2022, Z’Nuff has a new solo album coming out featuring musical guests including classic-era Guns N’ Roses drummer Steve Adler, as well as latter-day members of Whitesnake and Cheap Trick.

Highlights from the most recent Enuff Z’Nuff album, 2020′s Brainwashed Generation, include Fab Four-esque tune “Broken Love.” Recently, they’ve been releasing singles from “Hardrock Nite,” their Beatles and solo-Beatles covers album due out Nov. 12. Judging by early drops “Back in the U.S.S.R.” and “Cold Turkey,” they’ve done Paul, John, Ringo and George proud. You can preorder “Hardrock Nite” at orcd.co/hardrock.

But the real ruby of recent Enuff Z’Nuff releases is from the vault. Earlier this year, Z’Nuff excavated 40 early demos for a new boxset titled “Never Enuff.” And it’s most excellent. The latent leaps off the tape on tracks such as “Bye Bye Love” (not an Everly Brothers cover), “Enough’s Enough,” “Million Miles Away” and “New Night Tonight.” You can order the boxset at cleorecs.com.

On a recent afternoon, I connected with Z’Nuff for a Zoom video chat interview. He didn’t disappoint conversationally. Or visually for that matter, as he was wearing oversized purple-lens sunglasses, a hippie-dashiki top and sideways newsboy cap. Edited text excerpts from our conversation are below.

Chip, I was impressed by Enuff Z’Nuff’s recent cover of John Lennon’s solo song “Cold Turkey.” That’s kind of precarious covering Lennon and Beatles. I’m not surprised by how good it sounds, but I’m impressed.

For years and years we’ve been doing Beatle songs. When Donnie was fronting the band, we’d always throw in certain Beatles material within our set. Remember on the first Enuff Z’Nuff album, we went on tour and there were only 10 songs in the first record and we’re playing for 45 minutes to an hour every single night. We were usually opening for bands like Badlands or Mr. Big or Cheap Trick or Def Leppard. Whoever would be in the early days.

The record was 42, 43 minutes so we’d get a chance to throw in a couple of songs. Sometimes it would be an old Beatle song or a Lennon song or McCartney song. That was just part of our vocabulary back in those early days and those shows were great.

But doing those Beatles songs, it was special because it was something that we tried to turn it into “us.” So last year during the (pandemic-caused) shutdown, if you want to call it, we started recording and finished the whole album.

Picture Stone Temple Pilots and Cheap Trick fighting in an alley and I break it up and that was the (sound of the Beatles cover) record basically.

In the old days, there was no Pro Tools. It was really more about performances. I think that’s the approach we took on this record as well. In the old days, no one’s gonna beat my bro’s pipes. He (Vie) could sing the telephone book. But I took a chance on these songs and I sang them all live. I didn’t want to just punch in the words or sing a verse and stop. I want to sing them like I would have to sing them live. And that was the biggest challenge right there.

And maybe you’ll see a tour in the future. And whether we call it Enuff Z’Nuff or The Beatles Rock Show remains to be seen but either way it’s great Beatle songs and it’s a fun evening of hard rock and heavy metal. I remember going to see Cheap Trick when they were playing over in Las Vegas, they were doing a residency. They played nothing but Beatles songs. It was fantastic.

What were some Beatles songs Enuff Z’Nuff would cover in the early days?

We would do “Dear Prudence.” We’d put that in the set a lot and, boy, Derek Frigo who was the guitar player, was incendiary every single night we played that song. We just loved the meaning of it. It just felt great and there were cool harmonies on it. We would do “Revolution” as well. We did that on “The Howard Stern Show” and any kind of radio programs we would go on in the morning.

How did you you put together “Never Enuff,” the new boxset of early Enuff Z’Nuff demos?

Those records weren’t never gonna see the light of day, you know. Songs are like embryos. You don’t want to let it out too soon.

And then I was approached by Brian Perera over at Cleopatra Records, I went to Donnie and his management company and said, “Hey what do you guys think of putting out this catalog of material?” And they were into it.

Obviously, during the shutdown that we all experienced, that would help us out because we were getting paid to license the record to Cleopatra. And they were kind enough to be very generous to us. I talked to Donnie and he wasn’t sure he wanted to do it. And then he said, “You know what? There’s a good energy right here. Go ahead and put it out there.”

So I immediately went to the studio working for days and days just to clean up those tracks from the demo tapes. Because remember these are also two tracks. There was no overdubs, no fixing anything. It was basically here’s the recordings and take it or leave it.

And we’re talking about 1984, ‘85, ‘86 in our formative days, where it was just Donnie and myself at my house or my friend’s studio, just recording these songs on a four-track Tascam or Fostex. We recorded everything with just couple of microphones, no engineer, pretty much did it ourselves. And then later some of the demos you hear were recorded and engineered by a guy named Dave Mauragas. He did a wonderful job. He really sacrificed a lot in those early days to help us be creative.

We’re taking a chance exposing all the warts, scars and tattoos of our early days as a rock band, and the fans nowadays they appreciate that. I think that it’s nice that it’s not all fixed up perfectly. And it’s a nice boxset too, nice packaging.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t ask about the signature Enuff Z’Nuff songs. “New Thing” is a song that whenever I hear it, I’m immediately energized. What do you remember about the creation or recording of “New Thing”?

We recorded (a demo of) the song at my apartment on Longwood Drive, and it was just Donnie and myself and a drum machine. We recorded a bunch of songs during that little period. The song actually came about in Lake Geneva, Donnie came up with the riff, and then we took it over to my apartment 2231 Prairie (Street in Chicago) and then I get an idea. I was basically nicking something off the Cream record “White Room,” because it had a descending line on guitar.

We started recording that song and we did all the background vocals and we called my manager on the phone, Bob Brigham. After hearing that song, Bob goes, “Play it again.” I played it six times that night from my apartment for him. He was just blown away. It was just Donnie and myself both playing guitar, a drum machine and of course bass. We’re both singing the harmonies into the same mic. We weren’t multi-tracking or anything because we only had four tracks.

We recorded probably 60 songs in that bedroom. It was incredible. It was a little small apartment, two bedrooms. We had an ice chest that we put everything inside (instead of a refrigerator) because we couldn’t afford electricity. We ran a cord out to the hallway so when the lights would go on in the hallway in the morning, we’d have electricity until they shut off around one or two o’clock in the morning. That was our window of opportunity to record songs.

No one knew it (“New Thing”) was going to be the first single until Derek Schulman heard the track. He was the singer from (the band) Gentle Giant, and he had his own imprint over Atlantic Records called Atco Records.

When we recorded “New Thing” for keeps it was over at Royal Recorders in Lake Geneva. Doc McGhee came in the studio because Skid Row was recording their record. I remember Sebastian Bach walking in and I said this guy’s a star. Their record was really good. And while we’re recording, at the same time they’re recording their record.

And by the way Donnie doesn’t like the lyric to that song (“New Thing”), but I think it makes a lot of sense. He’s the king of metaphors, and it was put together where it was simplistic yet clever.

What’s the story behind the song “Fly High Michelle”? Who is Michelle?

Sometimes it’s better to leave the songs alone. We bring it to you guys and it’s up to you to interpret it. If you tell people what the song is about, I think sometimes it takes away some of the power of what it is initially.

I remember I ripped off that riff off of Adrian Belew (guitarist known for his work with David Bowie) after hearing him and (Belew’s band) The Bears. And I remember showing Donnie that riff, but I was playing it on a bass. We recorded that song in the studio in one day - the music, vocals, the whole thing - in Lake Geneva.

Back in the day, you guys played “Late Show with David Letterman” and also Howard Stern’s show. The bands that played Letterman, people paid attention to. What was interesting about playing Letterman and Stern?

We did Stern first, his radio show, and it was good because he was a big proponent of the band. Loved the songs. Loved our look. He was a big fan actually. So he set the whole thing up, unwittingly maybe, for Letterman to grab the band (for Letterman’s show).

Morty (“Late Show with David Letterman” producer Robert Morton), who books Letterman, he took the chance to have us on there. I remember showing up there and we weren’t smoking, we weren’t drinking. We were just totally focused and straight. We just wanted it to be a great show and it’s all we cared about. We weren’t doing “New Thing” or “Fly High Michelle,” we were out of our wheelhouse. It was a brand new song called “Baby Loves You” off the “Strength” record.

And they didn’t want the band, the just wanted Donnie and myself and we begged them and we begged Morty: Please we want (drummer Vik) Foxx and Frigo, those guys have been with us from the early days, and we just don’t want to cause any dissension with the group.

We got it worked out where Foxx played guitar too and we played with Letterman’s guys (the house band). We had a couple rehearsals, and it was bashed out live and it was great. And then I remember after we played the (Letterman house) band had me stay on and play bass with them during the commercial breaks. That was very special, because I got paid twice, by the way.

What’s the key to finding a balance between catchy and rocking, which is the strength of many Enuff Z’Nuff songs?

Well, you show me a band without influences and I’ll show you a band that doesn’t have a record deal. So when you hear Enuff Z’Nuff you hear Beatles influences and you hear Squeeze and Mott the Hoople, Cheap Trick and Led Zeppelin. That was our template.

But we’re trying to write songs for ourselves. Donnie was a writing machine. We were both really doing a lot of good stuff back then.

We had nobody really to help us. So it’d be Donnie playing rhythm guitar and I’m on drums, and that’d be one track. Then I’d go put the bass down and he’d sing, and we’d bounce stuff around. We had no idea what we were doing. We just knew that we had ideas and we wanted to get them on tape.

We were always a pop band, but we played those songs really aggressively. We wanted to be punchy and powerful.

When we came out, we were actually discovered by Doc McGhee (renown manager for Motley Crue, KISS, Skid Row and many other top Bands) and Derek Shulman. Through our manager, Bob Brigham, we got a chance to really expose what the band was all about, in a day and age where people listened with their eyes instead of their ears.

A lot of the bands that were on MTV back then, Guns N’ Roses and Motley Crue and what have you, they were really colorful and flamboyant, but they were much heavier than we were and much more aggressive. And I think Enuff Z’Nuff, there was a power-pop side to us that was appealing.

And maybe if we had come out a few years earlier, things might have been a little bit different. But we came out when we came out. We’re grateful for MTV and we’re grateful for radio for playing those songs. And at the end of the day, at least you got the real band, which was a band that was hard to pinpoint exactly what kind of style they were. Because we had elements of new wave, old wave, power pop, metal, hard rock. And I think you put it all together, for a journalist it’s really difficult.

Now we get locked in as hair-metal. Most people that know Enuff Z’Nuff and the millions of people that have bought the records in the past, they know we’re not a hair-metal band. It’s a tag from some guy in an office that came up with the name of hair-metal, because he’s a guy who tried to do what we do for a living and failed miserably. So he’s going to spend the rest of his life critiquing us.

For us to still be going is a modern day miracle. Over 20 albums recorded, still touring around the country. I believe in the legacy of Enuff Z’Nuff and I’m grateful to be in the front seat driving the bus.

You and Donnie have a unique relationship it seems. How would you describe the nature of your relationship with Donnie at this point?

We’re just trying to navigate the waters after he left in 2013. He was the one who told me, “If you’re going to carry on the name, you go sing the songs and people will know it’s Enuff Z’Nuff.” And that’s what I did. And then any record I put out, I always go to him and ask him, “Hey, you want to you want to do something out here?” He even came to me on the last record and said, “I’d love to sing on a track with you.” And I said that’d be great. The fans would love that. Let’s do it.

But you look at what we’ve been doing for last eight years without him we’ve navigated the waters pretty well. There’s no one going to take his place in the legacy of Enuff Z’Nuff. The guy’s a great vocalist and a wonderful songwriter. But he left and it was either swim or drown. I do the best I can and I hold the songs dear to my heart. I co-wrote a lot of those songs. I produced those records. I feel good about me moving forward.

I didn’t want this job. I really didn’t. And I think he still wants to do stuff. And we talked about him coming out and perhaps going to Japan. That’d be nice. The fans would love that. But he already said, he goes, “I’m not into jumping in a van and traveling around to places six, seven days a week.” And that’s what I do.

We’re just traveling around the country, reaching the fans, playing shows every night. I’m at the merch booth hanging out with the people, taking pictures. Tons of fans out there. I’m gonna listen to the fans at the end of the day and they’re happy with the way the band is right now. Got a great team around us. And I’m going to keep moving forward.

I think for all the stuff that we (Vie and Z’Nuff) went through together, we’re in pretty good shape right now. I don’t talk to him all the time. We don’t see each other all the time. But there’s a respect and love that’s there and it always will be.

Enuff Z’Nuff will perform at SideTracks Music Hall, address 415 Church St. N.W. in Huntsville, on Oct. 22. Anthony Corder, frontman of Memphis hard-rock band Tora Tora, opens the 8 p.m. show with an acoustic set. Ticket are $20 advance $25 day of show via eventbrite.com. More info on Enuff Z’Nuff at enuffznuff.com.

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