Best Songs on Savatage's Fight for the Rock

Fight for the Rock is the 3rd studio album by Savatage and was released on June 30th, 1986 and was recorded in England. This album was the first album with new bassist Johnny Lee Middleton, who has since become the only ever-present member on each Savatage record released. The album is largely regarded as the band's worst release by both fans and band members, with the band referring to it as "Fight for the Nightmare". Jon Oliva said in October 1994, "I've never really been fond of that album. WE'VE never been fond of that album". The band said that they were driven to make the record by their label, Atlantic Records ; particularly Oliva began writing pop-rock songs for other artists on the label such as John Waite. However, the label eventually turned around and told the band to record the music that Oliva had written for other artists themselves. This destroyed the band's credibility in the eyes of the press and reviews were not kind to the band. It not only destroyed the band's image, but the negative critical reaction has been cited as a cause of Oliva's bout of drug and alcohol depression which eventually drove him from the fore of the band.
Atlantic Records also wanted the band to have photographs taken, since none of their previous releases had included any. The band hired a friend to do the photography work, with one of the photos featuring the band re-recreating the famous photo Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima. The band agreed this was a good idea at the time, but look back with the same feelings on the photos taken as they do the album.
When initially released, the album featured a Parental Advisory label on the front cover, despite having no "nasty words", as Jon Oliva puts it, featured anywhere on the record. This was largely done to please the label, as they felt that putting the sticker on the record would drive up record sales. Although it did chart, the band have been extremely reluctant to perform any of the songs live, and haven't done so since the early 1990s. Even on the tour in support of the album, the band only performed "Hyde", "The Edge of Midnight" and few others.

Genres: Heavy Metal, Hard Rock

Personell:

Band Members:

Jon Oliva – lead vocals, piano

Criss Oliva – guitars, backing vocals

Johnny Lee Middleton – bass guitar, backing vocals

Steve "Doc" Wacholz – drums, percussion

Additional Musicans:

Larry Dvoskin (credited as "Dvoskin") - keyboards

Brent Daniels - backing vocals

Production:

Stephan Galfas - producer, engineer, mixing Mark Jolley - engineer

Dan McMillan - assistant engineer

Bob Ludwig - mastering

Robert Zemsky - associate producer

Steven Machat, Rick Smith - executive producers

The Top Ten

1 The Edge of Midnight

2 Fight For the Rock

3 Out On the Streets

The list description contains one of the most serious problems metal bands have - the constant struggle for independence when record companies ask metal bands to do poppy albums /songs. It also shows that metal music shouldn't be treated in the same way popular music is treated. Metal music isn't a market product.

4 Hyde

5 Wishing Well

6 She's Only Rock and Roll

7 Day After Day

Badfinger cover

8 Red Light Paradise

9 Crying For Love

10 Lady In Disguise

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