Actor-turned-president Ronald Wilson Reagan was restoring faith in the US. Everyone cruised around in their parents’ old Malibus and Monte Carlos; Miami Vice, Charlie’s Angels and the A-Team were on TV; Ghostbusters, Top Gun, and Rambo were playing in the movie theaters.

Everyone joked about being gay, but then you began to see a few. It was cool to drink, do drugs, and have sex; the trippy, Satanic music of 70s rock gave way to big-hair, lipstick, mascara, spandex, Aqua Net, and “ain’t-lookin’-for-nothin’-but-a-good-time” glam metal: It was a crazy, sexy, dangerous time to be alive.

It was a good time to be in a glam band and on the rough-and-ready Southside of Chicago, guitarist Scotty Rokkett — son of a gas station manager — bounced from high school to high school, loser band to loser band. After getting kicked out of school for pushing the principal’s car over the edge of a stone quarry, Rokkett decided his career as a scholar was over; he left the stagnant pond of the Chicago music scene to fish in the deep waters of the Hollywood “Hair Metal” Glam scene.

After playing in a series of wannabe bands — including “Pearl Necklace,” “Wet Finger,” and the not-so-subtle “Tongue ‘n’ Groove,”  — Rokkett found himself at a new low… no band, no place to live, and no chick to support him. While in a liquor store off Sunset Boulevard scrounging for something to drink, supermarket, penniless and desperate for food. A really rocked-out looking guy who could hardly speak English behind the counter recognized Rokkett from a Starwood Club concert and said he was a singer looking for a band.  In return for a fifth of vodka, Rokkett agreed to audition him for his new band.

Two days later, Rokkett was floored with the Swiss-born Nixx and his gut-wrenching vocals. The two hit it off musically and pulled in 7-foot Dave “Giant of Sunset Strip” Thunder (actually 7.5 feet to top of his hair… formerly of “Knights of Steel”, but kicked out after running over his drummer’s leg with a car after a disagreement on a song ending) to hold the bottom end on bass.

Drummer Vinnie Valentine (ex-“Cherry Gobbler” and “Wet Dream”) and lead guitarist Tommy Ziker (formerly of “Stripper Teeze” fame) joined soon thereafter. The dynamic Rokkett/Nixx songwriting duo quickly produced a set of powerful songs with industrial-strength rhythms, tight harmonic monster riffs, and blistering vocals steeped in testosteronic-laced metal energy. The name “Metal Justice” was agreed on after dropping Quaaludes and watching an episode of the hit show ‘Night Court’ together.

Once settling on a sufficiently metal name, the band’s big-haired, big-dicked, swaggering stage persona proceeded to tear down clubs like Gazarri’s and the Starwood night after night. Manager The band’s big-haired, swaggering stage personae proceeded to tear down the likes of Gazarri’s and the Starwood night after night.  Manager Gil Stevens saw opportunity signed the band and got them a record deal with Hand Job Records. They recorded their first album with the hit song “Swallow My Love” which revealed in full force their signature intellectual undertones that conveyed a sense of “purpose and hope for pussy”. The record ultimately went ‘plywood’ in the US but soon developed a following in the Glam metal starved Europe of the early 90s where the album was just three copies shy of “double plywood”.

Soon after Metal Justice’s European tour was launched, Kurt “Nobrain” launched the grunge movement out of Seattle, and the whole glam metal genre went down in flames faster than a prostitute with a mortgage. The landscape had changed from spandex and hairspray to flannel shirts and blue jeans. The word ‘fun” wasn’t in these band’s vocabulary. While touring in Nixx’s home country of Switzerland, Metal Justice’s manager Gil Stevens disappeared into drug rehab and Hand Job Records filed for bankruptcy. With no money, no lifelines, and no prospects, the band found themselves stranded in Geneva.

The rest of the 90s and early 2000s saw the band sink into a downward spiral of odd jobs, an endless circle of drugs, drug rehab, and girls of diminishing ‘hotness’ to supporting their habits and general destitution.  Hopes of any reunion were dashed when Ziker died an undistinguished death tipping a soft drink vending machine on himself while riffling it for change.

The grunge scene finally died under its own weight after the turn of the millennium and a neo-glam band called “The Darkness” became a hot, nostalgic success. Rokkett, still slumming it in Geneva started looking up the different band members through social assistance programs and unemployment agencies to discuss a reunion.

In 2005, everyone agreed to dry out and try once again serve sweet Metal Justice to the people. A new young guitarist responded to a MySpace (remember that?!) ad and laid some updated riffs over the band’s unabashedly true-to-glam foundation. Metal Justice found a couple of corporate sponsors interested in reaching the aging 80s rock population with drugs decidedly different from the 80s era, and the Viagra-sponsored “Second Coming Tour” was launched on the back of sexy single titled “Again and Again” followed by “Call Your Doctor (If You Rock Hard for More Than 4 Hours).”

But old habits die hard and within a couple of years a renewed party lifestyle emerged and the highly flammable ego combination of Rokkett and Nixx blow-up the reunion tour. Nixx ultimately left Metal Justice for good.

Rokkett, Thunder, and Valentine, the three remaining original members of Metal Justice, took to the streets of Geneva to find a replacement vocalist. Rokkett found Lexxxi Lombardi at a Migrol gas shop, singing heavy metal classics between huffs of petrol. During a casual practice session, Lombardi quickly demonstrated that he had the vocal range, sexual appetite, and chemical imbalance necessary to serve on the high court of Metal Justice.

Since 2008, the newer, sexier, Metal Justice has been passing sentences in Geneva and beyond with their balls-deep in the “Hide Your Daughters” tour sponsored by Viagra, Preparation H and Advil.

Amazingly, the band has stayed sober and a new generation has started showing up at the shows drawn by the funny clothes, outrageous hairdos and over-the-top stage antics which has always been Metal Justice’s stock in trade. Metal Justice has always been something that must be seen and felt — not just heard. It’s in your face.

Through it all, the band’s message has always been: there is no message… nothin’ but a good time party music with plenty of babe, booze and big hair 80’s metal. While the band is definitely back, it is always walking on a tightrope of antisocial and self-destructive behavior. Whether they fall or fly, you won’t want to miss it.