1 Put Up Or Shut Up
2 Spontaneous Combustion
3 My Love Is Like A Tire Iron
4 Jailbait
5 I Am A Predator
6 Heads Will Roll
7 The Flying Lip Lock
8 Land Of A Thousand Dances
9 The TNT Overture
10 I Take No Prisoners

This may be one of the stoopidest albums ever recorded, but the sheer hypermacho dumbness of it has it’s own charm. The concept behind it is that it features ten brand new tunes recorded live on a ten city tour (how’s that for high concept?) Though like most major label live albums of the period (KISS Alive! etc.) it seems as if the vocals and other parts were actually dubbed on later in a studio.

Pretty much every song begins with a speedrap introduction by Nuge, something along the lines of: “HEY! Igottanuthernicelittlenewsonghere, OH YEAH! Yergonnalikethisone!” — pant, giggle — 10 seconds of wanky lead guitar — “YEAH! Thisoneiscalled MY LOVE — hehehe! — MY LOVE! (yeah!) MY LOVE IS LIKE A TIRE IRON!!!” And then after the inevitable cock rock “big finish” at the end of each song he repeats the name of the tune a few more times (“YEAH!”) and does an MC5-ish round of “THANKYOUTHANKYOU!!” This manic patter between the songs sets the pace, and in fact is almost as entertaining as the songs themselves. His obvious ethusiasm about his new compositions is especially amusing when you consider how lame the songwriting is — on literally 6 of the 10 songs the title IS the entire chorus (and just look at those song titles!)

“Shut Up” sounds like a very treble version of Motorhead, and lyrically there’s not much more to it than the sentiment expressed in the title.

“Spontaneous Combustion” begins with a slow & trippy Amboy Dukes style psyche intro before it kicks into a fast treble-Sabbath kinda riff (I guess you need to play more in the treble range when everything you play is this fast.) It’s my favorite song on the album, because it’s about rocking so hard you burst into flames! (“I’m hot! Four alarm! A fire fed with gas! / Four alarm! The fire’s up! I’m gonna kick some ASS!”)

“Tire Iron” begins with another fakeout mellow intro, this time a sub-Hendrix pretty blue acid moment — before it turns into a slop backbeat boogie type of thing. Except for the singing it sounds like the Ramones trying to cover the Pink Fairies (or maybe the other way around.)

Musically “Jailbait” sounds like some lost classic KISS or AC/DC song, except Nuge ain’t no Bon Scott and his rhythm guitarist sure ain’t no Malcolm Young. The lyric is about exactly what you think it is about, in fact it’s more disturbing than you can probably imagine (climactic line: “Wait a minute officer, don’t put those handcuffs on me / put ’em on her and I’ll share her with ya!”)

“I Am A Predator” sets new standards in idiot songwriting. Besides the rhyming lines “that’s one thing for shore” and “you better lock your door” the title is the only lyric in the whole damn song!

“Heads Will Roll” is another meaningless song where the title contains the whole concept (“beheading people”), such as it is. (You didn’t think he meant THAT kind of Head did you?)

“Lip Lock” is an uptempo blues number that is probably about cunnilingus.

“Dances” is an old soul chestnut, and he does a pretty credible version of it. The best part is the rhythm section’s intense devotion to pounding out a AC/DC-simple beat while Nuge showboats and does his crowd interaction shtick (“LEMMEHEARYOU CLEVELAND!!!”) Gun nut that he is, Nuge also manages to insert a couple of lines from that other soul classic “Shotgun” (“shoot him ‘fore he run now.”)

“TNT Overture” is a really boring instrumental.

“Prisoners” is another shockingly anti-PC bit of trash. He’s basically singing about how he’s gonna come after you with his M‑16 assault rifle, you can run but you can’t hide, and you can guess what the implication of he’s gonna “take no prisoners” means.

So what’s to like about “10 Cities”? 

1. You’ve never heard a record with this much testosterone. I mean so much testosterone it’s as if Nuge has turned into one drooling, gun-toting, guitar playing giant set of testicles. It may sound infantile and icky, but I find it sort of sociologically fascinating — take the cover photo for instance, where Nuge looks like a naked sweaty Jesus and he’s being group-groped by an audience that seems to be entirely adolescent boys (who else would listen to his stuff?) The unintentional homoeroticism is amped up by the fact that all the audience members’ eyes have been blacked out with censor-bars (like on the cover of AC/DC’s “Dirty Deeds”) which definitely gives the picture an X‑rated vibe. He’s so much “MAN” there ain’t no room for no womens in his world. If he sees one, he’d probably shoot her!

2. If you like your rocknroll raw, dumb & loud — well this is about as raw, dumb and loud as it gets.

3. It’s obnoxious as hell and totally politically incorrect. Great for scaring the Christian fundies (or uptight hippies) next door and that sort of thing. I mean this is definitely music that will send your soul to hell (or ruin your karma, whatever.)

4. I think it’s hilarious and listening to it always makes me laugh out loud!