Perhaps one of the strangest moments at the American Music Awards in 1997 was the appearance of Christian crooner, Pat Boone. Boone had a new album out at the time but it took a lot of people by surprise. He went from playing gospel, R&B and country music, throughout most of his career, to all of sudden covering hard rock and metal songs.
The album and his change in appearance had some Christians up in arms, with some taking some pretty drastic actions. Boone, however, would save a special four-letter word for his detractors in the religious community when he appeared on Jay Leno’s Tonight Show.
Second Biggest Charting Artist of the 50’s
Pat Boone established himself as a successful singer and actor in addition to writer, and television personality. He was the second biggest charting artist of the 50’s, only lagging behind Elvis Presley. He was also the 9th highest charting artist between 1955-1995, according to Billboard.
Throughout the 50’s, Boone covered various black artists including Little Richard and Fats Domino, with some criticizing him for cultural appropriation. Boone was steadfast, claiming his covers broadened those artists’ appeal.
He told the LA Times, “Chuck Berry, Fats Domino and Little Richard were R&B guys, and pop radio in those days never heard of R&B. There was no chance for an R&B guy to get played on pop radio until pop artists did versions of their R&B songs. All those R&B artists were thrilled, and they told me so because their songs got to a wider audience.”
Boone’s Gospel Music Gains Large Christian Following
By the 60’s, Boone got more into gospel music as popular tunes at the time were more focused on sex and drugs, which clashed with his Christian faith. The pivot in Boone’s career resulted in him gaining a pretty big Christian audience in America.
His core audience was pretty shocked when he decided to do an album of hard rock and metal covers in 1997.
He would reveal that the idea came to him during a discussion with his band members of what his next project should be. He recalled to the AV Club, “My conductor one day said, ‘You know, we’ve been laughing about that idea, but there really are some great songs that only metal-heads know and if we went in and did them a different way, we could introduce them to a whole new audience. For example, if we did big-band jazz arrangements … ’ And then he rattled off the names of songs I really wasn’t familiar with.”
Boone’s conductor made him a mixtape of rock and metal songs but Boone also discovered a lot of the hard rock and metal songs by going to different record chains incognito and buying different bands albums.
He told Jay Leno in 1997, “I started going into record stores, Tower and Camelot and all those stores… hat pulled down, dark glasses, collar turned up… I started listening to hundreds of CD’s to find terrific songs that I can do. I couldn’t do most of the songs I heard.”
In A Metal Mood, No More Mr. Nice Guy
When it came to choose the tracks Boone had one rule, he would only cover songs and artists that didn’t clash with his religious beliefs. The resulting album would be released in January of 1997 and be called In A Metal Mood, No More Mr. Nice Guy.
The album consisted of covers of Judas Priest, Guns N’ Roses, Deep Purple, Van Halen and Jimi Hendrix, to name a few. Boone was able to get some of the composers and musicians who played on the original recordings to join him on his album including Ronnie James Dio and Ritchie Blackmore.
“I mean, he’s Pat Boone – the guy’s a legend.” – Ronnie James Dio
Dio would comment about appearing on the album, telling the Arizona Daily Wildcat, “I never thought I’d have the chance to meet Pat Boone. I mean, he’s Pat Boone – the guy’s a legend.”
Since the album was set to drop the same month as the American Music Awards, Boone decided to not only attend the show, but present an award alongside shock rocker, Alice Cooper. Boone and Cooper would present the award for Favourite Hard Rock and Heavy Metal Artist, which was to be awarded to Metallica.
Boone Presents New Persona at American Music Awards
The award ceremony seemed like the perfect opportunity to show off Boone’s new image. Dick Clark came up with an idea for both Cooper and Boone to trade personas for the night. Cooper was supposed to wear a v-neck sweater with his hair in a knot, while holding a glass of milk on stage. Boone, meanwhile, would don a leather vest, with a fake piercing and tattoos and a dog collar.
As the award show approached, Cooper backed out but Boone agreed to wear his outfit. Boone’s appearance was the talk of the show and the next day the newspapers covered his metal transformation. The appearance at the AMA’s propelled the sales of his album, which peaked at No 125 on the Billboard charts.
While most people seemed cool with the whole thing, he got a tremendous amount of blowback from his Christian base, despite the fact that Boone had warned some of their leaders of what was to come that night.
“A lot of these songs have sensible and intelligent lyrics, you just can’t hear them on the originals.” – Pat Boone
Boone would tell the LA Times, “A lot of these songs have sensible and intelligent lyrics, you just can’t hear them on the originals. For example, on ‘Crazy Train’, Ozzy is singing about the confusion of today’s world.”
Trinity Broadcasting Pulls Gospel Show
While Boone was promoting his album, he also had a tv show on the Christian station Trinity Broadcasting. In February of 1997, Trinity Broadcasting claimed they received thousands of viewer complaints about the musician’s new image change. As a result, they pulled Boone’s gospel show off the network.
The station released a statement that read, “The decision was based on recent changes in the focus and content of Pat’s music, which represents a different genre than the Gospel and traditional inspirational format and ministry of the ‘Gospel America’ program.”
The network also claimed that Boone alienated some of his core audience, even before the stunt at the AMA’s with representatives of Trinity claiming the show was focusing less and less on gospel themes.
“To whatever extent somebody was wounded, I am very sorry.” – Pat Boone
By April of 1997, Boone would appear on the network’s flagship show called Praise, telling the audience, “To whatever extent somebody was wounded, I am very sorry. That was never my intention.”
The audience ironically included a contingent of leather-draped Bikers for Christ. He would go on to say, “Little did I dream that the media and a lot of Christians would take it seriously. I was really stunned that Christians, evidently by the thousands, having known me for 35 – 40 years, would think that overnight I just radically changed my orientation and all my priorities. Just because I wore some leather pants and fake tattoos and non-piercing earrings doesn’t mean that I’m a fundamentally different person.”
It was on the same program that they took a poll of the viewers, asking whether they should bring Boone’s program back. 500 votes were cast in favour of bringing the program back, while 50 votes were cast against bringing it back. Eventually the network would renag and bring the show back.
“There is a little humour in this thing.” – Pat Boone
Boone appeared on Jay Leno’s Tonight Show and brought up a four-letter word that the religious community should consider, “Dear friends, I mean folks like Mercy Corps, Easter Seals, TBN, all the people that think I have dived headfirst into the pit. I want to give you a four-letter word. I’m not going to say it, I’m just going to spell it. J-O-K-E. Please look it up. There is a little humour in this thing.”
“I think he’s done one of the more interesting versions of one of our songs that I’ve ever heard.” – Lars Ulrich
Metallica Drummer Lars Ulrich met Boone at the American Music Awards and shared his thoughts on him covering “Enter Sandman”.
“You know what? …I can already tell from talking to a few radio stations, there seems to be some kind of hostility building up towards this, but I don’t know what people are scared of… I think he’s great. I met him at the AMA’s the other day, he was really nice, he was really funny and really friendly. I think he’s done one of the more interesting versions of one of our songs that I’ve ever heard… I think it’s really cool.”
In 2017, the album was reissued and Boone revealed plans to release a second covers album. He told Inquisitr, “Because it was a big hit, I was already preparing a list of other songs to do for Volume 2, and some of the groups immediately after were like Poison, the Scorpions, Aerosmith. They were saying, ‘Hey, why don’t you do one of our songs?’ Bruce Resnikoff, the exec at MCA, they thought it was a fluke and that a Volume 2 might not work, although they were selling the fire out of the first one, but they just quit while we were a hit.”
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