Alex Williams to Make Hair Metal Into Country on New Album
Bust out the leopard print spandex, grow out the ol’ hairdo and kink it out with a curly permanent, and steal your sister’s eyeliner and rouge because it’s time to fully embrace the hair metal era again … apparently.
Alex Williams is pretty highly-regarded as a country music Outlaw revivalist, with his last album Waging Peace earning an 8.2 rating around these parts. Williams has also been highly regarded as a live performer and songwriter throughout the independent country world, collaborating with Cody Jinks and others.
But for his next record, Alex has got a mind to do something a little more offbeat and fun. No, he’s not going hair metal. He’s making hair metal go country by covering ten hair metal classics in a country style. Alex is putting his country spin on well-recognized songs by Cinderella, Ratt, Mötley Crüe, Skid Row, Poison, as well as other metal legends like Motörhead, Ozzy Osbourne, and Guns N’ Roses.
Alex Williams assembled a crack team of guitar players like Dan Dugmore and Rob McNelley to pull this all off under the production of longtime collaborator Ben Fowler. Though country and glam metal might make strange bedfellows on the surface, Williams saw the idea as a challenge and an opportunity to emphasize the storytelling and songcraft under all the hairspray of the era.
Alex Williams fans can’t be too surprised at this project. In the summer of 2024, he dropped a country music cover of Ozzy Osborne’s “Flying High Again” featuring Cody Jinks. We though it was just a one-off song at the time, but this was just the first taste. Alex has released his version of Ratt’s “Round and Round” to coincide with the album announcement (listen below).
“‘Round and Round’ is one of my favorite songs of all time and has been since the first time I heard it,” says Williams. “I have to say as far as this one goes, I had worked up an alternate version of it first, prior to making the decision to do a full album of covers. As a result, it felt more natural to lay the song down when it came time to record.”
The collection will be called Space Brain, and is being released by Lightning Rod Records on July 18th. It is now available for pre-save/pre-order.
1. Nobody’s Fool (feat. Tom Keifer) [Cinderella]
2. Ace of Spades [Motörhead]
3. Flying High Again (feat. Cody Jinks) [Ozzy Osbourne]
4. Gettin’ Better [Tesla]
5. Look What The Cat Dragged In [Poison]
6. Youth Gone Wild [Skid Row]
7. You’ve Got Another Thing Coming [Judas Priest]
8. Wild Side [Mötley Crüe]
9. Round and Round [Ratt]
10. Night Train [Guns N’ Roses]
May 24, 2025 @ 9:03 am
A good song is a good song. This cover of “Round and Round” is solid. It just shows a what fine song the original was.
Tom Keifer was always one of the more roots oriented guys of that kind of music.. Heck, Long Cold Winter even had a little pedal steel on it.
And Trigger, have you even seen their hotdog commercial? IT IS GREATNESS! Didn’t Glynn Johns produce one their reocords?
May 24, 2025 @ 9:21 am
It was Andy Johns.
May 24, 2025 @ 9:17 am
The worst of both worlds.
May 25, 2025 @ 9:53 pm
Yeah, not feeling this at all. Hated hair rock then and now, and these arrangements and especially the vocals, aren’t making these songs any better.
May 24, 2025 @ 9:42 am
I listened to a lot of hair metal in high school and I wish the track list had other songs. I wish they had included ‘5150’ – Van Halen, or ’18 and Life’ Skid Row, ‘Sister Christian’ by Night Ranger, or ‘Something to believe in’ Poison.
May 24, 2025 @ 12:33 pm
18 And Life is such a banger.
May 24, 2025 @ 9:58 am
it sounds like fun. I always secretely loved hair metal back in the days since i was more into death metal. Though No hard rock goes country album is complete without a Quireboys song (7 o’ clock).
I wonder if there’s a Saving Hair Metal music site somewhere screaming at country interlopers!!!
May 24, 2025 @ 10:14 am
Personal gripe here, but can ANYONE who covers Motörhead find ANY other song to cover but “Ace of Spades?” A fast-chugging bluegrass-banjo “Overkill” could be fun …
May 24, 2025 @ 12:15 pm
Me and Omar are going to do one of our favorites, Love Me Like A Reptile, as a one off……I’m kidding of course….lol I always tease him about forming a side project called Metalrada with some qualified “ex Metal” Country guys (not me). Seriously though, I like the way these 2 songs came out. Let’s give Alex the benefit of the doubt on Ace Of Spades, I’m sure it won’t sound like any other version we’ve heard.
May 24, 2025 @ 2:48 pm
There’s a couple of YouTube videos of Rev. Horton Heat doing “Ace Of Spades” with one of their roadies singing. It actually sounds pretty good with the slap bass.
May 24, 2025 @ 6:09 pm
We never released it, but one of my old bands demo’d a spaghetti-western version of Orgasmatron. I thought it was pretty great.
Love Me Like a Reptile would work really well as a country song probably. And that’s the thing with Motörhead – if you listen to what Lemmy was playing, a lot of it was really just 1950’s rock and roll stuff just faster and louder. That’s why so much of their stuff lends itself to other genres.
May 24, 2025 @ 8:17 pm
Lemmy absolutely had an appreciation for country music and early rock. His side band The Head Cat did a remarkable version of Johnny Cash’s “Big River.” Sure, he also produced the sonic abomination that is his and Wendy O. Williams’ version of the country classic “Stand By Your Man,” but that was more of a joke than anything else. I seem to recall that there was a lady country singer who released a duet she’d done with Lemmy shortly after his death. Like Keith Richard’s, Lemmy is still able to keep a country vibe even when singing in an English accent …
May 25, 2025 @ 4:23 pm
Hetten Des, which was Belgian cowboy punk I believe, did my favorite cover of that song outside of the genre. That album was awesome and it was cool hearing someone with a Belgian accent singing Lemmy. I always wished they made more albums. They did a Mike Ness cover and some other cool stuff.
May 24, 2025 @ 12:40 pm
This should be a hoot. Tesla was a good band. I think they’re still around actually.
May 28, 2025 @ 4:52 am
Indeed they are. I’d even say a great band back in the day in fact. They got unfairly lumped in with the “hair metal” bands and that hurt them. They were actually just a good old-fashioned Aerosmith/Zepplin style rock ‘n’ roll band with a great twin guitar attack. Nowadays Jeff Keith’s voice is sadly pretty fried and the new songs lack the punch (and solos) of the old days. Still, glad they are still out there kicking it. Hate on hair metal all you want, at least it was five guys playing their own instruments, writing their own songs, etc. That hardly exists anymore in the rock/hard rock/metal scene.
As someone said above, perhaps SCM needs a sister project, Saving Rock ‘n’ Roll (SRR). I’ll head it up if Trigger wants to teach me how to do what he does. For example, I would think almost any fan of good rock ‘n’ roll should hear The Struts. At this point, they’ve been around for a decade and have some traction, but they’re one of the few newer rock bands with personality, songs and style that can also bring it live.
I’ve also said it many times on here, if you like rock and you like country, and you haven’t heard The Wildfeathers, you are missing out. A real band that writes their own song (consistently phenomenal songs), with three incredible lead singers and great guitar work. And they are fantastic live. To me they sound like the Eagles and Tom Petty had a baby. Start with the song Left My Woman from their debut album, and pull up a live version on youtube and watch the three lead singers trade the vocals. You will be impressed.
There you go, rock is not dead, you just need to go find it and I just told you where to start. SRR! …a little brother to SCM!
May 28, 2025 @ 7:36 am
I just read a quote from Keith Richard’s – “rock has lost the roll. I like the roll.” I think he was talking about Sabbath but it’s spot on for much of modern rock imo. Spoon is and has been my favorite rock band of the last decade. There’s a good band out of Nashville/Atlanta called the Vegabonds. Very much a branch of the Tom Petty tree. Check them out if you haven’t. I’ll dig inTo the Wild Feathers. Thanks for the tip
May 24, 2025 @ 3:07 pm
Rex Hobart did a cover of Every Rose has it’s Thorns,
Ratt’s Wanted Man video was filmed as a western, and a better country theme then Round and Round
Motörhead’s Iron Horse seems like a better option, “wasted forever, ferociously stoned”
Thin Lizzy’s Cowboy song would work (Supersuckers covered that one)
early Rose Tattoo could be country, tons of slide guitar that would translate to steel
May 24, 2025 @ 3:08 pm
On the flip side, I love me some Metallica “Don’t Y’all Think This Outlaw Bit’s Done Got Outta Hand”!
May 24, 2025 @ 3:46 pm
The idea for the tribute is cool.
Really hope they do new arrangements on some of these. Any Ozzy (Randy) fan is going to come away pretty disappointed by that single.
May 24, 2025 @ 4:32 pm
My thoughts exactly. Iron Fist, Stone Dead Forever, The Hammer, Killed by Death…
May 24, 2025 @ 7:36 pm
I would pre order this if it was available on CD.
May 25, 2025 @ 4:28 am
I’m a fan of Alex Williams. He used to do acoustic covers on Instagram every Wednesday and covered some hard rock. So it’s no surprise he likes this music. I was also a fan of hair metal back in the day, and have wondered in the past how country covers of some of my old rock favorites would go over.
Not sure how this album will end up as a whole, but I think the first couple of singles are kinda mixed results. Going with the most popular and well known songs from these bands makes it difficult to come up with a version that doesn’t pale to the original. Probably not a concern to Williams who seems to just be having fun here, but you kinda wish he had selected songs that transfer well to country rather than just selecting the big hits. Still expect there to be a couple good ones here though.
May 25, 2025 @ 10:03 am
Butt Country
May 26, 2025 @ 1:10 pm
I cannot WAIT to hear his version of “Ace of Spades,” one of my favorite speed-metal songs.
May 26, 2025 @ 5:18 pm
Motörhead was not a heavy metal band. Rock and roll, played fast and loud.
May 27, 2025 @ 8:03 am
C’mon now, Zakk Wylde’s Pride and Glory project was awesome. The fusion of country and metal can absolutely be done and done well.
May 27, 2025 @ 11:16 am
Ace of Spades is not, was not, and never will be Hair Metal. Motorhead was a driving influence of Thrash, which is the antithesis of Hair Metal.
May 27, 2025 @ 11:27 am
Tried to distinguish Motorhead, Ozzy, and Guns & Roses as being different from the other bands being covered. That’s why I said, “as well as other metal legends…” ahead of mentioning them.
And BTW, I don’t present myself as a metal expert in any way.
May 27, 2025 @ 11:49 am
Fair enough.
I’im not saying some of these bands didn’t have a harder edge, and I will admit to just scanning the title and track listing and immediately moving into the comments.
That’s why it’s important to read the article
May 27, 2025 @ 11:40 am
I’m not looking forward to this at all. Didn’t Sam outlaw do this same thing? Derailed his career for five years.