C.C. DeVille! The answer is C.C. DeVille! I just naturally assumed that all people featured on Behind The Music who claim that they are making the best music of their career are liars. But then I remembered that C.C. DeVille, at the time of the Poison Behind The Music, really was making the best music of his career.
However, I don't think he made that exact claim. I think he just said he had a new band that he was really excited about called The Stepmothers. (C.C. pronunciation: Stepmuhthuhs.) The Stepmothers eventually changed their name to Samantha 7 and released a great pop record. A tremendous pop record! A stupendous pop record! A pop record that was so much better than anything Poison had ever released.
I believe that Samantha 7 was so excellent because of C.C.'s personality. With Bret Michaels and his gigantic ego out of the way, C.C. DeVille was able to be full strength C.C. DeVille. The Samantha 7 album is completely fresh, with none of that needless experimenting that made Flesh And Blood such a steaming pile.
C.C. (or more likely, Jack Blades in a great production job) recognized his strengths and weaknesses and worked within those confines. There are (thankfully) no long guitar solos because C.C. isn't exactly Mr. Virtuoso. He won't be on the G3 tour any time soon. Of course I would go if he was on the bill. Satriani! Vai! DeVille! Sign me up. But no, instead C.C. is probably doomed to a life of summer tours with Poison until people stop buying tickets. That'll be soon, right?
Anyway, the Samantha 7 album didn't have much in the way of solos, but it was packed with that fantastic C.C. DeVille guitar tone. And while I think we all can agree that C.C. doesn't possess the greatest singing voice in the world, his vocals with Samantha 7 worked. I think since C.C. wrote the songs he wrote them for his vocal range, which is maybe three notes. I'll be generous and throw in another note so he can make the half-octave. But the limited range doesn't matter, because his personality carries the songs. Oh, so does the rhythm section. Those guys were great. But the focal point was always C.C.
I appreciate the fact that C.C. was in charge because when he is with Poison it seems like he has to throttle way back to make room for Bret Michaels and his pompous strutting. LCG still tries to needle me into admitting that I had a good time when we saw Poison, because he had an excellent time, but I will not cave. The token highlight for me was when C.C. sang a song.
Actually, one good thing did come from my trip to the Poison concert. LCG finally realized that I am not exaggerating when I do my C.C. DeVille impersonation. I guess he had never seen the Poison Behind The Music or C.C.'s many appearances on Rock And Roll Jeopardy, because he didn't know how C.C. DeVille talks. He thought I was going overboard for comedy value. I used have conversations in this vein:
LCG: How was your day?
Me: Sucked. (The old horrible day job.)
LCG would then try to dig to see if I had any stories or gossip. He loved my old job because I had a co-worker that was all the time falling asleep in her cube and never got fired for it. He was amazed that such a workplace could exist.
Me: I only have boring stories today.
LCG: So just tell them in the C.C. DeVille voice.
He would use my C.C. DeVille impersonation to add comedy value to any situation. And then we went to the Poison concert and as soon as C.C. spoke, LCG's jaw dropped. He turned to me and said, "You weren't exaggerating." "Well, I told you I wasn't!" Of course whenever he would accuse me of exaggerating I would squawk, "That's how he tawks!" in the C.C. DeVille voice, so it's no wonder that he thought I was stretching it a bit.
Anyway, I'm just bummed out that now if I want to see C.C. DeVille I have to attend a Poison concert. Even though Samantha 7 was the best music of his career, at last count I saw (Metal Sludge, January 2001) the album hadn't even sold 10,000 copies. Touring with Poison is where C.C. DeVille's money will be made and as a result, he doesn't have time to make (more) of the best music of his career. And that's a real shame.