MY CAREER IN FIVE SONGS

Four decades down the road with Winger, Reb Beach sheds his hair metal past with this quintet of metal and fusion cuts.

- MARK MC STEA

WINGER WERE GIANTS of the hair metal era, scoring hits and becoming a fixture on MTV with heavy rotation for their over-the-top videos. Like many bands of the era, they suffered the backlash of the grunge movement in the early 1990s when, almost overnight, the excess and extravagance of the big-production metal bands ran up against a cultural movement that considered the notion of fun in music to be almost obscene. Ironically, as we'll see in guitarist Reb Beach's five song selections, a fair amount of Winger's musical output was actually a departure from the bright and glossy excesses of the big, radio-friendly hits.

There are few bands that can say they still have their founding members 40 years down the road, and Winger are one of them. "Offhand, I can't think of any bands who still have their original lineup from when they broke through," Beach says. "The thing is, there are no jerks in the band - no big egos. In most bands there's always one guy who's a real asshole, but not in Winger. We're all pros. We've all been in a ton of bands, and we know how to do our jobs and never complain. We're great friends. We still eat lunch together every day when we're on the road."

The band's most recent release is Seven, their first album since 2014's Better Days Comin'. Beach says he's been delighted with the response to it. "People are really loving this album more than anything that we've done since Pull in 1993," he explains. "I was thinking it was maybe too dark and intense, but it seems to have touched people who like our music, which has been super positive. It's Kip's baby, for sure. I bring him a bunch of '80s riffs and he crafts them into something musical."