Savage Amusement

Following the massive success of *Love at First Sting*, Scorpions consummated their ambitions of the early \'80s. When they returned with *Savage Amusement*, they were an older, wiser, and more unhurried band. They could still write classic songs; “Don’t Stop at the Top” strikes a rare balance between aggressive and dreamy, while Klaus Meine continued to sing in a fashion that could only be called inimitable. While Scorpions had become more susceptible to hair-metal tropes than they\'d been four years earlier, they never sound weak or ineffectual here. “Passion Rules the Game,” “Every Minute Every Day,\" and “Media Overkill” might not have had the bite of “Blackout” or “Lovedrive”—what would?—but the songs were still a cut above anything else hair metal was producing in 1988. As if to prove they still had venom, “We Let It Rock…You Let It Roll” comes on like a blitzkrieg with a column of pop light shooting through the center. As was the band’s custom, the album closes with a weeper. In an era clogged with power ballads, “Believe in Love” was easily one of the best.

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