Album review: Extreme – Six

By STEVE MASCORD

WHEN I was 15, in 1984, I had no idea Eddie Van Halen was a good guitar player.

He was just a member of a band I liked because of their songs. I wasn’t really sure why “Hot For Teacher” didn’t have more singing and a less playing but I liked the song, even if it was a bit too fast.

By the time Extreme came along in 1989, I had realised EVH was rather good. But the comparisons between the two bands were not immediately apparent. It was like every song was “Hot For Teacher” with too much playing and not enough of any emotion, particularly VH’s ebullience. There was no “Jump” or “Panama”. 

A word I would use now for how I felt about Extreme then would be “technicians”. They seemed to be technicians, with everything Van Halen had except the bits of Van Halen I liked. 

Which brings us to 2023 and Extreme’s sixth album, Six. 

The question we ask ourselves about new releases from heritage acts today is “will I still be listening to this in a year’s time?”. The answer is, almost without exception, “no”. Because it’s more of what we know and we’d rather go back to the thing that influenced these bands – their earlier selves.

With Van Halen gone, Extreme could have attempted to step into the breach and put out something that sounded like, oh, 1989-brand Bulletboys.

Instead, with guitarist Nuno Bettencourt having played with pop star Rihanna, there’s a solid and determined pitch at crossover credibility on Six.

At first listen, it’s easy to dismiss and even laugh at some of the mechanisms employed, as podcast host Michael Butler justifiably does HERE. 

Hashtag in a song title? An industrial song? A reggae romp about pretty girls from all around the world? Pur-leez.

But having lived with Six for about a month now (thanks HM for a reason to give it such a generous chance to impress me), I have found myself humming “Other Side Of The Rainbow” with its sweet melodies, admiring the poise and – yes – beauty of “Smalltown Beautiful” and – looking around a town square during a summer holiday – just managing suppress the urge to sing “Beautiful Girls” out loud in the presence of my spouse. It’s naff – but it’s a great song.

“Hurricane” is delicate and wonderfully executed, “Here’s To The Losers” is at least a good idea if over-egged …. The opening two songs are more than functional dollops of modern hard rock.

There’s some absolutely ripping guitar in evidence here but there is not a single song where exhibitionism eclipses songcraft, which to my mind has always been Extreme’s biggest problem.

After about 10 listens, Six suddenly works.

This is the sound of a band on a 44-year creative journey that might just be in the finishing straight, ready to break a ribbon defined by excellence and restraint rather than the commercial success that came after the first few metres of their marathon.

Buy Six on CD

Buy Six on vinyl