''Love at First Sting'' is the ninth studio album by German rock band

Scorpions Scorpions are predatory arachnids of the Order (biology), order Scorpiones. They have eight legs and are easily recognized by a pair of Chela (organ), grasping pincers and a narrow, segmented tail, often carried in a characteristic forward cur ...

. It was released in February 1984 by

Harvest Harvesting is the process of collecting plants, animals, or fish (as well as fungi) as food, especially the process of gathering mature crops, and "the harvest" also refers to the collected crops. Reaping is the cutting of grain or pulses fo ...

and

EMI Records EMI Records (formerly EMI Records Ltd.) is a British multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It was originally founded as a British flagship label by the music company EMI in 1972, and launched in January 1973 as the succes ...

in Europe and

Mercury Records Mercury Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group. It had significant success as an independent operation in the 1940s and 1950s. Smash Records and Fontana Records were sub labels of Mercury. Mercury Records released ...

in the US. The album contains " Rock You Like a Hurricane", " Still Loving You", and " Big City Nights", three of the band's most famous songs.

Music

The album's music has been described as heavy metal,

hard rock Hard rock or heavy rock is a heavier subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and Distortion (music), distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the Garage rock, garage, Psychedelic rock, psychedelic and blues ...

, and .

Background and recording

The album was recorded at Dierks Studios in Stommeln, West Germany. Initial sessions took place in Stockholm's Polar Studios in the Summer of 1983 with ex-

Rainbow A rainbow is an optical phenomenon caused by refraction, internal reflection and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a continuous spectrum of light appearing in the sky. The rainbow takes the form of a multicoloured circular ...

members

Jimmy Bain James Stewart Bain (19 December 1947 – 23 January 2016) was a Scottish musician, best known for playing bass guitar in the bands Rainbow and Dio. He also worked with Kate Bush and Thin Lizzy frontman Phil Lynott, co-writing on his solo albu ...

on bass and Bobby Rondinelli on drums, but nothing made it to the final album. ''Love at First Sting'' is notable in that it was one of the first digitally recorded heavy metal records ever released. It became the group's most successful album in the US, where it peaked at number 6 on the ''Billboard'' 200 chart in 1984, and went double-platinum by the end of the year, reaching triple-platinum status in 1995. The song " Rock You Like a Hurricane" reached number 25 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 chart in the same year; " Still Loving You" reached number 64 on the same chart, number 14 in Germany, and number 3 in the French and Swiss single charts.

Artwork

The original cover art was created by Kochlowski, which is a German graphic design company, and features a photo shot by renowned German photographer

Helmut Newton Helmut Newton (né Neustädter; 31 October 192023 January 2004) was a German-Australian photographer. The ''The New York Times, New York Times'' described him as a "prolific, widely imitated fashion photographer whose provocative, erotically ch ...

. Despite the record company having shown the original cover art to retailers without any concerns, a complaint by

Walmart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores in the United States and 23 other ...

in the US after the album was released resulted in PolyGram Records issuing a "clean" cover for use in several department store chains. The alternative cover was designed to be less controversial by simply showing a photo of the band members, which was the same photo as the one on the inner sleeve.

Track listing

Personnel

;Scorpions * Klaus Meine – lead and backing vocals * Rudolf Schenker – rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2, 3, 8), lead guitar (6, 7, 9) * Matthias Jabs – lead guitar, rhythm guitar (6, 7, 9) * Francis Buchholz – bass,

Moog Taurus The Moog Taurus is a foot-operated analog synthesizer designed and manufactured by Moog Music. It was originally conceived as a part of the Constellation series of synthesizers. The initial Taurus I was manufactured from 1975 to 1981; a less pop ...

Herman Rarebell Hermann Erbel (born 18 November 1949), known professionally as Herman Rarebell, is a German musician, best known as the drummer for the hard rock band Scorpions from 1977 to 1996, during which time he played on eight studio albums. Aside from pl ...

– drums ;Production *

Dieter Dierks Dieter Dierks (born 9 February 1943) is a German record producer, sound engineer, music publisher, studio owner and musician. He became well known as producer of the rock band Scorpions (band), Scorpions who were signed to him between 1975 and ...

– producer, mixing *Gerd Rautenbach – engineer, mastering *Kochlowski/Missmahl/Pieczulski – cover design

Charts

Certifications

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Love At First Sting 1984 albums Scorpions (band) albums EMI Records albums Harvest Records albums Mercury Records albums Albums produced by Dieter Dierks Glam metal albums