''Under Lock and Key'' is the third studio album by American
heavy metal band
Dokken
Dokken is an American glam metal band formed in Los Angeles in 1978. It split up in 1989 and reformed four years later. The band had several hit singles which charted on the Billboard Hot 100, such as "Alone Again (Dokken song), Alone Again", " ...
, released on November 22, 1985, through
Elektra Records
Elektra Records (or Elektra Entertainment) is an American record label owned by Warner Music Group, founded in 1950 by Jac Holzman and Paul Rickolt. It played an important role in the development of contemporary folk and rock music between th ...
.
The album reached No. 32 on the U.S.
''Billboard'' 200 and remained on that chart for 67 weeks.
[ "Dokken – Chart history" '']Billboard
A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...
''. Retrieved June 15, 2015. Two singles also charted: "The Hunter" and "In My Dreams", both reaching No. 25 and 24 on ''Billboard''s
Mainstream Rock
Mainstream rock (also known as heritage rock) is a radio format used by many commercial radio stations in the United States and Canada.
Format background
Mainstream rock stations represent the middle ground between classic rock and active rock ...
respectively, with "In My Dreams" at No. 77 on the
''Billboard'' Hot 100.
''Under Lock and Key'' was
certified Gold
Music recording certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped, sold, or streamed a certain number of units. The threshold quantity varies by type (such as album, single, music video) and by nation or territory (see ...
on March 4, 1986, and
Platinum
Platinum is a chemical element with the symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish , a diminutive of "silver".
Pla ...
on April 14, 1987.
Critical reception
The album received mostly positive reviews. Eduardo Rivadavia in his review for
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the dat ...
calls ''Under Lock and Key'' "quite possibly Dokken's most 'complete' album, with a little something for every type of fan", like "fist-pumping headbangers", extraordinary "bittersweet mid-paced rockers" ("Unchain the Night" and "The Hunter") and "saccharine ballads". Rivadavia recommends the album as the best introduction to new listeners of Dokken, but notes that heavy metal purists would likely prefer the band's 1984 album ''
Tooth and Nail''.
Canadian journalist
Martin Popoff
Martin Popoff (born April 28, 1963) is a Canadian music journalist, critic and author. He is mainly known for writing about the genre of heavy metal music. The senior editor and co-founder of ''Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles'', he has additionall ...
considers the album "too weighted towards
Def Leppard
Def Leppard are an English rock band formed in 1976 in Sheffield. Since 1992, the band has consisted of Rick Savage (bass, backing vocals), Joe Elliott (lead vocals), Rick Allen (drums, backing vocals), Phil Collen (guitar, backing vocals) ...
's fat-and-open formula rock", resulting "a bit subdued and predictable" in comparison with its predecessor. The band's glamorous look, the media exposure and George Lynch's "attempt to define the L.A. sound in his own image" do not save ''Under Lock and Key'' from sounding "like the work of a band just fed".
Track listing
Personnel
Dokken
*
Don Dokken
Donald Maynard Dokken (born June 29, 1953) is an American singer and musician. He's best known for being the lead singer, occasional guitarist, and founder of the glam metal band Dokken. He is known for his vibrato-laden, melodic vocal style wh ...
– lead vocals
*
George Lynch – guitars
*
Jeff Pilson
Jeffrey Steven Pilson (born January 19, 1959) is an American musician best known for being the bass player in the glam metal band Dokken and currently classic rock band Foreigner. He has also had an extended stint with Dio in the 1990s. He is ...
– bass, background vocals
*
Mick Brown – drums, background vocals
Additional musicians
*Chris Currell –
Synclavier
The Synclavier is an early digital synthesizer, polyphonic digital sampling system, and music workstation manufactured by New England Digital Corporation of Norwich, Vermont. It was produced in various forms from the late 1970s into the early ...
programming
Production
*
Neil Kernon
Neil Kernon is an English musician, record producer, mixer and recording engineer from London. He is a Grammy Award winner and has worked on over 100 Gold and Platinum records.
Biography
Born to a musical family, Kernon's formal musical trai ...
,
Michael Wagener
Michael Wagener (born 25 April 1949) is a German former music producer, mixer, and engineer from Hamburg, best known for his work with many top glam metal and heavy metal bands in the late 1980s. He is particularly renowned for his multi-amping an ...
– producers, engineers, mixing
*Mark Wilczak – assistant engineer and mixing
*Cliff Bonell,
Michael Lardie
Michael Lardie (born September 8, 1958) is an American musician and record producer known for his memberships in the rock bands Great White and Night Ranger.
Early life
Lardie was born on September 8, 1958, in Anchorage, Alaska and raised i ...
– assistant engineers
*
Bob Ludwig
Robert C. Ludwig (born c. 1945) is an American mastering engineer. He has mastered recordings on all the major recording formats for all the major record labels, and on projects by more than 1,300 artists including Led Zeppelin, Lou Reed, Quee ...
– mastering at
Masterdisk
Masterdisk is an American multimedia company in New York (state), New York, located at 8 John Walsh Boulevard in Peekskill, New York, Peekskill. They provide production services such as Mastering (audio), audio mastering, LP record, vinyl cuttin ...
, New York
Charts
Album
Singles
Certifications
Accolades
''Unchain the Night''
The music videos produced for the singles from the three Dokken albums were featured on a longform videocassette release, ''Unchain the Night'', by Elektra/Asylum Records through
Elektra Entertainment
Elektra Records (or Elektra Entertainment) is an American record label owned by Warner Music Group, founded in 1950 by Jac Holzman and Paul Rickolt. It played an important role in the development of contemporary folk and rock music between ...
. That video debuted on ''Billboard''s Top Music Video—Longform chart at No. 11 in January 1987, peaking at No. 5 that May. The video collection was certified Gold in April 1987, and Platinum the following April.
In 2007 the collection was re-released in
DVD
The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...
by
Rhino Home Video
Rhino Entertainment Company is an American specialty record label and production company founded in 1978. It is currently the catalog division for Warner Music Group. Its current CEO is Mark Pinkus.
History
Founded in 1978, Rhino was originall ...
through
Warner Music Vision
Warner Music Vision (also known as Warner Vision) was a music video company formed in 1990 by Warner Music International to make music videos from artists and bands on Warner Bros. Records, Maverick Records, Sire Records, Atlantic Records, Elektra ...
, debuting on the Billboard Comprehensive Music Videos chart at No. 27.
VHS track listing
#"Into The Fire"
#"Just Got Lucky"
#"Breaking The Chains"
#"Alone Again"
#"The Hunter"
#"In My Dreams"
#"It's Not Love"
Certifications
See also
*
List of glam metal albums and songs
The following list of glam metal albums and songs is a list containing albums and songs described by at least one professional source as glam metal or its interchangeable terms, hair metal, lite metal, pop metal, and metal pop.
Albums
1978
* ...
References
{{Authority control
Dokken albums
1985 albums
Elektra Records albums
Albums produced by Neil Kernon
Albums produced by Michael Wagener