30 Years Ago: Great White Release ‘Once Bitten’

Great White released their third studio album Once Bitten on this day 30 years ago (June 29, 1987).

Great White formed out of Los Angeles in 1977 and gained success in the 1980’s with exposure on MTV. When the band released the album Once Bitten, it was a commercial success going Platinum for sales of over one million copies. The album would feature the anthem "Rock Me"  which would become one of the band's most well known songs along with the hit power ballad "Save Your Love" and rockers like "Lady Red Light" and "All Over Now". The band would see even greater success in 1989 with the album …Twice Shy and the single “Once Bitten, Twice Shy”. The cover of the Ian Hunter single earned the band a Grammy nomination for Best Hard Rock Performance. The album went platinum in the summer of 1989 and double platinum by the fall of that same year. Sadly, the band made headlines many years later with the tragic Station Nightclub fire of 2003 which took the lives of around 100 people in West Warwick, Rhode Island.

I have fond memories of heading down to Florida for Spring Break some twenty years ago (mid 1990’s) with my pal Joe Mason and we ended up in Panama City Beach. We had just missed MTV who had been there with the crew days earlier filming the annual spring break festivities for the network. We drove around looking for something to do and saw the big sign at Club La Vela that read: Great White….Tonight! We now had are plans for the night all set. It was great watching these 80’s rockers performing poolside at the club, while watching bevy of beauties in bikinis running around. Those are memories we will never forget.

I spoke with former Great White singer Jack Russell recently on the Metal Box. Check out the full interview here.