Skyscraper

Former Van Halen singer David Lee Roth’s second solo album had less of the cartoon-wolf ludicrousness of his debut, Eat ’Em And Smile; though he had the same band (guitarist Steve Vai, bassist Billy Sheehan, and drummer Gregg Bissonette), keyboardist Brett Tuggle added a lot of AOR/New Wave textures to songs like the title track, “Stand Up,” and “Hot Dog And A Shake,” and the single, “Just Like Paradise,” felt like a pitch straight down the middle to rock radio. Still, a persona as irrepressible as Roth’s is bound to come bursting through the wall like the Kool-Aid man no matter how superficially of-the-moment the rest of the musical environment might be, and there’s plenty of lubricious fun to be had here.