Ted Nugent: Unreleased Damn Yankees Album Had ‘Great Moments’

With Tommy Shaw unavailable due to commitments with Styx and drummer Michael Cartellone wrapped up with Lynyrd Skynyrd, some lineup substitutions were made. Joining up with Yankee mainstays Ted Nugent and Jack Blades, guitarist and vocalist Damon Johnson, late of '90s rockers Brother Cane, also stepped in, joined by Night Ranger's Kelly Keagy behind the kit.

By all accounts, the sessions were troubled and even with Shaw stepping back into the mix in the midst of the proceedings, the decision was eventually made to put the album on the shelf, where it has remained for nearly two decades. A few of the songs have filtered out via individual band member projects, with the rest staying under cover.

Maybe a few years from now, we’ll all be dead and somebody will resurrect ‘em and produce it properly and salvage some of it. Our ideas were on fire. I’d love to see us redo that particular song, because the way these guys played it, it was a sucker punch to the emotional solar plexus.