There’s a gnawing itch in my musical soul that just won’t fade. It’s this: I’ve seen so many of the big names — the glam-metal loudmouths, the arena rockers, the sequinned sleaze kings. But one band out there remains un-scratched, like an old record groove I keep returning to, hoping someday someone will press the needle down and deliver the moment. That band is Poison.
Picture this: in the late ’80s and early ’90s, hard-rock airwaves were awash with “Nothin’ But a Good Time”, “Talk Dirty to Me”, “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”, “Unskinny Bop”. Poison were right in the thick of it — MTV icons, hair sprayed to the skies, and big enough to fill huge venues. In the United States they became multi-platinum heavyweights: their debut Look What the Cat Dragged In sold millions — three-plus million in the U.S. alone.

Their follow-up Flesh & Blood soared to Number 2 on the Billboard 200 and racked up over 7.2 million copies worldwide while their compilation Greatest Hits 1986‑1996 went double-platinum in the U.S. for sales north of two million.
Poison are a band with songs that have stood the test of time and are a band that should be a global touring juggernaut. And yet: the UK remains a ghost in their live schedule. I’ve been watching festival line‐ups year after year. I see names like Motley Crüe, Tesla and Cinderella pop up at the likes of Download Festival, but Poison haven’t crossed the Atlantic since the early ’90s.
Not since April 1993 and a pair of shows in Nottingham and Manchester have they plugged in for a UK live crowd. That’s over 30 years of silence in the UK market. Three full decades.
Imagine the scene. The stage lit up in a field: we, the UK rock-family, cold beers in hand, the sunset turning orange, and the band launch into the immortal chorus of “Every Rose Has Its Thorn” or “Life Goes On”. The sea of voices singing back at Bret Michaels is long, long overdue and it has to happen – surely.
Why hasn’t Poison become the touring beast in the UK that their Sunset-Strip siblings did? Maybe it’s timing. Maybe they were one of the big victims of the seismic shift in music culture at the turn of the 90s. Because they have the songs, they had the look, the fanbase and they had the MTV momentum.
When comparing to their contemparies like Motley Crüe, the narrative of debauchery, reinvention and spectacle kept them headline-news. But Poison almost slipped off into silence at least on our shores.
If you haven’t been back, you’re easy to forget.
But even now in 2025 the music still hits. Whenever I revisit those songs I feel the blast of youthful abandon, the mix of swagger and heartbreak. It’s real. The fact that I’ve never seen them live here makes their omission all the more poignant. Of all the bands I’ve ever wanted to see, Poison still represent that un-scratched itch.
One day I dream they will announce a UK show or tour or even land on the Download bill. Let them stride out, big hair, big riffs, and let the UK crowd sing “Every Rose” back at them in unison. The moment would be one of those moments you remember forever.
In the end, it all comes down to rock-and-roll’s cruel truth: it’s as much about timing and luck as it ever was about talent and songs. Poison had more than enough of the latter.
And yet: hope springs eternal. With the band announcing their 40th anniversary tour (the original line-up, no less) maybe the timing is finally right for a UK leg. And if it does, I’ll be there. Cold beer in hand. Voice ready. And that record-scratch-itch finally getting scratched.
Until then, the thorn remains.