Andrea Wellenberg The Top Hair Metal Band of All Time: Poison, sans most of the hair.

Get ready, Houston, 'cuz here they come -- rolling into town in waves all summer long. No, not the Bayou City's infamous mosquito swarms, but the rock and roll package tours featuring '70s and '80s bands. And though these acts may have been off the charts for decades, their shows still attract audiences in numbers that many of today's top artists can't touch.

Mostly taking place during the summer in outdoor amphitheaters or "sheds," the bands on these bills are out to stir memories, spur record sales and maybe throw in a few new songs to boot, hoping against hope you won't view them as a good time to take a leak. And with an estimated two-thirds of all annual concert revenue racked up between Memorial Day and Labor Day, the competition for a concertgoer's cash is more heated than ever.

"The baby boomer generation have tended to stay loyal to the artists they grew up with," says Gary Bongiovanni, editor of Pollstar, a trade publication that tracks the concert industry. "They really relate to those artists, and they still come out to support them."

Locally, most of these package tours stop at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion in The Woodlands. It's a hot stop, according to Bob Roux, the VP of music for the southwest region for SFX, which books rock acts at the venue. "Houston is one of the strongest markets in the country for these tours. We often set records for attendance, and our merchandise sales are always among the highest in the country," he says. "And that's a pretty good tool for measuring fan loyalty."

Roux says that while many of these bands' original fans, now ages 35 to 55, are willing to dole out big bucks for seats (and restroom proximity), the general-admission hill tickets, often as low as $15 to $20, are ideally suited for the younger fan, or the cash-strapped senior headbanger deciding whether to pay the car insurance for the month or party hearty for one nostalgic night.

"They want bodies there to pay for parking and drink beer and eat hot dogs. That's where [a venue's] profit comes from, not tickets," Bongiovanni adds.

Lead singer Bret Michaels of Poison, whose band will oversee the all-day Glam Slam Metal Jam on Sunday, May 27, at The Woodlands, says he's "psyched" about having so many acts on his bill. The virtual who's who of '80s hair metal includes Vince Neil (of Mötley Crüe), Quiet Riot, Great White, Warrant, Enuff Z'Nuff and the Bulletboys.

According to Michaels, Poison has always done well in Texas, but he has another ace up his sleeve: the best-known lineup of his band. How much that matters to a band's ticket sales and credibility is a hotly debated topic among fans. While the loss of a drummer or a bassist is a generally unlamented fact of rock and roll life, things get dicier when the "missing" member is a lead guitarist or singer.

But what has kept these bands in the public eye over the past few years? More than classic rock and all-'80s radio formats, the real answer is VH1. With its mountain of documentary programs, headlined by the sublimely guilty pleasures Behind the Music and Where Are They Now?, VH1 reminds older viewers of bands they'd all but forgotten, while introducing them to new audiences.

"They just keep repeating our episode, and we get new fans directly because if it," Michaels says. "They dig up some amazing stuff." Poison also earned the dubious honor of VH1's "Top Hair Metal Band of All Time" on a program hosted by an unrepentantly mulleted Dee Snider. Michaels accepts the accolade with gusto. "I take it with complete pride and wear the sash proudly!" Michaels says with a laugh. "Hair metal, glam rock, shock rock, hard rock, cock rock. Call us what the fuck you want, as long as it rocks!"

And so bands whose commercial heydays have long passed can still look forward to a lucrative career on the road -- just as long as fans have them in their collective memory banks. "Familiarity breeds attraction," says SFX's Roux, summing up the current appeal of these groups. "We all want to be comfortable and have a good time."

A package tour is coming soon to a venue near you. Trust us.

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