Riffing on the timeless motivational children's story, you might say "That Metal Show" is the little crazy train that could. For 14 seasons on VH1 Classic, Eddie Trunk, Jim Florentine and Don Jamieson have drawn some of the biggest names in heavy music to the set of the program which is part history lesson, part roundtable debate, part comedy, and, as the show's tagline aptly declares, "all things hard rock and heavy metal."
Launched in 2008, "That Metal Show" is TV's only gathering spot for metalheads and hard rockers, fans of genres that have historically been marginalized by the music industry, despite the long-running popularity of the music and the brand loyalty of its fans. Cases in point: When the Grammys finally added a Hard Rock/Metal Performance category in 1988, the award infamously went to Jethro Tull instead of a metal or hard rock act; and it took the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame until 2013 to induct Rush and until 2014 to induct KISS, two of the most successful - if not critically beloved - bands to ever emerge from any genre; Trunk publicly campaigned for both groups to be enshrined.
Trunk, a former record company vice president and current syndicated radio host, dreamed up "That Metal Show" as a forum to showcase the bands that he and his brethren love and to tap into an audience of fans already faithfully following this music.
"I've seen that this genre of music is always very marginalized," Trunk says in a recent interview with Headlines & Global News. "People always think that they could pick you out if you like it. 'Oh, that guy looks like a metalhead.' They don't realize that there's a lot more people that like this music, and over my career, I've met and become friends with actors, professional athletes, surgeons, that you wouldn't look and say they were a metalhead, that are totally into this music. So that's a big part of it. I think it's a big message to the mainstream that there's way more people into this than they think they have figured out.
"And we don't fit into any of those boxes. If you look at us, you got three guys here, none of us have a tattoo, none of us have a piercing, none of us have long hair. That's cool if it's how you express yourself, but we love it just as much."
In addition to the guest interviews, which have featured heavy hitters like Alice Cooper, Ted Nugent and Marilyn Manson as well as current and former members of Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Guns N' Roses, AC/DC, Van Halen and Slayer, "TMS" is broken into recurring segments including the "TMS Top 5," where the hosts list their favorites in a certain category, such as '70s British Hard Rock Bands; a topical debate, called the "Throwdown"; and "Stump The Trunk," where audience members pepper the encyclopedic Trunk with trivia questions in hopes of stumping him and taking home a prize from "Miss Box Of Junk" Jennifer Gottlieb.
"TMS" is currently taping and airing new episodes, including the Feb. 21 season premiere featuring Rush bassist and vocalist Geddy Lee and musical guest, Dream Theater guitarist John Petrucci, and last week's episode featuring Anthrax and musical guest Alex Skolnick, Testament's guitarist.
The show returns this Saturday, at 9 p.m. EST with former Slayer and current PHILM drummer Dave Lombardo and musical guest John 5, Rob Zombie's guitar player. Headlines and Global News was invited to watch the taping of last week's episode at Metropolis Studios in New York, and after the taping we sat down with Trunk, Florentine and Jamieson in their dressing room for a candid conversation.
What was your mindset heading into the first-ever episode of "That Metal Show" in 2008? Did you worry that it might not work?
Don Jamieson: Yes, we thought it might not work (laughs). And every time we get done with a season, we still think "Does this work? Is anyone watching, are we doing OK?" But our fans have been super loyal to us, and we're metalheads too, we're the same way.
Eddie Trunk: I remember the one thing for me that I was thinking of is, the way VH1 does their deals is that you have to sign a contract before you do a pilot that has everything in place assuming it gets picked up, so you don't just do a contract for a pilot, you do a contract for like four seasons. And I just remember thinking, "If this thing doesn't get picked up, all I'm left with is a big, fat lawyer bill," because it had to be fully negotiated out. But I had a history with this channel since 2002 and I had been pitching this show for like five years, so when we got to the point where we actually did a pilot, and I knew having Don and Jim attached to it - we were friends already - I felt pretty good that it was going to go, that unless we really fell on our faces we had a good chance to succeed.
How would you describe the metal community's response to the show, both the artists and the fans?
DJ: Again, it's part of our DNA as metalheads; if we find something we like, we're loyal to it and we stick with it. I listened to KISS "Destroyer" when I was 9, and it's almost 40 years later and it's still one of my go-to albums. I think we just struck a nerve with the metal audience, and they came and they found us and they've stayed with us through everything. These shows that we're taping now, it's been almost a year since we've [last] been on the air, so they've been watching repeats, and repeats of repeats, so we're grateful.
JF: A lot of guys say that there's finally a show on TV that they can watch every week. These guys have been looking for something like this for long time. They're married, got a couple kids now, busy, got s--t going on, and then all of a sudden they're like "Holy s--t, I used to listen to that music in the '80s." They're reminiscing and they didn't even realize like Don Dokken still tours, and Ratt got back together a few years ago. They can learn that stuff from our show, which is cool.
ET: I think that we certainly fill a void. There's nothing else like it. Back in the '80s you had "Headbangers Ball" [on MTV], but when we started doing this, there was nothing like it, and there really isn't. We're real. Nothing you're seeing is a façade up there. We're three people who truly love this music, and we'll fight for it and argue about it, but we all love it. We're willing to say if we like or don't like something, and I think that comes across.
You've had some of the most famous people in hard rock and heavy metal sit in those guest chairs. But who has turned down your invitations?
ET: We've had, in over 100 episodes, and over the course of, what is this, our seventh year, we've had major people, from AC/DC to Black Sabbath members, Iron Maiden, Alice Cooper...
DJ: Those are our A-list. We're like "The Tonight Show" for heavy metal fans. And we treat them like that. We treat them like Jimmy Fallon would treat George Clooney, and that's another reason they love to come on the show.
ET: But there's a couple guys who've eluded us. The only people who won't do the show because of some sort of outstanding issues, whatever is in their head, is Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley [of KISS], and our door has always been open to them, but they're a little sensitive to stuff or whatever, and that's unfortunate because their fans watch this show and would love to see them, and hopefully one day they'll come around to do it. We've had the other two [former] members of KISS and we just do what we do. Again, the same thing for some reasons that aren't even truly clear, Ozzy won't do the show, but the other members of Sabbath have been on; we've had Bill Ward, Geezer Butler, Tony Iommi.
You can't worry about that stuff. Hopefully people come around and they figure it out and they realize that we're music fans, we're having fun, and we don't love every single thing every one of our favorite bands has ever done - very few people do - but we're real and honest about it, and the best guests are the ones that get that and come on and mix it up with us. Sammy Hagar and Michael Anthony [formerly of Van Halen]; Rob Halford [of Judas Priest]; Lars Ulrich [of Metallica]. We have so much fun with those guys.
JF: The guys we taped with today, they were busting balls out there.
ET: Eddie Van Halen we'd love to have, but he doesn't do any press, practically. Jimmy Page [of Led Zeppelin] we'd love to have, but Jimmy's afraid of the metal tag, even though we've had a ton of like rock artists on. We've had Paul Rodgers [of Free and Bad Company] on, we've had Mick Jones [of Foreigner] on, we've had a very wide net.
JF: It would be perfect timing for Jimmy Page to come on with all the re-mastered Zeppelin stuff coming out. If we don't get him in this window, we're never getting him.
ET: Jimmy Page doesn't need us, but it would be nice if he came around.
What are your most memorable stories from taping the show?
JF: I remember Lemmy [Kilmister] of Motorhead when he was on the show one time, Don was in the room just talking to him and I was walking by, and he's like "Jim, are you going to come in for a drink?" Absolutely. Me, Don and Lemmy sat there for like two hours drinkin'. Security was like, "We're closing the building now, you've gotta go." I was like, "I'm f----n' drinkin' with Lemmy, I don't care, you can call the cops." Just sitting there and listening to Lemmy tell stories. So that was the highlight for me.
ET: For me, there were so many and so many amazing guests. But just speaking about a day that was kind of like, "this is crazy," we shot on my birthday about three years ago in L.A. Back then we were doing two episodes a day, and one of the episodes had Steve Harris from Iron Maiden as the guest, with Michael Schenker as the guitar player, and the other show was Sammy Hagar and Michael Anthony, and in one of the episodes, [former Guns N' Roses drummer] Steven Adler popped out of the cake. All of that happening in one day, it was a really cool moment for me.
DJ: Adler has been great comic relief for us.
ET: We should Skype him in this season, he has a new song.
DJ: I think for me, last year having Ted Nugent on. He typifies the type of guest you want to have on: somebody who's going to tell it like it is, he's not afraid to hurt people's feelings. I know he's very polarizing to people, but I think for the most part we kept it to the music. He's outrageous, and whether you like him or not, you're going to watch because you want to hear what he has to say. Ted's one of my personal favorites, so the fact that he finally came on was a highlight for me.
What was your first hard rock or metal concert? What was the best one you've seen?
JF: Mine was Black Sabbath and Van Halen at Madison Square Garden. Ozzy was still in the band, and Van Halen had their first record out. Best one was...I don't know. I've seen so many good shows over the years. Sabbath reunion in '99 at the Meadowlands was huge because I never thought they'd get back together, and Pantera was opening too.
DJ: The first concert I ever saw was Judas Priest and Iron Maiden at Asbury Park, Maiden opening on the "Killers" tour, Judas Priest on the "Point of Entry Tour."
ET: I was there too.
DJ: We were all there and we didn't know each other.
JF: I got thrown out for throwing a smoke bomb during the encore.
DJ: So that was my very first concert, and the best one was honestly the "Black Ice" tour by AC/DC at Giants Stadium. I gotta say, man, two and a half hours, it just blew me away. I don't even want to go see AC/DC this time around, that show was just so unbelievable.
ET: I don't know if I could ever say a favorite, I could never narrow it down, but the first show I ever saw was certainly a favorite and was insanely impactful, and that was KISS at the Garden, Dec. 16, 1977. A band called Piper opened, which was Billy Squier's first band who I still love to this day, and here I am, KISS, the "Alive II" tour, I'm 13 at that point, and it was a game changer. I remember little parts of it, but that was the moment that just set me off on going crazy with rock music.
