SLOGAN

BEYOND THE BANDS. BEYOND THE VENUE. BEYOND THE MUSIC. THIS BLOG BRINGS FORTH ALL THAT IS METAL.

Monday, February 20, 2012

Tarnished Iron: Heavy Metal Van Hammer

Channel 13 presents "Tarnished Iron", moments outside of Metal that was meant to represent our beloved music that ended as a blemish on the genres rap sheet, and as you will see in todays launch post, these are people/events/thingies (as a science teacher of years past once told us)/etc. that will cover a broad spectrum guiding us to the false promise land.

Mark Hildreth, better known to wrestling fans as Heavy Metal Van Hammer, then Van Hammer and then simply as Hammer, during his time as a wrestler in WCW during the 90's & 00's, is this series first post.


One of his early gimmicks was that of a Heavy Metal musician, and as you will see, he could have given the likes of Yngwie Malmsteen and Steve Vai a run for their money at the gym, but the electric guitar was a different story since he didn't even know how to play the damn instrument. A cliff note to future wrestling promoters, if you want your character to hold weight in the audience eyes, make certain they can legitimately portray the character they play (i.e., Demolition as the maniacal road warriors from the Mad Max 2 film (a very Metal film), the Roadwarriors as the originals of the aforementioned gimmick and a turnbuckle chewing maniac ala George The Animal Steele. If you're looking for something closer to this type of post, Rowdy Roddy Piper wielding the bagpipe in it's Folk Metal glory.).


The Flying V he brought to the ring was something you would find at a K-Mart's kid section, which definitely made him look like an even bigger idiot than scientifically possible.


Aside from the lack of the musical gift from the Gods of Metal, he also had a sense of fashion that was more "VH1 false Metal news coverage of Sammy Haggar at a unknown awards show". I know Metal fans wear hats of all types, but the fact that he is also bringing shame to our wardrobe is not helping his case at all.


Later in the late 90's, he joined the likes of the Flock, a grunge styled gang of wrestlers, as the Hammer. Another cliff note (and more of an observation), it seems the Glam Metal eras collapse has repeated itself here. Fans got tired of a form of music due to it's excess of stupidity and outdated fashion, and grunge rising through the ranks of music fame, except this took place almost a decade later and instead of a form of music, it was a wrestler.


As the 2000's roared in, he became a member of the Misfits In Action, which was a paramilitary group of wrestlers. Interestingly enough, and a nod to the Metalheads choice of drug, he was supposed to have the ring name "Private Stash", but whined (legitimately) about having the lowest rank and had his "rank" changed to "Major Stash". Seems he didn't learn anything from his "Heavy Metal" days. And to put a final and embarrassing note on his WCW run that involved Metal, Van Hammer wrestled and lost his last match to The Demon (a KISS gimmick wrestler, a fitting end.).


These days, and according to Wikipedia (If it is true or not, can't say, but it is funny, which is why it is here.), he runs a sex shop, which goes to show his gimmick failed miserably, but at least he got his current occupation right as it is up a Glam Metal musicians alley to do something like this after the fall of that form of music.

Final Verdict: Mocking Heavy Metal as the worst of posers, bad choice in clothing and a guitar that belonged to an 8 year old kid learning his/her first chords and couldn't play it, this is a "Major Stain" on Heavy Metal. To end this post on a eye sore, here's a custom video of the guys first theme entrance. To say it is lame would be an insult to the word lame.



Read more ...

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Wackentrek Update

Good evening everyone. First, an explanation why Wackentrek and Channel 13 have not been updated. I was involved in a car accident some weeks ago, my motorcycle chose a good time to break down as well as working on a school project that has taken up my time and I have been hindered with getting these situations resolved/completed as well as looking into getting my next car. I would have posted something sooner, but if you know how I operate, I like to do a couple of things at the same time so that when we meet at the finish line, it's a victory for all. Look for new posts for Wackentrek and Channel 13.

To make up for the lack of updates, I have updated Wackentrek with Brutal Assaults, Day 4 post, which is the last day of my run in Brutal Assault. Enjoy \m/
Read more ...

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Breaking The "1,000" Hit Barrier

When I embarked on this blog, one of the first questions I asked if this blog will have an audience and if so, how big? Mind you, I used to run websites in the past (Miami Metal (geocities.com/miamimetal), Miami Metal Festival (geocities.com/miamimetalfestival), approximately early 2000's.) when I was just an average scenester.

Then, it used to be very different in terms how one promoted websites and brought attention to their space in the world wide web. Back in those days, I would go to an OfficeMax and make copies of the ads and hack 'em up in "4's" or "8's" depending on the concert or store I was distributing the flyers and of course, the budget.

Now, it's so easy to promote thanks to social media, relatively cheap ad space in major websites, and more and more people on the internet, that it surprises me my blog has reached the "1,000" hit mark since it's inception on November 27, 2011.


Just wanted to say many thanks for taking your time and visiting this corner of the web and allowing Channel 13 to be part of your METAL diet and making it what it is today.
Read more ...