Editor's note: All of this was written a day before the latest That Rocks episode where the hosts addressed many of the issues and announced the show would be ending. They did express interest in wanting to continue the show in the future so this column is still to be considered an overall review of the web series and what could be done differently next time.
Hello everyone and thank you once again for reading the CSM blog. This past year Eddie Trunk, Jim Florentine and Don Jameson of the VH-1 show "That Metal Show" reunited to form a YouTube show/podcast called "That Rocks". That Metal Show ran 14 seasons from 2008 until 2015. The show was memorable for it's interviews, off-the-cuff banter between the 3 hosts, live music and their countdown lists where they would pick a topic and rank certain things such as songs, albums, etc...
TMS ended in 2015 and Eddie Trunk has been regularly asked over the years if the show will ever come back. He has expressed that he'd love to do the show again, but no network is interested. Considering its been 8 years since the show ended, it's time that people moved on, but you don't need to move on. You can have the next best thing. That Metal Show in YouTube form.
Sounds great, right? The crew is back together... err uhh.. via Zoom. Ready to talk to the hottest names in rock today like Lita Ford, Nuno Bettencourt, Brad Gillis and Carmine Appice. The future of rock is in good hands with those hot names. Yes, I'm being factitious. I'll cut to the chase. As much as I was looking forward to this reunion of sorts and I have watched every episode to date and this reboot of sorts has been a complete flop. Here's why.
Technical Difficulties: From the start, this show has had issues with microphones (Don, in particular), connection both with the host and guest. It started out as a minor nuisance that I hoped would be fixed quickly, but it hasn't been. In one of the later episodes, Don finally got a good mic. However, because of the nature of Zoom calls, you're always at the mercy of the whims of one's internet connection or the very server of the software you're using. A problem that you don't need to worry about in the TV days of in-person interviews.
Which brings up another issue. The chemistry of the trio is still in there somewhere, but because they operate online their timing at times is awkward and a lot of jokes fall flat or go ignored by the others. It's just not the same as being in person. Another issue is with who they call their producer. I forget his name, but he does talk at times during the show, but you never see him. He's in charge of the graphics, but more times than not he messes that up. For instance, when they do their countdowns, often the picks are out of order, attributed to the wrong host and sometimes the picture of the band they're talking about isn't even a picture of the right band. I don't and never have produced a podcast, but this seems like simple stuff and these gaffes are not rare occurrences. They're the norm and it was a little funny at first but now it just comes off as low rent when you consider there are small-time YouTubers out there with much-much-MUCH more professional looking shows than this one. I mean, these guys, especially Eddie were in the TV business and Trunk has been in radio for 40 years. You'd think he'd be able to get a professional looking web show going.
The guests are... well... old. Very old.
Look, I love classic rock. If you look back at some of my album reviews you know I have a taste for the older stuff. In fact my favorite decade for rock music would be the 1970s and my second favorite would be the 90s stuff I grew up on, which is also old, but a guest from a 90's band would look like babies compared to the "gets" they got for this show. So far their youngest guest has been guitarist John 5 whois 53 years old. That's right. This show about rock and metal, which everyone insists is alive and well, has not had a single guest under the age of 50. Most of the guests are over 60. Guests KK Downing ,Glenn Hughes, Ted Nugent, David Copperdale and Carmine Appice are all in their mid 70s!
No disrespect to these guys, but come on... It's the same old guys from the same old era telling the same old stories that we have heard many times in the past. Many times on Trunk's own shows. Some of these guys are legends but these guests come off as both that Trunk has no ties to the current generation and is only calling in favors to older guys that he knows and is comfortable with and that the guys, especially Eddie, don't really follow new music.
I follow Eddie Trunk on social media and he recently posted about how he is going to have the exclusive break on Mick Mars' solo debut album with about the same level of excitement one would have if it were 1970 and Paul McCartney said to you "I'm going to debut my first solo album on your show". Dude... It's Mick Mars. Yeah, he's the most talented guy of Motley Crue and its his first solo album, but come on. Get real. He's been working on it on and off for almost a decade. He's 72 years old. You may be a huge fan of his work with Motley Crue, but him releasing a solo album is not huge news. Its not something that many people under 50 themselves are going to care about at all, yet Trunk is acting like he has some hot exclusive here.
Listening to this show, I heard a common old head trope that I'd hear regularly from Eddie. In the late 2000s or perhaps early 2010s I remember Trunk referring to bands like Godsmack, Disturbed and Marlyn Manson as "newer bands". Well, yeah I guess they are newer if all you talk about is what the guys from Kiss, Def Leppard and UFO are up to these days. On this show Eddie had a similar eye-rolling remark when he said something about how KK Downing launching KK's Priest as possibly akin to Ozzy Osbourne going solo in 1980 and how big that was for his career. I know age is a sensitive topic to some, but you can't ignore a key detail here that KK Downing is 71 years old and Ozzy was 31 when he was fired from Black Sabbath and went solo. Even if you love the KK's Priest albums, you have to realise what a ridiculous thing that is to say.
Scott Ian, 59 (will be 60 later this year) is one of this show's younger guests, but he feels like another favor call to Eddie since they are old friends going back to the 80s. Scott didn't even have anything to talk about. Like most of these guys. They got nothing to talk about. Most have nothing to promote. They might tell an old road story or two. That's it. Its stuff like this why I stopped listening to Eddie Trunk's old podcast a long time ago. I think after the 5th or 6th time of Ace Frehley being on shooting the breeze it was clear to me that Eddie really had nothing.
Trunk could inject some "youth" into his show by having a more current guy like Tobias Forge of Ghost on his show, but Eddie has made it clear that he doesn't like that band. I know Ghost debuted 13 years ago and Forge is now 42 years old but we need baby steps when dealing with a guy who still though Marilyn Manson was new in 2010.
The interviews are just unnecessary.
As I said, most of the interviews are just them shooting the breeze because they don't have much to promote, if anything at all and many of them don't have too many interesting stories that they feel like sharing. If it were my show, I would just get rid of the interviews.
For some reason, Trunk has it in his head that he needs a guest, but the best parts of the show are when Ed, Jim and Don are debating something and often they are talking about current news in rock. Of course, they are never talking about current bands, but at least its something relevant. It kills the whole vibe when they have a great discussion going and they are sharing real opinions and then suddenly its "oh we have Jack Russel on the line" or some shit and they have to ask boring questions about stuff that doesn't matter to the audience at all.
Again, it bears repeating, I mean no disrespect to these guys. Old, young, big names, small names, names that used to be big, many of these people are legends in their field, but they don't have much to talk about. Little to promote outside of reissues, and relying on the same old names just comes off as out of touch.
If you're going to ignore newer bands, market it as a retro rock podcast.
Don't tell me rock is alive and well because the 3 people who listened to Europe's last album think it is the album of the year and don't tell me rock is alive and well because KK Downing and Judas Priest both plan on touring. You can't tell me rock has a bright future and do nothing to show the audience what the future looks like. Instead we are stuck in the 70s and 80s. We barely even talk about the 90s on this show and many of those great 90s albums are celebrating 30th anniversaries now.
The 2000s? Forget about it. The Blink 182 reunion is one of the biggest stories of the past year and it has NEVER been mentioned on this show. Evanescence is back out there, anything? Nope. At least they briefly mentioned the Creed reunion and Eddie has expressed being a big fan of Alter Bridge. That's probably the newest band he actually likes. How about the 2010s? Mastodon was red hot for a bit and I'm not sure if he's ever interviewed anyone from that band. One new (by comparison) band that Trunk talks about a lot is Rival Sons. Let the audience get to know them in an interview. If not, just stick to the old guys and market it as a nostalgia show.
Everything beyond here was written after seeing the last That Rocks episode
With the announcement that the show is ending, the guys even admitted that their favorite part of the show was just the three of them talking and went on to say how frustrating it was to have to deal with guests who weren't prepared for live interviews over the internet. Well, if that's the case why have guests? You don't need them. I don't get why they insist on having guests on the show. All it did every week was kill the vibe. Ed, Don, and Jim have great chemistry together. The show should just be them and then on rare occasions if you want to have a guest, bring in someone who has a relevant topic to discuss. Not just "oh hey we got James Young on while he's taking a shit, what's happening?"
I hope the show returns, but just with the three of these guys. The show should just be they pick a topic, discuss some news, get in some heated discussions, have a few laughs and that's it. Simple. We don't need to know what the bass player of Toto had to eat at a Holiday Inn back in 1979 or what some scab member of Foreigner is up to these days. The show is there. You guys talking. That's the show. The hosts said it is their favorite part. Based on the comments of the videos that is their favorite part. So just do that. By this point well into the golden age of podcasting, I've seen enough shows to know that once they end, they never come back and when they do it doesn't last long. Don tried to paint it positively as "think of it like we did two seasons of shows". Podcasts don't work that way. People are creatures of habit and there are so many podcasts out there. You need to be consistent and on a regular schedule to keep that audience. That means weekly content. If you take a break for a few months that audience is going to be long gone when you come back.
Much of this writing was focused on the age of the guests, so let me just take a moment to say what I personally consider a "new artist" since it is a broad term. To me you're a new artist or new band if your debut album came out less than 5 years ago. So, I don't consider Rival Sons or Ghost new bands anymore and haven't for a while now and no that doesn't mean I consider KK's Priest a new artist. Yes that's a new band, but it is lead by a guy who is in his 70s and pretty much spun off of Judas Priest.
To me a new band is someone of the current generation that is also new on the scene. A good example right now would be Greta Van Fleet whose debut studio album is actually already 5 years old now and the members of the band are all in their mid 20s. Not their mid 40s or 50s or beyond.
It is a case-by-case thing. You can be 30 and still be considered new. You have weigh the age and experience of the band along with when they debuted. Sully Erna of Godsmack was 30 years old when they broke out with their self-titled major label debut album in 1998. Obviously, if you were a Godsmack fan around 1998 or 2003 you probably considered them a pretty new band even though they were in their mid-30s by the time they turned with Metallica and have a history in the Boston area going back to 1995. Taylor Momsen is 30 right now but I don't consider The Pretty Reckless a new band anymore since they've been around for 14 years and even their huge hit "Heaven Knows" is 10 years old already.
Thanks for reading, everyone. It's sad to see this podcast go the way it did but it's probably the right call. This reboot of sorts of TMS has been a flop. It just doesn't work on YouTube. My suggestions are simple. Keep it simple. Ed, Don, Jim. Pick a topic and just shoot back and forth for an hour. There's the show going forward. Just do that.
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