I'm not Dan from HADES at this time.

Hey everybody. My wife and I just got back from a perfect week in SoBe and Key West. I have nothing new going on musically other than a pilot I filmed with Mark and John from Talking Metal. I jammed Snowblind (Black Sabbath) with them, Rob Dukes from Exodus on vocals and Ron Lipnicki from Overkill on drums. It came out brutally heavy. Dukes kills it on vox. For those who don't know, I became the editor of Steppin' Out magazine at the beginning of this year. I still sell advertising straight commission as I have for over 18 years. My new position keeps me busier than I'm used to. Sometimes I work up to 40 hours a week! I know, crazy. About 2 months ago I informed (HADES vocalist) Alan Tecchio as well as Tom Coombs, Ed Fuhrman, Scott LePage and Kevin Bolembach that I would not be able to honor my commitment to performing July 28th at the Headbangers Open Air festival in Germany. The main reason? Time. Sure I could find the time to fly over for a few days, that's not really the problem. The main problem is the time it would take to me to "get up to speed" to do the songs justice. I've always been the worst musician in HADES. Thrash is not my forte. If it were a NON-FICTION show it would be much easier. They want us to play songs from the first two cds. Those songs are tough to play. If my heart were into it, I'd have to work at least an hour or two a day for months to play the songs adequately. I know it's not cool to break a commitment, but I felt like giving four months notice was sufficient. After I backed out Ed and Tom did as well. Alan did not want to let down our fans and wanted to find some way of making good. He is still performing as "A night of Hades music with Alan Tecchio" I was hoping Scott would be able to do it, but time/distance from NJ make it impossible for him as well. 

I sincerely apologize to our fans, but I have to do what is in my heart. I'd prefer to spend my summer playing basketball and traveling with my wife during the one week our office is closed. Playing 25 year old songs just isn't where my head and heart is this year. I'm beyond happy just being "Dan from Steppin' Out magazine". I had aridiculously great time performing with HADES two years ago at the Bang Your Head festival. I want to thank our fans and I hope they understand. 

Read the rest of Eddie's interview in Wednesday's issue!

OPIE AND ANTHONY

I went to see Jim Norton at Caroline's in NYC last night. In addition to a night of killer comedy, I was thrilled to get to meet and hang with Opie and Anthony after Jim's set. What nice guys! I'm hoping I can work out a cover story soon with them.

Sharon Osbourne has an issue with Eddie Trunk

In this week's Steppin' Out magazine http://www.so-mag.com I interview Overkill's DD Verni and comedian Jim Norton. Next week I have Joey Z. (Life of Agony) and Eddie Trunk.Eddie just returned from L.A. where he filmed the upcoming season of THAT METAL SHOW. Here is an advance look at a small part of my interview with Eddie. The full interview runs April 4th.

Are there any noticeable changes to the show?

  We are always evolving the show best we can within the budgets. We don’t have music because of publishing costs, but maybe one day. If you look over the guests you will see we are casting a wider net. Newer artists, at least for VH1 Classic, like Robb Flynn and Corey Taylor have been on, then we are getting into classic rock areas like Paul Rodgers and Styx. It all works. These guys are all fans of each other and it’s fun to see. Regardless of the name, and I never wanted Metal in the shows title, VH1 did, TMS is a rock and metal show. I say it every episode. We have to have that variety and most are cool with it. Two new features in Season 10. For the first time guest drummers play us into break. We have Brian Tichy and Mike Portnoy doing that. And we also have some guests in a few shows debating the Top 5. That segment gets people so crazy, and I hear from them all, so I said “you come down and join us for it”. Tom Morello, Scott Ian and Slash do!

Why did your Sirius radio show change from The Boneyard to Hair Nation?

You would have to ask Sharon Osbourne. She apparently has some issue with me. I don’t know her and have no idea what it is. She has not allowed Ozzy on the TV show after all these years, and then decided my 4 hours of live radio a week was not going to work for her when Boneyard became Ozzy’s Boneyard. It is bizarre for sure. I have never said anything critical about Ozzy that he didn’t say about himself many times. And even if I did, this is a woman who now has a career on TV judging people and hosting a talk show!?! That’s the greatest hypocrisy of them all! That’s what I mean about what I said earlier is so great about Lars. You can say Lulu sucked and he will come and talk about it with you, not cast you out! Clearly my show and the music I do is the best fit for Boneyard, but as long as Sharon has the deal for the channel my same exact show just moves to channel 39 on Sirius and XM. Just click one channel up and there I am, same show, same time, 6P on Mondays. The channel is called Hair Nation but honestly I hate the name and the stigma attached to it, plus I play so much more than that niche, so SiriusXM suggested I use Trunk Nation when I’m on. It is new and classic hard rock and metal, talk, interviews, calls, and music from Stryper to Slayer! What I have always been about.

THE BIRD IS THE WORD

Everybody is freaking over the fact that Alicia Silverstone is chewing food to eventually spit in to her 10 month old baby's mouth like a freaking bird. That's nothing. Last week while I was driving to Steppin' Out, Alicia flew over my car and took a dump on my windshield right after I just had my car washed. I hate when that happens. 

Why?

Why would the Jets sign Tebow? They are managed as poorly as the Mets. So stupid. 

Part of Jim Florentine interview.

Baseball's been very very bad to me.

Thanks to the Wilpon's, 2012 will be another season I refuse to watch or listen to the Mets. Call me a frontrunner, but if Wilpon doesn't care about trying to put a good team on the field, I don't care enough to watch a slow moving, boring game. 

Eddie Trunk not loving Electric Wizard

In next week's issue of Steppin' Out I interviewed Jim Florentine and Miss Box of Junk Jen Gottlieb from That Metal Show.

In addition, in my 24-7 column I tried to get Eddie Trunk to play some Electric Wizard on his radio show. It looks like that's not going to happen though. Here is part of my interview with Eddie. The whole issue will be up after 5pm Wednesday Feb. 29th at http://www.so-mag.com

 

My only complaint about your radio show is, I would prefer some more underground metal. I'm loving the song 'Dunwich' by the band Electric Wizard. Listen to this and tell me if you think your listeners would like this song and your thoughts. Eddie listened and said, 

 

I personally did not like the song or the production. Its amazing to me that people can not understand I do a three hour a week radio show flagshipped from the number one market in America and they want more “underground” music. It’s not a college radio show. Its on fifteen other markets and I’m trying to grow that. Most programmers think what I play as it is is too deep.  Underground music is “underground” for a reason. I can not be all things to all people with three hours a week. There are a ton of bands I love that are more off the radar that I do not play. After thirty years doing a radio show you figure out what most of the people want to hear and create a balance. If you do not do that you do not survive. That being said I play almost exclusively new and classic music not heard anywhere else on the dial, you just can not do it all in 3 hours a week. I also think it is vital to do more than just play music to survive in radio. If you don’t bring more to the table you will be replaced by a computer, it is happening everywhere as we speak.

 

Tell our readers about the guests on the upcoming season. 

 

We have a great variety of guests. For the first time, finally, a member of Iron Maiden Adrian Smith is coming on. Some bands are so tough to get because of touring schedules and logistics. Maiden has eluded us until now. Lars Ulrich is coming back. Lots to catch up with him on. We are in a great spot in that the show is evolving to feature rock and metal acts. Being on ten seasons,  we have a balance of returning guests and first timers as any talk show would. We're grateful to be doing it and to see how big it has become around the world.

Enclosure

Yesterday

Yesterday I was in NYC with Jim Florentine and Miss Box of Junk Jen Gottlieb. If a picture tells a thousand words.,..this is like 1,026 words.