february 5th, 2024
Today’s Playlist: Roadie Bangers
I had to make a couple of three-hour road trips last week and, instead of knocking out a couple of podcasts like I’d normally do, I chose to listen to music. I have no issue putting on a show when in the car when a singalongable song comes on, and these trips were no different. The following are my favorites from this trip. (Note: Most of these songs work better when you’re with other people that can sing along with you. Even though I was alone, I still belted them shits.)
Dancing Queen (ABBA)-A polarizing selection to be sure, but I’m not too proud to admit that I love this song. My kids, after initially resisting it on a car trip, have come to enjoy it as well. It’s infectious, and fun, and a legitimately great piece of pop music.
Panama (Van Halen)-An all-time kick ass opening riff, and the song somehow gets better from there. I was a bit too young to experience Van Halen in its prime, but I love everything about them. They might be the perfect ‘80s band.
I Want It That Way (Backstreet Boys)-It’s hard to overstate how big of a monster this song was in the summer of ’99. Easily learned, simple lyrics, catchy hooks and bridges…a road trip staple for me and mine. My son is nine, and he’ll ask me to play this about every third time he rides with me. Kevin, Howie, Brian, AJ, and Nick transcend generations.
Meet Virginia (Train)-Train can be a bit hit-or-miss, but this one is always welcome on any playlist I’m curating. The video was clutch too, as it included Rebecca Gayheart, the former Noxzema spokesperson who is on the short list of “1990s Celebrities I’ve Rubbed One Out To The Most”. A prestigious group that includes Britney Spears, Tyra Banks, and Troy AikmanDenise Richards.
Grindin’ (Clipse)-Pharrell absolutely wrecks this beat, and also starts to hone some of his ad-libs/intros. That beat, combined with an early-era Pusha T expertly doing his thing and a game assist from Malice, combined to give us “Grindin’”, ushering in the Coke Rap era. This song is so incredibly catchy, and not terribly difficult to rap to or learn after a few listens. “I’m the…neighborhood pusha/Call me subwoofer, ‘cause I pump base like that, Jack” is borderline Shakespearean.
The Finer Things (Steve Winwood)-A song that slowly builds, sure, but once it gets going it shifts into 5th gear in a hurry and stays there. It also lends itself to easy steering wheel drumming, a critical aspect of dynamite roadie songs.
Iris (Goo Goo Dolls)-I’ve been listening to a ton of songs that were released when I was in high school recently. Is it because I’m 42 and experiencing some sort of mid-life crisis and am trying to recapture some of my youth? Yeah, probably. Getting old sucks. I have an advanced case of Old Man Back, and I’m constantly pruning super long and visible hairs growing out of every orifice except my dick hole (as of 11:00 AM this morning, at least). Anywho…“Iris” came out right around the time I started driving, and you’d hear it roughly every nine minutes on the radio. Great singalong jam.
The Road Goes on Forever and the Party Never Ends (Robert Earl Keen)-An all-time great Story Song, Mr. Keen’s opus is easy to learn/memorize, runs for several minutes, and contains multiple drug references. A better roadie song you’ll be hard-pressed to find.
Black and White (Juice WRLD)-I love Juice’s music, and think his story is one of the most tragic of the past few years. He was an uber talented musician that also suffered from a host of mental health issues and chose to self-medicate with many types of drugs, including opioids, marijuana, Xanax, and cocaine. One empathizes. I did the same thing for damn near two decades. The difference between the two of us is that I wasn’t a multi-platinum rapper that was making a bunch of other people a shit ton of money, so I actually had people that cared about me encouraging me to get help for my problem, which eventually happened (655 days sober as of 2/5/24, mofos!!!). No one in Juice’s orbit seemed to want the money train to stop, so they enabled him to keep the throttle down on his addictions, leading to an overdose death at the age of 21. It’s a tragedy any time someone that young dies, but it’s especially heartbreaking when it likely could have been avoided had responsible adults intervened. This is probably my favorite song of his, and I’ve long interpreted it as more a cry for help than as a celebration of drug use.
When You Were Young (The Killers)-Maybe on the Mount Rushmore of Road Trip Songs. If you know this song, you know it’s insanely difficult to not turn it up as loudly as your ears can stand it, and to not sing as loudly as you’re able to.
Drift Away (Dobie Gray)-An egregious oversight was made by me last time out, as I left this song off my Favorite Karaoke Songs playlist. Shit happens, especially when you’re an idiot, and I take full responsibility. Allow me to try to right a wrong by including it here, as its simple-to-sing lyrics and timeless quality make it a staple of most every roadie set I’ve ever made.
I Got Five On It (The Luniz)-I’ve never been a huge marijuana consumer, as it tends to make me sleepy and hungry, and saddles me with the motor skills of a drunk toddler. I’ve certainly never understood how some folks can smoke and then actually get things accomplished other than watching “Chappelle Show” skits and making Pop Tart sandwiches. I do enjoy songs about weed, though, and this one is right at the top of the list. It takes a minute to learn the lyrics, but once you do it’s an easy choice if you’re in the car and feel like throwing a few bars around.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
I really enjoy professional wrestling, specifically WWE. If you follow national news at all, then you’ve probably heard about the…not great allegations made by a former WWE employee against Vince McMahon, the architect of the entertainment behemoth originally knows as the World Wrestling Federation. If you’re not aware, he’s been accused of several felonies, including sexual assault and sexual trafficking. There are also some really unsavory allegations involving…you know what? Never mind. Look it up yourself if you want to know. Just understand that it’s some sick shit. Literally.
It’s been a poorly kept secret for decades that Vince was, at best, a domineering and vindictive asshole that loved to flaunt his power in the industry and make others feel small. At worst, he’s a racist/rapist/misogynistic/xenophobic/homophobic piece of shit that has ruined countless lives. Wrestling is already one of those things that most people will judge you for liking. (“Dude, how can you watch that stuff? You know it’s fake, right?” “It’s not fake, it’s scripted. Just like 'Game of Thrones’, ‘Sons of Anarchy’, and ‘Brazzers Presents: Second Cousin Creampies’.”) News like this makes wrestling fandom an even more dicey proposition.
How should I cope? A Power Ranking, brah. Here are my ten favorite WWE moments that do not include Vincent Kennedy McMahon (with the understanding that almost every single moment in the WWF/E from the early ‘80s until a couple weeks ago involved Vince in some capacity):
10) Team Xtreme (The Hardy Boyz and Lita) vs. T&A (Test and Albert) and Trish Stratus (Six-person Intergender tag match at Fully Loaded 2000)
"Fully Loaded" was a pay-per-view event that took place at Reunion Arena in Dallas in July of 2000, and I attended in person (along with my brother and a few friends). This was the first match of the show, and it really set the tone for the rest of the card, but that’s now why it’s on this list. There is one reason why this made the list, and that’s Trish Stratus. The Attitude Era leaned (sometimes too) heavily into the sex appeal of its female performers (which, in hindsight, should have been a giant red flag since Vince always had the last word on what made the show and what didn’t), and a lot of that stuff has aged terribly. But on this night, Trish not only looked incredible, she and Lita helped put on a great intergender match that got the night started on a heater.
9) Ultimate Warrior vs. Honky Tonk Man (for the Intercontinental Title at SummerSlam 1988)
If you’re not familiar, the Ultimate Warrior was a wrestler from the ‘80s/’90s that answered the question “What would it look like if cocaine, Winstrol, spray tanning, and neon combined to have a vascular baby?” Warrior was not a good wrestler in terms of his in-ring ability, and could also be a pretty shitty person, too. But what he could do, exceedingly well, is rail a few grams of Bogota Boogeyman, sprint to the ring when his kick-ass intro music hit, shake the shit out of the ropes, and squash a jobber in 30 seconds or less. He excelled at that type of match, and that’s exactly what he did to the Honky Tonk Man in August of 1988 at Madison Square Garden at the first ever SummerSlam (a pay-per-view that would become one of the WWF/E’s biggest shows of the year, after Wrestlemania). The Intercontinental Title is the second-most prestigious in the WWF/E, and his win here gave Warrior his first major title. His second would come less than two years later when he defeated Hulk Hogan for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania VI.
8) Big Show’s Dad’s Funeral Gets Crashed by Big Boss Man (Smackdown, November 1999)
One of my favorite aspects of pro wrestling is the absurdity of it. Wrestling as a genre is inherently kind of silly anyway, so why not lean all the way into it? This is a great example of that. A very quick recap of this story: Big Show (a 7’0”, 500-pound goliath that had only been in the WWF/E for a few months at this point) was in a feud with the Big Boss Man (a real-life former corrections officer that had a nice run towards the top of the card in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s). Part of the story here was that Boss Man would take every opportunity to make fun of the fact that Big Show’s dad had recently died (this was in the story only, Big Show’s real-life pops was fine). On the November 11th episode of Smackdown (one of the two main weekly shows put on by WWF/E, along with Monday Night Raw), footage of the funeral of Big Show’s dad was shown. Not long into the service, Boss Man shows up in what appears to be an ’88 Buick Le Sabre, ready to talk some more shit. However, he secretly has far more nefarious plans, including tying a tow-hook to the casket of Big Show’s dad and trying to haul it out of the cemetery. Big Show’s reaction to this is to CHASE DOWN HIS FATHER’S CASKET ON FOOT AND JUMP ON TOP OF IT, RIDING IT LIKE IT’S A GODDAMN BULL!!! If you’re gonna go batshit with a story, then go all the way batshit. This certainly qualifies. Also, an important question related to this story that doesn’t get asked nearly enough: Who wears leather pants to their dad’s funeral? Paul Wight, that’s the fuck who.
7) Kofi Kingston vs. Daniel Bryan (for the WWE Championship, Wrestlemania XXXV)
My fandom can be broken down into three distinct eras. Era 1 was the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, when Hulkamania was running wild. Era 2 was the Attitude Era in the late ‘90s. Era 3 began in 2014, when two key things happened: the birth of the WWE Network (March 2014), and the birth of my son (November 2014). The WWE Network was a streaming service that cost(s) less than $10/month, and paying that price allowed you to watch pay-per-view shows (since renamed Premium Live Events); those shows previously cost upwards of $50 each. This development was huge. Even bigger for me, though, was having a son who would grow into a MASSIVE wrestling fan. This kid will create his own matches and storylines for Premium Live Events, draw posters for each match, then ask to borrow my phone so he can film himself acting out the matches he’s created with his wrestling action figures. Dude ADORES wrestling, which is really cool. It’s our thing. The first time he really marked out (i.e. went nuts about something that happened) was in April of 2019, when Kofi Kingston won his first WWE Championship by defeating Daniel Bryan at ‘Mania 35. He was only four-years old at the time but watching him go nuts for KofiMania was awesome to witness, and he still talks about that match several years later.
6) Stone Cold Steve Austin/The Rock/Limp Bizkit Video Package (Hyping Austin/Rock for the WWF Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania XXVII)
The match itself was phenomenal, and the pop (wrestling slang for audience reaction) for Texas boy Stone Cold winning the title in Houston was enormous. However, Vince factors heavily into the outcome, so let’s talk about the hype video for the match. This is the Holy Grail of wrestling promotional video packages. Austin/Rock was already a great rivalry (that had main-evented a Wrestlemania just two years prior), but the choice to add Limp Bizkit’s ‘My Way or the Highway’ to the footage of promos and interactions involving the two megastars was inspired. I still watch this a handful of times a year, and it always delivers.
5) Damien Bites Macho Man Randy Savage (WWF Superstars of Wrestling, November 1991)
A few things to know about the principles here: Damien is a snake (in reality, it was many snakes over the years) that was brought to the ring by Jake ‘The Snake’ Roberts, a dastardly heel (bad guy) character from the Hulkamania Era; Macho Man is a babyface (good guy) that become famous for his magnificent in-ring ability, very distinct gravelly voice, and Slim-Jim commercials; Pop was what I called one of my grandpas.
This angle aired when I was 9 years old. By this time, I had an understanding that the matches probably weren’t true athletic competitions. However, I still could easily lose myself in a storyline and forget that it’s scripted. The story of Jake’s pet snake biting Macho Man is a perfect example. I remember watching this at my grandpa’s house and legit panicking, thinking that Macho Man was gonna die. Pop, with a lit Vantage cigarette no doubt hanging from his lip, played up the idea that this might happen. “Damn, boy, I think he’s a goner. You see how big that snake was?” He probably wished he hadn’t done that when he had to spend the next couple hours talking me off the ledge. Towards that end, he enlisted the help of a big ass plate of taters fried in bacon fat. Grandpas are the best. Miss you Pop.
4) Edge Returns at Royal Rumble 2020
The Royal Rumble is a match that modifies the rules of the Battle Royal, a staple of professional wrestling cards since at least the 1970s. In a traditional Battle Royal, anywhere from 10 to 30 or more dudes get into the ring at the same time and try to throw each other over the ropes; the last one standing is the winner. In the Royal Rumble, two men start in the ring and then 28 more come out every 90 seconds or so. It’s a huge match in WWE (probably the second biggest of the year after the Wrestlemania main event), and surprise returns in the Rumble have been a big part of Rumbles since the early ‘90s. My favorite surprise return was Edge coming out of retirement at the 2020 Royal Rumble in Houston. Edge was a huge star in the Attitude Era and beyond, but a severe neck injury forced him to hang ‘em up in 2011. When most wrestlers ‘retire’, there’s a tacit understanding that they’ll eventually be back in the ring (see Ric Flair and Terry Funk). With Edge, though, it seemed legit, and he stayed gone for a long time. He even made a successful transition to acting, and it seemed like his retirement would stay permanent. Time (and advances in neck therapy) heals all wounds, though, and when the Rated-R Superstar’s music hit at the Rumble in ’20, my son and I both went berserk. So did the fans in Houston, as this was one of the loudest pops I’ve heard. The ending to this particular story was a bit anti-climactic as COVID-19 wrecked the plans for an Edge/Randy Orton match in front of 50,000 at ‘Mania 36, but the legitimate shock and excitement of hearing a Hall of Famer’s music and seeing him enter the ring almost a decade after everyone thought he was done can never be taken away.
3) Stone Cold Steve Austin vs. Shawn Michaels (for the WWF Championship at Wrestlemania XIV)
Stone Cold is very likely the most popular wrestler of all time. Shawn Michaels is on the Mount Rushmore of Best Wrestlers Ever. Stone Cold won his first WWF Championship in the main event of ‘Mania 14 by pinning Michaels in what would be Michaels’ last match for over four years. When you factor in all of that, plus the fact that Mike Tyson was prominently involved, you have one of the most important moments in WWF/E history. If you’ve ever watched it, you can hear these words as you read them (said by Jim Ross, probably the greatest wrestling play-by-play guy ever): “The Austin Era has begun!”
2) Cactus Jack vs. HHH (Street Fight for the WWF Championship at Royal Rumble 2000)
These dudes beat the shit out of each at the 2000 edition of the Royal Rumble in Madison Square Garden. MSG has always been the WWF/E’s unofficial home arena, and these two tearing each other apart in the company’s mecca has to be a career highlight for the Hall of Famers. They would have another match at ‘No Way Out’ the next month that is probably more famous, since Mick Foley (the guy who wrestled as Cactus Jack…and Mankind…and Dude Love) went through the roof of an enclosed cage and made a huge dent in the ring in what was ostensibly a retirement match, but I’ve always liked this match better. This happened almost a quarter of a century ago, but I so vividly remember the details of watching this at my parents’ house with my brother and all our buddies, which is something we did a lot of. Wrestling gets shit on a lot, and sometimes rightly so, but some of my fondest memories from high school revolve around watching WWF pay-per-views.
1) Sami Zayn Turns on the Bloodline (Royal Rumble 2023)
The 2023 version of the Rumble took place at the Alamodome in San Antonio, and my son and I were in attendance. I hadn’t been to a WWF/E show in almost 23 years, and it was my son’s first, so we were both amped up. Heading into the Rumble, the Sami Zayn/Roman Reigns/Bloodline story was THE story in wrestling and had been for months. Sami wasn’t really a part of the Bloodline, but Roman had been stringing him along and letting him think he was part of the crew. Roman faced Kevin Owens (longtime best frenemy of Sami Zayn) for the WWE Universal Championship in the main event, and after Roman’s win he and his cronies (his real-life cousins Jimmy Uso, Jey Uso, and Solo Sikoa) handcuffed Kevin to the ropes and proceeded to beat the shit out of him. It culminated with Roman handing Sami a chair and instructing Sami to finish off Kevin. After some hesitation, Sami finally swung the chair…and CRUSHED Roman right in the back. I’ve only been to three live wrestling shows, but I can’t imagine hearing a bigger pop than what I heard that night as one of over 50,000 fans in attendance. It sounded like an explosion, and the best part was that I was there with my son. I didn’t even get that mad at him when he joined in during the ‘Fuck You Roman’ chants that broke out. Solid parenting? Probably not. But neither he nor I will ever forget it.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
-Sorry about missing last week, I was out of town for a few days for a work thing. A convention, actually. I was thinking about doing a power ranking of the craziest shit I’ve seen at conventions, but I’d need to brush up on Statute of Limitation law first.
-It’s no secret that I’m not a huge fan of capitalism, but one aspect of it that I can overlook every now and then is the idea of fancy steakhouses. I ate $200 worth of food while attending said convention, including roasted bone morrow, a shrimp cocktail, crab and artichoke dip, a 12-ounce bone-in filet, creamed spinach, and a chocolate souffle, all on my company’s dime. It was sublime.
-Pitchers and catchers report in a couple weeks. Get your mind right, folks. I fucking love baseball.
-I think it’s beyond hilarious that a bunch of MAGA dipshits are losing their minds over Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce being front and center for this year’s Super Bowl. In fact, they’re losing their minds to the point that a bunch of far-right, mouth-breathing hate mongers are actively and openly cheering for a team from SAN FRANCISCO to win. That’s just…an exquisite, perfect, chef’s kiss type of irony. The Chiefs winning is by far the best outcome for me personally, as it would piss off Niners’ fans AND the Trump crowd, which is as perfect a scenario I can imagine. I don’t drink anymore, but if did I’d celebrate a KC dub this weekend by wearing a Pride shirt and shot gunning a Bud Light in front of a Planned Parenthood.
- Shit. Gotta go. Don’t be an asshole.
