That Metal Show, with guests Kip Winger and Reb Beach from Winger

That Metal Show is a heavy metal music talk show on VH1 Classic hosted by radio DJ Eddie Trunk (from Q104.3’s Friday Night Rocks) with comedians Don Jamieson and Jim Florentine. It is instantly evident all three obviously live and love the music they promote, Don and Jim are excellent impromptu comedians and Ed as well gets his shots in as they randomly break each others balls (all done in fun). You can tell these guys are professionals and genuinely friends. Each episode sees our hosts in a relaxed setting (in what appears to be someone’s living room) discussing all things in the world of hard rock and heavy metal music.

Segments on the show include News, Pick of the Week, Stump The Trunk where viewers ask Ed trivia questions and if they stump him can pick a prize from the Box of Junk (which is held by a pretty lady), The Throwdown where two topics are pit against each other and the in studio crowd votes on which is the better of two, Whatever Happened To, and live on location reports from concerts and other events.

Today’s show featured in studio guests Kip Winger and Reb Beach from the band Winger who are out promoting an excellent new album (released in 2009) titled "Karma" (which appears twice, in the top 10, of Metal Asylum’s Top 20 Albums of 2009). Ed, as with Jim and Don, expressed a low tolerance for people who by ignorance disregard Winger as a quality hard rock act because of media opinion, the rise of the grunge rock trend in the early 90s, and the Beavis and Butthead show which had a nerd dressed in a Winger T shirt.

Over the course of the Q&A session this is what we learned:

1. Kip and Reb like always sat down together over a twelve pack of beer and pretty much wrote all the songs for "Karma" in succession as they appear on the album (with a few out of order).
2. Kip gave Reb free reign concerning the riffs on "Karma" and wanted to make a record that combined the best elements of their self titled debut and the album "Pull" (which I find very overlooked).
3. Reb and Kip shared several stories from the road. Reb remembers having some issues with his guitar opening night on their first tour with the Scorpions and Kip said they were just awful and to boot it was their first show ever as a band. Kip (laughing, speaking in Klaus Meine’s German accent) "who are these Americans, get them off my stage".
4. Kip recalled once a foreign object with a hair attached was hurled on stage, landed in his mouth, and as he spit it out it got caught on his headset microphone (eeewwhh…gross).
5. Reb remembers being on the Poison tour and hearing the guys in Dokken’s dressing room fighting all the time (confirming stories of the band always argued and didn’t get along), and never understood how a band can be such a business.
6. Kip’s time in Alice Cooper’s band was discussed, as was Reb’s.
7. Reb was a session guitar player before hooking up with Kip Winger in the late 80s, and many people (like Ed), didn’t realize Reb played most of the guitars on Twisted Sister’s “Love Is For Suckers” album.
8. When Reb first joined Winger Kip let him stay at his house (which was not the nicest of places) and warned Reb not to use the toaster. Reb didn’t heed his warning and when Kip got back asked why the toast didn’t taste right. Kip said "because there are dead roaches in it".
9. Kip said he would like to know why Mike Judge chose to pick on Winger in the Beavis and Butthead show and why Lars Ulrich from Metallica threw darts at his picture in the ‘Nothing Else Matters’ video.
10. Kip also plays 12 string guitar, is a respected composer and wrote a piece called Ghost for orchestra, and aside from playing in Winger, drummer Rod Morgenstein is currently an associate professor teaching percussion at Berklee College of Music in Boston.

Thanks Ed for having Metal Asylum in your audience. We look forward to doing it again.