I go to this one place every so often and order one of these to go. Every time it’s a little different. I never know what to expect. That makes it more exciting somehow.

is good for me. Now that I’ve spent a good amount of time connecting with my old people and looking at the old pics and being proud of being part of one of the most awesome rebellious youths I think any group ever had, we all seem to be coming to the same place.

What happened?

When did it end and why? Or did it end really? Seems like everything dried up in the mid-to-late 90’s and then we all got back in action in one way or another. I’ve been reluctant to go back to this old music, because its not the same anymore and because I did feel abandoned. I was forced to move on and going backwards never felt right for me.

All the bands I loved that left me have reunited. I was focused on Manowar who never stopped. Well, They’ve got that going for them anyway. I think I became “The Legendary Almighty DawnOwar” and supported Manowar they way I did because in 1994, when I needed a band to go see, they just got picked up by Geffen, a major label, who remastered and re-released all their old albums on CD so you could finally get good copies of these songs, and they went on tour.

The next 5 years of my life would be about me getting myself and the other fans to shows. I loved the band, who inspired me to learn how to make web sites. My Manowar site was THE Manowar site on the internet up until the band hired me to work for them. I quit shortly after I began because working for them properly, it turned out, wasn’t that good a gig. I’d been doing it better than them without their help for five years. Didn’t like being ordered around by people who had no freakin’ clue what they were talking about when I was the obvious expert.

Then I spent another five years trying to lay low and doing a really crappy job of it till Ross The Boss hired me to work for him for the next five years. The last one of which I worked for Scott Columbus too.

That’s 15 years of a whole lot of me being all up in these dude’s business.

I’m only just a year away from not having anything to do with any of them at all anymore. I fill my free time going to see new up-and-coming bands that are fresh and exciting to me now.

I’ve made peace with Ross The Boss and I’m not only cool with not working for him anymore, I’m sure its the healthiest thing for me. I really don’t need to fixate on Manowar any longer than I already have. Joey’s always doing some asinine thing and everyone would come and tell Ross and me about it and I would be forever stuck in this loop of being worked up over whatever ridiculous thing Joey was doing.

I’m lucky. I’m out. Ross may never be able to get out because the fans bring it to him daily. They get offended by Joey, They rush over and tell Ross all about it.

I’m not judging them for it. I did it too. That’s how I started working for him. But the grudge I had against Joey isn’t even a little important to hang onto anymore. I proved whatever point I was proving. I think.

The second I found out Scott died, none of it mattered anymore anyway. I wish I had been able to do more to bring the real person that Scott was to his fans. I get to be proud that I did at least a little. I still wish I’d done more.

I hope Ross can find a way to break free from the disgruntled Joey fans. Last I checked they were collecting around him. Which for me, meant that every motherfucker I left behind when I quit working for Manowar and started working for Ross, ended up in my universe all over again with the same bullshit as before.

Where it is true that I didn’t quit working for Ross willingly, it is also true that I did have a bad attitude. Because what I was doing working for Ross was moving on, while what Ross was doing was collecting all the asshats I was trying to move on from.

So I’m not holding a grudge. I was a big fan of his since 1987 when I saw him play guitar live in front of me for the first time. It blew me away and I never forgot it. Now that I don’t work for him anymore, I can be the fan I always was again.

Which brings me to today.

I’ve recently vowed to go see old Thrash bands when they come to town, because that IS the music I identify with and enjoy most. I’ve really tried not to become an old fogie fan like a lot of the dudes I know from back then who cut their hair, grew beer bellies, only wear black T-shirts, don’t listen to anything that happened after 1994 unless its one of the big four, and complain there’s no good music being made anymore.

Cause it’s simply not true at all.
They just got old.

I won’t ever let that happen to me, so I’ve been rejecting all old bands pretty much across the board in favor of new bands that are good now.

I think that’s important but my new faves are ‘old’ by record company standards now. Electric Six’s big hit was from 2003 and Valient Thorr’s been around quite a few years too, but I think both bands are still good today and I don’t feel like a fogie supporting either of them.

There’s not a lot of new bands I really dig, but I keep looking. I’d say Red Fang but I haven’t seen them in years since they’ve been opening big shows I don’t want to go see. The Sword got too popular for me to enjoy the same way but they were my #3 for a long time. But the point isn’t what bands I like or don’t. It’s that I keep looking for new ones to love.

Not sure why I started all this rambling or how to close it up for that matter. I think with the new Van Halen not sucking and how much I enjoyed myself at the Anthrax, Testament and Death Angel show, I just have to be more open to the possibility of also continuing to love things I used to derive so much pleasure from.

But I started this post with the intention of writing a narrative that suggested that my unresolved thrasher issues had everything to do with how I became the huge Manowar fan I turned into, and that since scanning the pics and reconnecting with the people from that era did me so much good, I was thinking about diving back into the photo album and scanning some of my Manowar-fan era pics in an effort to put all that in some perspective for myself as well.

It could happen.
Not tonight, but it could happen.

I don’t think this has ever happened before.