I Met My Idol 10 Years Ago Today

I don’t know who came up with the phrase “never meet your heroes,” but that person clearly needed better role models — fortunately for me, every person I’ve looked up to in some capacity and have been able to meet over the years has led to nothing but good experiences, the first of which having taken place a decade ago today.

As someone who was raised on the classic rock and heavy metal music that my father enjoyed, with the big two favorites being Rush and Iron Maiden, it didn’t take long for me to find favorites of my own and to want to learn as much as I could about every band under the sun. My favorite show growing up was That Metal Show, a talk-show staple of the now-defunct VH1 Classic that specialized in hard rock and heavy metal music, hosted by radio personality Eddie Trunk and comedians Don Jamieson and Jim Florentine. Aside from interviewing some of the biggest names in the genre, the hosts also had several banter-filled segments between just the three of them over the course of the show, from the TMS Top 5 (with examples being “Top 5 Concept Albums,” “Top 5 Band Logos,” etc.) to “Take It or Leave It” (with one topical example being the potential death of CDs at the time of the show’s filming in the early 2010s), and I often found these segments just as entertaining, if not more, than the interviews themselves.

Not only did I learn about a lot of different bands/artists that I would eventually become a huge fan of while watching That Metal Show, but it also helped me learn what I wanted to pursue professionally at a young age. When I was in middle/high school and trying to figure out what I wanted to do as a career, one of my earliest ambitions was to work in radio and to interview bands because I was inspired by the TMS hosts. There was something about watching and listening to them that made me want to do what they did, and I would often come up with lists of questions that I would’ve asked certain artists if I was ever in that position. Needless to say, the show and the hosts were a huge influence on me, so you could imagine my surprise when I learned I was going to be able to meet one of them.

On Wednesday, July 16, 2014, Eddie Trunk had a book signing event at the Retro Active store (similar to Hot Topic, but 70s and 80s-centric) in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina to promote his second Essential Hard Rock and Heavy Metal book that released the previous fall — the event was roughly a two-and-a-half-hour drive from my hometown of Jacksonville, North Carolina. I was on summer vacation at the time, and was told by my parents that we couldn’t go because we had to drive to Wilmington to pick up medical tests that morning. However, once my mom and I were actually on the road, I was surprised halfway through the drive and told that there weren’t any tests to pick up and we were actually going to Myrtle Beach to see my idol. Also, having already owned and read both of his books at that time, I was reassured that the books were already in the car and the trip was planned for a while without me knowing.

With the signing not until 5 PM that day, my mom, sister, and I spent the day checking out the Retro Active store and walking around the rest of the Broadway at the Beach complex (my dad was unfortunately stuck at work), and made sure we were the first people in the line once the event was actually getting set up. I remember talking to the Retro Active employees about Eddie Trunk and TMS earlier in the day when we first arrived, and they ended up high-fiving me when they saw that we were at the front of the line. Thankfully, the three-hour wait didn’t feel extremely long because I was able to just flip back and forth between his two books while waiting.

These types of meet and greet events always go quickly, but as Eddie Trunk was signing my books and I asked him about his career and how I could end up doing the same thing as him, he took his time giving me advice and it didn’t feel like he was on a time crunch at all. I know for a fact that I wasn’t the first person to tell him I wanted to do what he does as a career, but he answered my questions like it was his first time being asked — he could’ve easily been insanely short and dismissive, giving an answer like “you just gotta do it,” but the fact that he wasn’t like that and took the time that he did meant a ton to me.

Ten years later, this experience still comes to mind on a frequent basis for me — while a lot has changed in my life since then, music is still an extremely huge and important part of it and I’m glad to say I’ve been able to take some of Mr. Trunk’s advice. As I got older, my dreams of being a professional radio host and interviewer were eventually halted after listening to authority figures in my ear saying that radio was dying and I should probably look into something else, but I eventually got the itch again halfway through college and added a journalism minor to my film studies major. Subsequently starting Dead Noise in the spring of 2022 also allowed me to act on my early hopes of interviewing musicians, and in the short time I’ve been at it, I’ve had the pleasure of speaking with people I never thought I’d have the pleasure of meeting, from local favorites like To Begin Anew and Mortal After All to up and coming regional artists like Makes My Blood Dance and Heartbent to established acts like Tantric, Saliva, Vampires Everywhere, A Killer’s Confession, and even founding Blue Öyster Cult bassist Joe Bouchard. I obviously still have a long way to go, but I also had no idea I’d even get this far, and it truly means a lot in the moments where I’ve had artists tell me how much they enjoy the questions I ask or how I ask them (with an on-camera example of this happening during the ever-so-hilarious interview with Dropout Kings), or having artists reach out to me directly for interviews specifically because of the way I conduct myself and ask questions — whenever this happens, it’s hard not to look back on the night I met Eddie Trunk, because I wouldn’t have even dreamt of doing this if it wasn’t for him and TMS.

While That Metal Show has been off the air for several years now, I still listen to Eddie Trunk on the radio and his podcast whenever I’m able, and it’s also been great to see him back with Don Jamieson and Jim Florentine on That Rocks!, their new YouTube show together that launched last year. I hope there will come a time where I’ll be able to speak with him again and let him know how that brief interaction at his book signing ten years ago left such a big impression on me, but if not, hopefully this article does it justice.

Keep up with Eddie Trunk by visiting his website.

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