After our huge afternoon of television, LCG and I actually left the house for a few hours, but were back in time for an evening of VH1 Classic. I finally went upstairs to work on the job search (my computer is old and doesn't like to load graphics-heavy sites quickly, so if I want to use any of the job-hunting sites, I have to use LCG's computer) and he stayed on the couch. Sometime after midnight, I got a phone call.
LCG: "You have to come downstairs. Metal Mania is on and they are playing the greatest video ever."
I was almost done with that day's job search and was about to gather up my crap, but since I got the call I left my notebook and soda on the desk and barreled down the stairs. He didn't even have the TV tuned to VH1 Classic. It was such a great song that he had to wait until I was settled on the couch before treating me to the video.
It was Every Rose Has Its Thorn.
Me: "I hate you."
Grumbling loudly, I stormed back upstairs to collect the rest of my stuff (as if I am going to look for a job when Metal Mania is on) while he giggled and hollered after me.
LCG: "You're going to miss it!"
Me: "Uh-huh. Go ahead and tell me when the roadies haul Bobby's drunk ass offstage."
LCG: "There he goes!"
Me: "Uh-huh. Super."
Unfortunately, since I only needed to grab a couple of items, I was back in time for the end of the video, and we fought about the Poison concert we saw. I don't think he will rest until I claim that I had a good time, and that's never going to happen.
Next up came the L.A. Guns! It was the video for Never Enough. I had never seen that video because it's from the Cocked And Loaded album, and once the MTV got hold of the video for The Ballad Of Jayne, there was no room for any other L.A. Guns videos. Wait a minute...I remember a video for I Wanna Be Your Man. That song is excellent, but it makes me huffy because it was a bonus track on the CD and cassette only. This was the era when The Man was trying to phase out LPs, and one way they tried to make other formats more attractive was by throwing on a bonus track. They also did that on the first Mr. Big album. But I digress in the most hostile of fashions because I am still mad about the attempted phasing out of LPs.
Oh, I just looked up Cocked And Loaded and apparently Never Enough was a hit on the MTV. I have no recollection of that, but okay. The point is I had never seen this particular L.A. Guns video. It's black and white and started with an Ed Sullivan-type introduction by an Ed Sullivan looking guy and they playing on a set that looks like the one from the television studio in A Hard Day's Night. Of course there is a crowd of girls acting like the Beatles fans at the Ed Sullivan show, did you have to ask? About ten seconds into the video, LCG sighed wearily.
LCG: "Do you know what's not original?"
Me: "Ed Sullivan takeoffs."
LCG: "Exactly."
I too, am tired of videos that go for a sixties television look. Groups wouldn't have to do that if we had some neato music programs today. (I realize that the L.A. Guns video I am complaining about is over ten years old. The gimmick hasn't gotten any more original since then.)
After that came those pillars of originality, Ratt. That gave us a chance to continue The Ratt Fight. We have been having The Ratt Fight for at least a couple of months. Actually, it could be several months by now. The fight is over how many hits Ratt had. LCG insists that they only had one hit, Round And Round, and I refuse to accept this.
Me: "What about Dance?"
LCG: "Not a hit."
Me: "Slip Of The Lip!"
LCG: "Not a hit."
Me: "It was totally a hit!"
LCG: "Next!"
Me: "Way Cool Jr."
LCG: "Not a hit."
Me: "What are you talking about? It was their last hit."
LCG: "Maybe in your warped little world it was a hit, but Way Cool Jr. was not a hit."
Me: "Aaaaargh! They had more than one hit!"
So I just looked it up, and Round And Round peaked at #12 on the Billboard chart, and the next closest single was only #40, and it wasn't even one of the songs that I claim was a hit! It was Lay It Down. I just called LCG to close out The Ratt Fight and admit defeat, and he didn't gloat very much. I am guessing that he will point and laugh at me every time we see Ratt from here on out, while muttering under his breath, "More than one hit, yeah right." Wait, he always did that during The Ratt Fight anyway.
I think after Ratt they went to commercial, so we started flipping channels. When we remembered to go back to VH1 Classic, we were treated to Parental Guidance by Judas Priest.
LCG: "Is this from Turbo?"
Me: "I think so."
(When we listen to Turbo, we usually just listen to Turbo Lover over and over. I can't get enough of that song, or the little dance that Rob Halford does in the video.) We decided it was from Turbo, based on Halford's hairdo and outfit, and were so pleased when we were right. Not as pleased as I was when the next video started. It was Hello From The Gutter by Overkill. If you ask an Overkill fan, they will tell you that I was excited about that video for all the wrong reasons. While I liked that song when it was new, I liked it even more once I saw it given the Beavis and Butthead treatment.
Beavis and Butthead were not kind to that video, and when I see it, I get to re-live all of my very favorite Beavis moments. I like trying to figure out if they are saying yellow butter and suggesting that the flying skull should fly into a cool video. Best of all, I like the end of the video where I get to shriek, "We've been expecting you!" at top Beavis volume.
I didn't even have time to mourn the fact that Beavis and Butthead are no longer on the air because the next video was Ozzy Osbourne's Shot In The Dark. This is another video that appeared on Beavis and Butthead, so I got a double shot of joke stealing! Thank you, VH1 Classic. I only remember one joke from that episode, but it doesn't matter because it is the best joke in the world. When Ozzy appears in his sequined outfit, they declare that it's from Ozzy's concert in Vegas.
I miss Beavis and Butthead so much. (The other night LCG and I were watching a VH1 program on final episodes of TV shows, and Mike Judge looked all baffled because he had heard that some people cried during the final episode of Beavis and Butthead. LCG immediately looked at me accusingly.)
Me: "It wasn't me! I did not cry during the final episode of Beavis and Butthead."
LCG: "Are you sure?"
Me: "Pretty sure. You'd think I would remember that."
Anyway, after Ozzy we got Iron Maiden! It was Aces High, which really didn't need to be watched because we are in the process of wearing out LCG's Visions Of The Beast DVD, but still, it's always nice to see Iron Maiden on TV. The evening didn't quite end with a bang, but it did end with Bang Tango. And it was another video I had never seen! It was for, um, I want to say Breaking Up A Heart Of Stone, but I'm not entirely sure. I am sure that it was shot on the same set they used for Someone Like You, so it wasn't as exciting as I had hoped. But even with the weak ending, that hour was still a fine finish to the Greatest Day Of Televsion, Ever.