Chris and Frank discuss the WWE World Heavyweight Championship Tournament, missed booking opportunities for The Undertaker and Bray Wyatt, Rhonda Rousey vs. Holly Holm and speculate WrestleMania 32.
Trailer Feedback: Krampus
Looks like we’ll be getting an unexpected guest this holiday season.
A family of grinches gets together for what’s likely to be their annual (and last) Christmas tradition when all goes dark. During their tumultuous bickering, one of the children tears up his letter to Santa and throws it out the window – presumably the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s (or Krampus’) back.
When the ungrateful family starts to come to their senses, it’s too late and Grandma warns everyone of what’s coming. Krampus is seen on the roof of the house with his sack of baddies and morbid toy contraptions before coming down the chimney to wreak havoc on la maison de dégénérés.
This looks like a holiday treat. From square one everyone but Grandma is an unlikeable character. Envy, bitterness, pettiness and disgust run rampantly in this household. The kids are fighting to the point where one angrily shreds his letter to Santa Claus – and on Christmas (for shame). You can bet that not a creature will be stirring when Krampus rears his ugly head (except Grandma, she seems nice). Krampus’ helpers are going to terrify and provide us with unique deaths that are sure to hark a few herald angels.
At this point the only question that remains is will Santa save the day (or show up at all)? Regardless, Krampus should jingle some bells and raise some hell.
Whether you’ve been naughty or nice, Krampus is coming to town.
Iron Maiden, Judas Priest and Ozzy Era Black Sabbath Halloween Tribute Show Haunts Brian’s Backyard BBQ
A party went on this Halloween at Montgomery, NY restaurant Brian’s Backyard BBQ. This (free) party included a costume contest, an outside haunted house and three tribute bands covering Black Sabbath, Judas Priest and Iron Maiden classics.
Normally I don’t go out of my way to see cover bands but a free show with tributes to three of metal’s greats only five minutes away was something I just couldn’t pass up.
After a party with co-workers I picked up an older metalhead, my buddy Jay and his friend. After a short car ride consisting of jokes about Danzig making a Christmas album we got to the venue for some great music.
British Steel
First up was the Priest cover band British Steel. My friend Branden and I went close to the stage when it was their time to get on. We were joined by several people including a drunken old woman.
After the band started their set with one of Priests newer songs “Dragonaut,” they then went into classics such as “Nightcrawler,” “Painkiller,” “Breaking the Law” and “Metal Gods.”
What impressed me the most was when they played “Free Wheel Burning.” I’ve seen Priest twice and they didn’t play it either time.
While not as good as Priest (obviously), the band did a good job playing the songs and was able to get the crowd going.
Never Say Die
Next up were Never Say Die – an Ozzy era Black Sabbath tribute.
Though the band was called “Never Say Die,” they didn’t play any songs from that album (thankfully). Instead, they opted for a mix of deep cuts and hits.
I was glad I got to hear some of my Ozzy era favorites such as “Wicked World,” “Snowblind,” “N.I.B” and “Children of the Grave.” The crowd was pleased with “War Pigs” and “Paranoid” (yet no “Iron Man”).
The crowd was a little more drunk than at this point, with drunk old ladies grabbing Branden (not making this up).
The band sounded great and I was glad that the singer didn’t fully try to copy Ozzy. Since I’ll be seeing the real Sabbath in February, lets see which band has the better set list.
Sanctuary
The final band of the night was the Iron Maiden tribute Sanctuary.
They played “Caught Somewhere in Time,” “Flash of the Blade” and “Flight of Icarus” before the band took a break for the costume contest.
While I felt the hot girl dressed as a dragon ninja was the best, somehow an old lady dressed as a banana won. After the contest Sanctuary went back to playing.
They played many more greats such as “Powerslave,” the new single “Speed of Light,” “Phantom of the Opera” and “Wrathchild.”
Sanctuary did such an awesome job covering Maiden’s songs to the point where if you were blindfolded you’d think it was the real deal. The singer would even talk to the audience in a British accent and acted like Bruce Dickinson on stage.
It was starting to get late and I had work the next day so I didn’t stay for the whole thing. I did however, stay long enough for my favorite Maiden song “Hallowed Be Thy” name which sounded epic.
Trailer Feedback: 007 – Spectre
In just a few short hours we get what may very well be Daniel Craig’s James Bond swansong.
At first glance, Spectre seems like your average 007 flick. Everyone’s favorite British spy has to save the world from a deranged lunatic (Christoph Waltz), get the girl (Monica Bellucci) and grab a few swigs of the old reliable (shaken, not stirred).
But that would be too easy.
Walt’z character Oberhauser is not just a simple villain, but the head of the evil organization the film’s title bears. Throw in Hinx (former WWE champion and Guardians of the Galaxy’s Drax Dave Bautista), and you’ve got one of the most intimidating henchmen Bond has ever faced. This time around, Bond will not just be on her majesty’s secret service – he’s going to be taking down an entire entity with him.
While it may not be as good as its predecessor Skyfall, Spectre still looks like a contender to be another great Bond film. If this is in fact the final Craig Bond film, let’s hope he goes out with a bang Ian Fleming would approve of.
F*ck Mondays – Episode 2: James Bond, Bruce Campbell and the X-Files Walk into a Bar
Jon and Chris talk Ash vs. The Evil Dead, Halloween excursions, the returning X-Files, the new James Bond film “Spectre” and more.
Bonesaw Podcast – Episode 22: Superjoint’s Jimmy Bower
We got the chance to sit down with Jimmy Bower from Superjoint, Down and Eyehategod during the New York City date of Danzig’s “Blackest of the Black” tour and had a ball!
Bower talks about Superjoint’s reformation and plans, the joys of fatherhood, which guitar company he’d like to be endorsed by and a whole lot more in this awesome podcast.
Manopera! Episode 4: Hell in a Cell 2015 Supershow
Chris Butera and “Spaceman” Frank Lucci return for another round of Manopera to discuss Hell in a Cell and Survivor Series possibilities. Also discussed are NXT Takeover and Chikara Pro Wrestling. Chris and Frank cut promos on pet goldfish and Burger King’s Black Bun Halloween Whopper.
Exinfernum: The Band From Hell
New Jersey has never been a stranger to metal.
Classic bands such as Danzig, Overkill, Ripping Corpse, Whiplash and Symphony X have all come from there. The state still has its fair share of greats today including newcomers Exinfernum. In this interview, members James and Vinny talk about the band as well as some other fun topics.
How would you describe your band’s sound?
Vinny: The way I see it, we take inspiration from different forms of dark music. This includes black metal, darker death metal bands and old goth music – it all inspires us. The only term I think can describe our band is dark metal.
James: Essentially we just play really dark metal music and some of it verges on death or black metal. Metal-Archives.com even calls us blackened death metal. The sub-genre of metal we play isn’t as important to us as it would be for other bands. Really, we are just looking to make some dark, heavy music
Why did you choose the name Exinfernum and what does it mean?
Vinny: The name means “from Hell” in Latin. I was sitting in the dark one day, writing riffs and the name just hit me out of nowhere. It seemed to be a perfect fit for the music I was writing. It was also one of the few cool sounding names that wasn’t really taken.
I understand you used to be the old-school death metal band Gorematory. What made you decide to change to this new style and was it hard at first?
Vinny: Originally, Gorematory split up in November 2011 after opening for Entombed. We tried to bring the band back a few times but it didn’t work out. We decided to change the bands style. Since we went in such a new direction, the name (Gorematory) didn’t fit anymore. Our lyrics went from being gore and horror themed to more dark and spiritual. Due to these changes we put Gorematory to bed and Exinfernum was born.
James: We had alot of bad luck with the band. We started to feel the name Gorematory was cursed. This was around late 2014. We decided we were going to start 2015 with a clean slate. I also felt our style grew a little.
Vinny: To this day I am still a very big horror fan, but I needed to write about more things that are personal to me. At that point I started getting more into the left hand path.I started reading a lot more books and looking into different things. What I wanted to do was say these things but in a form of music. I guess you can say it’s something that feels more natural and personal to us. It’s more real then what Gorematory was.
Any new releases on the horizon? If so can you tell us about them.
Vinny: For the rest of this year we will continue to promote our album “The Gutting of God.” In the middle of next year we are going to start working on our second full length.
James: We have some rough song ideas (maybe around four). Cereberus, our drummer is also working on a few. Some might not make it to the next album but whenever we feel like writing we write stuff. Nothing we wrote is really concrete at the moment.
How do you feel about the state of black metal today? Do you feel the original idea of black metal is gone or do you think it just took other forms?
Vinny: I personally feel metal needs to evolve to survive, this includes black metal. As much as I like the classic bands such as Darkthrone, Carpathian Forest, Gorgoroth and Dissection; in order for the music to continue it needs to evolve. Don’t get me wrong, I love bands that are throwbacks to the old style but it still needs to evolve.
James: My opinion is a little similar to his. I feel black metal fans today take themselves and the music way too fucking seriously. I think a lot of black metal bands get too into the ideology and the image and forget it’s fucking music.
Vinny: To me, ideology and music go hand in hand.
Spaceman Frank’s WWE Hell in a Cell 2015 Predictions
By Frank Lucci
Hell in a Cell 2015 promises to be one of the more memorable pay per views of the year, but for all the wrong reasons.
What should have been a stacked card that has been built up expertly over several weeks has turned into a plate of hot garbage. The WWE has managed to waste appearances by Ric Flair, Shawn Michaels and Stone Cold Steve Austin (side note: HOW THE HELL DO YOU BOTCH STONE COLD’S RETURN?) and filled the top matches with aging superstars instead of the hot young talent who WWE can’t even be bothered to come up with feuds for despite having around seven hours of weekly programming to fill.
Despite all this, there are a few matches with potential on the card that should give fans something to cheer for. Here are the predictions for Hell in a Cell 2015.
Preshow Match: Dolph Ziggler, Cesaro and Neville vs. Rusev, Sheamus and King Barrett.
This match was originally supposed to Randy Orton and Dean Ambrose vs. Luke Harper and Braun Strowman, but apparently Orton has hurt his shoulder (again) and Harper was removed from the card because of a family situation (wish him the best). Harper lives in the same suburb of Rochester as me, so this slight is unforgivable. Anyway, this match features six men who have nothing going for them unless you count being Mr. Money in the Bank, a former world champ or being european as something.
Given time this could be a great match, but it will most likely be a ten minute snorefest as JBL yells about Mountain Dew and Premier League Futbol. The face team will pull out the victory because Rusev needs to be punished for having his fiance’ be excited they are getting married instead of keeping that shit on lockdown and Barrett and Sheamus aren’t allowed to have nice things in general.
Kevin Owens (C) vs. Ryback (Intercontinental Championship Match)
Vince McMahon most likely booked this match during his play time where he smashed the two superstars action figures together like a five year old before realizing he could make this happen in real-life.
WWE had a chance to develop this feud after Owens won the title by cheating but instead they just had these two bounce around aimlessly. With no added stipulations to raise the stakes, expect Owens to cheat again to win to show how despicable he is in a lackluster hoss fight.
John Cena (C) vs. TBD (US Championship Open Challenge)
I can see Cena’s match breaking down in three ways:
1. Newly called up wrestler Tyler Breeze answers the challenge and sneakily wins the championship from Cena to give Breeze some much needed rub considering his NXT run ended with him losing over and over again at Takeover specials. Perhaps Breeze could hit Cena with the “Beauty Shot” or the “Unprettier” and injure Cena’s nose again to get the victory. On Raw the hurting Cena could be taken out by Lesnar or some other force so he can take his time off and have feuds ready to go.
2. The New Day shows up and use their numbers game to take down Cena and give Xavier Woods a championship (as he is on the sideline for their title defenses 90% of the time.) Then The New Day could get some real heel heat by dismantling Cena and knocking him out of action so they get more boos from the WWE target audience of children. Then when Cena comes back he can heroically overcome the odds yet again (despite almost never losing a single match) because BIG MATCH JOHN MAGGLE.
3. Dolph Ziggler challenges and beats Cena for the championship using some less than heroic tactics. Ziggler goes full heel the next night which leads to Cena being taken out for his vacation. This ties into the “Total Divas” storyline and allows Ziggler to take on some fresh opponents. No matter what, I expect Cena to lose (if you couldn’t tell).
The New Day (C) vs. The Dudley Boyz (WWE Tag Team Championship)
The WWE had several chances to put the titles on the Dudley Boyz. The forgettable Madison Square Garden show, for example. But instead had The New Day repeatedly disqualify themselves to keep the titles. This is good heel tactics, but at least point switching the championships would be fairly anticlimactic.
With the Dudley Boyz once again getting a rematch with no added stipulations, The New Day will likely win, Xavier Woods will get destroyed afterwards, and the tag team division will keep spinning it’s wheels.
Charlotte (C) vs. Nikki Bella (Divas Championship Match)
With the Divas Revolution quickly losing steam, Charlotte (and by extension, Becky Lynch and Sasha Banks) need to do something to capture the magic that the NXT women’s division has. Feuds with Team Bella is not the solution. Charlotte wins, Nikki films an episode of “Total Divas” about how sad she is about it, and the WWE gives Sasha Banks (who clearly is the fan’s choice for favorite new Diva) a shot (and maybe gives Becky Lynch something to do besides hang out with Ric Flair at ringside to cheer her bestie on).
Roman Reigns vs. Bray Wyatt (Hell in a Cell Match)
This feud started out promising, but overall the Reigns vs. Wyatt program has shown how far behind Reigns is compared to Wyatt and his BFF Ambrose. BUT HE’S TALL AND TAN BY GAWD so now we’re stuck with him.
Wyatt has attempted to keep people engaged with this feud by delivering his signature promos, but after three months of his “anyone but you” schtick it is time for this to end.
By the way, nice of Wyatt to summarize the internet’s feelings about Reigns and help us feud with him by proxy. Reigns did his best to get us emotionally invested in him with his infamous “I’m doing this for, like, my family and stuff” promo, which only went to show how much better Wyatt is as a talker and how much more natural charisma Ambrose has. At the go home Raw, the WWE then tried to get people hyped by bringing out Ric Flair. Instead, Flair puttered around the ring and said Reign’s name to try and get the crowd to pop.
I guess it was better than Flair bursting into tears every time Charlotte wrestles.
With rumors of Reigns winning the World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania circling again, Wyatt will lose this match as he always does, then find another guy we hope he will defeat and gain momentum, but ultimately end up jobbing to.
Seth Rollins (C) vs. Kane (World Heavyweight Championship Match)
Does anyone else feel like this will be the bathroom break match between Hell in a Cell matches? The Corporate Kane/Demon Kane thing is kinda funny, kinda meta, but does not belong anywhere near the championship picture. Have this be a random offshoot of an Authority storyline, but not something involving Rollins, who goes from wrestling AARP Sting to wrestling a 48 year-old guy who is an honest to God grandfather.
Can we get this guy a challenger who works full time on the roster and is under the age of 40?
Another side note to this feud: way to bring out Shawn Michaels to bury the champ and eat some kids pizza (which probably cost $8).
Rollins vs HBK would be a bonkers match but it will never happen and Michaels did not seem to care much about selling people on Rollins or his match.
Another legend wasted.
Please let this be a swan song for Kane, who deserves to bow out in a decent match for all he has done for the WWE over the years. While he should not be gunning for the championship, he should have a nice moment to close his career out and transition to becoming HR Representative Kane to counter The Authority’s thuggish tactics.
Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker (Hell in a Cell Match)
WHO’S READY FOR SOME TORTURE PORN???
Seriously though, I fear for the Undertaker in this match. The guy had a massive concussion (which by the way, never stopped him from competing while Daniel Bryan continues to sit out) after WrestleMania 30, then collapsed after his match with Lesnar at Summerslam.
Clearly the guy cannot hang with Lesnar anymore and should not be doing this. Any enjoyment to be had will be mixed with the feeling that Undertaker can be legit hurt at any moment (I know the point of Hell in a Cell matches is to be dangerous and violent, but at some point you need to step in and say enough is enough).
Brock wins, Undertaker has his big retirement hoopla in Dallas at WrestleMania 32 and rides off into the sunset. Personally, I’d like to see ‘Taker vs Bo Dallas in a easy squash at ‘Mania so the crowd can watch the legend take a bow and not worry about whether he can walk on his own power after the match.
#DallasinDallas people make it happen!
Bonesaw Podcast: Episode 21: Mick Mayer from Sonic Pulse
Our guest at this time is Mick Mayer from Adventure Metal band (who’s last release bears the same title) Sonic Pulse. Mick and Chris shoot the breeze on touring, music, comic books and more – including Sonic Pulse’s upcoming album “Vs. The Internet” and why they band covers the “Adventure Time” theme song.
The Bonesaw 