Peter Hodgson from iHeartGuitar tweeted this link today, to an absolutely hilarious page on Cracked: Old School Heavy Metal Fans. It consists mainly of a list of “101 ways you know you’ve been a Heavy Metal fan for too long”. I briefly posterous’d the standout ones for me, but here I’m going to go through them – and yes: explain the one single, simple, silly and slightly sad reason I don’t follow Eddie Trunk on Twitter 
3. You don’t know the words to the national anthem but you know all the words to Stairway to Heaven, including the extra bits on the live version
Well duh. I lived and breathed The Song Remains the Same for a looong time. Hardly need to explain that one. 8)
7. You know there is absolutely nothing gay at all about grown men dressing in makeup, lingerie and spandex, playing for an all male audience, and gradually disrobing by the gig’s end.
Again duh. I was a teenager in the 80s, listening to 80s metal. Spandex and big hair rule. It is not gay. Not that there’s anything wrong with it if it is.
But it’s not.
21. You’re suspicious of metalheads with short hair, and doubt whether they’re ‘really into it’.
This. This is why I cannot take seriously Eddie Trunk, or his co-hosts on That Metal Show. Yes, they appear to know a lot, and be deeply into the scene, but … FFS their hair! One looks like Charlie Sheen. Another I would swear is Stewart Copeland. And Eddie Trunk himself looks like that kind of nerdy kid who wanted to be associated with the metal crowd, so the hair was a bit longer than a crewcut, but … nah. Try as I might, my wife and I just cannot take him seriously, or watch That Metal Show. And I haven’t been able to bring myself to follow him on Twitter.
Maybe silly, but …. Dude! Hair! 
29. You regard Ozzy-era Black Sabbath and Dio-era Black Sabbath as two completely different bands.
30. You’ve had arguments with friends over which era of Sabbath was the best, and the Ian Gillan era never rates a mention.
Another duh. If you need me to explain this, I don’t think I can do so in a way that would make sense to you. It just is.
The ones about disagreements with one’s wife around metal and associated paraphenalia aren’t relevant for me, as my wife remains a metalhead. 8)
42. You and your metalhead friends can pinpoint the precise time when Metallica started to suck, but it’s different for all of you.
My wife and I were discussing this just today, as it happens. And yes, it’s different for us: I say their slide started immediately after Master of Puppets (and I’m right), but she says it’s after the Black Album (not that she likes anything on Justice … just sayin’)
55. You grow a beard and some drunk yells “Hey Jesus” from across the street.
Well … ummm… yeah.
57. You remember heavy metal before it was called heavy metal.
I thought I’d add this one, with major reference to my obsessive listening to In A Gadda Da Vida, by Iron Butterfly.
Amazing stuff, that. Remember that was back in 1968. Listen to what Erik Braun was doing with the guitar – 43 years ago. 
58. You remember when heavy metal singers could actually sing.
Yeah. Already blogged about this. Back when singers actually sang. Those where the days, not that you young whippersnappers would know anything about that. Why I oughta! Get off my lawn you damn ….
76. When someone asks you if you’ve heard any good Nu-metal you immediately think of a new Saxon CD.
Well, don’t just take it from me:
Pull your head back
Hold your hands high
Shake your body
If it’s too loud
And your brain hurts
Fill your heads with heavy metal thunder(Heavy Metal Thunder, by Saxon)
Nuff said.
88. You remember when you first heard Black Sabbath and it scared the shit out of you.
Not just the band; the song Black Sabbath in particular: that tritone – before it got hammered to death by all and sundry – was the most monstrous thing I think I’d ever heard up to that point. Absolutely amazing. Totally blew me away.
And of course:
101. You hate the fact all your favourite metal bands are now referred to as ‘Classic Rock.’
Oh the pain.
