by Ben Smith (@BHSmithNYC)

That Metal Show Top 5 Underrated Guitarists

TMSGits

Each week fans tune in to That Metal Show to see Eddie, Jim and Don weigh-in and argue about such important subjects as The Top 5 Jason Newstead Metallica Albums or The Top 5 Best Screams In A Song on the TMS Top 5. This season we’re moving the debate online and letting you, the fans, make your voices heard in our weekly TMS Top 5 polls.

Saturday on That Metal Show, the boys debated who were the most underrated guitarists in hard rock and heavy metal history. Special musical guest Richie Kotzen, who’s played with everyone from Poison to Mr. Big, came out on top but the full list of players is a who’s who of unrecognized or under-appreciated shredders from around the hard rock globe.

Peep the final list along with Eddie, Jim and Don’s selections and then cast your votes below and let us know where you think these guitarists rate. You can vote as many times for as many different guitarists as you like and don’t forget to check back every week for more TMS Top 5 countdowns and watch That Metal Show on VH1 Classic every Saturday night at 11/10C!

TMS Top 5 Underrated Guitarists
1. Richie Kotzen
2. Brad Whitford
3. Dave Meniketti
4. Chris Broderick
5. Wolf Hoffmann

Eddie Trunk
1. Richie Kotzen
2. Dave Meniketti
3. Wolf Hoffmann
4. John 5
5. Snake Sabo/Scotti Hill

Jim Florentine
1. Tom Morello
2. Chris Broderick
3. Mike McCready
4. Phil Demmel
5. Mike Mushok

Don Jamiseon
1. Brad Whitford
2. Scott Gorham
3. Phil Campbell
4. Paul Quinn
5. Kurdt Vanderhoof

by Ben Smith (@BHSmithNYC)

Show Off Your That Metal Show T-Shirt And You Might Get Featured In An Upcoming Episode

[Photo: David Teng Photography]

Calling all fans of That Metal Show! In honor of the show’s upcoming 12th season, we want to see pictures of you rocking your TMS stripes!

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by Mark Graham (@unclegrambo)

AMERICA’S HARD 100, FINALS EDITION: Vote To Determine The Greatest Hard Rock Song Of All-Time

AMERICA'S HARD 100 - FINALS

Well folks, you did it. Just under two weeks ago, VH1 Classic began releasing a series of viewer polls that would ultimately determine what songs would separate themselves from the pack in America’s Hard 100. Over one million (!!!) votes were cast by you, THE FANS, to determine which songs deserved to be at the top of our list of the best hard rock and heavy metal songs of all-time. We’ve sorted through the votes, analyzed the numbers, and now we need your help again in determining the FINAL RANKINGS of America’s Hard 100.

We have come up with a list of 15 songs here, 10 of which won their respective polls — a healthy round of applause for Dream Theater‘s “Pull Me Under,” Type O Negative‘s “Black No. 1,” Bon Jovi‘s “Living On A Prayer,” Cinderella‘s “Gypsy Road,” Dio‘s “Holy Diver,” Rush‘s “Limelight,” Poison‘s “Nothin’ But A Good Time,” Guns N’ Roses‘ “November Rain,” Ozzy Osbourne and Randy Rhoads’ “Crazy Train,” and Black Sabbath‘s “Paranoid”! — and 5 of which we’re deeming wildcards. Each of these wildcard songs — AC/DC‘s “Back In Black,” Accept‘s “Balls To The Wall,” Guns N’ Roses’ “Paradise City,” Megadeth‘s “Sweating Bullets,” and Poison’s “Talk Dirty To Me” — reaped more votes than all the other non-poll winning songs, and might have won their respective polls had they been placed among a different group of songs.

So, with that said, here are your final 15 songs. The same rules apply this time around; vote early and often for as many of these 15 as you think are deserving, and you can always click Return To Poll to vote again. The polls will close on Tuesday, October 2 at 4 p.m. ET, and you’ll be able to tune in to watch America’s Hard 100 on VH1 Classic in November to see the final results.

Without further ado, let the voting commence!

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by Ben Smith (@BHSmithNYC)

AMERICA’S HARD 100, Day 9: Vote To Determine The Greatest Hard Rock Song Of All-Time

VH1 Classic Presents America's Hard 100

The VH1 Classic America’s Hard 100 Countdown Poll is nearing its end but we’ve still got more classic hard rock and heavy metal tunes that need sorting and we need your help! We’ve put together a list of 100 essential rockers but we need you to vote on them to let us know where they should fall in the America’s Hard 100 Countdown when it airs this November.

IMPORTANT NOTE: You can vote AS MANY TIMES and for AS MANY SONGS as you want, simply click on “Return To Poll” after your initial ballot. If your favorite hard rock jam is missing from today’s list please click on one of the previous days polls which are still open and keep checking back daily as we add new songs to new lists.

Today “The Boys Are Back In Town” by seminal Irish hard rockers Thin Lizzy goes up against Soundgarden’s grunge metal opus “Black Hole Sun,” Ozzy Osbourne’s metal standard “Crazy Train” featuring the late guitarist Randy Rhoads and technical thrash act Megadeth’s “Sweating Bullets” plus more.

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by Ben Smith (@BHSmithNYC)

AMERICA’S HARD 100, Day 4 – Vote To Determine The Greatest Hard Rock Song Of All-Time

It’s Day 4 of VH1 Classic‘s America’s Hard 100 countdown poll where we ask YOU, the FANS, help us determine the 100 best hard rock and metal songs of all-time! Every day we’ll be posting a new list of classic hard rock and heavy metal tunes for you to vote on to help us with the rankings. If you don’t see your favorite bands or songs on today’s list, check back daily as we are adding new songs every day! (Watch our new promo for AH100 above.)

Today, two of hard rock’s hardest hitting ladies, Joan Jett and Lita Ford, duke it out with decadent Sunset Strip denizens Motley Crue, unflappable and unfettered classic rockers Aerosmith and heavy metal icons Judas Priest, among others.

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by Christina Leake (@_bobina)

That Metal Debate: Top 5 Bass Riffs Of All-Time

We kicked off the season premiere of That Metal Show this weekend with Russell Allen and Mike Orlando of Adrenaline Mob, along with David Draiman of Disturbed fame, and rocked out with TMS veteran Mike Portnoy on drums.

In the Season 11 premiere episode, we debated the Top 5 Bass Riffs (not players) with signature lines in songs. You know, when you heard the first few seconds of a song and immediately start banging your head because you know exactly how to play it on air guitar bass and you immediately get excited cause it’s your favorite song or cause it just rocks that hard? Yeah, that.

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by Kat George (@kat_george)

Twelve Photos Of Metal Legends Being Totally Un-Metal

“Metal dudes are people, too!” you shout, and we hear ya, we honestly do. But here’s the thing — we like to live under the fantasy, however inaccurate, that metal dudes just do totally awesome metal stuff all the time. We want to believe that metal dudes go around biting the heads off bats, smashing guitars, sticking it to the man and headbanging ALL THE TIME. The same way we like to believe that pop stars all eat, sleep and go to the gym in their elaborate costumes, rappers freestyle battle each other in the street and country singers all know how to lasso like cowboys.

Obviously, the illusions we live under (yes, we’re twisted, we know, but being twisted is like, SO metal), are unrealistic, and we have to admit we get a perverted sense of pleasure when the wall does come down. So if you want to see what metal dudes are doing when they’re not being metal, and just being sort of, well, regular, click through to our gallery below! Beware: there are images of James Hetfield WEARING A KNITTED SCARF! Slipknot‘s Corey Taylor READING BOOKS! Megadeth‘s Dave Mustaine HANGING OUT WITH A GEORGE W. BUSH IMPERSONATOR! If this is all just too much for you and all you want is to see metal guys being, like, totally metal, then check out National Metal Day on VH1 Classic, airing all day today!

[Photos: Getty Images]

by Kat George (@kat_george)

Tuned In: Megadeth Play For Jimmy Kimmel’s Halloween Special

Last night, Jimmy Kimmel Live celebrated Halloween the way it was supposed to be celebrated — with grotesque costumes and Megadeth playing on stage. The iconic metal band went all out and got ghoulish in some of the best creepy costumes we’ve seen this year, revising tried and true classics like Frankenstein’s monster, Wolf Man and Count Dracula. The band played two songs, “Public Enemy No. 1″ and “Symphony Of Destruction” to close the epic show, which saw Kimmel (appropriately?) dressed as a monkey.

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by Jim Shearer

Shearer’s Spotlight: Spitballing Some Ideas For Other Potential Big 4 Festivals

Each Friday here on the VH1 Blog, our VH1 Top 20 Video Countdown host Jim Shearer (@jimshearer on Twitter) will be sharing his Shearer?s Spotlight with us. Be sure to tune into the Top 20 Countdown tomorrow morning when it airs on VH1 at 9 a.m. ET/PT.

Next Wednesday, Sept. 14, the Big 4 Festival will descend upon Yankee Stadium in New York City. The participants will include the ?big four? bands (i.e., pillars, staples, torch bearers, etc.) of thrash metal music: Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth, and Anthrax. Here are some other acts that could pull off a Big 4 Festival of their own:

1) Big 4 of Millennial Pop: Britney Spears, *NSYNC, Christina Aguilera, Backstreet Boys
This past summer, the Backstreet Boys created some buzz when they toured with their boy-band predecessors, New Kids On The Block, as NKOTBSB; but could you imagine the pandemonium they could create by teaming up with late ?90s peer/rival, *NSYNC? The reunions alone would sell tickets on this tour: Justin and *NSYNC, Justin and Britney, Britney and Christina, and three old Mouseketeers back together again.

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