Post by Deleted on Jan 4, 2021 9:46:13 GMT -5
Are You Dead Yet? (off-cam)
How does one come to terms with their own mortality?
I was sitting in my living room, scrolling through Finnish news sites like I do occasionally just to keep tabs on whats going on back home.
Not that they really make a difference for me since I haven’t been there in 20 years… But its still a habit I keep up. Just like occasionally speaking in Finnish just to keep it in practice.
It was just another day of pointless news until I stopped on a big headline and felt a sinking feeling.
Alexi Laiho, frontman/lead vocalist/lead guitarist of Children of Bodom dead at 41.
That stopped me on my tracks. CoB had been a band I had listened to almost since their debut in the mid 90’s, Discounting the classics like Motörhead or Black Sabbath, they were probably my first foray into the world of heavy metal. And all through the years the songs and the albums have been on my playlists non-stop.
The death of someone you’ve idolized for decades is hard enough when they’re old, like Sean Connery, Eddie Van Halen or Niki Lauda.
But when its someone who is your age. Hell, YOUNGER than you are… it stops you dead on your tracks.
Sure, music business is one where careers are fleeting and life-expectancy is almost directly dependent on the level of success you enjoy, the more popular you get the shorter you live.
Drug abuse, rough touring schedules, the pressure of being a public figure… Unless you’re named Ozzy Osbourne or Keith Richards, making it past your 50’s is a damn miracle.
But after all… the same applies to my business. The Wrestling Business. Fleeting careers. Drug Abuse. Rough Touring schedules, the fame and fortune… they all come with a price. Both mental and physical.
The list of wrestlers who departed the mortal plane far too early is a list that is uncomfortably long… and grows year after year.
I’ve always managed to push those feelings to the back of my mind and not think about it. I made it to my 40’s and I’m still going strong. And more often than not, the names that pop up in the news as premature deaths are either names I don’t know or names that didn’t really mean that much to me.
Sounds jaded I know. But its the only way you can maintain your sanity when you see colleagues drop like flies. Keep emotional distance and don’t let it affect you.
It’s a lot harder to keep that distance when its someone you know. Someone that has indirectly been part of your life for over 20 years. Someone who’se handiwork has been there when you’ve worked out, when you’ve partied, when you’ve felt shitty and when you’ve just wanted something to listen to.
Children of Bodom was that to me. The one band that was always there if I needed something heavier to get me going.
I managed to shamble over to my stereo-system and dig up one of my most prized possessions. The second album released by CoB. Hatebreeder. With the signatures of the band in it. My hands were shaking as I pulled out the CD and entered it into the stereo and pushed play.
“From now on we are enemies, you and I”. I had to sit down as the opening line of “Warheart” blasted out. The whole album was filled with memories, but I’ve never forgotten the first time I pressed play on it.
I was suddenly reminded that the masked freak, Supreme Machine, used Warheart at one point of his career as both his entrance theme and the opening line as his catchphrase. Must’ve been some sort of divine coincidence that he’d join the promotion shortly before this happened…
As Laiho let his vocal and guitarwork rattle the windows and walls I walked over to the liquor cabinet and fished out a bottle of Koskenkorva. The most finnish of all booze. Didn’t even bother to grab a glass, instead just took a big swig from the bottle as I returned to the couch.
I began thinking to my own situation. I was 42. Not really that much of an age, except for wrestlers. My physical issues were well documented, just not in public. And my mental issue… better not dwell on them.
As songs followed each other from Warheart to Hatebreeder to Towards Dead End I felt moisture on the corner of my eye.
My youth was long gone. But the memory remains. Heading to Tuska Festival to listen to them, headbanging in a crowd of thousands. Seeing these guys who were basically my age living their dream of being musicians.
I was now at a crossroads in my career. The biggest match I’ve had in 20 years looming in the horizon. This could very well be my last chance of making it big. For 20 years my career has been one running gauntlet of failure. I have been walking towards dead end for so long. I stopped to listen as the aforementioned song played and sung the lyrics under my breath without even realizing it.
“Draw back in silence to dwell in anxiety,
No matter where I am, I'm alone. I'm crying out loud
the tears of blood I bleed, so fuck the world,
I'll go now, I don't care. (Who cares?)
I'm walking towards dead end, and I'm walking all alone
Two steps ago I past insanity
There's no starlight guiding my way out this downward death row
So now is the time I have to go”
Grim? Yeah. But for some odd reason so fitting to my situation. Because if I failed at Coronation he might aswell be singing about me. I stood up and switched another album in. Are You Dead Yet?
It was my favorite. Hatebreeder had a special place in my heart, but AYDY? Was the album I loved the most. With the songs that I always found myself humming.
Hell, I had actually used one of them as twitter hype and banter not so long ago. “If you want peace, Prepare for war”.
I chuckled and decided to fire of a tweet. Luther had used “Are You Dead yet” as his theme for some time. Fantastic song.
“Should I regret or ask myself, Are You Dead Yet”?
That line is deeper than you’d think. Do I have regrets for all the stuff I have done in my career? All the fuckups, all the missed opportunities? Or should I ask my self “Am I dead yet?”
Because I am not. I am still alive. Despite all the enemies I have made, all the chances I have squandered, I am still here. I am still going strong.
Coronation… It could be the end of the line for me. Or a beginning of a whole new chapter in my career. Because if I failed at Coronation the chances of having a new go at being the top star anywhere probably wouldn’t come soon enough. At Coronation I would either prove everyone wrong about me, or validate all the shit that has been slung at me over the years.
At Coronation I would either break out of the role I have been cast at. Or end up falling deeper into it.
Are you Dead Yet?
No. I am not. I still breather. I can still fight. I can still talk. I can still do what I do best.
Revolution 4 will be an appetizer. But Coronation will be the main course. And I will stand triumphant. I have to.
Or I might as well start walking Towards Dead End.
How does one come to terms with their own mortality?
I was sitting in my living room, scrolling through Finnish news sites like I do occasionally just to keep tabs on whats going on back home.
Not that they really make a difference for me since I haven’t been there in 20 years… But its still a habit I keep up. Just like occasionally speaking in Finnish just to keep it in practice.
It was just another day of pointless news until I stopped on a big headline and felt a sinking feeling.
Alexi Laiho, frontman/lead vocalist/lead guitarist of Children of Bodom dead at 41.
That stopped me on my tracks. CoB had been a band I had listened to almost since their debut in the mid 90’s, Discounting the classics like Motörhead or Black Sabbath, they were probably my first foray into the world of heavy metal. And all through the years the songs and the albums have been on my playlists non-stop.
The death of someone you’ve idolized for decades is hard enough when they’re old, like Sean Connery, Eddie Van Halen or Niki Lauda.
But when its someone who is your age. Hell, YOUNGER than you are… it stops you dead on your tracks.
Sure, music business is one where careers are fleeting and life-expectancy is almost directly dependent on the level of success you enjoy, the more popular you get the shorter you live.
Drug abuse, rough touring schedules, the pressure of being a public figure… Unless you’re named Ozzy Osbourne or Keith Richards, making it past your 50’s is a damn miracle.
But after all… the same applies to my business. The Wrestling Business. Fleeting careers. Drug Abuse. Rough Touring schedules, the fame and fortune… they all come with a price. Both mental and physical.
The list of wrestlers who departed the mortal plane far too early is a list that is uncomfortably long… and grows year after year.
I’ve always managed to push those feelings to the back of my mind and not think about it. I made it to my 40’s and I’m still going strong. And more often than not, the names that pop up in the news as premature deaths are either names I don’t know or names that didn’t really mean that much to me.
Sounds jaded I know. But its the only way you can maintain your sanity when you see colleagues drop like flies. Keep emotional distance and don’t let it affect you.
It’s a lot harder to keep that distance when its someone you know. Someone that has indirectly been part of your life for over 20 years. Someone who’se handiwork has been there when you’ve worked out, when you’ve partied, when you’ve felt shitty and when you’ve just wanted something to listen to.
Children of Bodom was that to me. The one band that was always there if I needed something heavier to get me going.
I managed to shamble over to my stereo-system and dig up one of my most prized possessions. The second album released by CoB. Hatebreeder. With the signatures of the band in it. My hands were shaking as I pulled out the CD and entered it into the stereo and pushed play.
“From now on we are enemies, you and I”. I had to sit down as the opening line of “Warheart” blasted out. The whole album was filled with memories, but I’ve never forgotten the first time I pressed play on it.
I was suddenly reminded that the masked freak, Supreme Machine, used Warheart at one point of his career as both his entrance theme and the opening line as his catchphrase. Must’ve been some sort of divine coincidence that he’d join the promotion shortly before this happened…
As Laiho let his vocal and guitarwork rattle the windows and walls I walked over to the liquor cabinet and fished out a bottle of Koskenkorva. The most finnish of all booze. Didn’t even bother to grab a glass, instead just took a big swig from the bottle as I returned to the couch.
I began thinking to my own situation. I was 42. Not really that much of an age, except for wrestlers. My physical issues were well documented, just not in public. And my mental issue… better not dwell on them.
As songs followed each other from Warheart to Hatebreeder to Towards Dead End I felt moisture on the corner of my eye.
My youth was long gone. But the memory remains. Heading to Tuska Festival to listen to them, headbanging in a crowd of thousands. Seeing these guys who were basically my age living their dream of being musicians.
I was now at a crossroads in my career. The biggest match I’ve had in 20 years looming in the horizon. This could very well be my last chance of making it big. For 20 years my career has been one running gauntlet of failure. I have been walking towards dead end for so long. I stopped to listen as the aforementioned song played and sung the lyrics under my breath without even realizing it.
“Draw back in silence to dwell in anxiety,
No matter where I am, I'm alone. I'm crying out loud
the tears of blood I bleed, so fuck the world,
I'll go now, I don't care. (Who cares?)
I'm walking towards dead end, and I'm walking all alone
Two steps ago I past insanity
There's no starlight guiding my way out this downward death row
So now is the time I have to go”
Grim? Yeah. But for some odd reason so fitting to my situation. Because if I failed at Coronation he might aswell be singing about me. I stood up and switched another album in. Are You Dead Yet?
It was my favorite. Hatebreeder had a special place in my heart, but AYDY? Was the album I loved the most. With the songs that I always found myself humming.
Hell, I had actually used one of them as twitter hype and banter not so long ago. “If you want peace, Prepare for war”.
I chuckled and decided to fire of a tweet. Luther had used “Are You Dead yet” as his theme for some time. Fantastic song.
“Should I regret or ask myself, Are You Dead Yet”?
That line is deeper than you’d think. Do I have regrets for all the stuff I have done in my career? All the fuckups, all the missed opportunities? Or should I ask my self “Am I dead yet?”
Because I am not. I am still alive. Despite all the enemies I have made, all the chances I have squandered, I am still here. I am still going strong.
Coronation… It could be the end of the line for me. Or a beginning of a whole new chapter in my career. Because if I failed at Coronation the chances of having a new go at being the top star anywhere probably wouldn’t come soon enough. At Coronation I would either prove everyone wrong about me, or validate all the shit that has been slung at me over the years.
At Coronation I would either break out of the role I have been cast at. Or end up falling deeper into it.
Are you Dead Yet?
No. I am not. I still breather. I can still fight. I can still talk. I can still do what I do best.
Revolution 4 will be an appetizer. But Coronation will be the main course. And I will stand triumphant. I have to.
Or I might as well start walking Towards Dead End.