Written By Remmy Chillmister
From Moshpits To Medicare is a love letter to the generation that built metal and now needs Ibuprofen to enjoy it.
“My spine may be a Jenga tower, but my heart still double-kicks at 220 BPM.”
We are the latchkey kids, the Gen-Xers and elder Millennials forged in steel. We invented mosh pits and headbanging before there were tutorials on how to do it.
We were the ones who disappeared outside all day with no food, no water, no phones and came home when the streetlights came on. We witnessed the rise of Black Sabbath, the birth of the Tampa Bay death-metal scene, the thrash explosion in the Bay Area, and MTV’s Headbangers Ball.
We built the underground tape-trading networks by hand at dingy clubs and record shops. We devoured the first metal magazines hot off the press. We lived this culture before algorithms told you what to listen to.
That underground era is exactly what I broke down in that piece about hunting metal before algorithms, the bloodsport years. The underground never needed your approval.
“Spinal Tap first crashed onto the scene in 1984 — and now they’ve landed the cover of AARP Magazine. They’re still brutal, just a little slower and wielding canes.
Their exclusive feature, Turn Down For What? The Senior Tour Diaries,’ includes hot tips on managing sciatica mid-solo, the best denture adhesive for screaming into the mic, and a buyer’s guide to hearing aids that go to… you guessed it… ELEVEN.”
And as Jack Nicholson said in The Bucket List:
“Never pass up a bathroom. Never waste a hard-on. And never trust a fart.”
We’re older now. Louder in the knees, maybe, but look around at Wacken, Hellfest, Download Festival and Bloodstock. We’re still here, front and center. The same kids who forged this world now run the pit from the back row.
Elder metalheads still reign supreme. “We’re still brutal… but now we need bifocals and Bengay.”
But let’s be real, time’s cruel, and this is our journey from mosh pits to medicare. The riffs still shred, but the backs ache a little louder than the amps. The circle pit now comes with a warm-up stretch and an orthopedic specialist on speed dial. So why not embrace it? It’s time for the next generation of metal merch. Absurd products for the battle-hardened headbanger.
Liquid Death And Depends Metalhead Pit Diaper
Because missing a riff while you’re stuck in a bathroom line at a festival is a crime against metal. Comes in black, chain belt included.
For Whom the Bell Tolls Hearing Aid
Because the ringing never stops. Years of standing too close to the stack, sleeping next to amps, and proving you don’t need earplugs have finally caught up. Now every bell tolls… and so does your tinnitus.
Kickstart My Heart At-Home Defibrillation Unit
When your pulse is slower than a doom metal intro and the pit’s calling your name, one zap is all it takes to Kickstart your heart and give it a start.
Painkiller Muscle Ointment
The metal god of muscle relief. After decades of stage-diving, circle pits, and hauling amps heavier than your first marriage, those joints are screaming louder than Rob Halford.
Dead Skin Mask Moisturizer
Too much time under the sun at outdoor metal fests got you looking more like a crypt keeper? Slather this on.
Cemetery Gates Burial Plots
Reserve your final resting pit before your Countdown to Extinction becomes a documentary.
Holy Diver Aquatic Ear Plugs
For when you’ve been down too long in the midnight sea… (and don’t want a damn ear infection).
Sweet Leaf Herbal Tea
For the elder metalhead who’s traded bong hits for bedtime brews, Sweet Leaf delivers all the comfort of your hazy youth. Now with fewer coughing fits. I love you, sweet leaf… though you can’t hear.
Metal Thrashing Pad
Because your spine thinks it’s 1984, but your lumbar knows better. For ex-maniacs who still stomp the gas in the pit and pay for it physically the morning after
Iron Maidenform Compression Socks that run to the hills with your circulation.
Skullkrusher Denture Cream
keeps the chompers in place when the pit goes Overkill.
Hemorrhoids, Bloody Hemorrhoids From the pit to the porcelain, the struggle is real. Soothe the scorch after nights of brutal riffs and burritos with this infernal ointment forged in the fires of comfort.
Black No 1 Hair Dye
For those who refuse to fade. Channel Peter Steele while covering the grey. Because immortality isn’t about living forever, it’s about looking like you haven’t aged since 1993.
Because metal doesn’t age, we do. And we’re gonna laugh about it while we’re still loud enough to wake the dead.
“Sure, our knees creak louder than a doom intro and we keep Tums in the battle vest but we’re still here, louder than hell and twice as stubborn. And now… the merch we really need:”
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About The Author:
Remmy Chillmister survives on beer, bad decisions, and one functioning ear since ’79. Banned from three festivals and one nursing home for telling the truth – and yet somehow still accredited for press.