Jim Florentine: Heavy Metal Man

The comedian and VH1 co-host explains why he’s metal-thrashing mad

Like heavy metal itself, both VH1’s That Metal Show and its co-host, comedian Jim Florentine, survive and thrive.

With over five years and 100 classic episodes about classic heavy metal music stretched like spandex into eternity, the show (hosted by Eddie Trunk and co-hosted by Don Jamieson) continues to serve metalheads and young up-and-comers who weren’t there for the glory days.

But according to Jim, metal is not only alive and well in the Age of Beiber, it’s recruiting new converts and developing awesome young talent.

“There are new heavy metal bands like Avenged Sevenfold and Five Finger Death Punch,” Jim says.  “There are new metal bands that are selling a lot of tickets and are real popular. There’s a new band called Rebel Lake out of Baltimore with a similar sound to Rage. I love them.

“My nephew is 15 and he loves [these new bands] and he also loves Judas Priest and Motorhead. He loves the old stuff and embraces the new stuff. It’s also a good bonding thing for a father and a son. My brother [his father] is 52. He’s the one who got me into metal.”

The New Jersey native and former Crank Yankers cast member came up like most suburban kids with a burgeoning attitude: conformity wasn’t cutting it.  Jim wasn’t the Boy Scout type.

“I had two older brothers,” he says. “They brought home heavy metal and I had no choice but to listen to it. They would drive around, driving me to school or whatever, and I would be in the backseat. It got me into Black Sabbath, AC/DC, Aerosmith, Judas Priest. I had no choice, but it was great. It was rebellious.”

Like all rebels, Jim learned early of how being a metal head can earn you a pigeonhole. He’s since chewed his way out as one of the more successful and perceptive standup comedians on the circuit.

“In high school, you were always the loner, the outsider, wearing the Ozzy shirt and hanging with the burnouts,” he recalls of his high-school metalhead beginnings.

But look at him – and the metalheads – now.

“The perception is that they’re just dumb meatheads,” he says. “Long hair, not educated, living in mom’s basement. But we do That Metal Show, and I walk into a hospital and the freaking doctor is a huge fan of the show, judges and people like that. They still love heavy metal but they can’t look like they do.”

Even the metal artists are, well, savvier than they look.

“A lot of them, as they get older, realize that it’s a business and there is a lot of money to be made,” Jim says. “They know they can’t just mess around like they did in their 20s. They really train and practice and get in shape for these tours. Ozzy sounds better than ever, and I’ve been seeing Ozzy since I was a kid. Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, all those guys, they still sound great.

“They realize that they can be making a living like this into their 50s and 60s, but they can’t go up on stage as a big, fat, bloated guy.

“Touring and merchandise is where they’re making the money. So they gotta be out there touring. And ticket prices are really high, so they have to be able to give a good show, or people are not going to want to come back when they come back around again in a year.”

As big a heavy metal fan as Jim is, he himself has some big fans in high places. Example One: Eminem.

“I worked with him on Crank Yankers,” Jim says. “I dug him just because of his lyrics. Eminem, he’s a great lyricist. He doesn’t write about what everybody else writes about, about the ho’s and being in the club. He hates his wife and wants to kill her and throw her off the cliff, and the next song is about how much he loves her. Anybody in a relationship can relate to that. It’s beautiful.”

Any advice for kids, Jim? Even if the truth hurts?

He says, “If I see a kid listening to metal now, I go, ‘you’re going to have a tough time getting laid.’ No chick, especially in this generation, with all those reality shows, will want you to talk about what Slayer is going to do without Jeff Hanneman now. The girl you want to bang is going to want no part of that.”

It’s an easy sacrifice, though, for the love of the music. Not everybody can have everything, like Jim Florentine does: a successful standup career, a family, a popular podcast, a legendary line of prank call CDs (Terrorizing Telemarketers) and a long-running heavy metal TV show. But Jim says that the passion is perennial and well worth it.

A few more words of advice for the kids from our old pal Jim:

“When I see a young guy at a metal concert, I say, ‘Just remember, you are going to be a metal head for life,” he says. “When you’re 40 or 50, you’re still going to love this music.”

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Find out more about Jim here.

Listen to Jim’s podcast, Comedy Metal Midgets, here.

Photo by Ethan Miller, Getty Images