Your old friends

Well, I suppose it's about that time. Every once in a while, nostalgia fans get to wondering what their heroes from their chosen magical era are up to. Civil War buffs know that U.S. Grant, Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis and everyone that was at Appomattox Courthouse are now rotting, but many of our '80s stars are still alive and up to exciting things. Let's check in.

In the '90s, Tupac said "I'ma drink 40s 'cause that's what niggas do! I'ma smoke weed cause that's what niggas do!" Yngwie wears his shirts open becuase that's what shredders do.

Yngwie J. Malmsteen: Yngwie was the first of the super shredders to emerge in the early '80s after the success of Eddie Van Halen's virtuosity on the first few Van Halen records. He was in Steeler (with Ron Keel) then Alcatrazz before going solo with Yngwie Malmsteen's Rising Force in 1984 and making everyone's head explode. My favorite of all the shredders, The Swedish King of Neoclassical Guitar is still touring and making records including 2002's "Attack!!" Hell, I'm going to go see him on the G3 tour in a month or so. The Yngwie Malmsteen website has a ton of cool features, especially the ones that let you get to know him better. I suggest starting with the Ask Yngwie! section. Also in 2002, Yngwie had and incident aboard an airplane where he got in an, uh, altercation with a woman who dumped water on him for talking shit about homosexuals. Whoops.

Even though the Ultimate Warrior's popularity kind of straddled the late '80s and the early '90s, things that did that are still allowed on Night of the Living '80s as long as they have an '80s sensibility. Since the Ultimate Warrior's gimmick of a slow vitality drop followed by an explosive burst of energy and rage mirrored the behavior of a cokehead, he's '80s. Didn't the first Ultimate Warrior die? NO! I've been hearing that shit since 1992 and it's still not true! There has only been one Ultimate Warrior. He was in and out of the WWF for a few years in the early '90s, then re-emerged in WCW in 1998. That's when we discovered that Warrior might be going crazy. His statements about the One Warrior Nation seemed nonsensical and he transported himself using the time-honored-but-only-borderline-sane puffs of smoke system. It was much more exciting when Warrior blasted to the ring at top speed to his chugging theme song in the '80s. What's the Ultimate Warrior up to today? You can visit his personal website and judge for yourself. He will even make you a customized workout cassette for $150.

I don't know about you, but I always flipped when the Ultimate Warrior came out.

The Skoal Bandit. When I dip, I usually go for Bandits because they are less messy.

Harry Gant was the first name that I could think of when the notion of '80s NASCAR was hinted at. I guess '80s NASCAR commentators Brock Yates, David Hobbs and that brown-haired guy beat his name into my skull as a tyke. The fact that he was the first IROC champion to drive an IROC probably didn't hurt, either. Harry retired from racing in 1994, after years in the Skoal dip car. Now, he rides his motorcycle all day and gets paid to show up to whatever NASCAR events he chooses. That must be shitty. I bet he gets all the free dip that he wants, as well.

Max Wright played Willie Tanner, the dad on ALF. ALF was sort of a dumb show, actually, because it was a family sitcom. There aren't very many good family sitcoms. I'm going to talk about it anyway because Max Wright is interesting. Max has aged fairly poorly, and here's why: a few years back while working on The Norm Show, Max made the cover of the National Enquirer. Cover, page #1, page #2. It takes a special kind of crackhead to videotape the proceedings. He also recently got another DUI. Things appear to be going really well for him.

They're making another movie about John Holmes. Boogie Nights was done back in the late '90s and was only loosely based on his life, since Mark Wahlberg only plays characters that are loosely based on people from small towns in Ohio that make it to the big time (see Rock Star as well) because the studio doesn't want to give money to the people involved (Holmes' widow, Judas Priest, Ripper). John Holmes has been dead since 1988 of course, but how can we forget about America's coolest porn star? Wonderland is about Johnny Wadd's involvement in some nasty cocaine-related murders in SoCal back in '81. Val Kilmer has taken over the role of "The World's Biggest Porn Star/Dopenose" while Lisa Kudrow plays his wife Sharon. Ozzy: "Sharon, Sharon, where's me bloody corkscrew?" Sharon: "Ozzy, I hid it because you aren't supposed to be in the booze. You're sober now." Ozzy: "I... I... I... I'm only sober because I don't 'ave a fucking corkscrew!" Sharon: "Ozzy, 'I,I,I' (actually just "I", but it goes "I,I,I", OK?) was a song from the 'Dehumanizer' album. Dio sang on it. You don't want to sing a Dio/Sabbath song, do you?" Ozzy: "Dammit, Sharon, where's the corkscrew?" Oops, wrong Sharon. I am allowed to talk like Ozzy because I sing in a Sabbath cover band. You don't. Now would be a good time to remind you that John Holmes was from my hometown back in Ohio. The new movie comes out next month. I'll be there.