Favorite Memories From MTV’s Headbanger’s Ball

[@tapanim6576]

Those were the glory days when MTV actually showed music. 🤘😎🤘

[@thatdevilmusic6670]

Recording videos on VHS just like recording songs from the radio. I still have my VHS tapes with those videos :)

[@BrendonSnyder]

I forgot about that! Yes, me too! I’ve still got my tapes of fave videos too. Of course now we have KZbin to see it all.

[@kennethhardbargeriii2798]

I remember doing that when my dad got cable and set me up in my room with vcr with the mtv channel so I can watch it in my room.

[@KWSfan2000]

Back when MTV actually played music videos and no ridiculous reality shows.

[@angelotig]

💯 💯 👍

[@michellerosebrown]

My generation had VH1 That Metal Show but MTV’s Headbangers Ball is a classic. I’ve seen and recorded clips of the show and I love it. 🤘🏾☠️🤘🏾

[@arturodouglas2484]

I grew up in Australia and in the late 80s we only had MTV on for 2 to 3 hrs on Friday and Saturday nights when I'd sit there with my hand on the record button for the vcr just hoping for some metal which was rare but I knew of Headbangers Ball and thought how amazing it would've been to have access to that show. Keep rockin' Brendon

[@MetalGreggNY75]

My friends and I would come over drink beer play crazy 8s eating pizza & junk food & watching Headbangers Ball. Those were kick ass times.

[@lisathurston8265]

Headbangers ball, Beavis and butthead was my jam in the 80's and 90's. I miss this so much. I loved to see the antics the bands did on the show. it was fun to see them being goofy at the same time listening and watching music videos. Those days long gone with YT keeping the music going now. Sad day not able to stay up late when the ball got tore down. Shame on MTV for letting the metal community down.

[@PRSchilling1]

Head Bangers Ball was great, as was 120 Minutes! I miss that version of MTV!

[@BrendonSnyder]

I too liked 120 minutes. Since that show existed it’s why I was always so pissed that they added the Alt. Rock to Headbanger’s Ball. Both are great but they should have kept the two separate.

[@kennethhardbargeriii2798]

My every Saturday night. I would go to my grandparents house to go in their tv 📺 room. To watch it .that show got me into so many bands.

[@OctoberLibrary]

Man, I really miss the 80s and 90s, two eras I wish we could get again. Such fun times back than.

[@mikaelbodin9178]

Great memories. Here in Europe the show was hosted by Vanessa Warwick. Since my family didn't have cable TV I had to bike over to a friend to watch it. It was on Sunday nights as I remember.

[@BrendonSnyder]

Yeah initially I didn’t have the MTV channel either and had to go to a friend’s place to watch as well. But then we moved and the new place had it. I was more stoked about that than the pool our house came with haha 😂

[@mikaelbodin9178]

@@BrendonSnyder Such an impact MTV had during those years. 😅

[@MetalGreggNY75]

I remember Poison doing Unskinny Bop, GNR You Could Be Mine, Motorhead releasing Hellraiser, seeing Doro doing Unholy Love….all of those memories, Brendon you mentioned I remember as well. Lonn Friend was/is cool as ever.

[@petebrown3715]

I remember the 89 Headbangers Ball tour with Anthrax, Exodus and Helloween. Exodus really kicked ass that night at the notorious Aargon Brawlroom in Chicago 🤘🤘 Good times and friendly violent fun. We all looked forward to Headbagers Ball every Saturday night.

[@KennyBrooks-u1b]

I really got into Y&T after seeing the video for “Don’t Stop Runnin’” on Head Bangers Ball. Still listen to them today.

[@jacobjimmie7500]

For me, the alice in chains guest episodes were the most memorable. Having all this stuff on youtube now is the best 👌.

[@d.christophertatum2936]

My favorite memory of the Ball involves Dream Theater. I had stumbled across “Images and Words” at a record store, but thought it had been misplaced in the metal section. I liked the cover but it looked like no metal album I’d ever seen. A couple of weeks later, I saw the video for “Pull Me Under.” I went back to the store the next day and bought the album. I also credit the Ball for exposing me to two of my favorite bands - Type O Negative and White Zombie. White Zombie was so weird that they were “my” band, I never believed that they would cross over to the mainstream. The show jumped the shark for me when they kept playing “No Rain” by Blind Melon. Lonn Friend also edited a couple of horror fiction anthologies back in the day.

[@craigforrester9359]

Awesome I was more part of the Vanessa Warwick days in England. We also had Raw Power TV which used to be on at 3am on Wednesday nights I think?? Good memories of rushing home from school to watch it

[@mikecamilli1047]

Had 2 full 90 minutes each VHS tapes of their music videos! Awesome!

[@christopherbarker1048]

I had a channel called MTV Classics and on Saturday nights they'd play Metal Mayhem for 3hrs.

[@TheDravensixx]

I still have a tote full of vhs tapes of headbangers ball, manage to transfer some to DVD but didn’t even make a dent in the stack lol

[@Hwy13La]

Motley was coming out of the Rehabs and had been working Feelgood in Vancouver . Tommy and Nikki come out with the Sleeved Tattoos (one arm each to start) . It was their first show clean and sober from the hard years of TOP and Girls touring , with the Nikki OD deal . The footage of Sambora and the guys jamming on the plane with an acoustic guitar sticks with me ..

[@MeToo-e4m]

How about a segment on METAL EDGE magazine? That was my music bible.

[@markcloer2274]

Hell yeah, great mag in its day. Still like thumbing thru my old issues.

[@ElizabethGillis-Bennett-ot6rj]

Thats were i would get tour dates

[@MetalGreggNY75]

One of my favorite segments on Headbangers Ball was when Alice In Chains at the waterpark. I loved Headbangers Ball even w/ Adam Curry & Riki Rachtman. I remember when Guns N Roses trashed the set when Appetite was released. Yes, The tour segments were awesome.

[@markcloer2274]

My ritual was to record it every Saturday night and watch it after church on Sunday. Episodes that stand out to me were when Iommi and Cozy hosted it when "Headless Cross" came out, and the episode when Mustaine was hosting and announced that Stryper had turned "anti-Christian" when "Against The Law" came out. Of course they were not "anti-Christian", just exploring their secular side. BTW, I saw Rachtman at a Black Label concert in Charlotte NC (where he lives now) a few years ago. He was coming out of the pisser as I was going in.

[@dshafterh3897]

I had to rewatch it twice but you definitely said the Unskinny Bop video was "the Bee's Knees" , never stop being you.

[@jorgen1032]

Sepultura Chaos A.D was my first CD.

[@Hicks-g1m]

I loved it when Damage Plan was on their RIP Dimebag Darell Abbot and Vinnie Paul Abbot

[@BrendonSnyder]

Must have been in Europe because the US edition ended while Pantera was still together and before Damageplan formed. But I do have good memories of seeing Pantera on Headbanger’s Ball.

[@johnnycashlives316]

Best video!!!!

[@dimitriosmetalos]

The last ever Headbangers Ball was aired by MTV GREECE few years ago.

[@BrendonSnyder]

As I said it’s still online.

[@nickthompson4978]

Headbangers ball came on mtv at around 11 pm on Saturday nights they played videos like Metallica enter sandman and megadeath sweating bullets what an awesome show with Epicly cool music do know if headbangers ball is on dvd or blu-ray

[@GoNorthDesign]

I just watched the episode from April 1989 when Great White had an album release party for "...Twice Shy", and it was a real *PARTY*! Members of Whitesnake, GNR, Def Leppard, etc. were at the party; even Bonnie Raitt (who was on the same record label as GW) was there.

[@cjchilvers]

Fun fact: VJ #2 Adam Curry went on to invent podcasting with Dave Winer, working with Apple to create their implementation too, so he did pretty well after Headbangers Ball.

[@horrorcinema5130]

Brendon remember a band called Teeze? They had a 1985 album that is super hard to find. They had the song called "Leave Me To Burn." You can search it on KZbin.

[@jasonstatham3703]

🤘😎🤘🎸🔥🎧

[@Duqsteel1115]

I started watching HBB during the Adam Curry era and as I thought the show was awesome, I had trouble accepting him as a host for a “Heavy Metal” show. Rikki Rachtman was a huge improvement, but I think I enjoyed the shows that had guest hosts the best. Side note: We saw GNR open for Cheap Trick in 86 at a dive Bar/club in Long Beach, CA. I never heard of GNR before that show. About a month after that show, I saw Welcome To The Jungle on HBB and I went nuts. I actually yelled, “That’s the band I just saw at Fenders Ballroom!!”😂

[@Lesfrye]

Brendon do you still watch MTV Classic? (Specifically Metal Mania on Friday nights)… I do and I really love that MTV Classic has a more diverse collection of videos that they show than when VH1 Classic had the channel.

[@jamesbrown9910]

I love the metal show when it come on

[@BrendonSnyder]

No I got rid of cable about 4 years ago. Can’t stand the commercials. That said when I did and I watched those shows they played essentially the same videos all the time and never any rare or deep cuts. I got bored very quickly with those shows. Plus simply not long enough.

[@Lesfrye]

I get it on KZbin TV.. and YES it was often the same videos every week, but since rebranding from VH1 classic to MTV Classic they have done a much better job of having a better rotation… You not get some videos from Danger Danger, Krokus, WASP, so they have done a much better job of showing more than just Round & Round and Cum On Feel The Noize.. haha Anyway Thanks for replying to me!

[@livonian]

Don't remember the MTV Europe version ever showing grunge, punk or alernative music videos. There was a different show for that which was aired just before Headbangers Ball.

[@BrendonSnyder]

That’s probably why the European edition of the show aired for 5 years after the US edition of the show ended.

[@smallspacearcade8158]

Never really watched much MTV. Im a fan of Radio.....though i do appreciate a good music video. 😁

[@Skycladatdusk78]

I read that the ratings were strong for it at the time it got cancelled, they took it off because at the time they were moving away from heavier rock and metal and moved more towards hip hop and r & b, which was dumb since metal made that channel. Eventually they turned their back on all music. Also do you remember in February 95 right after Headbanger's Ball ended it's replacement was a show called SuperRock, it last for like 3 episodes then just went away.

[@stephenfeltner3258]

I was fortunate enough to live in England and Germany during the late 80s and have fond memories of European HBB. They played way more actual heavy metal rhan the American counterpart. I remember a VHS tape being traded around with my friends with videoes taped from Euro HBB with King Diamond, Death Angel, Overkill, Nuclear Assault , Testament, Anthrax, ect. This was like the bible for me in 1988! 😂 When I moved back to the states in 1990 the glam metal movement was nearing its peak, and the daily programming of MTV included all the usual suspects like Poison, Warrant, Crue,Aerosmith , Bon Jovi, Scorpions , ect. The problem was that HBB was playing mostly the same videos. They only played actual metal during the Triple Thrash Threat. This was lame , since I would have rather had 2 hours of that then sit through another watch of Unskinny Bop. Unfortunately, this trend kept going, with grunge replacing glam (yawn) and instead of Tease Me, Please Me/ Up All Night/Do Me Good it was Teen Spirit/Evenflow/Outshined a few years later. All of it good music. Very little of it metal. Zero of it anyrhing you could headbang to. Like many of you I was one of the faithful that stayed up late to catch some good music, and have some great memories of HBB. I will always be glad it existed, but damn, I always just wated more METAL!!😂🤘🤘

[@robertforet4477]

How old is the headbanger shirt you are wearing?

[@johnnycashlives316]

It was 10-2????

[@johnnycashlives316]

Biohazard!!!!!!!

[@miketheyunggod2534]

Riki Rachtman was the boss.

[@RickroxxUsa]

When Motley Crue hosted when Dr Feelgood came out in ‘89. Skid Row whenever they hosted. I liked Adam Curry. Rikki was cool but I laughed when he would chase every trend . I had hair down to my ass like Sebastian Bach at 15 in ‘92 and I was trying to keep the flag of metal flying. Kurt making a mockery of the “macho” side of metal as he explained later is just another reason why I despised Nirvana and Pearl Jam. The sky diving episode with Megadeth during Rust In Peace was cool. That was filmed out in Perris, Ca about 20 minutes from where I grew up. I have a ton of vhs tapes of Headbangers Ball from ‘88-‘94. One of my favorites was from ‘90, interviews with Stephen Pearcy (Detonator album release) and when Great White was at The Rainbow Bar and Grill in ‘89 (Twice Shy release). My mom dated Lenny Wolfe from Kingdom Come and her girlfriend was dating Kelly Nichols from La Guns at the time who knew the girl in the beginning of the Don Dokken video for “Mirror Mirror”. Great time period ! Lonn Friend from RIP Magazine !

[@Skycladatdusk78]

Yeah Rikki had a different hairstyle and clothing style each year depending what the trend was at the time 😅😅

[@vistalite]

I don’t remember if the “Live from The Ritz” series was a part of Headbanger’s Ball, but my friend and I video recorded the Guns n’ Roses and Great White broadcasts the Saturday nights each debuted. I had already been “into” GnR prior to the release of Appetite since I already picked up “Live Like a S…” in March of ‘87. To me, this show is where GnR were at their best. Unfortunately, the broadcast included those awful censor beeps throughout the performance.