Why didn't they manage to 'make it'?

A lot of things helped.

The fact of the matter is, they aren't THAT good. They were original, they had energy, Robb is a heck of a drummer and they had a few solid songs. But no consistency. Listen to their albums, even the best have a few good songs and a lot of filler. That's common in music, its not an end all but every album can't be like that. You have to every few albums or so really knock it out of the park or people simply start to lose interest.

Not metal but look at the Killers. A few years ago, they were on top of the world. Their first album was a huge hit. Critics loved it, it sold like crazy. It had a bunch of hit singles and the music was good. Almost every song on that album was actually good. Its rare and that's why it did well. Are they incredibly talented? No, they're solid. But they hit that CD out of the park. But it won't carry them forever. Their last 2 CDs have stunk. Critics hated them, they didn't sell that well, they had maybe 1 hit single off the 2nd and I'm not sure they've had any off the newest one. If they don't have another really good album soon, they're going to be done.

That's what happened to Anvil. A big hit followed by disappointment after disappointment. They've released 13 albums. NO ONE has heard any of them after the first 3. People stopped caring. Insane talent succeeds. I'm talking INSANE level. You really can't screw it up. Poor management? Better management will beg to work with you and you'll put them behind you. Poor sound quality? A record label will rerecord the whole thing if they have to. Weak songs on a CD? No big deal, your pure talent elevates the thing to still be solid.

But if you're a little lower in talent, if you're pretty good, you have some talent, but you aren't out of this world? Things have to fall right. You need to be well managed. Even as an indie band, you have to put the right people around you. You have to write good songs consistently, or at least songs people want to hear. A lot has to go right frankly.

Are they going to get another chance at 50? Probably not. I've heard This is Thirteen, its not bad. Decent album. I'm not doing back flips, but its better than most of what they've made in a long time. This documentary is giving them some exposure though there is a limit to what audience such a movie will reach. It has gotten them in front of some major audiences in the US for the first time in a LONG time. They aren't going to be mega famous, but they could use this to establish a solid following and make a good living off of it, sell albums and be set for however long they decide to keep going. But their margin for error is actually smaller than it was in the early 80s. They still aren't THAT good. They're now 50 and that limits the appeal in itself frankly. Lips still ain't pretty and they still haven't shown they can write more than solid songs. They need good management, they need to come up with some good songs, and they need a bit of luck. I wish them well. They are talented, if not insanely so, and they seem like a good group of guys.

It was probably because they were on a lousy record label. I think Lars Ulrich may have mentioned that.

Because they're just annoying speed metal no talent hacks and suck maybe?



**Skin that Smokewagon and see what happens!** Tombstone

Their agent is sh*t and frontman doesn't have the charisma of a frontman. Also Lips' voice sucks like someone else said before. When they were making vocals for their 13th album, I was mildly embarrassed for him.

I agree with lucius and others: they're not that good. They have good chops, but good chops are a dime a dozen in metal. You can go into any club on a saturday night with 50 people and you have a decent chance of seeing players with good chops. Lips has a LOUSY voice. When they meet with that one record guy, the one with the blue shirt, there's a good riff for the first 10 secs, than Lips starts singing, and you can see all the enthusiasm go out of the guy's face. He tries to be nice, but you can tell he wants no part of the band, and probably wouldn't if they were in their 20s.
If a guy wants to play because he loves to play, hey, god bless. But Lips' delusions of grandeur are...pretty infuriating. You are a balding, stringy haired, unnatractive middle age man with a crappy voice, no charisma, writing infantile songs with no hooks. Do it if you love it, but don't flog us with your tales of bad luck and unappreciated greatness. I could throw a rock in any city and hit 100 better bands on any weekend, of any age, playing any style. I looked them up on wikipedia after I saw the movie and found myself actually hoping they didnt meet with success after the movie.
Sorry...I don't tend toward snarkiness with my imdb posts, but Anvil sucks. Like I said, I respect their chops, and I found Rob to be quite likeable. But Lips...I wanted to apologize to his friends and family for having to put up with him all these years.

They weren't really that good or anywhere near as influential as the movie made them out to be. Mike Scalzi(singer/guitarist of the underground metal band Slough Feg) said it best in this interview:

Adam: When you talk about that desperation and your life depending on it, that reminds me of something else I wanted to talk to you about. Earlier this year, I interviewed Anvil.

Mike: Oh my God, yeah.

Adam: It was an interesting interview.

Mike: Pretty desperate guys, huh?

Adam: In the interview they seemed frustrated, but they just seemed angry at the world for not succeeding.

Mike: Even now?

Adam: Even now, yes...even after the film.

Mike: That's ridiculous. They have nothing to be *beep* angry about at this point.

Adam: I agree. I asked them "what do you want to do left in your career?" And they said "Oh I'd like to sellout some stadiums," their drummer said.

Mike: That's ridiculous. That's...delusional.

Adam: I agree. It's completely delusional. Yeah, delusional enough to think that their music was good enough to be the best band in the world.

Mike: That's the *beep* thing, dude. That's the truth. I don't give a *beep* I'll say it. They're not that good.

Adam: Yeah, I agree.

Mike: They're just. I mean, you've heard Anvil. I've heard Anvil. I've heard them for years and years now. I've played with them live a couple of times, and I can't remember...Okay, out of the whole catalog of songs that I have heard, I remember one thing (sings) "Metal on Metal." Period. I don't remember what the riff sounds like. I don't remember what the lyrics are. I've heard all their *beep* I remember one *beep* thing: "Metal on Metal" repeated a couple of times. They don't have any good songs. They don't have any memorable songs.

Adam: They had fifteen albums that sound exactly the same. It's very basic heavy metal.

Mike: But it's not that good. I respect them for what they've done. I've met them. They're really nice. In fact ten years ago, we played a show with them. There were about twenty-five people there when we played. Immediately after the show ended, Robb started kicking Lips in the back drunk and they got into a fight with each other in the backstage area. They're really like that. It's not an act. They're just *beep* up. But I mean the movie's great. They're really cool. I still like their style a lot. But they got lucky. Someone made a movie about them.

Adam: Yeah, and I remember walking out of the theater. I was the only metalhead there and telling people "you know that could've been made about one hundred other bands."

Mike: Yeah, no *beep* People don't realize that. You're right.

Adam: No one realizes that they were the handpicked band.

Mike: People who are not into metal...I mean someone said that to me the other day. I was with a bunch of people eating dinner. I was with a friend of mine, and I was talking about this old venue and I said that we played there with Anvil. Yeah, we've played there a bunch of times, and with Anvil once. She was like "I can't believe you guys played with Anvil." I said "Why not? Anvil was around before that movie for twenty years."

Adam: More than that, twenty-eight years.

Mike: And they were just like our band. It was just *beep* shows, and no one came to see them. People just don't realize it. I mean, watching that movie was really hard for me in a way, because I saw the years that I went through. Anvil, of all people! After all those years, we've learned more than Anvil did about what to do and what not to do, and they're still totally deluded. I mean, their *beep* jobs...

Adam: They quit their jobs. That's what they told me. They quit their jobs to pursue Anvil because they thought the film would provide permanent lucrativity. They're still angry for the twenty-five years of obscurity. Now they think that this documentary will provide them with financial success for the rest of their lives, which is incredibly delusional.

Mike: But the question is: has it provided that? Is it providing that?

Adam: I think it did for about six months.

Mike: Oh so that was back then when you talked to them?

Adam: It was right on the heels of success of the film, and they had a big tour that VH1 was sponsoring.

Mike: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Adam: And they had about six months of not just success in metal, but fame.

Mike: Yeah I know.

Mike: I saw Lips about six months ago standing outside of Amoeba records in San Francisco. He was talking on the phone to somebody for a long time, and I just kept waiting out there like "I'm gonna say 'hi.'" He was talking on the phone so long and I didn't want to interrupt him, so I just went the other way. Not sure he would've recognized me. My hair is different. I mean, he might've or he might not have. But it would be funny if he didn't, because it'd be just like Michael Schenker in the movie when he's like "who are you?" But I was gonna say "Hey man. Good job." But that's the thing man, you can get like that...or honestly, I respect them for what they've done. I really do. I really feel kindred with them in that sort of way. Here's my thought on that, this could be about my band. It could be about a hundred bands. Right?

Adam: Yeah.

Mike: There's one band particularly it should be about. This movie should be about Brocas Helm.

Adam: Huh. Okay.

Mike: Brocas Helm was the same age as Anvil. They've gone through all the same *beep* They're ten times better. They're more interesting people, for sure. Even though Anvil are pretty interesting people. And, the guys in Brocas Helm, just like the guys in Slough Feg, and the guys in Manilla Road and a lot of other bands, they were wise enough to get their *beep* together and get some real jobs and make some real money. They're like "I've gotta get into the electricians union. I've gotta become a computer technician. I've gotta become a mechanic. I've gotta support my family. I can't just keep going on in a *beep* whatever. Not that I'm against doing that. Anvil never really seemed to get it together that much. I freaked out when I was 31 years old. I completely freaked out because I'd been doing this band for all this time. It was after Traveller. Traveller wasn't out yet, but we'd recorded it. I was driving across the country with my girlfriend at the time, and we ended up in Los Angeles. I was outside of my environment. I was outside of Hammers of Misfortune and Slough Feg, and the people I've associated with. "I'm nothing. I'm not some heavy metal rock star. People know who I am in Germany. Big *beep* deal. I'm just a jackass" So I kinda freaked out. We ended up coming back to San Francisco and I ended up going back to school, you know getting a bachelor's degree and getting a master's degree and going on to teach philosophy because I felt just totally useless. That's just real life. I mean, that's great, but you don't want to be fifty years old and delivering food for a catering company. I mean, that's fine if you want to do it. But every day of my life I wanted to mean something more than some gut who "oh yeah, every six months or so I go to Europe or wherever and people love me and tell me how great I am and then I go back to working in a warehouse or something."

Adam: So you wanted to contribute more beyond your music. Because your music, as great as it is, was limited in its contribution.

Mike: Yeah yeah. But not just that, that I'm contributing, but that I'm enjoying my life. Before that, I hated my life. I worked in a dry cleaner. I worked in a warehouse. I did these things. Every day of my life was *beep* I didn't like what I was doing that much, or at all. I felt like I had more to give. I can do more than this. My dad used to say...I was lucky in a way because my dad had a very tough kind of approach to this. He wasn't just my dad. My dad would say to me every once in a while "You know you're a lot more than just a rock musician. You can do whatever you want. You can go to school. You're good at it. Or you could do something else, some other sort of entertainment. Go be an actor. Go back to school. Study philosophy." I mean, I learned that from living life. But also, honestly, I learned it from my dad. He told me "Your life's gonna be *beep* every day, working in a factory or something, and then people are gonna tell you that you're great for a month out of the year? What kind of life is that?"

Adam: Yeah.

Mike: So my dad gave me an attitude, but he's right! You know?

Adam: He is.

Mike: I didn't need him to tell me that to think about it, but he reinforced it. Eventually I went back to school. Maybe the guys in Anvil didn't have a dad like that. You know what I mean?

Adam: (laughs)

Mike: Well seriously. Let's face the *beep* facts. Not everyone gets the motivation they need from Mr. Rogers. That's what he's there for, but he doesn't provide the emotional motivation and that sort.

Adam: People need a reality check every once in a while.

Mike: Yeah yeah. I was doing it myself. But I had my *beep* dad, this really old guy just going "Ah, you gotta get it together." He'd say it over and over. The point is, I just didn't want to live that life, and a lot of metal guys do that, and God bless them for doing it. They work construction or they work this or that. If they like it fine. Construction is fine, but some guys just have their band and that's their identity, and then they just go from one really *beep* job to another. You know they'll drive a cab for a while and they don't like it much. It's all about the band. That's great, but the band aint gonna fill up your life. It's not about money. It wasn't about money for me. It was about having something every day in your life where you get the same sort of inspiration or motivation from. Like teaching philosophy, it's like playing a show every day.

They missed their window.

I used to listen to a lot of Anvil, and what always held them back a little for me was a bit too much goofiness. I got Metal On Metal when it came out and liked it a lot (although now I think the lyrics to "Metal On Metal" are hilarious, but maybe the most "metal" metal song outside of "Rapid Fire" by Judas Priest or "Powerdrive" by Venom, which is SO METAL that Cronos is yelling at the rest of the band to play faster even during the last notes). But the albums that came after had sillier and sillier songs. "Butter Bust Jerky" and "Toe Jam" were pretty embarrassing, and then there were songs about hockey and whatever.

With other bands getting more serious at the time (Metallica were doing songs about Hemmingway novels and Lovecraft, Iron Maiden were covering history and Coleridge poems, and Slayer were taking ya straight to Hell), Anvil just seemed cartoonish. They were still likeable, but I got less enthusiastic about their music and my music-buying dollars started going to less-goofy bands instead. (Which may just be me -- I had the same problem with Anthrax). But, I think that's at least one factor that kept Anvil from being bigger than they are. They have great musical skill, but they're a bit on the dumb side. I still like 'em and think of them affectionately, but I can understand why they're not one of the heavyweights.