Tonight VH1 Classic will air the premiere episode of season nine of 'That Metal Show.' To kick off the new slew of episodes host Eddie Trunk scored an interview with Guns N' Roses frontman Axl Rose and lead guitarist Dj Ashba. It's a huge exclusive for the program and its network and a testament to the show's growing success. But Trunk's journey to cable ratings gold wasn't always that easy.

"It was a long plight for me to get this show on the air in the first place. I've worked for VH1 Classic going on 10 years now and I was always pushing the people that previously ran it to do something like 'That Metal Show.' My campaigning went on for years.

"The fact that the show is a success is proof that people wanted to see something like this. It's taken a lot of hard work from me, my co-hosts, and the network level, to get everything to work. I think everyone bring something a bit different to the table," Trunk says.

"I think the biggest key to the show being as popular as it has become is that we've managed to reach beyond just the hardcore music fan. Look, that's certainly the target and we expect people that love bands like UFO and Iron Maiden to watch the show, but it's been much more than that. The biggest compliments I've heard about 'That Metal Show' are the ones from people that say that they don't even listen to this kind of music, but we love watching the show. When I started hearing that kind of stuff is when I knew we were onto something."

Watch 'That Metal Show Guns N' Roses Teaser' Video


The interplay between Trunk and his co-hosts – comedians Jim Florentine and Don Jaimeson – is one of the most important factors of 'That Metal Show' and its success. "There's nothing calculated about our relationship with each other. What you see on television is what you get in real life. We've been friends for years before the show even existed. That's why we can bust each other's chops and get away with it.

"It's also cool because we're huge fans of this music. We don't sit there and read artist bios before we have guests come in. We know this stuff. I used to have Don and Jim on my radio show in New York. When we started 'That Metal Show,' I told them to act the same way on the TV set as they did on the radio show. I wanted them to be themselves and let things fly."

Besides their interesting array of guests, one of the most popular segments on 'That Metal Show' is 'Stump the Trunk.' If you haven't seen the show already, it's when members of the studio audience get a chance to win a prize if they can stump Trunk on a metal trivia question.

"That started on my buddy Jim Breuer's radio show. He was amazed that I knew all of this stuff. Anyway, when I would guest on his show, he would have callers try and get me with these obscure trivia questions. It's a lot of fun to do it on the show now and our viewers really seem to like it too."

'That Metal Show' premieres tonight, 11/11/11 at 11:00PM EST/PST on VH1 Classic.

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