Lords of Pain, Podnasty, and a young wrestling fan.
Ten years ago to the… year, one of my friends first introduced me to dirtsheets. We were in a computer lab at school waiting for a class to start when I saw him looking at Lords of Pain and I was BLOWN AWAY. I had just gotten into wrestling the previous fall, so I wasn’t all that knowledgable about the way the business worked. I know some would say that I still don’t know how it works, but I mean back then I didn’t know a push from a burial, a spotfest from a botched spot. I was completely new to it and I was in awe at how much was on Lords of Pain that detailed exactly how things were going to go down.
Eddie challenging Batista for his World Title? They called it way in advance. Dudley Boyz drama? They had the inside scoop. Again, this was before I knew that a dozen other websites would do it too, and WAY before backstage gossip broke on Twitter before any website- all I knew is that this had opened up a whole new way for me to enjoy wrestling. While I’ll occasionally stray to other dirtsheets to read reviews, the first website I check every day (many, many, times a day) is Lords of Pain.
Anyway, I tell you all that to tell you this: A week ago Lords of Pain posted an interview with Kevin Owens by Alfred “Big Nasty” Konuwa on his Podnasty podcast. Why did this matter to me (other than it being a really good interview)? Because, as you may have guessed, he commissioned me to do the logo for his podcast, so it was featured in the article. It felt pretty cool to see my art up on the website that really triggered my interest in the backstage workings of wrestling. I’ve seen people post links to my comics in the comments before, and I’ve had sites offer to put my comic on them for “exposure”, but to see this naturally occur on there was pretty cool. It makes me wonder if my old buddy Mario, who I lost touch with years ago, was looking at that picture thinking, “Wow, that’s a lot of text in that image!”
I know what you’re thinking. Big deal, Podnasty submitted the interview. Big deal, he could’ve commissioned anyone to do his logo. Big deal, Rob Schamburger’s art is on there like, ALL the damn time, and that one guy who did the pencil sketch of AJ and Punk sleeping together where she tells him to call her Lita got on there and that was probably the first comic he ever drew. Well, it is a big deal. To ten-years-ago me who gazed starry-eyed at rumors about John Cena not actually being stabbed by Carlito’s bodyguard, Jesus. It is to me.