Bam! Non-Factor! AEW All In 2026 Review

Sep 11, 2026 ~ Lex Leeson ~ Leave a comment

For years, and possibly to this day, the muscle memory answer to the question of the greatest wrestling PPV of all time would be Wrestlemania 17. The epic denouement of the Attitude Era! Austin’s heel turn! TLC II! Shane’s Coast to Coast! “You think your special… you do… I can see it in your eeeeeeeeeyes…”.Peak fake fighting perfection!

…in retrospect, of course. Mania 17 in 2001 might not just be the greatest wrestling show of all time, but the greatest example of “Fuck it, it’ll be good on the night, I guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯” in wrestling history. Because 25 years later we can conveniently forget that the build to that historic 2001 show was pretty much dogshit.

That historic TLC II match was just the WWF throwing their hands up and thinking they may as well do the exact same match they did at Summerslam 2000, because the sweaty marks seemed to enjoy that. The Shane v Vince McMahon match is one of the greatest examples of Sports Entertainment soap opera to have ever been sweated out, but it all stems from a questionable handing of the WCW purchase in storyline that would eventually lead to the biggest example of money left on a table that you would later take a big curly dump on and set fire to in wrestling history. HHH v Undertaker was an incredible match, but only happened because the company had nothing for either star to do; the great Chris Jericho and William Regal opener was built by having Jericho piss in Regal’s tea (no, honestly); and the incredible match between Kurt Angle and Chris Benoit – two of the greatest workers of that or any era – was announced the week before the show. And that historic Austin v Rock II was a complete shitshow. Remembered now as the storyline peak of their legendary rivalry and historical second match in their Mania trilogy (though not as good as their Mania 19 match #FightMe), WWF at the time instead chose to focus the feud on Stone Cold’s wife Debra becoming the Rock’s manager, because this was an era when WWF couldn’t conceive of any major wrestling angle not involving Jerry Springer level domestic nonsense. And, to ensure the challenger looked as strong as possible going into the match, they decided to have him lose to HHH on the PPV a month before! People now like to remember the story behind the match being how Austin was so desperate to get his hands on Rock’s title that he was willing to win by any means possible, but that whole idea was only introduced in a sit down interview with Austin, Rock and JR, on the Smackdown nine days before the show. It was also during this interview that Austin said the immortal words “Let’s just go ahead and take Debra out of the equation. BAM! She’s a non-factor…”

It’ll be alright on the night…

i am going somewhere with this

The Legit Bosses:136 Best Tracks of 2018

Jan 6, 2019Sep 28, 2019 ~ Lex Leeson ~ 9 Comments

This is officially the end of 2018! And it’s only the 5th January [EDIT: Still only the 6th!]! Although there’s freaking one hundred and thirty six tracks to get through, so this may well take until mid May! Happy Cinco de Mayo! No time to talk! A shit load of songs to get through!!

136 Candace: Rewind

Gorgeous, innit?

135 Epic Reflexes: Cha Cha

While Z-Tape’s ‘Spring’ collection was veritably busting at the seems with Legit Bosses, as you’ll soon see, this is the only similarly legitimate position of authority from their ‘Summer’ collection. They’re all still great though, as is the Epic Reflexes’s album ‘ChaChaChinatown‘.

134 The Carters: Apeshit

I had a lot of problems with ‘Everything is Love’, the surprising debut release from Beyonce and Jay-Z. Part of the reason I struggled with it was that I wasn’t sure how canonical it is. Like, is this it, Bee? Is this underwhelming collection of occasionally very entertaining rap boasts officially your actual follow-up to one of the most acclaimed albums of the 21st century? It’s an album about how two very rich people love each other but probably love their money more, that includes the line “My grandchildren’s grandchildren already rich” which, despite Kanye’s crisis of publicity, is by far the line from 2018 that Donald Trump is most likely to high five in a men’s locker room. Also, there’s a moment on the opening track where Mr Carter drawls out “Let it breaaaathe, let it breaaaathe” like JB Rockefeller basking in the glory of a fart he’d just released under the bedsheets, which marks the first time in more than two decades that I’ve thought to myself that I don’t think I really like Jay-Z. However, he often wins me back with the later claim that he’s “Good on any MLK boulevard”. This song’s pretty great though

Fucking hell, Jay, that haircut though… One hundred and thirty three more after the jump!

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5 Mitski: Be the Cowboy

Jan 1, 2019 ~ Lex Leeson ~ 3 Comments

I normally leave this until the end, but Mitski’s live performance is central to this piece, so:

I really liked Mitski’s last album, even if as you can see my review was mainly made up of me bemoaning the fact that I hadn’t afforded it the time it obviously deserved and it was a far better album than its lowly placing suggested. Then I started talking about the person who murdered Jo Cox, because I’ve always found it difficult to concentrate on one thing and I’d probably read a bit about Mr. Death To Traitors, Freedom For Britain recently and I can’t help myself jabbering on sometimes and it’s getting cold but I don’t want to turn my heater on and my favourite theme song at the moment is probably Alaister Black‘s but I’m growing to love Tomasso Ciampa‘s and oh look, is that a squirrel? I went to see her at Gorilla mainly down to the fact I fancied going to a gig and she was there. I even shamefully put off buying her album until just before the gig, waiting for it to appear on torrent sites. I did buy it eventually, Ms Miyawaki, don’t worry, I just didn’t consider owning it as being that essential. Then. I saw her.

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