The day Max was released from the hospital with a new knee.

Rehab starting. Exercises underway. And even with the fresh pain of surgery, Max says it still doesn’t compare to what he was living with before.

That’s the part people don’t understand until it’s them. Chronic pain doesn’t just hurt, it starts messing with your mind. It gets to the point where getting in a chair, getting in the truck, doing normal life feels impossible. Max said if it kept going the way it was, another week might have pushed him to a place he didn’t want to be.

This is the turning point.

Not “everything is fixed overnight.” Not “no struggle.”

Just the first day where the path forward is real.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #MaxBakerJr #Recovery #NewKnee #RealLifeStories #LifeAfterPain #BehindTheScenesLife #Oklahoma #OKC

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Pimpadelic was that kind of band. Even as a spectator, you could feel the room going sideways. They were shock-rock meets rap-rock chaos, and it was so wild it made other rowdy crowds look tame. Ralph was in disbelief, and that takes a lot.

Then there’s Easy Jesus.

Easy Jesus is David Allan Coe’s nephew, and that connection mattered when it came to getting attention for bookings. Texas roots, easy to reach, easy to route, and the name carried weight in the right circles.

The story also hits on what could have been. Pimpadelic had momentum, a record on Tommy Boy Records, and the kind of unpredictability that could have exploded with the right touring package. Put them on the road with Insane Clown Posse and it might have been a perfect match. But band drama and instability can kill a run fast, no matter how good the product is.

If you were at one of those shows at The Other Side, you already know.

Wildest nights don’t always come from the biggest names. Sometimes they come from the bands nobody can control.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #Pimpadelic #EasyJesus #DavidAllanCoe #DiamondBallroom #ICP #MaxBakerJr #JeffBrownen #oklahomacity

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Volume 15.

By that point, Metal Bash wasn’t an experiment. It was a machine.

This one was special because it was the first time bringing Metal Bash to Cain's Ballroom. Bigger room. Bigger stakes. And somehow, we crammed the whole lineup into a 60-second commercial. No music from every local band either, just names, because the national package took priority.

But the local scene still mattered.

80 Proof. Skullplate. Self Inflicted. Transfixed. NOS out of Bartlesville. Sounds of War. Separation From All. Bands new enough to be hungry, proud enough to show up early, and loud enough to justify two stages. That’s what Metal Bash was built on, giving local heavy bands a real platform in a real venue.

And the ripple effect is still there.

Kyle Williams from 80 Proof later connects into Medicine Horse, a Cherokee heavy project. Names and scenes keep evolving, but the roots were those nights. Those flyers. Those two-stage lineups where everybody wanted to prove something.

Metal Bash 15 was part of a longer run. You did a lot of them. The numbers blur. But the intent never changed.

Put the right bands together.
Give them a real stage.
Let the scene speak for itself.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #MetalBash #CainsBallroom #TulsaMusic #OKCMetal #LocalMetalScene #TwoStageShow #ConcertHistory #MaxBakerJr #JeffBrownen #oklahomacity

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Before Edgefest chaos, Tulsa and OKC were already stacked that week.

August 15th and 16th — Brady Village and the Zoo Amphitheatre.

Paul Rodgers and Kansas on the bill. That classic-rock lane where the crowd knows every chorus, and the shows run like clockwork. Kansas doing one of those late-era victory laps, still pulling real fans.

Then the conversation clears something up.

The downtown outdoor Evanescence show we talked about earlier wasn’t Edgefest.

This one was.

Edgefest lineup:

Evanescence
Mudvayne
Cold
Blue October
Revis
Smile Empty Soul
Fanzeen (Tulsa band with a British lead singer)
Finger Eleven

One week you’re in classic rock mode with Paul Rodgers and Kansas.

The next minute you’re counting merch money at Edgefest while a band manager is cussing you out and you’re trying to eat a corn dog.

That’s how those summers worked.

Different genres. Same calendar. No breath.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #PaulRodgers #BadCompany #KansasBand #Edgefest #Evanescence #Mudvayne #BlueOctober #ZooAmphitheatre #BradyVillage #TulsaMusic #OKCMusic #MaxBakerJr #JeffBrownen

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If you’ve worked the Zoo Amphitheatre, you know the struggle isn’t the show.

It’s the load-in.

Rolling cases through gravel. Fighting the layout. Dragging gear where it was never designed to go. Years of stagehands have earned their stripes out there, and the new crews don’t even realize how lucky they are compared to what it used to be.

The Zoo has served its purpose for a long time. It’s hosted legendary nights. It’s part of the city’s DNA.

But the argument is simple.

It’s old.

Vintage.

And sure — so is Keith Richards, and he still rocks.

That’s the point.

Old doesn’t mean useless. Old means proven.

Still, you can love a place and admit it might be time for something new. The debate isn’t sentimental, it’s practical: location, comfort, summer heat, accessibility, production standards.

Would the right deal bring big acts back to the Zoo?

Probably.

Just not in July or August.

And if you won the lottery? You’d book them out there anyway.

But you’d invite 50 people. Closest friends only.

Because a vintage venue deserves a vintage kind of night.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #ZooAmphitheatre #OKCMusicHistory #KeithRichards #VenueLife #ConcertProduction #LiveMusicStories #OklahomaCity #MaxBakerJr #JeffBrownen

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Two nights. Two completely different scenes. Same weekend.

September 13, 2003 — Curly’s. Dropkick Murphys with Last Target and The Unseen. DCF and AEG. One of those Curly’s nights that proved you didn’t need a polished venue to have a legendary show. Curly’s was raw back then. Vacant-lot energy. Dirt and torn-down buildings nearby. But the shows hit.

Then the next night, September 14, 2003 — Diamond Ballroom.

All hell broke loose.

Superjoint Ritual headlining with Strapping Young Lad and Spooky Fruit on the bill. 459 people in the room, but the energy was bigger than the number. This was Superjoint Ritual in their early, unfiltered era.

And yes — that was the show where Hank Williams III (Shelton) was on bass.

Phil Anselmo up front. Heavy support. Tight room. Loud crowd. A night that stuck.

Two nights like that are why 2003 was such a blur.

Punk mayhem at Curly’s one night.
Metal chaos at the Diamond the next.

That’s Oklahoma show business in real time.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #DropkickMurphys #TheUnseen #SuperjointRitual #StrappingYoungLad #DiamondBallroom #Curlys #PunkShows #MetalShows #OKCMusic #MaxBakerJr #JeffBrownen

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Two nights. Two stages. Full local scene energy.

The dates matter here. Not July 24th. It was July 29th and 30th.

One of those nights was at Cain's Ballroom and it was a Mad Max style build. Two stages, constant changeovers, and a lineup that felt like a roster sheet of that era.

Udora headlining the mix with Midnight to 12, Wither, Makeshift, Rook, Cynical Theory, All Too Familiar, Vent, Waiting on Juliet, Oversold, Trip C, and Fighting Tomorrow.

This wasn’t random booking. Udora mattered. David’s band. They’d been on the road with Jerry Cantrell. They finally had a record out under the Eudora name, and this was the home-market push.

And here’s the other layer.

A commercial got made for it. Those old-school local promos that actually moved people. That was part of the grind too. If you weren’t touring, you were promoting. If you weren’t promoting, you were building a stage. If you weren’t building, you were selling tickets.

Two nights like that weren’t just shows.

They were a snapshot of a scene trying to break out, one packed weekend at a time.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #udora #CainsBallroom #TulsaMusic #TwoStageShow #Wither #JerryCantrell #LocalMusicScene #2000sRock #MaxBakerJr #JeffBrownen #oklahoma #oklahomacity

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June 9, 2003 — Bricktown Event Center.

The Flaming Lips. Liz Phair. Starlight Mints.

That night wasn’t just a great bill. It was work.

Assistant promoter rep. Managing runners. Checking in merch. Counting money. Keeping the machine moving while the crowd kept coming. And it was a big merch night.

Because the Flaming Lips don’t do average merch.

They’re known for those killer tour posters. Unique designs that feel like art prints, not souvenirs. I had one. Got it signed. One of those pieces you don’t just toss in a box.

Years later, after a fire, that poster showed up again in the rubble. Still there. Still mine. Not mint anymore, but surviving a fire gives it a different kind of value.

That’s live music.

You remember the show.
You remember the job.
And sometimes you find the proof of it years later, burned around the edges but still standing.

#HeresTheDealPodcast #FlamingLips #LizPhair #StarlightMints #BricktownEventCenter #ConcertMerch #TourPoster #LiveMusicStories #OKCMusic #MaxBakerJr #JeffBrownen #oklahomacity

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