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Podcast: Pantheon - Podcasts for Music Lovers
Episode: Metal Mayhem ROC: Twisted Sister’s JJ French on 2026 50th Anniversary Shows, Legacy, PMRC & Longevity
Description:
JJ French has lived the full arc of
American heavy metal — from club-level survival to global legacy.
As guitarist, co-founder, and longtime
strategist behind Twisted Sister, JJ French reflects on what it actually takes
to last 50 years in a business designed to burn artists out. This is not a
nostalgia interview. It is a candid conversation about discipline, reinvention,
timing, and truth.
JJ discusses the early definition of
success, why the UK embraced Twisted Sister before the U.S., the cultural
divide between punk and metal at CBGB, the PMRC hearings and th...