Tim "Ripper" Owens: Never too old to rock!

Forget that shit movie with Marky Mark lip-synching to Dio-penned music wrapped around a goopy love story with Rachel from "Friends" as the love-interest, the real Tim "Ripper" Owens is humble man who takes pride in his work. He bleeds, he sweats, he screams metal and rock! He has had his ups and downs, playing to arenas with popular metal bands to fronting small club acoustic shows in his hometown, inviting his fans to chill and have a beer with him (on you, of course).

He's perhaps the busiest man in the game, too! There's his own solo band, and Beyond Fear, as well as the all-stars troupe Hail with many luminaries (too many to mention), and reknowned prick Yngwie Malsteen. Ripper, who is already in his 40s, plays with joviality and an intense electricity that is refreshing. Judas Priest be damned! When the 90s whupped their asses, Ripper was the only person to keep them afloat long enough to contact Rob Halford and eventually jettison Owens in favor of a reunion that eventually proved fruitful. In any case, rather than wallow in self-pity, Mr. Owens soldiered on and joined Iced Earth, gaining more momentum and maintaining his metal street cred within the circles as the new millennium was in full swing.

Tim "Ripper" Owens is proof that you can rise up, fall down, get back up, continue moving forward, and take charge again. Grab 'em by the balls and hold 'em until they pass out, I think he once said. (Or perhaps Rob Halford said it.) That's the one thing that shit movie didn't tell you, which completely minimizes the significance and courage that Owens instills in the common man. There aren't too many of those around anymore.