{"id":1125,"date":"2026-07-18T20:21:44","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T20:21:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/?p=1125"},"modified":"2026-07-18T20:21:44","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T20:21:44","slug":"the-greatest-star-trek-icon-just-created-a-vulgar-heavy-metal-band","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/?p=1125","title":{"rendered":"The Greatest Star Trek Icon Just Created A Vulgar Heavy Metal Band"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBy Chris Snellgrove<\/a>
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To this day, the greatest Star Trek icon is William Shatner<\/a>. As Captain Kirk, he taught all of us the importance of boldly going where no man had gone before. In many ways, the actor has led his life by this philosophy: after dominating sci-fi, he killed it in other genres, including cop dramas, legal procedurals, documentaries, and so much more. Heck, he even headlined some infectiously charming commercials for Priceline. After a while, it looked like there might be no new worlds for Shatner to conquer. However, he\u2019s about to boldly go into his own final frontier with the project of a lifetime: leading his own heavy metal band!<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll be the first to admit that this news feels like something out of a fever dream. But as William Shatner\u2019s colleague Avery Brooks once said so memorably on Deep Space Nine<\/em>, \u201cit\u2019s real!\u201d Shatner has assembled a heavy metal band called The *uckers, and they will be making their debut on September 20th at Chicago\u2019s Riot Fest. This will be the group\u2019s first live performance, but in a truly bizarre twist, their appearance took nearly two decades to arrange.<\/p>\n

Captain Kirk Gets Heavy<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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While Riot Fest is mostly about established musical acts, they have a charming tradition of trying to woo various celebrities into attending and performing. For example, after a decade of increasingly wacky invites, the festival eventually convinced Full House<\/em> star John Stamos into performing alongside the Beach Boys. Similarly, Riot Fest has courted Shatner for the last 17 years<\/strong>. He finally said yes, but instead of performing with a well-known band, the Star Trek<\/a> legend decided to assemble his own group, the equivalent of a musical away team.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Apparently, both the actor and the festival know how silly it is to have William Shatner<\/a> playing heavy metal, and they collectively decided to lean into the humor by publishing a hilariously outlandish rider by the actor. The rider includes demands for Chicago to let Shatner co-anchor the local weather, name some local food after him, let him sing \u201cTake Me Out To the Ball Game\u201d at a baseball game, and name a boat after the actor that he can then captain.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s Open Up This Pit!<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Additionally, the rider requests a dressing room themed as \u201cShatner\u2019s Shag Shack,\u201d a bunch of adoptable puppies, an intro video from Gwar, and a bunch of Faygo that is not<\/strong> to be shared with the Insane Clown Posse. Oh, and he wants his artist\u2019s golf cart replaced by a Delorean. Believe it or not, these are just a few<\/strong> of the winking, outrageous, and almost certainly fake demands.<\/p>\n

Obviously, most of this is tongue-in-cheek, and as a Star Trek fan, it\u2019s great to see Shatner playing along. But he also expressed some real sincerity in an official statement, writing that, \u201cI\u2019ve always believed that music, like space, is about exploration. Riot Fest is exactly the kind of place where anything can happen.\u201d Continuing, he wrote, We\u2019re bringing volume, intensity, and a few surprises. I can\u2019t wait to share this experience with the fans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Somehow, Mr. Tambourine Man Returned<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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While Shatner is new to heavy metal, he\u2019s not new to music, having released several albums in the past. Instead of taking on Riot Festival solo, the Star Trek actor assembled a band, The *uckers, consisting of several well-known musicians. This includes Marcus Nand on guitar, Phil Soussan on bass, Britt Lightning on guitar, and Fred Aching on drums. Together, they will play reimagined songs from Shatner\u2019s musical history as well as songs from their amusingly titled debut album, What the F Is Heavy Metal<\/em>. As he told People<\/em>, \u201cThat\u2019s the name of the album because I know nothing or didn\u2019t know anything until I found out how little I do know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Want to see William Shatner make his inexplicable heavy metal debut? Be sure to save up your latinum<\/a> and snag tickets to Chicago\u2019s Riot Fest, which runs from September 18-20. On Instagram<\/a>, the actor claims it will be an event that fans will want to tell their grandchildren about. We\u2019re inclined to agree: one way or another, Shatner beaming into his metal era is something nobody will ever<\/strong> forget!<\/p>\n

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By Chris Snellgrove | Published 20 seconds ago To this day, the greatest Star Trek icon is William Shatner. As Captain Kirk, he taught all of us the importance of boldly going where no man had gone before. In many ways, the actor has led his life by this philosophy: after dominating sci-fi, he killed…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1126,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.giantfreakinrobot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/star-trek-heavy-metal-band-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1125"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1125\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valutednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}