🎂 OSW is 14 today!!

Today's OSW's birthday!!
We've been bringin' the bollix since May 5, 2011. Thanks for being with us brahbrahs 💚

On this day (May 5) in 2011, we released our very first episode, WrestleMania 1. The show was made out of spite! The Attitude Era was getting all the love, and I wanted people to know just how awesome the coke & steroids era of WWF was too :D

It came about as my bro bought me a rake of Silvervision DVDs for Christmas (someone was selling like, 30 of them!) and I thought it'd be cool to make use of 'em. I was a big fan of Review-a-Wai (now POSTwrestling) and wanted an Irish version of it, with Simpsons and Partridge and Blackadder quotes lol.

I remember we'd cancelled our podcast recording session TWICE already (it was meant to be a 4-man pod; but someone dropped out last minute both times) and third time V1 couldn't make it, but we pushed on ahead, or else I think we would've cancelled the whole thing. I'm glad we forged ahead and I hope you did too!

Our original goal was to get to SummerSlam '92 - that being the peak and the first major show this side of the pond. I had to stop episodes for about 4 months between Mania 6 and SummerSlam 1990 for exams, but took the time to improve the production. I had no idea what I was doing, having no training tech-wise. Which is why early eps sound ropey - they're done with a rock band mic held up by a tea-towel in a popcorn tub!

It was also around circa Mania VII that I knew I wanted to continue, and we've been going ever since! When OSW was impinging on my work and home life, a fan we met at WWE event in Dublin suggested we open a patreon. I was hesitant but thought, if I can show my family it brings in something, anything, that there is some merit in it. So i set the goal for $400. We blew past it in minutes! I was more relieved than anything, I thought I killed OSW!

But thankfully it grew so it could employ myself and v1, and a host of freelance editors, animators and musicians too! Thanks to NoggerU we can keep going and bring what's in my leaking spongebag of a brain to life, lol.

Anyway i'll stop blathering, know I appreciate you and let's ride until the wheels fall off! Here's to the next 14 years! 🙂🍻

Love, Jay 💚