WCW Mayhem

Mayhem was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) produced by World Championship Wrestling (WCW) that replaced the promotion's November PPV event World War 3 which was held from 1995 to 1998 and was held in the month of November in 1999 and 2000. It is noted for being the first wrestling pay-per-view named after a video game, rather than the video game named after a pay-per-view. The 1999 match between Bret Hart vs Chris Benoit was featured in the opening credits of the TV Show Malcolm in the Middle. The rights to the event is now owned by the WWE since 2001.

1999

Mayhem 1999 took place on November 21, 1999 from the Air Canada Centre in Toronto, Ontario.

During the WCW World Heavyweight Championship tournament semi-final match between Bret Hart and Sting, The Total Package interfered by attacking Sting with a baseball bat. This led to Hart being announced as the winner via disqualification. Not wanting to win in this manner, Hart demanded the match be restarted, and ultimately forced Sting to submit with the Sharpshooter. Scott Hall was originally supposed to face Rick Steiner for the WCW World Television Championship, but Steiner was too injured to compete. Hall was awarded the title by forfeit and immediately had to defend it against Booker T instead.

Mayhem (advertising character)

Mayhem is an advertising character created by Leo Burnett Worldwide for Allstate Insurance. Burnett pitched the character to Allstate as "Mr. Mayhem", comparing him to the character Mr. White from the 1992 film Reservoir Dogs played by Harvey Keitel.

Mayhem has been played by Dean Winters since the campaign was launched in April 2010.

Commercials

The formula for almost every Mayhem commercial has been the same. To begin the commercial, a situation is set up with Mayhem explaining what is going on and hinting at what is about to happen. For instance, a 2015 ad features Mayhem as a portable grill hastily put back into a car before being put out, which leads to an explosion when the still-burning embers ignite an enormous bottle of lighter fluid. Once the end result is revealed, Mayhem warns that certain "cut-rate" policies are lacking in coverage, advising the viewers to get their insurance policies through Allstate.

In some ads, Mayhem also has advised against going without roadside assistance. In three separate situations, he described what could happen in the face of a catastrophe while driving; these consisted of having to stay in a creepy roadside motel overnight because one's car ran out of fuel, being forced to change a tire in a heavy downpour, being forced to stay at an awkward family gathering because one's car battery died, and potentially becoming a victim of crime due to a breakdown in the wrong neighborhood.

Mayhem (band)

Mayhem is a Norwegian black metal band formed in 1984 in Oslo, regarded as one of the pioneers of the Norwegian black metal scene. Mayhem's career has been highly controversial, primarily due to their violent stage performances, the 1991 suicide of vocalist Per Yngve Ohlin ("Dead") and the 1993 murder of guitarist Øystein Aarseth ("Euronymous") by former member Varg Vikernes ("Count Grishnackh"), of Burzum.

The group released a demo and an EP that were highly influential, and amassed a loyal following through sporadic and notorious live performances, attracting further attention through their ties to the string of Norwegian church burnings and the prominent incidents of violence surrounding them. They disbanded after Aarseth's murder, shortly before the release of their debut album, De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, regarded as a classic of the black metal genre. Surviving former members Jan Axel Blomberg ("Hellhammer"), Jørn Stubberud ("Necrobutcher") and Sven Erik Kristiansen ("Maniac") reformed two years later with Rune Eriksen ("Blasphemer") replacing Aarseth. Attila Csihar and Krister Dreyer ("Morfeus") have since replaced Kristiansen and Eriksen, respectively.

Illusions (Thomas Bergersen album)

Illusions (formerly called "Nemesis II") is a stand-alone production album created by Thomas J. Bergersen from Two Steps From Hell, and was released in 2011. It features vocal performances by Vladislava Vasileva, Elitsa Todorova, Merethe Soltvedt, Kate St. Pierre, Jenifer Thigpen and Colin O'Malley and samples from Troels Brun Folmann's Tonehammer library, as well as instrumental performances by the cellist Tina Guo and the Capellen Orchestra. The CD contains 19 tracks. The album cover and artwork are designed by Jesper Krijgsman. The album is available for download on iTunes, Amazon and CDBaby. The CD has been released physically on March 13, 2012.

On January 24, 2013 Illusions was released on ExtremeMusic.com to clients promoting motion picture advertising. This version contains 18 alternate versions of many pieces, which makes 37 tracks in total.

Track listing

Use in media

Thomas Bergersen's music has been licensed for several trailers.

Illusions (Bach novel)

Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah is a novel by writer and pilot Richard Bach. First published in 1977, the story questions the reader's view of reality, proposing that what we call reality is merely an illusion we create for learning and enjoyment. Illusions was the author's followup to 1970's Jonathan Livingston Seagull.

Plot

With some similarity to Nevil Shute's 1951 novel, Round the Bend, Illusions revolves around two barnstorming pilots who meet in a field in midwest America. The two main characters enter into a teacher-student relationship that explains the concept that the world that we inhabit is illusory, as well as the underlying reality behind it:

Donald P. Shimoda is a messiah who quits his job after deciding that people value the showbiz-like performance of miracles and want to be entertained by those miracles more than to understand the message behind them. He meets Richard, a fellow barn-storming pilot and begins to pass on his knowledge to him, even teaching Richard to perform "miracles" of his own.

Illusions (Cypress Hill song)

"Illusions" is a song by American hip hop group Cypress Hill. The song was released as the second single from Cypress Hill III: Temples of Boom.

Track listing

Chart positions

Notes

References