Glories of the ‘tube: STEELEWORLDWIDE
This is the first in a series of passionate essays I intend to write about my favorite YouTube personalities.
YouTube is an incredible publishing platform for a wide variety of reasons. Sure, people are able to make “money,” or spread an “important message,” but to me, what allows the ‘tube to flourish is the miniscule barrier to entry. Get yourself a camcorder for $20 at your local goodwill, gather your most valued thoughts and prized possessions, and congratulate yourself because you are officially on the fast track to the ~new media~ television equivalent. And as long as you have consistent material and an absurd amount of internal drive, there’s nothing stopping you from continuing your carnival of internet pleasures indefinitely.
This is exactly what STEELEWORLDWIDE (government name: Trent Steele) has done. His passion for malt liquor, particularly the kind found in the iconic 40 oz. glass bottle packaging, has fueled a raging tire-fire of videos showcasing the spectacle of his own alcoholism, amassing over ONE MILLION TOTAL VIEWS, a fact he is proud to mention in almost every episode of his show CHUG A 40oz (to celebrate this milestone he created a second, almost identical channel and continues to post regularly to both).
What amazes me about Steele’s videos is his undying dedication to the format he has chosen. With a dizzying level of consistency, he presents his bizarre, nightmarish version of a nightly talk show, where the host is always completely alone, and drunk off his ass the entire time. The desk is made of cardboard boxes which used to hold bottles of the beverage to which he owes much of his success, the theme music is always the same godawful, outdated Jon Lajoie song, and the conversations consists of one-sided, brief, vulgar rants about sports, current events, and his hatred for other YouTube personalities.
That’s where Mr. Steele finds his small, dedicated fanbase. YouTube has a sizable community for almost every hobby imaginable, including drinking. There are hundreds of people from all walks of life involved in the “YouTube drinking community,” many of whom make vlogs to share their thoughts on everything from craft beer to their day-to-day trials and tribulations. STEELEWORLDWIDE functions as the antagonist to this microcosm, viciously insulting anyone who dares to make a video outside of his strict guidelines. “Follow the fuckin’ blueprint... drink malt liquour, and only malt liqour!” he states repeatedly between chugs of his sweet nectar. “Label out!” has become somewhat of a rallying cry in both the videos and comments, suggesting that folks who enjoy the occasional 40 should do so without shame or discretion. His anger intensifies as he regularly suggests any hobbyist homebrewers watching immediately set fire to all of their equipment, and throw themselves into the inferno. He’s not afraid to call out any of his enemies him by name, and harbors a particularly strong contempt for dorf68, never failing to call him a cunt in every single video on both of his channels.
While the consistency of his cap-tosses, casual balaclava use, and hip-level thumbs-ups are all part of the charm, he’s wise enough to realize his antics can get monotonous, and attempts to remedy the situation by knocking back bottles in front of a variety of backdrops, from his creepy basement, to his garage featuring different sports cars (occasionally showered in US currency) to exotic locales like a frozen river, the beach, or the Vegas strip. My favorite of these outings occurs in a McDonalds restaurant:
As he dual-wields identical 40s, boasting loudly about his view count to anybody in the vacinity willing to listen, a man rudely interrupts to inquire about the girth of his YouTube revenue stream. In his retort, Steele shows that he doesn’t even know what the financial buzz-acronym CPT means because money doesn’t fucking matter when you have amassed over one million cumulative views doing exactly what you want. This incident perfectly exemplifies why I find STEELEWORLDWIDE so inspiring. He’s thrown caution to the wind and found a way to create a small empire centered around his favorite vice, never sacrificing creative control to appeal to a wider audience, let alone selling out for a check. He uses YouTube in one of the best ways one can: as an easier, more flexible version of cable access where it’s okay to be whatever or whoever you want and the only thing between you and your dreams is about 1,200 carefully planned exhibitions of your own eccentricity.
STEELEWORLDWIDE, the number one provider of malt liqour entertainment on the internet, provides far more memorable moments than I can describe here. For more, check him out at one of his YouTube Channels:
https://www.youtube.com/user/STEELEWORLDWIDE
https://www.youtube.com/user/SteeleWorldWide2
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