Greetings jabronis,
I’ve been meaning to write this column for a few weeks now, ever since I compiled my list of favourite entrance themes (see here for the foolish fools who missed it – and yes, I would include Mr Perfect if I were to revise it. Dang).
Sure, we’re slap bang in the middle of the road to Wrestlemania now, and for those of you that think that there are more pressing matters at hand to fill column spaces… well, you’d be right. But I’m a rebel unto myself, so what I say goes and this is what I want to write about this week. It’s no wonder the chicks dig me so hard.
This list was actually far more difficult to write than my “favourites’ list… You see, back in the Attitude era, and the WWF years before that, there was a wide range of musical styles that helped define the individuals. There were countless great tracks, and every named performer on the roster had an entrance theme that served their character justice. These days however, 90% of the roster has a generic rock track to accompany them to the ring. Whilst I’m indifferent to generic rock, it’s hard to dislike something that’s so instantly forgettable, which Is why I struggled to scribe this. But I’ve tried my damndest to seek out the songs that really tore apart your ears, and then crawled under the skin and infuriated you. A bit like a vicious STD. You feel me?
So for those of you who are feeling rather giddy with excitement at the prospects of hearing me trash some awful WWE entrance themes, I say “be giddy no more” for the time is upon us…
9. Rikishi – Bad Man
So unconvincing was Rikishi as a heel that his entrance music had to inform the crowd that he was a “bad man” as he waddled down the ramp. This was a guy who wore a thong, enjoyed disco-dancing and gave his opponents the stinkface. How were fans supposed to perceive that as the behaviour of a bad man?
Anyways, this was so basic and bland that I’m betting a lot of wrestling fans don’t even recall its existence. Lucky you. It’s essentially an angry black man unconvincingly spouting angry sentences that frequently include the words “bad”, “pain” and “crime”. Propaganda at its worst!
8. R-Truth – Get Crunked
I had to include this due to the fact that it failed so spectacularly! WWE bigwigs felt that R-Truth singing the same tune week in, week out was growing rather tiresome – and so they decided to add a second song to his repertoire (wow – two songs! Quite the artist!)
The problem was, none of us wrestling fans could quite get the hang of it – there was no obvious hook (a la “What’s up?”) and whenever Truth signalled the crowd to holler “get crunked” in unison, they just stared at him with hanging jaws in dumb silence. If the crowd is required to singalong, it helps if the singalong part is abundantly obvious. In this instance, it abundantly wasn’t.
“Get Crunked” wasn’t helped further by some or other diva (they’re all the same to me) busting out some extremely crappy dance moves to it as if she was having a severe mental fit. And thus the song was quickly dropped and we’re now back to the familiar medley of “What’s Up?”… hooray for familiarity!
What the hell does “get crunked” mean anyway? Sounds like slang for getting a vasectomy to.
7. John Heidenreich
Talk about bland. So lazy were WWE’s creative team that when it came to working on an entrance theme for the Heidenreich character, they just decided to repeat his name over and over again to a marching beat. Maybe they foresaw his short tenure, hence the lack of exertion.
Progressive it certainly wasn’t. Intimidating though? Possibly. Heidenreich did make Michael Cole piss his pants once after all. And that, unfortunately for him, was the most memorable moment of his entire wrstling career.
“Heidenreich, Heidenrei, Heidenreich, Heidenreich, Heidenreich, Heidenreich…” – check it out, I can still remember all the lyrics!
6. Chyna – Who I am
This sounded like a Godawful B-side remix to a lame, 90s, euro-pop single that was played on repeat in gay bars. Maybe it was? I guess we’ll never know. Unless we Google it of course… but that requires effort.
It was mighty confusing of Chyna to make her entrance with the lyrics “don’t treat me like a woman, don’t treat me like a man”… You can only really have it one way or the other when you’re an adult. Was this Chyna trying to tell us she was a hermaphrodite? It would certainly be a believable revelation.
5. Bastian Booger/Right to Censor
I’ve coupled these two together because they’re not essentially “themes” so much as just being noise. Horrible noise I hasten to add.
The Right to Censor came down to the ring to the constant whirring of a siren. And boy, was it ever annoying. I get that it was supposed to be annoying because the RTC were jerks – but let’s not forgot that first and foremost, WWE is a TV show. And if you want to annoy your viewers, then there’s a little device known as the TV remote that can help said viewers find something less annoying for their brains to absorb.
Bastian Booger (rest in peace) was a rather ogre-some performer who was shoehorned into a revealing, tight singlet and whose accessory of choice was a bucket of chicken (literally a bucket – I’m not talking one of those card KFC buckets). To accompany this unsightly behemoth as he walked to the ring, an onslaught of burps and farts played out over the speakers…
Think about it – someone in WWE actually thought this would encourage fans to watch their product. Not only did someone get paid to portray this disgusting guy who walks around to the sound of burps and farts, but someone was also paid to come up with the idea. That just depresses me.
4. Yoshi Tatsu
Yoshi Tatsu has been embossed with a truly diabolical, disco dance track that sounds like the opening theme to a terrible Japanese kid’s programme.
What really annoys me about this track is that it is soaked in WWE’s racist stereotype towards Asian performers. The lively, cartoon-esque music instantly assures the crowd that Yoshi Tatsu is only a bit of light-hearted fun, and if he were to come up against a bigger opponent (you know – an American perhaps) he would get his ass kicked. But for now, let’s all enjoy the loud noises and bright colours and just laugh at him until he’s smashed in. Ha ha ha – he probably only speaks broken English too! Hilarious!
I wonder if Asian wrestling has a generic style of theme music for all Western performers to use? Maybe they all have to walk to the ring to a randomly selected Backstreet Boys track. That’ll teach them.
3. John Cena – My Time is Now
Before anybody lambastes for me only listing this song due to a general dislike of Cena – I hasten to point out that I thought Cena’s original “Basic Thugonomics” entrance was rather fantastic… his theme tune today, however, truly reeks of suckiness.
If any piece of music was ever specifically written for a wigger, then this is it. I can imagine that guy from Offspring’s “Pretty Fly” music video would totally get off on this painful piece of ear-piercing music. It’s rather reminiscent of those vile orange and purple Cena T-shirts – obnoxiously loud seemingly just for the sake of being obnoxiously loud.
Not only do I hate the song – but I also hate the lyrics. What does “my time is now” refer to? Have the last 6 years been John Cena’s “time”? Because that seems like an awfully long period to specifically reference as “now”. Plus, a theme tune serves little other purpose than to let us know that a specific wrestler is on the way to the ring. So for Cena to claim “you can’t see me” is just plain backwards logic. We can see you – you’re right there. On the way to the ring. So, it’s puzzling as well as awful.
2. Nickelback- Burn it to the Ground
Okay, so it’s not an entrance theme , but it is the RAW theme used to introduce the show every week, so I feel it’s ripe for inclusion.
I detest Nickelback with all my being. Their bland, insipid, middle-of-the-road, mega-boring brand of “rock” boils an anger inside me that I can’t really explain. If you like Nickleback, I can confidently predict that I hate you too. I’m sorry.
(Similarly – the Green Day song currently used on Smackdown is also pretty freaking awful – but nowhere near as bad as this.)
You wanna know what song I always thought be a great theme song for RAW? No? Well I’m gonna tell you anyway – Bawitdaba by Kid Rock. It just shrieks “wrestling” at me.
1. The X-Factor (X-Pac, Albert and Justin Credible)
I guess it’s rather fitting that a faction as naff as the X-factor would have a naff entrance theme. And boy, did this ever suck. Albert, Justin Credible and X-Pac were all decent enough performers in their time… but you gotta assume that someone in WWE really had it in for them when they bundled them together in this unbelievably pointless faction with this impossibly bad theme music.
It’s like someone has taken the worst rap song in existence and the worst boyband ballad in existence and merged the two together, creating a blubbery mess of epically depressing proportions.
Take a listen by clicking here and see what I mean, but please take precautionary measures when doing so (i.e. keep volume to a minimum, and don’t listen alone in case you pass out from fear that the world has ended)
I would sooner listen to the screams of the people I love being slowly crushed to death then ever listen to that again.
And on that pleasant note, I bid you farewell! I’ll be back next week with my thoughts on the elimination chamber.
Please post your own choices below as ever. I love it when you do.
Over and out.
