This week I thought we'd take a little break from our usual serious, heady issues and look at an often under-appreciated aspect of the WWE product: the music. Specifically, the ring entrance theme songs.
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Even in 2004, Jericho's millennial entrance still hasn't gotten old. |
Music is an important aspect of a wrestling character. It helps to tell the audience just what kind of character is being depicted before we even see the wrestler. If you were new to WWE and watching for the first time in a foreign language, the entrance theme would tell you just as much about whether a superstar is good or bad as the design of his trunks and the look on his face.
But a lot of times, wrestlers get stuck with bland, trendy theme songs that aren't as descriptive as they could be. Eddie Guerrero's song tells us exactly what we're going to get with him. Chris Benoit's, on the other hand, is very vague. It's obvious that WWE was more interested in being able to involve a big-name band in his song rather than actually tailoring some music specifically for Benoit. And this is quite common. There has been a plethora of other superstars, from Bret Hart to Edge to Brock Lesnar, who have been stuck with non-specific theme songs that could have just as easily been used with any other wrestler on the roster.
So in honor of the truly great wrestling theme songs, the ones that were not only pleasurable to the ear but also best complemented the wrestler they were written for, I submit to you the Shining Wizard's Top 10 Entrance Themes of all time, followed by the Five Worst. Music is obviously a pretty subjective topic, so after you read my choices I encourage you to write in and vote for your Top 5 and Worst 5. I'll tally the votes and next time around we'll look at your picks. But for now, you're stuck with mine, so here goes.
THE TOP 10
#10 Ultimate Warrior
During his first big run with WWE, the Ultimate Warrior had a hair metal theme called "Unstable" that was a perfect match for his character: high energy with little substance. It might not have been an amazing song on its own, but it was a great fit for a guy who ran down to the ring for every match and loved to shake the ring ropes and pump his fists in the air. If you were a Warrior fan, this was the kind of theme that got you so pumped up for his matches, you were almost able to forget that he couldn't really wrestle.
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#9 Rob Van Dam
There's nothing wrong with RVD's WWE intro music, but it's an obvious ode to his awesome ECW theme music, "Walk" by Pantera. Rob Van Dam was to ECW in the '90s what Hulk Hogan was to WWE in the '80s. So he needed a high-energy theme song that would also allow his entrance to go on for four or five minutes while he slapped hands with all the front row fans and did some posing. So ECW looped the chorus to "Walk" and gave RVD a badass-sounding metal song with simple easy-to-yell lyrics like "Respect! Walk! Are you talking to me?!" The result was incredible. As RVD made his way to the ring, the entire audience would shout his theme song back to him louder than the P.A. could play the music. Even though "Walk" wasn't written specifically for RVD, I think the reaction it drew from the audience makes it deserving of this ranking.
#8 Shawn Michaels
There are probably not many fans today who remember that Shawn Michaels' "Sexy Boy" theme song was originally performed by his manager, Sensational Sherri, in 1992 during the pair's brief alliance. When they broke up, Michaels apparently liked his theme song so much that he went out and rerecorded it himself, simply changing the lyrics to a first person perspective. And it worked
