IoMP 178: Most Metal Wrestling Themes, Pt. 2 – Ep. 4
What happens when the worlds of heavy metal and professional wrestling collide?
Apparently, you get enough material for four episodes — and Collin still isn’t finished.
The Influencers of Metal Podcast returns to the squared circle for another collection of wrestling entrance themes powered by actual metal and hard rock bands. This time, however, there’s an added challenge: Tom completely forgot to research the wrestlers beforehand.
So while Collin arrives prepared with wrestling history, context and enough obscure lore to fill a Royal Rumble, Tom is basically walking into every new entry blind.
That becomes immediately apparent as the episode kicks off with Batista and Saliva before moving to one of wrestling’s most recognizable masked stars, Rey Mysterio, and his P.O.D.-powered entrance. From there, Collin introduces Tom to the metalcore side of Ring of Honor, including Roderick Strong entering to Killswitch Engage’s “The End of Heartache” and Misery Signals’ “A Victim, A Target,” while a pre-WWE Seth Rollins — then known as Tyler Black — used War of Ages’ “Battle On.”
Then there’s Chris Jericho. His use of his band Fozzy’s song “Judas” becomes one of the episode’s biggest rabbit holes as Collin explains how Jericho debuted the song as an entrance theme for his massive Wrestle Kingdom showdown with Kenny Omega. What began as Jericho conveniently using a song from his own band eventually became so closely associated with him that wrestling crowds could practically become his entrance music themselves.
But if “Judas” represents wrestling entrance music becoming an anthem, Bray Wyatt’s Fiend represents the exact opposite end of the spectrum.
Code Orange’s brutal reworking of “Let Me In” accompanies a crash course in the bizarre evolution of Bray Wyatt from swamp-dwelling cult leader to children’s television host to nightmare monster — complete with the Firefly Funhouse, Hurt and Heal gloves and an entrance lantern that takes “merchandise idea” in a considerably more disturbing direction.
The metal-wrestling connection keeps getting stranger from there. The Undertaker trades Kid Rock for Limp Bizkit during his American Badass era. House of Black gets suitably crushing hardcore. Poppy and FEVER 333’s “Scary Mask” becomes an alternate entrance for IYO SKY. Cody Rhodes’ “Kingdom” sends the show careening into some absolutely ridiculous wrestling lore that Tom is increasingly convinced might get the podcast cancelled.
And then we reach ECW.
Here the rules — both wrestling and apparently copyright — become considerably more flexible.
Justin Credible gets Prong’s “Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck.” Jerry Lynn walks out to Megadeth’s “Trust.” Proud Canadian Lance Storm gets the wonderfully titled “El Phantasmo and the Chicken-Run Blast-O-Rama” by White Zombie while Collin explains his collection of aggressively Canadian wrestling championships — including the immortal Saskatchewan Hardcore International Title.
Yes. Its initials spell exactly what you think they spell.
Finally, Mike Awesome closes things out with Metallica’s “Phantom Lord,” complete with the bizarre wrinkle of Anthrax eventually covering the song for copyright purposes. Nothing says professional wrestling quite like approaching Anthrax and essentially telling them, “Your music is great, but could you play Metallica instead?”
From huge WWE stars to cult ECW favourites, iconic entrance songs to completely unexpected deep cuts, Part 4 proves once again that wrestling and metal have been stealing from — and improving — each other for decades.
Click play and join Collin and an extremely underprepared Tom for another trip into the wonderfully ridiculous intersection of heavy metal and professional wrestling.
DISCLAIMER: Copyright Exceptions under the Copyright Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-42), allowance is made for "fair dealing" for the purposes of criticism or review.
