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Simplicity is Success in Music and Wrestling

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This article talks about understanding pro wrestling from a musician’s perspective. I have been a wrestling fan since the age of 9, and at an earlier age; I was blessed with a gift of playing the piano by ear. A certain feature attraction that I enjoyed about wrestling were the different musical themes that played while the wrestlers walked to the ring. I thought I was the man for being able to hear these wrestling tunes and then play them on the piano to myself, I remember ringing up a friend from school just to play Macho Man Randy Savage’s theme, “Pomp and Circumstance’. I was 11 when during a school assembly, my neighbour made me get up in front of the school to play an impromptu piece on the piano, the first song that came to mind was the Macho Man’s song followed by the Fabulous Rougeau Brothers’ “All American Boys” theme. My confidence in performing in public came partly from playing these themes. Music and wrestling went hand in hand so much that when I moved away to study music, I took with me my collection of wrestling tapes; in between my studies, I would watch a tape or five as a way to de-stress. The qualification I worked towards was the first of its kind for a university in New Zealand, the focus of the curriculum was contemporary rock and the outline included lectures that discussed how Eminem’s lyrics and American accent were cleverly crafted to music. In addition to lectures; students were put into bands and taught to work together. This was a valuable tool for the reasons that we were at the start of networking with other musicians, each of our skills developed from playing with other band members and listening skills were honed from hearing the other members playing their instruments. This exercise ensured that we complemented each other and the overall sound. Being in a band was similar as being in a family unit or a very small community where each member had a certain skill set that was necessary for the community to function and as an out of town student, the band also served as a support system.

A few years ago, I came across this Facebook status that was posted by a pro wrestling veteran:
“Watching some Hulk Hogan matches before bed. Selling makes matches. Hogan was good at selling. I hate when I see guys on the Indies think they’re “too big” to sell. André the Giant sold for people … stop being marks”.

This post was a response to the internet wrestling fans’ criticism about Hulk Hogan’s wrestling skills being limited – according to their definition of limited skills; Hogan would only use a selection of simple (yet memorable) moves and his matches had the same order of format. This wrestler defended Hogan’s skills by eluding to examples of when Hogan would take a thrashing from his opponents, Hogan reciprocated the beatings by showing such believability as if he was on the verge of defeat. People within the wrestling profession refer to it as ‘selling’, and a ‘mark’ is a term used to describe a fan that overly regards a wrestler, wrestling company or wrestling style to be superior. This simple sells formula which Hulk Hogan mastered for many years was instrumental in the WWE’s success with attracting and maintaining new fans. Hogan’s detractors would explain his ‘lack of skill’ by comparing him to Kurt Angle or Daniel Bryan, wrestlers that were built to display a scientific style that comes with an unlimited move set. This certain style is what the internet fans believe to be the superior craft. Those judgments made against Hogan are unjustified as he was not equipped to perform that technique. Hogan also wrestled two different styles between the United States mainstream and the highly respected leagues in Japan; where in Japan, Hogan had the freedom to demonstrate more of his abilities that was suitable to his 6 foot, 8 inches, 300-pound build; that part of the argument is rarely acknowledged by those fans. Their ideology is that the most purist scientific wrestlers should be at the top of the card.

I played in several bands during and following my studies, the experience of being in a band helped me to identify with the wrestler’s Facebook status and subscribe to this ‘simple sells’ logic. I recognised the similarities in the way pro wrestlers and musicians worked their craft; this revelation is not too surprising as the two professions share the objective of performing to their audience. As a ‘band’, Hulk Hogan was the frontman of 1980s WWE, the wrestlers of that era were the band members, and the opponents served as part the songs. Like a great front person, Hulk Hogan’s role was to gain the trust of the fans so that they see themselves in their hero and invest emotion into Hogan’s matches and safety. In reality, Hulk Hogan’s gift of connecting with people was a vehicle for the WWE to generate revenue by encouraging the consumer to attend the matches, watch their television shows and buy merchandise. The WWE roster of that time was stacked with talent that wrestled a variety of different styles; the internet fans viewed wrestlers such as Ted Dibiase and Curt Hennig as the ‘uncrowned world champions’; technical greats that should have been in Hogan’s place – just because they ‘did more in the ring’. As great as some of these wrestlers were (and it applies to the current WWE), there is a definite place in the band for these ‘uncrowned world champions’; in most cases that place is not situated at the front. You will find these incredible workhorses supporting the frontman from the side where their instruments are of greater use.

The Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiase was a notable foe of Hogans. The Million Dollar Man was aggressive in his pursuit to attack Hogan’s values of integrity and justice with greed and selfishness, their conflicts brought about many matches/songs that are remembered with great fondness. Mr. Perfect Curt Hennig embodied an unattainable quality on the surface and was unreasonable in his disputes against Hulk Hogan’s message of inclusiveness. A lot of great songs speak about the main character facing conflicts and vulnerability, and the listener can relate to those stories through their own experience. The front person singing the part of the main character connects with the listener; this method applies to pro wrestling when the fans see themselves vicariously through their hero. Mainstream wrestling relies on stories of conflict and the empathetic hero that the fans pay to see to resolve those challenges. The Million Dollar Man and Mr. Perfect are examples of where Ted Dibiase and Curt Hennig were of most value to the WWE.

I look at WrestleMania 3 as an illustration of Hulk Hogan’s drawing power, how Hogan’s appeal helped to enhance the WWE’s visibility and the careers of those who were involved in the company. WrestleMania 3 (29 March 1987) is regarded as the event that established the WWE as the top definitive wrestling promotion in the United States. The event brought in the largest wrestling crowd in the US (93,173), and this record was sustained for almost 30 years. The advertising leading up to WrestleMania 3 was hyped around the Hulk Hogan/Andre the Giant main event. Hogan and Andre generated much attention that when it came time for the event, the matches on the undercard, in particular; the Ricky Steamboat/Randy Savage classic had gained massive exposure.  Steamboat vs. Savage was of a higher quality to Hogan vs Andre, however, the level of publicity that was achieved by Hogan and Andre helped give Steamboat/Savage the attention to be remembered and appreciated by a new generation of fans.

Since its beginnings, the WWE has stayed close to the ‘simple sells’ practice; requiring the wrestlers to slow their pace during their matches. This method was vital for their top stars such as Bruno Sammartino, Hogan, Steve Austin, the Rock and John Cena. The reason for this is that the wrestlers could tell better stories that would be received by diverse audiences; it also conserves their bodies to keep up with the travel and demand of wrestling several nights a week. This, of course, applies to a sensible front person that looks after their vocals and lifestyle.

Although Hulk Hogan was nicknamed the ‘Real American’, he was able to appeal to an international audience; other American based characters like Sgt Slaughter and “the American Dream” Dusty Rhodes had certain barriers to their characters which limited their appeal to southern Americans. A fruitful band and wrestling roster can depend upon the maturity of a great frontman and the members whose skills are used for a specific purpose; for the WWE, their purpose has been to reach a broader audience by having the right person in the front.

https://twitter.com/Ite_Lemalu

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Opinion

TheChairshot.com PRESENTS: WWE Bash In Berlin Immediate Reactions

Join DJ and Tunney for their immediate reactions to WWE Bash in Berlin. For the latest, greatest and up to datest, ALWAYS #UseYourHead and visit THECHAIRSHOT.COM

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Join DJ and Tunney for their immediate reactions to WWE Bash in Berlin. For the latest, greatest and up to datest, ALWAYS #UseYourHead and visit THECHAIRSHOT.COM

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prowrestlingtees.com/TheChairshot – TONS of Great designs…MAKES A GREAT GIFT!

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Opinion

AJ’s Top 3 Favorite SummerSlams

AJ is back with his annual opinion article, and this time the SummerSlam buzz got him wondering about his personal Top 3.

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It’s been a while since I have done any form of writing and SummerSlam is this Saturday. Of all the SummerSlams I’ve seen over the years; which ones are my favorites? While it’s not a revolutionary idea, I figured everyone loves to debate favorites of well, anything. Don’t worry though because this isn’t just going to be pure recency bias. I’ve watched the majority of them so with the ones I put on the list, it hit me more in some way shape or form whether it was story, a really good match or it just felt like a solid event.

At least this proves WWE is trending in a good direction for me, when it gets the ol’ brain juices flowing just because a show is around the corner!

#3: 2022 (Ol’ Brock Lesnar Has A Farm)

r/Wrasslin - when did Brock lesner begin his farmer and cowboy gimmick and when did he stop doing the gimmick ? is it worth watching I believe it was 2021 but not sure when he stopped the gimmick
Starting off the show, we get Bianca looking for a rematch against Becky from last years SummerSlam and it was better than the 21 second affair that everyone claims was a squash. This time Bianca holds her own and beats the Man in a fairly decent match, good way to get the event started. Next up is the heat seeking missile, Logan Paul against the former heat seeking missile because, well he wasn’t cut out for it and wasn’t a guy in everyone’s eyes, The Miz. After they had their blow off at Mania with Logan coming out on top which… isn’t awful, I just don’t like Logan Paul because he has that dude bro aura and swagger to make him more hateable than any other person on the card. Which I suppose is his gimmick…so…kudos?

First Championship match is for the US Championship and it’s as expected that in Theory, he should never beat someone to the caliber of Bobby Lashley which is no surprise. Dominik and Rey still back when Dom wanted the good fight against the Judgement Day before joining them later. The former Colts players, which they hammered it dahn in this match up showed that the canal swimming, trash talkin’, podcastin’, current RAW Color Commentatin’ goofball we all love, Pat McAfee came out on top again Bum Ass Corbin.

Usos putting the Street Profits on lockdown in the penitentiary since I believe this was peak Bloodline with the belt collecting and running all of WWE. Liv beat Ronda Rousey which isn’t astonishing but it’s not something people had on their bingo cards for anything with WWE so it was a nice little shock factor. The most memorable part of the night is obviously the Main Event, Lesnar brings the tractor, Roman catching the Microphone and Brock stands on top of the vehicle. Damn good match that showed off what they do in the ring since Roman caught his stride as the main bad guy and Brock… liked people after all of this? That is still a weird statement in my head. Brock being a good guy people person. If Liv wasn’t on bingo cards for wrestling, that is not on bingo cards in any aspect of life really.

That is more of the event that had solid matches and story going for it. No weird double count out, multiple people involved, 5 tag matches on the card. Things made sense and weren’t convoluted, had shocking moments that were great to see like Liv actually getting a title defense and there were the results we all expected at the time like Theory losing in 4 minutes to Bobby Lashley.

#2: 2009 (Are You Ready for The Return?)

10 Greatest Summerslam Entrances in WWE History - GameSpot
This event wasn’t that strong. It was strong with the star power involved in 2009 with guys like Rey Mysterio as Intercontinental Champion, Orton and Cena for the WWE Championship as it was becoming as stale as month old chips and CM Punk was facing Jeff Hardy before he ultimately returned to TNA at the beginning of 2010 after this PPV. For me, it’s not so much of the show itself, it was more of the memories because the Balai as our friends Chris Platt and Rey Cash like to call my brother and I, we were just coming back into wrestling and we were TNA Fans. We didn’t watch WWE that much really, it was just what came on after another channel had old ROH shows before they moved to three hours and swallowed the 8pm Eastern Slot. No, the reason why this has so many memories for me is three main reasons. First, Orton and Cena. They have had their rivalry since the beginning it seems, being each others foils like Hogan and Piper before them and there had to be a stipulation where if Randy was Counted Out or DQ’d, he’d lose the championship regardless. This was prime Viper Randy and the obvious joke we had of Super Cena where he very rarely lost, unless it was SummerSlam surprisingly enough.

Number two reason was CM Punk and Jeff Hardy. Hardys known for the Ladder and TLC matches in the past and this being the penultimate match for this feud and it was a banger of a match. If you didn’t know Punk before, it was a great introduction to his wrestling. I used to like Punk a lot because of this match because he could talk, wrestle… and not insanely personal with things in wrestling. In all seriousness, this was a great match. Ultimate risks, high reward for Punk grabbing the World Heavyweight Championship and he was given his next feud because of the final boss of SmackDown at that time. Thanks, Teddy Long.

The main and final reason though why this match gave me the memories flowing back is more of the fact that one of my closest and longest termed friends of 23 years, also loves wrestling. Back when we were younger, he’d do MoCap videos on YouTube with his figures. We’d have friends come over for parties at his house and we’d do the one thing WWE always told us not to do and that was try it at home. He was always stronger than me, I was always more charismatic. He had the power aspect and did things with brute force, I could talk my way out of trouble with parents if we did something wrong. There was always one thing that our respective mother’s always called us though… it’s on the tip of my tongue… oh right, ‘Degenerates’.

As soon as we were called that, we kind of parodied the DX line. I was limber enough to do the HBK pose and do a Superkick before it became the new DDT and he would just Spinebuster people and knew how to do the water spit. So what do you think was the main reason we even ordered this PPV for his 13th Birthday? I think the two guys we were pretending to be were set to return on a tank and toss out some glow sticks. The return of DX, Shawn Michaels coming back after Mania with Triple H to deal with the Legacy problem was an amazing return for them and made everything so much fun.

So we have the solid card and this one has a personal story… what’s my number one SummerSlam? Is it personal? Well yes but not going into that. Is it a good card? To me, it was a phenomenal card! Is it memorable? Seeing how wrestling fans still mention at least three matches to this day.

#1: 2005 (Octopus in the Washer, Lover’s Quarrel and Where the F%#$ is Vickie?)

Vickie Guerrero on Rey vs. Dominik Mysterio: 'I wish I was part of it' -  Cageside Seats
Quite possibly some of the best matches I’ve seen and one that was just the most hilarious moments of overselling in wrestling history, I know why I love this SummerSlam but it’s also a really good card at the same time. Redacted beats Orlando Jordan in 25 seconds for the US Title and they made jokes about it like, he can make a coffee faster than he beat Orlando and stuff like that, it’s pretty funny. Angle getting sick of Eugene’s antics for his Gold Medal was also a great bit they had play up, the Year long feud of Randy Orton and Undertaker was still going on where Orton comes out on top this time around to get the win back from Mania, Jericho returning for the match with Cena in a whole promotional thing for each other’s groups, Fozzy for Jericho and the Chain Gang doing Bad, Bad Man for Cena leading up to a match for the WWE Championship. JBL won a 20 man battle royal on SmackDown to win the Championship…… Opportunity to face the newest member of SmackDown, Batista but the three main matches that a lot of people talk about to this day; Edge vs Matt Hardy, Rey vs Eddie for Dominik and Hogan vs HBK in the Main Event.

I have reasons to enjoy the Hardy/Edge match but it looked like a real fight, it really made us believe that Matt Hardy was going to kill Edge because real names were dropped during this tirade from Hardy. It wasn’t Edge and Lita, it was Adam and Amy. Matt was so dead set on beating the hell out of Edge that they made a situation into gold and it was a great moment for this match to happen, I believe it was also an Unsanctioned Match too which added the intensity until matt got concussed and knocked senseless that it looked like he couldn’t fight for anything but the build up was what made it seem like a marque match. It made it feel real, it made it feel awesome and it made it feel personal.

Eddie kept tormenting Rey Mysterio about Dominik not being Rey’s but Eddie’s for the summer. That’s all you heard from Eddie being the weasel he was is hanging out with Dominik, making the world believe it’s his son and what not (Let’s not do a fast forward to today where he has the mullet, mustache and everything like Eddie) but they settle this in a Ladder Match where the top of it is a document for the custody of Dominik and my god, this match is better than it should have been. I expect nothing else from Eddie because the man hated having a bad match, Dom got involved and stopped Eddie, Vickie was late and stopped Eddie. The whole match was good it was just very weird with the premise but was a great match. I wonder if Rey regrets his decision to win the match now…

Octopus in a Washing Machine… those five words have resonated with Shawn Michaels’ performance in this match, forever. It was supposed to be an amazing match up between Hogan and Michaels, Icon vs Icon it said and suddenly Hogan’s back gives out, can’t do a trilogy of matches so we can only do the one and then pull out of everything after. This match was set up to be a classic and instead turned into the most unbelievable sell fest ever. A Hogan big boot caused Shawn to tumble 3 or 4 times, getting crotched on the ropes had HBK bouncing higher than he should have, being tossed out of the ring made it look like Shawn never broke his back in 1998 from how much he flopped and flipped around like crazy. It’s bad… or maybe even good that a lot of current wrestlers watched this match that went, “I can sell like that, I want to be a wrestler” and did. So good or bad, I don’t know but for some reason this PPV has always had a place in my heart for how memorable it was.

Those are my top three SummerSlams so far but who knows, 2024 has potential to maybe bump something or at least get me to consider a shift. Should be fun to see how the show plays out! What are some of your favorite SummerSlams?

About Chairshot Radio Network

Launched in 2017, the Chairshot Radio Network presents you with the best in sports, entertainment, and sports entertainment. Wrestling and wrestling crossover podcasts + the most interesting content + the most engaging hosts = the most entertaining podcasts you’ll find!

 MONDAY - Bandwagon Nerds (entertainment & popular culture)

TUESDAY - Musical Chairs (music) / Hockey Talk (NHL)

WEDNESDAY - The Greg DeMarco Show (wrestling) 

THURSDAY - Keeping the news ridiculous... The Oddity / Chairshot NFL (NFL)

FRIDAY - DWI Podcast (Drunk Wrestling Intellect)

SATURDAY - The Mindless Wrestling Podcast

SUNDAY - The Front and Center Sports Podcast 

CHAIRSHOT RADIO NETWORK PODCAST SPECIALS

Attitude Of Aggression Podcast & The Big Five Project (chronologically exploring WWE's PPV/PLE history)

TheChairshot.com PRESENTS...IMMEDIATE POST WWE PLE REACTIONS w/ DJ(Mindless), Tunney(DWI) & Friends

Patrick O'Dowd's 5X5

Classic POD is WAR


Chairshot Radio Network Your home for the hardest hitting podcasts... Sports, Entertainment and Sports Entertainment!

All Shows On Demand


Powered by RedCircle


Let us know what you think on social media @ChairshotMedia and always remember to use the hashtag #UseYourHead!
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