Chris Jericho has lifted the lid on why he chose Judas as his theme after leaving WWE and why trying to get booked in Japan outside of wrestling played a part.
Chris Jericho is one of only a handful of wrestling stars that can lay claim to having more than one iconic theme song in their wrestling career.
During his days in WWE Break The Walls Down was an anthem, holding its own among the broken glass, if ya smells, and break it downs of a different sort during the halcyon days of wrestling theme songs in the Attitude Era.
Speaking to Inside The Ropes’ Alex McCarthy for talkWRESTLING, Chris Jericho explained how his WWE theme came to be:
“Break The Walls Down was written by Jim Johnson, with some input from Kevin Dunn and myself, because I wanted something much more kind of dated, almost like an 80s thing. And Kevin Dunn was like ‘Oh, you need something contemporary, something like a Rage Against the Machine.’ And I was like okay, and Jim came up with that. At first I heard it, like this has got a real good groove to it. I remember just saying I want more guitars on it, like put another five tracks guitars on it, and he did. So yeah, it is one of those classic themes.”
Chris Jericho’s post-WWE career began in New Japan Pro Wrestling where he needed a theme song to herald his arrival in the company. Jericho explained why picking his band Fozzy’s hit Judas as his new song was more to do with his rock ‘n’ roll career than his wrestling one:
“And then obviously, when I left WWE to go to New Japan, I couldn’t use it, and maybe I could have tried but I didn’t want to. I wanted something new. The reason why I use Judas is because Judas was at its peak as a radio hit at the time, and we have been trying to tour Japan for 22 years that we’ve been in a band we just can’t get booked there for whatever reason, I thought, ‘well, f*ck, If I’m headlining the Tokyo Dome, maybe if I come to the ring to a Fozzy song, at least 50,000 people will hear it, maybe one of those people will be a f*cking promoter that can bring us over.’ It didn’t work out that way, but it did work out to be an amazing song.”
“I remember the first time I used it was against Kenny at the Tokyo Dome and just like holy sh*t, this vibe is so good, so cool. And then you know a few months after that people started singing it on the cruise, on my cruise and that was just a magic moment that still exists to this day it was organic. And that’s what we always look for as an organic reaction.”
The singalong of Judas has become a firm part of AEW shows and something that was easy to explain when Jericho was beloved in the latter days of the Inner Circle. When he began The Jericho Appreciation Society however there was plans in place to make it less of a singalong song in keeping with his villainous role but Tony Khan wanted to keep it as part of the show, something Jericho concedes was the right call:
“Then when I started the JAS and turned heel I had a remix with Rich Ward that we did that was a little bit less of a sing along. Tony didn’t want to do it. I was like I’m a heel, I don’t want people to sing. He’s like why? It’s an organic moment that people know is part of our show. Why would we want to cut off our nose to spite our face? So you use a different song, get the heat for one week and then you just have an entrance why? Let’s f*cking use it, and it’s part of the show. And he was right, you know?”
“Yeah, people sing along, and then after that it’s my job to be a heel. And this is entertainment, right? So when you have that moment where people are singing on their own organically, why mess with it? And we didn’t. And as a result of all of those things, you know, we just got a gold record for Judas, which 500,000 units sold, or streaming equivalent of. And from what I understand, it’s still steamrolling towards probably going to go platinum in the next four to five years. So who am I to argue with that?”
“It’s not [slowing down]. And if I came to the ring three times, sometimes I come to the ring during Dynamite, and then I’ll come to the ring for Rampage to commentate on the same night, maybe, there’s another time, if we play it three times, people will sing it three times, like they don’t f*cking care. They’ll just sing it again, and sing it again, and sing it again. So like I said, it’s part of the show. And it’s a highlight of the show for so many people, so that makes me happy.”
To check out the full interview and other chats with wrestling’s top stars check out the Inside The Ropes YouTube channel!
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