Rock & Wrestling Gone Wrong

by Jonny Rokket

In wrestling, such as in life, there are only a few things you can count on. You can always count on Jonny Rokket to know about all things historical about rock & roll and wrestling. By the same token, there are just the plain facts and it's a historical fact that two things exploded in the '80s: wrestling and MTV. With that in mind yours truly decided to hit up YouTube to see what "classic" rock and wrestling combination videos were available. The results were, to put it mildly, humous, and in many cases, painful. Thes are just a few.

Not all music related clips from the time period were WWF clips. Check out this promo music clip from Southern Championship Wrestling in Georgia. The clip is from the late 80's and the song is 38 Special's "Wild Eyed Southern Boys". The wrestler? "Wildfire" Tommy Rich. I believe a couple of the clips may be from Augusta.



While we all know that The Freebirds brought rock & roll into wrestling, it was the WWF's hook up with Cyndi Lauper that made for wrestle-rock history. Of course Lauper had one of the first "created" for vids on MTV as Captain Lou played her pops for "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun." This next video is a Lauper promo for the movie "The Goonies" and this clip features both parts played on MTV as a special! The videos feature Captain Lou, the Iron Sheik, Freddie Blassie, Nikolai Volkoff, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Andre the Giant and more! To bad it sucked but you be the judge. Love the "you haven't had gas until you've had mom & pop's" store sign though!



Not to be outdone, original Freebird Michael P.S. Hayes did a video for Freebirds theme song "Badstreet USA". This clip was eventually used to make another, very controversial clip. Love ya Michael but this is proof positive why rock died for a while in the early 90's.



Of course WWE title holder the Ultimate Warrior couldn't let another "long-hair" out-rock him so he went out and picked up the biggest baddest most hard rockinest musician on the planet to film a music video with. Phil Collins. WHAT? WAIT? OH DAMN!



Now I could get excited that clip is done but folks, it only goes downhill from there! Check out these next two clips from the WWE. Clip one is a gaggle of WWE wrestlers performing "Land of 1000 Dances" with backup help from Rich Derringer and Meatloaf with band. YIKES!



Next is the legendary (hack) "Stand Back" video from 1987. McMahon sings, dances and makes gay faces while Hulk Hogan "bass-synchs" along. Jesse Ventura's intro is spot-on.



Finally...we have even more Hogan for you courtesy of this more recent clip of Hulk Hogan's Wrestling Boot Traveling Band. The songs' "The Hulksters in the House" and it appears to have been filmed at a Hard Rock Cafe, probably Orlando or Miami. What a combo: Bad food AND bad music!



Well kiddies, I guess that's all the ear-bleeding I'll force upon you on this day. But stay tuned...you never know when I'll be back with more painful sounds for your delicate ears!

Rokket Out!