Issue 046
February 2009
Entrance music in MMA can sometimes be depressingly formulaic. Some metal here, a bit of rap there, repeat, repeat, repeat, from the start of the show right through to the end. Thankfully, some fighters choose something a little more memorable, and just that bit different. This month Andrew Garvey (a man who truly hates rap in all its forms) picks out five of the very best entrance songs.
01 Song 2 by Blur
The second single from their fifth studio album, Song 2 is a great little entrance song. Just over two minutes long and crowd-pleasing from start to finish, it doesn’t give a fighter time to saunter to the ring or cage. Instead, they have to sprint down the entrance way as if they have to destroy their opponent immediately. This all makes it the absolute perfect accompaniment to Michael Bisping’s entrances. This is particularly true of UFC shows in Britain, where Bisping is guaranteed a rapturous reception and absolutely everybody knows the song (well, at least that infectious ‘WHOO HOO’ bit, anyway).
02 Scary by The Mad Capsule Markets
Hands up all the fans of Japanese electronic / punk / industrial / metal reading this. Surely there must be at least a few of you? Shame on you. But even the unconvinced may at least be aware of ‘The Fireball Kid’, Takanori Gomi’s signature tune. A frenetic three minutes of barely understandable English and seemingly random noise that actually flows together quite well, it may represent the best of the utterly bonkers band’s output. Aggressive, fast, and exceptionally Japanese, it’s the perfect soundtrack to Gomi’s fantastic scraps against Jens Pulver, Tatsuya Kawajiri, Luiz Azeredo, and Hayato Sakurai.
03 Bad Moon Rising by Creedence Clearwater Revival
Originally released by the Californian quartet in August 1969 (17 years before Dustin Hazelett was born) this American rock ‘n roll classic still gets regular radio airplay and has featured in ‘The Shining’ and ‘An American Werewolf in London’. It’s a truly great song that has inspired everything from soccer chants to nicknames of sports stars (and even an episode of the West Wing). It was also the perfect fit for the ultra-exciting bearded submission machine Hazelett (who looked like he was midway through a werewolf transformation) at UFC 91, where he scored the second ‘Submission of the Night’ bonus of his UFC career.
04 A Country Boy Can Survive by Hank Williams Jr
Two-time UFC welterweight champion and MMA legend Matt Hughes is known for a few things; his farm-boy power, his excellent wrestling, his disdainful attitude to his opponents, and his trademark entrance music. For much of his career, Hughes has strolled out to this song and bludgeoned his opponents to a painful defeat. Hank Jr won fistfuls of music awards, churned out a whopping 50 studio albums and provides the theme music for the NFL’s ‘Monday Night Football’. His anthemic ode to the country boy perfectly fits Hughes’s personality, worldview, and fighting style – just don’t listen to Kid Rock’s appalling cover version, we beg of you.
05 The Wild Boys by Duran Duran
With one of the most ambitious and expensive music videos of its time, The Wild Boys is certainly memorable and the tune itself is infuriatingly catchy. Whether its any good or not is a completely different matter, but that doesn’t seem to bother Mirko Crop Cop, as he seems to love it, having used the song as his entrance tune for years. This makes it almost as much a part of the ‘Cro Cop experience’ as him blasting some poor unfortunate into unconsciousness with a foot to the face. The catchiness of the song comes across best in a live setting – you really haven’t lived until you’ve witnessed grown men stamping their feet and singing along like giddy schoolgirls as Mirko makes his way to the ring.
