TNA's trouble with themes

[Mr. Artistic guy]

At a glace when you look at WWE and then TNA just from watching one single show, there is an abundance of difference between them. One has become PG meaning there has to be more emphasis on in techinque in the ring, the other has stuck to hardcore wrestling with higher creative licence for moves. One has an arena regularly attending to thousands at a sitting, the other one has an arena that hosts a maximum capacity of not even 1,500.

These and many more are major differences between the products but one often overlooked but highly significant aspect is the themes of each wrestler. WWE has over the past 25 spurted out some of the most memorable songs and tunes in all of music, to the point where real talent has been attracted on occasions to perform for the company. TNA has similarly some memorable tunes, but they are so sparse that they are often drowned out by the genericism of medium-paced, non-lyrical droning indie rock.

Other poor examples include what can only be described as a siren stuck to a beat (similar to right to cencor but at least WWF were trying to piss people off), the theme of the founder of the entire company and one of it's biggest stars. There is also a remix of ric flair's theme of decades which although fairly well executed is quite frankly lazy and about a bad a job in creativity as Bret hart's theme remix in his return to Raw. And there are several other examples of music to set your suicide to.

So my question would have to be primarily how important is it that TNA, trying to be a rival to the world's biggest wrestling company, updates it's entire rosters theme musc until it is all listenable considering some of the bigegst stars of all time have often had the best themes?

Then as a follow-up what should TNA do about this if they are trying to change, ie hire bands to make themes or professional producers? (I mean if they can give some psycho who likes to bang peoples head on metal $15,000 for trying to take out the newest edition to their roster, surely they can pay up for some good music that will last a while longer than her career)

And finally, following up to a thread posted not long ago. Who do you think in TNA has good/bad themes and does it help them get over, or is it a small part of their whole character?


Personally the guys I would label as having bad themes are samoa joe, jeff jarrett, MCMG, ill say ink because although I cant remember their theme, im assuming this means its bad enough for me not to remember... you dig?

Anyways......your turn, go wild shoot, blow those themes out the water. Its all part of improving TNA to make them a viable opposition figure, constructive criticism, at least thats what we can call it.....sounds better than bitching for the sake of it......

 

[Rayne]

First, Jim Johnston is a fucking genius. He better get a whole wing in the WWE Hall of Fame.

This is one of the things TNA needs to copy. Pay attention to every WWE theme song. The key is that every last one of them begins with a recognizable hook. The idea is that the audience knows exactly who's coming down the ramp before they even pull the curtain, and can react appropriately. (For instance, if it's a Divas match, your audience knows it's safe to hit the head for about five minutes.)

Music helps set mood. Theatre's been using music since the Greeks. With only a couple of exceptions (I really like the BP's theme, and I'll disagree with the OP and say Jeff Jarrett's is an example of what-to-do), TNA's entrance music is pretty bland. They need to hire a composer to rewrite a lot of themes.

 

[LizardKing]

The quality of their theme songs has improved over the past few years, but yes, they are light years behind WWE.

First of all, WWE has the money and the national awareness to actually get quality artists to do theme songs. TNA just doesn't have enough money and public image to generate much interest with musicians. For that simple fact, TNA's theme music will always be behind WWE's in quality.

Secondly, WWE has an incredible production set with an INCREDIBLY loud sound system. This loud sound system allows the theme music to come in clearly on your TV set at home, which generates fan awareness to this music to the millions watching at home. I can't tell you how many times I've not been able to clearly hear a TNA wrestlers theme song while watching on TV. Hopefully as they continue to grow, they will be able to improve the quality of their production equipment.

 

[akrassikauda]

First, Jim Johnston is a fucking genius. He better get a whole wing in the WWE Hall of Fame.

This is one of the things TNA needs to copy. Pay attention to every WWE theme song. The key is that every last one of them begins with a recognizable hook. The idea is that the audience knows exactly who's coming down the ramp before they even pull the curtain, and can react appropriately. (For instance, if it's a Divas match, your audience knows it's safe to hit the head for about five minutes.)

Music helps set mood. Theatre's been using music since the Greeks. With only a couple of exceptions (I really like the BP's theme, and I'll disagree with the OP and say Jeff Jarrett's is an example of what-to-do), TNA's entrance music is pretty bland. They need to hire a composer to rewrite a lot of themes.

Yes I fully agree Johnston is a genius. He sets the tone for a character. Take for instance The Undertaker once you hear the bells you don't leave your seat. The first riff from The Ultimate Warriors theme you could hold the bathroom break another 5-10 mins because we all knew he was going to run down to the ring shake the ropes, have a quick match shake the ropes some more. Perfect theme for a wrestler quick heavy out of control the name of that theme is unstable. The Ultimate Warrior's character was unstable.

 

[blackmetalbuick]

This topic is pretty beaten into the ground already. Yes, TNA themes are terrible. Sting's sounds like a crackhead trying to play a guitar solo. The beginning of Samoa Joe's sounds like a fat elephant in a cartoon. Kurt Angle's is cheesy uninspired crap. Compare it to the epicness and crowd reaction from Angle's WWE theme. The only memorable TNA themes are memorable because of how bad they are.

 

[Vintage]

I have to agree with the others. Jim Johnston is a very valuable asset for WWE. He's beyond talented held back only by his fear of performing in public. TNA or anyone else would be hard pressed to be able to come close to matching the in house production skills of a company that's been around for over half a century. I still think TNA should take a page out of ECW and license music or whatever Heyman did to get around paying for it. That or let Jimmy Hart have a crack at a few themes while he's still on the payroll. He's not the best in the business but he is capable of cranking out better crap than what Hernandez or EY uses for music.

 

[Rockafella]

Sometimes, I think that TNA just doesn't try. I mean really, how hard is it to hire somebody to do a job for you? I think that if TNA could have all of their themes resemble something like A.J. Styles' old theme that would be a big boost. Or as somebody else said, add that distinct beginning to a theme song that everybody could pair with the superstar that is coming out.

But then again, I could relate this to some of the characters not having much character.

Good Example : Kurt Angle in WWE was basically an American patriot, and the beginning of his theme song resembled that quite easily.

Even it were something simple as cleverly putting the superstars name at the beginning song.

Good Example : Test (R.I.P). Everything after the beginning of the theme song was basically just a jingle, but immediately after the first word, you knew who was coming out.

Bad Example : .. Well TNA is so bad that I can't even think of a specific theme song to pick on. They're THAT unrecognizable.

TNA needs to skip on planning to hire Matt Hardy (we all know they are) and hire somebody GOOD to create new theme songs.

 

[akrassikauda]

This topic is pretty beaten into the ground already. Yes, TNA themes are terrible. Sting's sounds like a crackhead trying to play a guitar solo. The beginning of Samoa Joe's sounds like a fat elephant in a cartoon. Kurt Angle's is cheesy uninspired crap. Compare it to the epicness and crowd reaction from Angle's WWE theme. The only memorable TNA themes are memorable because of how bad they are.

ROTFL because it's true sometimes I wonder does Russo create these themes also. He has to know since the 80's themes are important if they're all the same or not in touch with the character the crowd is not going to tune in at home. TNA needs to end the geniric WCW( pre-Nitro ) themes.

 

[Mr. Artistic guy]

Despite all this, some TNA themes are pretty great honestly, and you find it hard to realise like somebody mentionned because of the size or the speakers and the reverb in the arena. I hate that god damn arena, I honestly think TNA will not be able to grow any more until it has a much much bigger arena and bigger seating, to be a contender, you have to look like a contender and TNA are actually MAKING themselves look like the 'B' company because they don't move house. That is something they just have to consider.

But that does not excuse the terrible themes, like I started off with, there are some ones I really think are great. AJ Styles theme does the required job, when you hear it straight away you know who is coming out and personally his theme always gets me excited because you associate it with and AJ match, so one big tick and a smiley face from me there.

Anderson's theme also fulfills this criteria of the immediate reaction except everthing after 'MISTEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERR' sounds pretty jaded and typical. Mickie james' theme sounded particularly good the other day, I was quite impressed. there are some diamonds in there surrounded by a pool of worthless rocks so the question is why can't they transfer that succes to the whole roster? Who knows, TNA is often it's own biggest enemy.

 

[RD_21]

To answer the first part of your question maybe they should give contract to band but even then WWE rarely has song that are from a known band.

For people with good song

Samoa Joe as a good song but I don't think it fits him that much if it makes sense. I would prefer him with something more hardcore.

Abyss has a very recognizable hook at the beginning with the mad circus and it really fits him weel with his crazyness gimmick.

Rob Van Damn, I don't even like the guy that much but I am going crazy for his song, as much as I like other song in TNA I think that one is genius, at least for me it hit the target.

Angle has a good song that you can also instantly recognize but his entrance is more memorable than his song.

The Pope song with his entrance money is perfect for him because it's kind of groovy and fit his gimmick.

Anderson song is good but like Hogan, Wolfpack and Flair song it seems to me like there song is almost the same as when they were in WWE, which isn't bad but can be seen as missing in originality.

I think AJ Styles song with the lyric is the closest you can get to a band signing a song and it's good but now awesome.

And the more I type the more I realise that I disagree with this topic. I am listening to songs to try to find a really bad song and I just can't so far I like them all, even Beer Money and MCMG that could be seen as more generic are recognizable to me, maybe not to someone who don't watch often.

If the problem you have with it reside in the fact that there's not a lot of variety in the style I will agree with you but disagree that it's bad because TNA has a style that fits into rock music being hungry and all. Sure the music in TNA may not be perfect but I can't find bad example at the moment and even if I could I can gives you a lot of bad examples in the WWE.

I also think that if some of the WWE song are "THAT" good it's because of the accomplishment that the wrestler did while using that song and not the song itself. Sure some of the song are really good as stand alone music but most of them hit hard because of our attachment to the wrestler who use it.

But in the end if you are talking about truly epic song mine in TNA is the Rob Van Dam one.

 

[MMK]

For me, all of TNA's theme songs sound the same. They're all just generic heavy metal riffs. I can't tell one from the other half the time. And most of the themes have nothing to do with the character they've been assigned to.

The lack of individuality in the entrance themes for wrestlers is just another example of TNA not paying attention to the little details that are so important.

A memorable theme can do wonders when trying to create and push a top character. As every time you hear that theme you instantly think of that wrestler.

I agree with what others have said about Jim Johnson belonging in the WWE hall of fame. Now there's one WWE guy TNA actually should try to get. That would have more impact on TNA than any wrestler they could ever sign.

 

[Rasha]

Other poor examples include what can only be described as a siren stuck to a beat (similar to right to cencor but at least WWF were trying to piss people off), the theme of the founder of the entire company and one of it's biggest stars. There is also a remix of ric flair's theme of decades which although fairly well executed is quite frankly lazy...

The "siren" theme, which belonged to Scott Steiner, began in WCW and has followed him ever since. Even your precious, amazing, genius people in the WWE decided to use it. I've always thought it was great and fit his character perfectly.

I also find it funny that you'd criticize TNA for keeping Flair's LEGENDARY music close to form. Would you rather they butcher it with some weak song like the "American Made" them Hogan to use because "Real American" wasn't available? The Undertaker is still using a theme from the early 90s even though he has MUCH COOLER music available from the Ministry of Darkness. Is that lazy? Nah, because the "great" WWE is doing it.

It's called bias, son, and your post is full of it.

 

[deadelviX]

This topic is pretty beaten into the ground already. Yes, TNA themes are terrible. Sting's sounds like a crackhead trying to play a guitar solo. The beginning of Samoa Joe's sounds like a fat elephant in a cartoon. Kurt Angle's is cheesy uninspired crap. Compare it to the epicness and crowd reaction from Angle's WWE theme. The only memorable TNA themes are memorable because of how bad they are.

the beginning of Joe's theme is a snippet of the classic Godzilla theme song. however... it just doesn't work.

the biggest problem with TNA themes is that they use generic loop based music software to create most of them. these public domain loops are freely available to download all over the internet.... so they're not uncommon at all.

the only one i like is Foley's.

 

[Rayne]

To clear up a misconception here- the WWE's themes on their shows aren't being picked up by an arena sound system and fed into the live broadcast that way. It goes direct from soundboard to broadcast, which is why they sound so crisp on air. I suspect TNA does the same thing, just with the theme mixed into the broadcast at a lower volume. The arena mic gets turned down during entrances, for several reasons; acoustically, so that you don't get a double image, and stylistically, so that you can hear the theme over your audience and so that you can hear the announcers discuss whatever the hell they're going to discuss.

If you don't send the theme straight from the soundboard, you're going to end up with a sound that feels kind of compressed. Arenas do terrible things to acoustics.

 

[SydTinDad]

I have said it a million times...............TNA theme music sucks. It doesn't match the charictar and the ones that do are WWE/WCW rip offs. Really walking the line with some plagerism on some of those.

HOWEVER.............TBP music is the best in the industry hands down. TNA must have made a deal with Satan for that one.

 

[RD_21]

I have said it a million times...............TNA theme music sucks. It doesn't match the charictar and the ones that do are WWE/WCW rip offs. Really walking the line with some plagerism on some of those.

HOWEVER.............TBP music is the best in the industry hands down. TNA must have made a deal with Satan for that one.

I agree that TBP theme is good but the funny part is that I now feel like that song is best suited to Maridon and Tara when they enter on the bike it just fit so perfectly. I wish Madison and Tara would keep using it as I feel it's a better song for them and it feels more heel than face.

 

[Mr. Artistic guy]

To answer the first part of your question maybe they should give contract to band but even then WWE rarely has song that are from a known band.

For people with good song

Samoa Joe as a good song but I don't think it fits him that much if it makes sense. I would prefer him with something more hardcore.

Abyss has a very recognizable hook at the beginning with the mad circus and it really fits him weel with his crazyness gimmick.

Rob Van Damn, I don't even like the guy that much but I am going crazy for his song, as much as I like other song in TNA I think that one is genius, at least for me it hit the target.

Angle has a good song that you can also instantly recognize but his entrance is more memorable than his song.

The Pope song with his entrance money is perfect for him because it's kind of groovy and fit his gimmick.

Anderson song is good but like Hogan, Wolfpack and Flair song it seems to me like there song is almost the same as when they were in WWE, which isn't bad but can be seen as missing in originality.

I think AJ Styles song with the lyric is the closest you can get to a band signing a song and it's good but now awesome.

And the more I type the more I realise that I disagree with this topic. I am listening to songs to try to find a really bad song and I just can't so far I like them all, even Beer Money and MCMG that could be seen as more generic are recognizable to me, maybe not to someone who don't watch often.

If the problem you have with it reside in the fact that there's not a lot of variety in the style I will agree with you but disagree that it's bad because TNA has a style that fits into rock music being hungry and all. Sure the music in TNA may not be perfect but I can't find bad example at the moment and even if I could I can gives you a lot of bad examples in the WWE.

I also think that if some of the WWE song are "THAT" good it's because of the accomplishment that the wrestler did while using that song and not the song itself. Sure some of the song are really good as stand alone music but most of them hit hard because of our attachment to the wrestler who use it.

But in the end if you are talking about truly epic song mine in TNA is the Rob Van Dam one.

Look I appreciate your point of view but most people would disagree, please for a second just compare someone in a similar spot in WWE. OK take dolph ziggler and jay lethal for example, no idea what lethals theme is but I remember dolphs after the first time and his isnt even that great.

I seriously had to sit there before for 10 minutes (cos my headphones are broke) trying to remember what the beautiful people theme is. Samoa joe's makes him sounds like a cartoon game villain like bowser is about to walk in and breathe fire. Jarretts is pathetic. Most of the rest are either OK or imemorable. RVD's is good and catchy, anderson's start is good but the rest is lax. But AJ style's theme is probably my favorite in the wrestling world, I think it's absolutely awesome, one of the best ever for me. Like i said some gems, but you have to search, in WWE your surrounded by them.

 

[Mr. Artistic guy]

The "siren" theme, which belonged to Scott Steiner, began in WCW and has followed him ever since. Even your precious, amazing, genius people in the WWE decided to use it. I've always thought it was great and fit his character perfectly.

I also find it funny that you'd criticize TNA for keeping Flair's LEGENDARY music close to form. Would you rather they butcher it with some weak song like the "American Made" them Hogan to use because "Real American" wasn't available? The Undertaker is still using a theme from the early 90s even though he has MUCH COOLER music available from the Ministry of Darkness. Is that lazy? Nah, because the "great" WWE is doing it.

It's called bias, son, and your post is full of it.

Just to clear something up, I am not a WWE mark. In fact I'd say I aire on the side of TNA is anything. I have no problem with someone KEEPING the same theme like taker or HBK or others have done and I have no problem to ric walking out to his own music, how could I? I do have a problenm with fortune walking out to that monstrosity of a, well I guess 'remix' best describes it

 

[goodlay]

This is yet another dumb thread about the most irrelevant shit that TNA "desperately" needs to fix.

TNA hasn't been around as long as WWE. TNA doesn't have the amount of money WWE has. Obviously they aren't going to be able to get big name bands like Motorhead and Killswitch Engage and what not. Dale Oliver is pretty good at coming up with themes, but he obviously isn't as good as the master that is Jim Johnston.

Oliver has come up with some great themes: Angle, MCMG, Fortune, Sting, Anderson, and Pope are some of my favorites that come to mind first. So I don't really understand the point here.

Oliver clearly isn't as good as Johnston. TNA doesn't have the money that WWE does. Simple as that.

I'm hoping these threads keep coming though. Maybe soon we'll get "TNA needs to change the ring apron" or something along those lines.

 

[Remix]

This is yet another dumb thread about the most irrelevant shit that TNA "desperately" needs to fix.

Music is kind of important, even in wrestling.

TNA hasn't been around as long as WWE. TNA doesn't have the amount of money WWE has. Obviously they aren't going to be able to get big name bands like Motorhead and Killswitch Engage and what not. Dale Oliver is pretty good at coming up with themes, but he obviously isn't as good as the master that is Jim Johnston.

You don't need big bands to create memorable music for example:

[YOUTUBE]CXkPwRtYkaU[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE]A4f9rc0HOX0[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE]btS0OVdqkb0[/YOUTUBE]

All of those were whipped up my Jim Johnson, and even when WWE gets a band in to make a theme tune, he still writes the damn thing.

Oliver has come up with some great themes: Angle, MCMG, Fortune, Sting, Anderson, and Pope are some of my favorites that come to mind first. So I don't really understand the point here.

First off Anderson's theme is not that good. The first thing it makes me think of is a Jimmy Hart version of his WWE theme sans words, Angle's theme (featuring an outside band) has nothing on Medal. I'll give you the rest. But that does not change the fact that TNA themes, usually suck.

Oliver clearly isn't as good as Johnston. TNA doesn't have the money that WWE does. Simple as that.

Oliver was in WCW too and still produced inferior pieces of music, which doesn't need a massive budget.

 

[goodlay]

Music is kind of important, even in wrestling.



You don't need big bands to create memorable music for example:


All of those were whipped up my Jim Johnson, and even when WWE gets a band in to make a theme tune, he still writes the damn thing.

I didn't mean it wasn't important. I'm saying it isn't something urgent that TNA needs to fix. WWE and TNA both have their good and bad themes.

Jim Johnston is obviously better than Oliver. I said that like 5 times in my post. What are you trying to prove?

 

[Mr. Artistic guy]

This is yet another dumb thread about the most irrelevant shit that TNA "desperately" needs to fix.

TNA hasn't been around as long as WWE. TNA doesn't have the amount of money WWE has. Obviously they aren't going to be able to get big name bands like Motorhead and Killswitch Engage and what not. Dale Oliver is pretty good at coming up with themes, but he obviously isn't as good as the master that is Jim Johnston.

Oliver has come up with some great themes: Angle, MCMG, Fortune, Sting, Anderson, and Pope are some of my favorites that come to mind first. So I don't really understand the point here.

Oliver clearly isn't as good as Johnston. TNA doesn't have the money that WWE does. Simple as that.

I'm hoping these threads keep coming though. Maybe soon we'll get "TNA needs to change the ring apron" or something along those lines.

Your saying that oliver has come up with some great themes. Firstly this isn't true, he has come up with a few really good ones, some average ones, and some shockers. Second what your doing is excusing him and basically saying doesn't need any better music because they already have 'great' themes. But seen as you also acepted that the themes of the WWE are better by acknowledging that johnston is a better song writer you also are in effect saying that although WWE has better themes we don't need to try to be as good as them. So right there is where your wrong. TNA needs to aspire to be at least as good as WWE if not better in every department and that is why improving their music is so important. They can't sit back knowing they as not that far from being WWE standard hence now why good themes are so important

 

[Derrtown]

I disagree with this actually. All WWE has are Rock/Pop songs while TNAs themes sound so much more traditional. Sometimes WWE music themes seem to sound the same and I cant say that about TNA's.

 

[LitasRevenge79]

I really don't think TNA or WWE is going to have a one up advantage on each other on this. You have to look at the person/wrestler/entertainer that the song/theme is being done for. That person also puts a little bit of them into that song as well.

Let's take for example Dale Oliver, he has put together some good, some bad, and some out of nowhere hits. For example, a song that I still to this day cannot get out of my head is AJ Styles' remix of the Get Ready To Fly with the rap remix. When I first heard it at one of the PPV's I was like I was MTFO. It wasn't any worse than his original, but it brought about a great change of pace. Now you also look at some of the other songs/themes he's done, I do like Jeff Jarrett's "My World" not bad. Then you look at Booker T's theme...basically a redone version of his WCW/WWE theme he had, and Christian Cage's theme, a remix of Evanescene's "My Last Breath" okay, a little different, but still, a unique thing. But for Knockouts, let's look at "The Beautiful People", probably the most recognized of the women there, amazing choice, and Awesome Kong, brilliant as well. Then you have Taylor Wilde, a version of some electro-pop type of nautical theme, and its like , what? Then let's look at some newer people Jeff Hardy, his own song, original, and yet people recognize it because of the way he used it before, and RVD, people automatically identify the heavy beats behind it right away and the signature arm moves, so there is a gimmick to it.

Now onto the WWE and Jim Johnston, a genius in his own right. He's able to work his magic. Let's see, you've got the Shawn Michael's song "Sexy Boy" classic. Then one of my favorites themes, for "The Brood." Then he's able to capture great artists like Motorhead, Killswitch Engage, Three Six Mafia, Alter Bridge, Rev Theory, and many others to create fantastic songs that will live on in infamy. To this day, there are some songs I still will never understand, like Alicia Fox's, an instrumental rip-off of Nelly's "Hot In Herre" or you have Tiffany's song "Insatiable" basically praising about being a nympho. lol. Or you have Daniel Bryan's "Flight of the Valkyries" which, original, but doesn't seem to suit him. He would be better suited for something a little more electronic at least in my humble opinion. But each one has their good, bad, and "Huh?!"

 

[mr.lance]

That is why Jimmy Hart was hired . He ran wcw's and was one of main music producers in the WWF in the late 80's and early 90's.