WWE’s Survivor Series is set for Saturday, and the team of Rhea Ripley, Bayley, Iyo Sky, Dakota Kai and Nikki Cross will face Raw Women’s Champion Bianca Belair, Alexa Bliss, Michin, Asuka and a mystery partner strongly rumored to be Becky Lynch.
Ahead of the show, Ripley did a lengthy, wide-ranging interview with Dillon Collins of Metal Injection where she discussed her current theme music, getting into heavy metal and how wrestling fueled her interest in heavy music. She also talked about her love for the mosh pit.
According to Metal Injection, Ripley enlisted Motionless in White frontman Chris Motionless for a new version of her theme song, “Demon In Your Dreams.”
“I fought for the Motionless in White one,” she explained. “The (original) New Year’s Day one, I don’t know. They were like ‘we’ve got this rad chick that’s going to sing your song.’ And I was like, cool. Like, who is it? Like, are you going to tell me? And they finally told me, Ash Costello. I was like no way! Like, I’ve been listening to her for so long. I had the half head hairstyle as well when I was younger because I got inspiration from her. I was like, this is bloody wild!”
“So I guess because my aesthetic and like the way that I am is so different to what they’re used to, especially in the women’s division, they were like, ‘Right, we sort of have to go above and beyond and find someone that suits her well.’ So it’s cool that Ash Costello was the one that they picked.”
“And then for the Motionless in White one, l texted Chris and I was like, ‘Would you be down to do it? I want to change my song up.’ And he’s like, ‘Oh my God. Like, Yes, I would definitely do it.’ So I was like alright! I texted the music guys like, ‘get ready for this. I’m changing my song and the person singing it and you guys have absolutely no say in it. I’ve already got the okay from him, so make it work, please’ (laughs). So I was like, ‘It’s got to work. If you can’t get Chris and you won’t let me have Chris, I’m not changing my song.'”
Ripley shared that her earliest metal memory was hearing Papa Roach on Raw.
“So my earliest memory is Papa Roach, of course, because of wrestling, it (‘…To Be Loved’) being the Raw theme song. They were like the first band that I really listened to and got into and started to love.”
“And then of course, I would go to YouTube and listen to their songs over and over again because it was the time that you did that and you didn’t really have an iPod per say or you couldn’t download things as easily. So I would just go to YouTube and once it goes through a Papa Roach song it starts going to other bands that are similar. It sort of just keeps trickling in. I remember stumbling across Suicide Silence and Of Mice & Men, and I was like, ‘Yo, these guys are sick!’”
Ripley would use Of Mice Men’s “Second & Sebring” as her theme song working for the Australian independent promotion, Riot City Wrestling. She said that heavy metal’s connection with wrestling is what got her into the genre.
“Being a wrestling fan definitely did turn me into the metalhead that I am today,” Bennett said. “It’s crazy and it’s wild that like two things that are sort of completely different just meshed so well together. And it’s not just WWE and like listening to the bands and the music that they would have on the pay-per-views and for Raw and Smackdown. Yes, that was where it all stemmed from. But then also going to Riot City Wrestling in Adelaide, South Australia.”
“We were all massive wrestling fans and we would listen to the songs that WWE would choose of course, and then we would listen to them. And then it’s funny how YouTube works and like the algorithm. More just pop up and we’d use them for recaps of the shows. We would use them for our upcoming shows and theme songs as well. So it’s just like all been trickling and man, it’s crazy. And I’ve found a lot of fantastic bands. And now to think that I’m here, I work for WWE and we’re using bands that I’ve been listening to for the past, I want to say ten years, that I’ve been absolutely obsessed with.”
“Other people think of metalheads and wrestling as like two different outcast groups. So when the outcast groups sort of come together and we’re one and we all get along and we all love each other, it’s really cool,” she said.
Ripley also revealed that she is no stranger to the mosh pit, and said it’s her favorite part of going to concerts.
“I’m definitely in the middle of the mosh pit,” she said of attending concerts. “Even when I was younger and I was a lot smaller, I had a lot less muscle, we would go to like Soundwave Festival and man, I would be in that mosh pit for hours. Like, I’d be headbanging in it, I’d be doing the wall of death, I’d be doing the circle pits, I’d be fly kicking everyone in the face and then helping them up. I did absolutely everything. I loved being in the middle of it all and being squashed and just like thrown around. That’s the funnest part to me. Like, you’d go to the concert or the festival nice and clean and you would leave a sweaty, disgusting mess. And that was just part of it.”
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