Jim Johnston: Behind WWE's legendary theme songs, why he's not in the Hall of Fame, thoughts on AEW

is doing the same kind of hammer dynamics, but with violins and uh and orchestras and it's always struck me that they're very similar, but I was lucky enough, through a friend, to be in the studio, not that he I knew it with Randy, uh, when he was working and literally conducting the orchestra for the Robert Redford movie. movie nashville wow and it was, I mean, it was embarrassing because I'm kind of hiding in a corner, I don't know anyone there and I spend most of the day trying not to burst into tears because it was just because I was saying, "Oh my God, they're going to close the session and the session cost like eight. million dollars a minute with these major musicians in the room and they're going to say "Oh my God", this guy is having a nervous breakdown here in the corner, what's the problem, but it was so amazingly beautiful, what was playing the orchestra and Randy. music and then I was in the control room just sitting there and this guy walks in and boom, Robert Redford was just as simple as Dave, he saw me, he came over and he says hello Bob Richard, I say, oh yeah, right, welcome Welcome to The Twilight Zone .

You know that somehow your music has touched a lot of people the same way. I know, but it's so strange because it's so hard to process that and I feel so honored. and almost embarrassed by it, you know, it's actually an interesting dynamic when someone, particularly when it happens in person, and someone is, you know, really gushing about how much you've meant to them or what you've done. them, yeah, and you know you want to honor that and be completely respectful, but at the same time there's another part that you want to say like you, hey, I like it, I'm glad you like this stuff, but because I think all songwriters when you're doing what you do you're just doing what you do you're that you know I'm not sitting in the studio saying oh god that's really oh geez oh that's really good you know that's that's that's going to kill people right there you know I don't think so you're different than the firefighter who puts out fires, that's your job, my job is to sit here in the studio and compose music, the thing is you could look at it that way, but from the outside looking in when we listen to your work, you're the best that I've never done this in the wrestling business, yeah, well, you know, and now I'm trying to get out of that business and uh.

You know it's very interesting because I was never, ever a wrestling fan and like I said, I walked in the door by absolute chance. You know, it wasn't like I was sending tapes to Vince saying I gotta listen to my stuff, man, you know, because I have this great idea: We're going to make intro

theme

s for these guys, you know, huh, but it just dragged so fast and Vince would obviously want to take it. taking the business away from his father for a long time or I guess he wanted to do that for a long time he finally did it and once he had control he just wanted to completely change the landscape which he did yeah where does the process start?

It starts when Vince or someone in WWE says we have this new person coming in, we need a

theme

for them, where does the process start? um, I never got much information, Chris, it was, you know, yeah, it was, uh, yeah If I could watch some video that would help me tremendously because a lot of it, where I start is usually I want to know a basic tempo and a vibe so you know in the extreme that if he is a giant guy, he will be a slower heavyweight. slow and heavy theme that tempo that reflects that he's a big guy, you know he is, so if you run fast, he would start doing that from time to time, other guys are smaller and wiry and, you know, so, they're, They are, Do you want to reflect that nervousness and that nervousness and that energy?

So you start there and then. I just try to find something that resonates so that it's really as elusive as I just sit down and start playing things and Then all of a sudden, you know it's a very strange process, but suddenly something will happen. I'll know. There isn't a time in my life where I have writer's block, it's me, you know, and this sounds like everything to you, but you know everything, even the best things can be in extremes where they don't help you much Yes, and I have been lucky enough to never have writer's block, but the flip side is that I can't pick up a guitar, sit down at the piano, or play a bass without having an idea.

They just come, so I have. I have this work pending, you know, I keep all these ideas on my phone, you know, and before that I was on Little, you know, those little handheld computers like Palm Pilot or some reporters, so I just deleted this the other day, um , and I'm done. up to 73 ideas, yeah, and I have these files and notes and every folder, I take them off the phone and file them, every folder should have, you know, it'll get to about 200 or 300 when I do it. Finally I just say that I have to get them off the phone so it doesn't break or it doesn't get stolen and disappear, but I have hundreds of hundreds of folders of these. things that I would love to go back and go over and I mean obviously you know about 70 things that I guess if I had the time, you know which ones are worth pursuing to make a full recording, I don't know 15, you know that well.

I don't know what the odds are, but I don't have that kind of time, you know? So it also produces another thing that's not particularly valuable to me, which is distraction. You know, I'll be working on one. While I'm working on them, a cool idea comes to me and I want to stop what I'm working on and now go work on the new cool idea because it's fresh and current and it's you, that's exciting versus the less exciting disciplinary aspects of moving forward and finishing the composition and my time in WWE was a blessing in that sense because the pace was such and the course schedules were so demanding that I didn't have time to be distracted, I'm sure you know.

Just keep pushing yourself forward what was the fastest turnaround you've ever had for a topic oh we just hired this guy who's debuting tonight on Raw Jim oh that happened all the time oh my god that wasn't weird at all more minimal, but me. You know, I don't know an hour and a half or something, whose topic did you write in an hour? I have no idea, but I know. You know, there were definitely times where I got a call from wherever they were filming television and it's like you know we need something for this guy, you know what it is, you know whatever he did, the writers just decided they weren't a team, but they are going to separate them, it will be a solo, you need a piece of music. you know, give me anything and you know it's easy for them to say give me anything, but I felt a big responsibility like part of these guys' careers and successes were in my hands and you know, I think the music now in WWE and in aew um I guess I'm sorry, this is bad.

I think everything is very homogeneous and very mediocre and has nothing to do with the characters and I think that is why there are fewer big stars. I don't think there aren't any big potential stars. in the lists that are hidden there, I mean, before steve austin was steve austin, he was the master of the ring and there are a lot of stories like that where these people need the right story, the right wardrobe and definitely the right music to encourage them, because particularly the music. is serving multiple masters in a way that is entertainment for the audience, it is a great kick in the butt for the wrestler before they go out and to put them in the headspace of their character and encourage them to put on a great performance and if you are in that situation, I can't imagine being in that situation where you know you're not really sure about your character, uh, you know, the story is kind of like, you know, I'm supposed to.

I hate this guy, but why don't I do it? I don't even know why I'm supposed to hate him and you know your music is kind of generic wrestler music, right? and you're supposed to go out there. and being on top of the world and charming everyone else and I think it's a great question, well your music ends up influencing who that character is and can often define what their gimmick becomes. I just had Chris Masters on the show recently. I can't imagine Chris Masters without that entrance theme that then became his entrance and that then became part of who he was, but I always saw WWE as a live movie, you know, and I always felt like I'm from those who make up the characters. to the movies um your theme has to be like the theme of jaws or darth vader or any other dr chivago uh you know air force one you know you have to listen to it and think like yes, okay, here comes steve austin, no you don't need to know nothing else you don't need to know the story you don't need to know who he's fighting tonight I don't know you don't need to know you know what happened last week or what could happen next week all you need to know is that steve austin is going out, it's like boom I'm ready to go I'm right and and instantly you're in that defiant mood, fuck you and you take that out of the wrestling business and I think it's a huge component so the audience is Like you're giving too much responsibility to the audience, it's like being in a movie and the movie isn't very good and you're not following the movie. so you know like you're pushing your girlfriend it's like wait a second is this the guy we think killed the girl or do we think the girl killed the guy like I'm a little lost here if that's the reaction of the audience so boy so you're fighting a losing battle they have to be the exact opposite they have to be like this guy did they're going to get his ass kicked and I can't wait to be there when it happens it happens you know you mentioned aew and when they started already You weren't a WWE employee, did they ever contact you to make it happen?

No and it's always just from a business angle, it always surprised me because if I was into something like that. board room or whatever I'd say like Vince just fired you, this is one way we can really hit him, find that guy, bring him here this afternoon, you know right, think about how many other people they brought in from the wwe, jim ross justin. roberts and of course all kinds of other artists that you meet in the ring, yeah, it's amazing, uh, I don't know, you know, it doesn't make sense to me, but well, I think what was so great about your

legendary

songs

on all the time. your career is a beat or two away, boom we knew exactly who was going to come out and this is something wcw never figured out, tna never figured out and unfortunately aew doesn't really have it either, no they don't and it's the biggest Surprise to me I was in WWE my entire time, music was really important to Vince, I mean, he clearly understood the importance of that and then something changed, so I mean, either the business has gotten so big or I don't know, maybe maybe he is a little. he's older and he just doesn't want to be that involved in a micromanaging level and he's leaving those decisions to other people, but it seems like such an obvious thing, both in WWE and Aew, well you know things don't go perfectly here and in our Los Ratings certainly aren't what they were before.

What can we do to give this baby a shot in the arm? You know someone doesn't raise their hand and say, "Everyone thinks music is okay, maybe we can get better music." I don't know, you know, but I mean, you know you're in Hollywood, it's the whole entertainment world. There are a lot of egos floating around out there and a lot of decisions are based not on logic, but on, you know, love or lust. or hate or resentment or um you know, yeah, he's the right guy for the job, but we're not hiring him, yeah, you know, um, he's cool, Abby's crazy, but hey, that's the world in that we live, but with the incredible relationship you had. with vince mcmahon, you know, since the '80s, did you ever think that one day you'd get fired? have them kick me out and have their people come through the door and um, then you know, okay, that's how the game is played, but it's not the way I think, so I may be speaking completely out of turn here , but you are available. to hire, you're doing all kinds of other jobs, if a wrestler who wasn't signed to a major company contacted you, could you make music for someone like the one I did? um uh um oh my gosh, I don't feel like it's pco, yeah, pco, thank you, uh, it's really bad for me not to remember his name, uh, he came up out of nowhere, somehow he got to me and he was very kind and courteous and he said You know, this is, I'm taking an absolute flier here.

Would you even consider writing a track for me? And this was shortly after I came out of the hole, not so soon, you know, but I don't know, six nine months. year uh and um I said sure, well, you know why not, what not to do much more, you know what, what the hell and it would be fun, you know, so is when you do something for so many years, human beings are very habitual. You know, and if you get into the habit of doing things, they don't disappear overnight, of course, and while I have a million ideas, song ideas, orchestral ideas, still to this day, I'll be playing with something and I will go. boy, that would be a great idea for the theme, you know, I mean, you know, you just pick up a guitar and you're playing, you know it's like, oh, okay, I just wrote my intro theme, thanks, you know, that would be cool and that's how it happens most of the time, so yeah, yeah, I mean, I guess there are contractual issues, but it's also been a little surprising that somehow much is it per minute, let's say one minute you get a hundred dollars if it plays on cbs on prime. time, uh, it could be a couple thousand dollars, so when your stuff plays Friday night on Fox a lot more, yeah, sure, yeah, I don't know, I've never done it, I've never tried it, It's something difficult. to discern unless you hear the exact same piece of music on both and can see, but yeah, there's an absolute sliding scale and there's actually a big controversy right now with the correct interpretation societies because a lot of people are getting their content. through streaming and all the composers who have a lot of stuff on streaming services say: do you know why the rates are so low when the vast majority of people watch TV and movies and everything else through a streaming service ?

And it has to change because Clearly, I mean it's happening exponentially fast at this point, change. I think the biggest pro is happening so fast. I think the biggest problem now is what are these terrestrial television stations going to do. I mean, how is cbs going to come out? from this you know, I don't know the answer to that, I mean, you know, regular television, since we know that it's basically going to fade away, I would assume that it's going to basically fade away and that the new televisions are going to be essentially just a computer and you.

You'll turn on your computer and instead of switching to channel 2, you'll go to cbs.com directly from there, so where can we listen to some of your other work right now that isn't wrestling related because you're doing all kinds? about things outside of wrestling, well, I have a topic for you somewhat related to that, the way the music industry works there, each piece of music has two owners, it has the composer and the publisher, and if it is a situation like the mine where I'm the only songwriter and WWE is the only publisher, so there's two ways to look at it: either I own 50 of that composition and they own 50, but the way the music industry handles it is really every composition is 200, I own 100 on the composition side, they own 100 on the publishing side, the strange thing about that system is that if you are the editor, if Chris is the editor, you have all the power so that Ford can come to us and tell us: Hello.

We want to use Stone Cold Steve Austin's theme for our new F-150, yes, you could say it's a great idea, I love it and you could say no, I don't like it and we're not going to do it. Wow, it's that simple and there are all kinds of Besides that, I can't do anything with my own music because they are the publisher. I would have to ask your permission to say that I would like to send this to four because I want to present an idea, yes. and I just want to make sure that you guys would be okay with it if I can sell it, because if not, I'm dead in the water, which is very strange not being able to do something with your own music.

I can use it for a demo purpose, sure, demo reel, but that's it, so when I posted WWE I found myself in this situation where I had to create a music reel because I've been busy all these years without doing my own music. and even some

songs

that were my songs that I guess you would say borrowed from WWE um are now mine, but there's another element in the music business called master, it's that report, so that recording is their property. recording even though I own the writing side and the publishing side they own that recording so I can't use that recording and this is what is happening now for anyone who is a taylor swift fan yeah, she's been re-recording masters because that's not her, yeah, and there's a lot of injustices in the music industry and that's a huge injustice that needs to be resolved, but yeah, anyway, I've been in the process of creating a reel and and that.

Basically, it takes me a while to promote myself, so there are a few things I keep in rotation on my website, mainly orchestral stuff, that I really enjoyed taking the time to do, but I'm working on a bunch of songs right now. including some, uh, I'm throwing out there, that are basically like incoming news because you know, I've had a couple of ideas where it's like I have to do that, that's good, are you scoring films too? I'm also trying to score TV shows, that's what I'm trying to do and I'm about to sign with someone in Hollywood or in some kind of negotiation with them, so this is exciting, yes, yes, yes, no. everything is great, it's a little bit scattered and, you know, leaving WWE is like going through a divorce, you know you've been doing the same thing for so long, yeah, there's a considerable amount of emotion that happens and you readjust because you I've known for so long that you wake up every morning and you're doing the same thing and you know what's on your table and then you wake up one morning and that's no longer on the table or yes, or that person is no longer there I'm no longer there next to you and you know that requires adjustments or did it from there.

Yes, I think it seems obvious that you are a Hall of Famer, but do you think WWE will induct you into their Hall of Fame? If they haven't already, they won't, yeah, and it's just, you know, it's one of those kinds of annoying things where you don't want to be mean about it, but it's like you guys fired me and now I want me back. and put you above you by knowing the

hall

of

fame

, so you know, it would be an honor, of course, yes, but at the same time it would be uncomfortable. It would certainly be awkward because there are several people there that I would love to never see again and not have to shake their hands and pretend like we're all friendly, but I don't know, you know, it's just not a big aspect of my life right now and I love it. what I'm doing and you know, one of the really exciting and positive things after doing the WWE thing for so long is being able to come to the studio and write whatever you want, yeah, you know.

Don't tell me okay, you know Chris needs a theme and we need. I need a theme. Yes, I will make a topic for you. You want to thank God. He would die a happy man after that. I've been very excited to do it. a theme for you, what do you think would be a theme for you, boy? We could be at this for the next four hours trying to figure it out, but I was a backyard wrestler when I was 16. I really had anger against The Song of the Machine because I was a heel. AHA. I don't remember what it was called, but that was my theme song.

Don't know. I mean, I think you'd be more comfortable being Baby Face or Heel. I think I'd be a babyface now, I mean I'd like to think I'm pretty positive, charismatic and happy. I like to smile, yes you are, yes that comes off, but sometimes they get the best returns because you know. think about your easiest way is to think about your favorite movies in particular the best bad guys are the most outstanding hannibal lecter uh you know it's not the fast ones uh ugly uh dirty ones you know it's kind of trite you know well, you're a bad guy, I get it , you know, please slap me again, um, but you know it's that person or or something like the mystery where there's this perfect, charming guy, it's like, well, he's not the serial killer, I mean, God.

My, honey, this guy is. This is the guy who is doing everything he can to save everyone and catch the serial killer, so those are the best ones to find out that he is the serial killer, yeah, you know, because the good guys are just as good as the serial killer. bad guys are bad and if you're going to play Superman you better pray they come up with you know a wild card guy or you're Batman like he's really bad I mean he's a really messed up sick guy and that makes Batman be better because it's It's a c

hall

enge to win, it's meaningful to win and this other guy is so bad and so scary and even though you know it's just a movie, you can't help but think like a man, there are probably guys like that out there and you have to kill these people. you know and save it because you know that's dangerous yeah so having bad guys that are really dangerous I mean it would be interesting to go and I'm also a little bit contrary to what I don't like if there was a new black wrestler immediately like If the last thing he wanted to do was hip-hop he was like oh my god okay yeah he's black so let's do hip-hop you know, it's like no, how about we do whatever we don't Is it hip-hop? -hop, yeah, um, so you say that and and my first impression when we started talking about a topic for you would be something very mysterious, uh, very dark, and uh, and it could still be used for your show because it would come off as what I am.

I'm doing this week, who knows, let me know. I could be interviewing Jim. I could be watching interviewing the rock. I could be surfing. I could be climbing a mountain. You know, it could be interviewing some beautiful woman. You know, it's like you're already complete. optimistic, you know, healthy, handsome, handsome, fit and everything you don't need, music to sell, what you sell, you already stole it, so now you're being redundant, your music states the obvious, I think you want, you want music being a kind of subtext that says something deeper about what you believe or what's going on beneath the surface.

This is like a master class. I love it, but while we finish this, Jim, can you grab your guitar and give me a little riff. of what Chris's fan fleet thing would sound like, no, it would be oh, I'll never think about it, but whatever you come up with I'll do it, here you go, it's something like this, something in that category, this has Ha It's been a great pleasure oh my god no, it's been great spending time with you. I love it and I want to be respectful of your time, but I end each interview talking about gratitude because it is something very important in my life. and you see it here I love this, be cool, thank me too, so I start and end each day by saying out loud three things I'm grateful for, so I end each interview the same way.

I want to ask you, Jim, what are three? things in your life that you're grateful for right now uh I'm grateful for this period of time um I've always been a pretty instinctive person and I feel the wave coming that um you know there's been this big chapter one. in my wwe life and so I'm so grateful for this time in between because chapter two is so eminent, I mean, really potentially days away, um, so many different things conspiring in a good way in my life, I love it, um my wife without a doubt she keeps me centered and you know sane and fed and all kinds of good things um and um I'm grateful for just being uh I I I you know I'm just as awkward as I know it makes some people being dishonest if I don't say it , God has blessed me a lot by living a great life and having great good fortune and in that whole relationship I take him seriously because I have a responsibility in that relationship.

I don't think he just gives you free stuff. I feel like I'm doing my part. I work hard and I have a very strong work ethic and a responsibility in what I do, but I feel like I have this great gift and uh and I. I feel like it's my responsibility to get it out there, yeah, so I'm grateful to have had this great opportunity to get it out there through WWE and I'm really happy to see some things opening up here, um, uh. two so some chapter two media give me year three on behalf of wrestling fans around the world.

I just want to say thank you, thank you for everything you've done, thank you for marking our childhood, thank you for marking our adolescence, thank you for all the memories that are linked simply to you, simply making amazing music. Thank you, could you do us the great honor of interpreting us? Sure, what do you want to hear, oh My Underer, play The Underer, so, oh my God?