Last night in London, the largest wrestling event ever took place in London at Wembley Stadium, as scrappy upstart turned massive promotion All Elite Wrestling (AEW) hosted their ‘All In’ pay-per-view. As is wont to happen during this kind of thing, some wrestlers get special entrances that more align with their personal interests or that further deepen their character. In many cases, that means some kick ass licensed song makes its way to the show.
And while Swerve Strickland had a rapper do his entrance music and Chris Jericho called upon his bandmates in Fozzy to perform his entrance music “Judas,” it was legendary wrestler Sting and his de facto protege Darby Allin that likely cost AEW owner Tony Khan a boatload of money by using Metallica’s 1983 classic “Seek & Destroy” from Kill ‘Em All.
This, of course, was a throwback to Sting’s time with WCW, when he used the song from 1999 to 2001.
This isn’t the first time Metallica’s been used as a wrestler’s entrance music. ECW hardcore madman The Sandman used “Enter Sandman” most of his career, while “Now That We’re Dead” was used by The Undertaker just prior to his Boneyard Match with AJ Styles at Wrestlemania 36. And that’s not to mention all the other times their songs were used to promote various WWE pay-per-views and whatnot.
What’s wild to note is that Metallica played SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles on the same night and while that venue has a 70,240 capacity, there were more than 81,000 wrestling fans in attendance at ‘All In.’ So more people heard “Seek & Destroy” at a wrestling show than they did at Metallica’s show last Friday in Los Angeles.