dChan - Q Origins Project Archive

Jim Johnston is the musical genius behind the Undertaker's theme.

One of my all time favorite composers.

Wikipedia

James Alan Johnston (born June 19, 1959[1]) is an American music composer and musician best known for his time with professional wrestling promotion, WWE. Over the course of three decades, he composed and recorded entrance theme music for the promotion's wrestlers, and compilations of his music released by WWE charted highly in several countries.

Writing and recording mostly by himself, he wrote over 10,000 pieces of music, many of which are as highly regarded as the wrestlers themselves. In later years, he regularly collaborated with mainstream hip hop and rock musicians such as Motörhead, Disturbed, Kid Rock, Ice-T, Run-DMC, and Our Lady Peace for new music and different takes on existing entrance music. Johnston was released from WWE in 2017, replaced in the role by CFO$.

-Career-

Johnston's career began composing soundtracks for animated and industrial films, which led to working for the television networks HBO and Showtime.[3] While living in Connecticut in the mid-1980's, Johnston met Brian Penry, art director for professional wrestling promotion World Wrestling Federation (WWF).[4] Although not a fan of professional wrestling,[2] Johnston soon began working under Vince McMahon to create entrance theme music for wrestlers.[5]

WWF began releasing Johnston-produced theme music as compilation album's beginning with WWF Full Metal: The Album in 1995,[3] with WWF The Music, Volume 3 achieving platinum status in the United States, signifying one million sales,[2][4] while WWF The Music, Volume 4 reached number five in the Canadian Albums Chart.[3] Following this, Johnston would collaborate with mainstream hip hop and rock musicians for albums,[3] and Johnston would often hand-pick artists to work with on new theme songs.[5] In 2001, WWF The Music, Vol. 5 reached number two on the Billboard 200 and number five in the Canadian and UK Albums Chart.[6] In April 2013, the entrance theme of Fandango reached number 44 in the UK Singles Chart.[7] On November 30, 2017, it was announced that Johnston was released by WWE in 2017 after 32 years.[8][9]

Johnston also scored several film projects for WWE's film division WWE Studios, these included The Chaperone, That's What I Am, and The Reunion. He also provided music for other WWE-affiliated products including the World Bodybuilding Federation and the XFL.

-Writing process and reception-

In writing theme music, Johnston often drew from outside inspiration, notably John Williams' main title music from the movie Star Wars when composing the original theme song for The Undertaker.[10] In a 2004 interview with Mix, he described feeling a "sense of responsibility" to create unique-sounding music for each wrestler, that also had instant recognisability.[11] Johnston is credited with writing entrance theme songs for the most popular wrestlers over the course of his 30 year tenure,[12] in particular the company's Attitude Era into the early-2000s.[5] Johnston wrote, composed, and produced his compositions alone, in addition to playing all the instruments, including self-teaching a new instrument if necessary.[2]

His music is described by Newsweek as being as "legendary as the WWE stars themselves,"[13] while Metal Hammer ranks some of his themes as the "most metal" songs used as entrance music. [14] Vice said the tracks "weren't just catchy, colourful pieces of music, but cinematic scores that communicated the emotional makeup of your favourite wrestler clearer than any catchphrase ever could."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Johnston_(composer)