10 Fascinating Backstage WWE Facts About Rhea Ripley
7. She Borrowed Her Entrance From A Metal Singer
One look at the Nightmare will tell you that her favourite type of music is not cheesy pop.
Ripley is a massive fan of heavy metal, having spent her youth listening to bands like Papa Roach, Motionless in White, and Of Mice & Men. She carries her metalheadedness with her in her ring attire, which looks like it comes straight out of a Judas Priest video, and even her entrance hints at her preferred genre.
For a start, her song is sung by Ash Costello, the lead singer of the band New Year’s Day. There’s also the big stomp that Ripley does to set off her pyro, which she admits she borrowed from Suicide Silence frontman Mitch Lucker.
“Yeah, it’s the Lucker stomp,” she told Louder Sound in 2023. “I still have my Mitch Lucker memorial shirt that came out ages ago, and it’s still my favourite shirt.” Lucker sadly passed away in 2012, an event Ripley describes as “horrible” in the same interview. The fact that she continues to honour his memory every time she makes an entrance is testament to how important music is to the superstar and how dearly she holds the memories of her childhood.