Latest / Tigs Bits Podcast / Gary Cantrell on Music, Wrestling, and Bubba Army

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Gary Cantrell on Music, Wrestling, and Bubba Army · Tigs Bits Podcast

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We have with us today a very special guest.
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We've been talking about this for a while, and finally all of
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our schedules have clicked together and we're able to do it
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without any further ado. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Gary
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Cantrell. The one and only a man with a
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name so strong. I still think it ought to be the
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cocktail. You know what I mean?
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That is such a great name. You come up with the right
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cocktail and we'll drink it, I promise you that.
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I don't know what I mean. It's got to be something really,
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really nice, you know, really high end type situation, you
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know. So yeah, yeah, we're going to be
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thinking about triple sex, probably involved in that for
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sure. You got till January.
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Things we do, we do, we do. I don't drink often, but you
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figure it out and we'll do it, probably.
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Not. I got all the time in the world,
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man. I got laid off back in in June,
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so now I'm just flying by the seat of my pants right now, so
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let's do it. I mean, that jumps right into to
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like I was going to say, let's talk about your story here,
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Gary, because I know the Bubba Army that it's listening to this
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very, very familiar with you, your story and everything that
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you do. But the rest of the nation
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that's watching this right now and right now TV not so
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familiar. So tell us a little bit about
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yourself and what all you do exactly, Gary.
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My God, how much time do we have, by the way?
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We got all the time in the world.
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Let let me, let me figure out if I can summarize it.
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And then you can pick a part where you'd like to to go from
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there. I mean, my, my earliest instance
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of creating anything was probably in the mid 90s when I
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picked up a guitar for the first time.
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Now I'm kind of OK at it. I probably was better years ago
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because I was doing it every day.
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Now it's very much a once in a year I might pick that thing up
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off the wall. So that's where it started.
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I got out of doing music in about 2007.
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I was like heavily active in like the pop punk emo
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underground scene of the early 2000s.
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And so I did all that. And then I got into wanting to
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do like talk radio, which at the time, you know, podcasting was
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about two or three years old at this point.
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And I started it with a live wrestling radio show every week
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on a website calledblogtalkradio.com.
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I did that until 2010 because wrestling at that time was
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certainly not nearly as hot, not even close as to what it is now
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or even back in the mid to late 90s.
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So kind of get burned out on it. And then I came back a few years
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later. I did it for a little longer
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while trying to mix a little bit of wrestling, but other
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entertainment, various topics, music.
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And at that point I finally walked away from podcasting 2015
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until I restarted it again in 2017, doing just like a personal
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journal show. I was, I had like a weight loss
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journey that I was on. I lost over 100 lbs.
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I've gained it all back now almost, but I did lose it at one
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point and I was interviewing people from Instagram that were
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like on the weight loss journey. So I did that for like 3 years
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and then I got into YouTube and Mr. B said my channel sucked and
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I tried to figure that out. And then somewhere along the
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line I got a hold of Lummy and and started volunteering for the
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Bubba show and got a job a few few months ago.
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Part time gimmick with the Bubba show.
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So and. I'm part time gimmicks.
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I like it too. And I picked up photography, you
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know, I like doing that. I like doing like concerts and
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stuff like that. So I'm all over the place.
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You, you can take me wherever you'd like from there.
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But that's I try to like summarize it within like a
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minute or two answer 'cause I get very long winded.
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That. So do all of us.
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But that I mean, that it's almost like you've rehearsed
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that, Gary, that was fantastic. That is, that is a great
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summary. Did ChatGPT, did my friend Amber
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help you with that? I mean.
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It reminds me I I swear I thought we just let Lex Luger in
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the Four Horsemen and he and Ric Flair wrote out his scene Or JJ.
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There you go. Wrote it out for him.
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I mean, he that was, that was beautiful.
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That was, that was. That was.
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Now what's? What's the deal with the Mr. B
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situation? That's exactly what.
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I was going to ask. Well, there's actually, there's
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actually a video on my channel. I, I have my own channel, Gary
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Cantrell that I'm trying to revive now.
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And back in this would have been November, I did a video where I
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or I try to do a video every single day in the month of
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November. And one of those days was me
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reacting to this. So I bought a book from a guy
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named Darrell Eves. He works with a lot of bigger
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YouTube guys and they said that if anybody bought this book, you
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can go to this live stream him and Mr. Beast in the in the same
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live stream and they put up in there like, hey, put out your
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channel link and we'll essentially roast your channel
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and they happen to pick my channel first.
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So this video is up there. You can see it.
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It's about 20 minutes of me reacting to a 10 minute video of
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them roasting my channel that I used to do with my cousin.
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We used to do food reviews. So.
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OK. Yeah, it, it, it, it was so
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damaging. It was so damaging to my mental
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health for like, a few months because here's a guy at the time
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who had 50 million subscribers, and he's telling me everything
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I'm doing wrong. And the key is we need to hear
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that. We need somebody to tell us how
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much we potentially suck in a carefully constructive way.
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And, you know, that guy pulled no punches.
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So it, it helped me to open my eyes essentially as far as like
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what you actually need to do on YouTube to try to grow.
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And I essentially try to take those things that I learned and
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apply them to what I'm doing to help with the Rhett and Bubba
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and all them now. So yeah, yeah, it's, it's up
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there, but you can go check it out.
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And, and it's, man, I, I, I can watch it now without shaking.
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But man, the first day or two, it was, it was tough.
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Well, that's hardcore, priceless advice, though, you know what I
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mean? Like, dude, I mean, not not many
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people get access to that, you know?
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So congratulations. Yeah, take it.
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I'm sure it was tough. Yeah, very tough.
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Guy I I can only I can only imagine well, y'all stick around
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we'll this is just the beginning with Mr. Gary Cantrell.
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We'll be right back. We're going to dive into some
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wrestling talk next, so don't go anywhere.
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We're back. And Gary, we know that the one
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thing that we've all talked about on this show since we've
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started to know you and the Bubba Army and all that, our
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first introduction to you was through a wrestling podcast that
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was on the Bubba Army Network and and Jr. huge wrestling fan.
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I've been re energized, I guess you could say, since
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WrestleMania really, and since a little bit before this
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WrestleMania hooked me back in, got me back into watching.
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I've got some of my neighbors into wrestling now.
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So let's just talk a little bit about wrestling.
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Let's start it off with who are some of your favorite wrestlers
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and some of your favorite matches?
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I think right off the top of the list would be Austin.
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I mean that that's a guy that in high school I was, you know,
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teenager at the time. He's flipping off his boss.
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I'm like, this is really cutting edge stuff.
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And it wasn't Even so much just like the foul mouth of it.
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It's just the delivery, the intensity, the what is going to
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happen next. I mean, the night that that
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Vince had challenged Austin to a fight with an arm tied behind
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his back and it was like a couple of weeks after
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WrestleMania 14, they were on this whole like easy way or hard
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way thing. Like that whole story arc, like
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blew my mind. So I would say Austin is right
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at the top of that list. Obviously Hogan, Rock, Shawn
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Michaels, as far as like current, you know, Cody Rhodes,
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that's that's my guy right now. Yeah.
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Match wise, I, I know a lot of people did not like this match
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per SE. Probably I'm a little biased
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because I was front row for it. But Hogan and Shawn Michaels in
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2005 at the SummerSlam, that was a wild match.
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And, and the reason why a lot of people don't like it is because
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they felt like Shawn was overselling to try to embarrass
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Hogan because allegedly he wasn't going to win the match.
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And that was the whole thing. So the whole like politics of it
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and all that was very fascinating to me.
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I guess if we have to talk about like I'll I'll give you a deep
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cut that no match, a match a lot of people don't talk about and
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that is Shawn Michaels and Diesel AKA Kevin Nash.
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April of 96 in your house, good friends, better enemies.
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They had this knock down drag out.
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It was Nash's last match in the company.
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One of my all time favorites. A close second is Brett and and
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Nash at the Survivor Series 1995.
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Wow might be the only list of all time that has Nash in one of
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the greatest matches. Like him as world champion.
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I, I, I liked him. I mean, and, and they were
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slowly starting to, he was almost like the precursor to
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Austin. If you really go back and watch
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the week to week television. He was starting to get really
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edgy like they would later do with Austin the next year.
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So I almost feel like it was tapped for Nash and not for
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Austin, but Nash left, so they put it on Austin.
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And that's really that that that areas they changed the
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storylines as things develop, people get injuries, contract
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disputes, things like that. You have to pull the belt off
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this one to drop it for that 1. And in an intermittent champion,
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those type things. Yeah.
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And I was a big fan of Diesel. Kevin Nash, you know, AKA the
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bouncer from the Cheetah Club in Atlanta, play basketball at
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University of Tennessee. And you know, there's another
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one of those that that I I feel doesn't get enough love, who was
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another big guy who we just recently lost was Sid.
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Sid Udi from West Memphis, AR Psycho Sid.
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When he first popped on the scene, I saw him as Lord
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Humongous in the Memphis territory.
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Then I watched him come over and actually he in Texas read which
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would be the Undertaker and their stuff in Memphis prior to
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that. But when Sid came over and first
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came into WWE with that look and that attitude and that build, it
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did it for me, you know, and I, and this was coming out of the
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era where it wasn't as technical as it got into in the mid 90s,
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late 90s, which I really like that too, with the, with the
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Benoit's and Malenko and the, and the, and the cruiserweight,
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really some really Matt wrestling and really technical
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wrestling. But when the bigs were still
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there, you know, Sid coming in with that look and we're still
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coming off the air, where one of my favorite matches were Jake
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the Snake put the cobra to bite Macho Man on the arm on live
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televisions on Saturday night's Main event.
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That's what. Everybody knew, and everybody
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knew right then it wasn't. That wasn't fake.
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You can say what you want about wrestling, but that snake was
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biting Macho Man's arm and everybody's attitude changed for
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a second. You.
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Know what I mean? That is the angle that brought
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me in to wrestling fandom 1991. I had seen it, you know, here
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and there over the kind of mid to late 80s, but no angle
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brought me into wrestling like that angle right there.
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And and real quick on Sid. If you go back and watch
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Survivor Series, 1996 Madison Square Garden, him and Shawn
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Michaels, if you watch just that entrance of Sid and you don't
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get goosebumps, something's wrong with you because that is
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one of the most intense introductions to a guy that
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you'll ever see in the New York crowd.
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They didn't give a shit. They were like, hey, we love
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Sid. You know, this is the guy who
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wanted and he's the bad guy. And he had a huge reaction.
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Yeah. I'll think about those moments.
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I've played. I've worked Madison Square
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Garden one time and it was on a Miranda Lambert tour about that
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same era. When we talked, we had met
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earlier and the whole time I'm backstage and walking in and out
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of that same tunnel and concourse area that all the
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wrestlers came out of my this is where Hogan walked.
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This is where see, this is where everybody walked out of.
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That's all I could think of that whole day.
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I'm there is, I wonder if Macho Man sat on this chair.
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You know those type of things. You get chills going in that
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building. I did a tour there and 2009 you
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paid like 2025 bucks. They took you all over the
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building. It was like the best.
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I would have paid 150 for that tour.
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I had goosebumps man. Just literal goosebumps walking
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through that building. I love getting Gary's thoughts
12:02
on wrestling. When we come back, we're going
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to get his thoughts on the current state of the WWEAEW and
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all of those as well. Y'all stay with us.
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Welcome back everybody to Tig's Bits.
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We've got a very special guest today, Mr. Gary Cantrell, who is
12:18
music and wrestling aficionado. Glad to have him on the show
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today. Before we went into commercial
12:23
break, we were talking about favorite matches and favorite
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wrestlers of all time, Gary. Now we want to get into a little
12:29
more modern scene, which I know we're all trying to keep up
12:32
with. It's a great time to be alive
12:34
and wrestling. There's a lot of great wrestling
12:35
on right now. What are some highlights for you
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of the current scene? Well, this might be a very
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controversial statement by people who love the old days of
12:44
the Attitude Era, but I think we are truly in the ultimate time
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for wrestling and I think that right now is bigger than it's
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ever been. I don't think that's completely
12:53
out of the realm to say, but I really enjoyed the whole Cody
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Rhodes story of of finishing the story at WrestleMania.
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The fact that this man was in AW, which is the number 2
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company for those that aren't paying attention, and he was
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able to come back to WWE. The guy bet on himself.
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He left the company in 2016. He went all over the world.
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He went to New Japan, he went to all the Indies.
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He had a list of all these people he wanted to dance with,
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essentially, and he helped start this AW in 2019.
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And then he comes back. We still don't know the story.
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I feel like one day that story will come out.
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But he comes back and there's a story about how he wants to win
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the world title. He tells you this the night
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after WrestleMania in Dallas where he successfully defeated
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Seth Rollins. And now we have the story arc
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from 22 all the way up to 2024. And to me, that's just probably
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my favorite thing that I've seen.
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Maybe a close second would be the Ria Ripley stuff with Dirty
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Dom, but those are kind of like my 2 highlights that stick at
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the very top of my mind. I love it.
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And you mentioned on it too, Cody left the company, left the
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biggest company in the world when he had a great spot there
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for years, a company his father was with his brother was his
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family business, left to go travel the world, wrestle all
14:10
these international stars, which he and Okada and Kenny Omega and
14:13
Okada. I mean, you talking about some
14:14
some knock down just great wrestling matches.
14:18
But the team up with the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega,
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independent stars from all over the world, to get with Tony Khan
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and start a new wrestling promotion, which a lot of people
14:26
have tried since the fall of WCW.
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But to actually have one come to fruition, rise to the ranks it
14:32
did, then leave the company, go back to the big dogs and win the
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championship. I mean, they didn't write that,
14:39
they didn't plan that, but boy, what a story it end up being.
14:42
Well, and what what story can you think of other than maybe
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Austin flipping off his boss 25 years ago?
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But what other story could you possibly take and say this is
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the most realistic kind of story where you can actually relate to
14:56
it? Like, who in the hell doesn't
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want to quit their job that they do not like, go off and do
15:01
something amazing and come back, right?
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Well, maybe not come back to your job.
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If you left it, there's probably a reason why you left it.
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But essentially go off and do better things.
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I mean, who wouldn't want to do that?
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And then get asked back then you know.
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And then build your value up. Because you've done so well.
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Like, OK, we're sorry. Please come back and dance with
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us one more time. Oh yeah.
15:23
Gary, give us give everybody out there listen.
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And I'm I'm really I'm asking this for myself.
15:29
AEW is just I have not been able to get into it.
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I've tried a little bit. I just can't seem to to push
15:37
through give us a reason to want to watch AEW reason to like it.
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People like. Me, I'm still waiting for a
15:45
reason honestly. OK, no, OK, But let me explain
15:48
that I don't want to just drop that and then just leave it.
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I I was there with them at the beginning.
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They said 2019, we're starting this thing up.
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I was there from day one as a fan.
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I attended the first Dynamite in DC.
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They had a lot of momentum going into 2021 where they had CM Punk
16:05
the first time in what, 7 or 8 years since he had left the WWE.
16:10
And then they had Daniel Bryant, Bryan Danielson come to the
16:14
company. They had Who's Adam Cole?
16:18
All within like a 2 month span. All these guys came and they had
16:21
all this wave of momentum and there was just a lot of stuff
16:25
that came out on the Internet as far as like backstage tension
16:28
and Tony Khan's not doing this or The Young Bucks are doing
16:32
that, Jack Perry this. And it just got so much
16:35
oversaturation of drama that it really took a lot of people out
16:39
where they had a lot of momentum.
16:41
And this was the wrong time because they're in a contract
16:44
renewal right now. And the word on the street is
16:47
they they've resigned. It's not official yet, but it
16:49
should be coming out any moment. And that it's going to, they're
16:52
going to, they're going to essentially probably double
16:54
their money, which is good. But, you know, the thing I will
16:57
say about them is they have one of the best, most deepest talent
17:01
rosters in the world. Probably too many people, if
17:05
we're being honest. But they have, you know, the
17:06
Will Ospreys and all these guys that can take them to the next
17:10
level. They just need to double down on
17:13
the storytelling more like the Hangman page swerve.
17:18
That whole story was amazing. I love that story.
17:21
More of that and less of the Internet drama and all that
17:25
stuff. And you got a, you got a multi
17:27
$1,000,000 product that's going to take the world by storm.
17:30
I think exactly like you're saying, you know, because they
17:32
have the international stars like the will Ospreys from
17:35
England. They have my favorite Pentagon,
17:37
Elzo Romero, you know those the, the, the, the AAA stars in the
17:41
Lucha Libres from Mexico and and just too much.
17:45
They need to dial it in. And I don't know, get your
17:47
opinion on this. A little off topic though, but
17:49
Lucha Underground, I thought was a great transition into what we
17:53
have in AEW now. And I think you'd like you're
17:56
saying dial up more of that lucha content where they're
17:59
doing storyline episodic, So almost like a soap opera of
18:04
wrestling getting really into the storylines.
18:06
I think that's the angle they need to go and keep the
18:08
international flair because that's something it feels like
18:12
WWE has catered more the Disney audience.
18:15
They're going straight for the kids.
18:17
Let's have something for the adults, you know?
18:19
Yeah. I would agree.
18:20
They just as long as they can get into that storytelling, they
18:23
do their visuals very well. Like when you watch their promos
18:27
or stuff that's not in the ring, they clearly know what they're
18:30
doing from a cinematography standpoint and all that stuff.
18:34
They just need to get the right stories in front of the people
18:37
and they're going to be just fine.
18:38
Like I, I don't worry about the, the, the talent roster.
18:41
I mean, they have, like you just said, they have everybody they
18:44
need and they're going to be just fine in that regard.
18:47
They just got to tell this the the better stories.
18:49
And I think they're already making roads towards that.
18:51
It's just getting people back on board.
18:53
When we come back, we're going to talk, we're going to wrap up
18:56
wrestling and then I want to talk a little bit about working
18:59
with the Bubba Army. Yeah, yeah.
19:02
All right. We'll be right back y'all stay
19:04
tuned. We are back.
19:05
We're visiting with Mr. Gary Cantrell.
19:07
We've been talking a little wrestling, talking a little bit
19:10
of fun stuff. We're going to continue this
19:13
right now with with the wrestling chatter.
19:18
What do you see happening, Gary, in the storyline with WWE moving
19:24
forward? But shout out to Bubba Army for
19:26
sure. We're going to talk about Bubba
19:28
Army and Gary's involvement in just a second.
19:31
But where do you see this storyline going with Cody
19:33
Rhodes? Do you think he'll remain the
19:35
champion after WrestleMania in 2025?
19:41
I am going to say my gut tells me no, and that's not indicative
19:45
of what he's doing now because he's doing an incredible job.
19:48
But they have this thing with The Rock that they need to
19:51
revisit and that's going to come up at WrestleMania now.
19:54
Rather, I'm not saying necessarily the throw on The
19:55
Rock. I don't know that Cody's going
19:57
to have it by WrestleMania. I feel that somewhere in
20:00
between, maybe the Royal Rumble potentially he might lose that
20:04
belt because they have this people's Championship that The
20:06
Rock has and a lot of people are saying that.
20:09
They introduced that in case they want to take the title off
20:12
Cody and use a title maybe with Roman or whatever he's going to
20:15
be doing with Solo or Jacob Fought 2 or whatever.
20:19
And so that way that Cody and Rock will still have something
20:22
to to wrestle over essentially. And which is just going to bring
20:27
in huge numbers. I mean, I can't wait until the
20:29
rock is back involved because that was just so it was fun.
20:34
It was. Netflix was coming up.
20:38
You know, they're going to you. So that's what's been happening,
20:40
isn't it this summer, because this summer got like right after
20:44
WrestleMania, it kind of got boring.
20:47
I'm just going to say it was just like the, the, it didn't
20:50
get boring, but the, the bubble blew up, the, you know, the
20:53
balloon burst or whatever, you hit the climax.
20:57
So now you've got to let it build back up.
21:00
They do all these international shows.
21:01
You got to have the ebbs and flows after Mania.
21:03
It's going to be a follow up. Hey, and why we're we're talking
21:06
about Cody Rhodes, Stardust, whatever you whatever moniker he
21:11
goes by it. Would you consider him the best
21:13
wrestler in the world right now? 100% I'd say he's the he's the
21:17
king. He's on top of the mountain
21:19
right now for sure now. And some of those other guys,
21:21
like if you'd asked me this 6-7 years ago, I would have had to
21:24
make an argument for like a Kenny Omega or an Okada even or,
21:28
or, you know, and, and everybody used to ditch on a Roman.
21:31
But man, Roman's put the work in.
21:33
I mean, he's a good hand, no doubt.
21:35
But I think, I think Cody holds that spot up there by himself
21:38
right now. But you have to rank it not just
21:40
by the wrestling ability, but also the ability to be a
21:42
businessman, to be that, as he says, the quarterback and.
21:46
Dig the whole thing. Yeah, he's done an incredible
21:49
job with that. Nobody can do it better.
21:52
Cena did it very well, Roman's done it very well.
21:55
And now Cody, they gave him the ball and he's doing it at the
21:57
top of the level, the top of the game.
22:00
I agree he is. He isn't talking about people
22:02
doing it at the top of their game.
22:05
Bubba. Bubba is back at the top of his
22:08
game. And I mean, I was watching him
22:10
this morning, just having fun watching every morning.
22:14
How did this whole thing, you're wearing a Bubba army shirt right
22:18
now. How did you, how'd you get
22:20
involved with Bubba? Well going back to 2007 was the
22:24
first year I heard him. He was on Howard Show with the
22:27
Iron Sheik of all people and Iron Sheik was basically
22:31
talking. All back make you humble.
22:33
That's right. And he he was, you know, talking
22:36
smack about Hogan. Bubba's in the studio defending
22:39
his friend. And I was like, who is this
22:40
Bubba guy? So start listening to the show.
22:43
And for years, I had tried to, you know, get on the show or get
22:47
his attention because at the time I was doing my own radio
22:49
show and I wanted to see how I could potentially do something.
22:53
And so the way that I feel like you get on somebody's radars,
22:56
you offer some value. And that's going to play into
22:59
how I'm with them now. But in 2010, I had the Honky
23:02
Tonk man. So we're going back to the
23:04
wrestling for a second. I had him on my show.
23:06
Him and Bubba had a crazy feud for years and years and years.
23:09
And they would try to call into all these shows to confront him
23:12
while they were on the serious show.
23:14
Nobody would ever let him on. I had him on my show.
23:17
I let them know that he was going to be on the show and they
23:21
had Spice Boy of all people that called in and confronted him.
23:24
The next day they played this confrontation on the air.
23:27
So I had Bubba's attention. But I ended up retiring that
23:31
show because, as I said, I got burned out in the wrestling.
23:33
The product was not nearly as hot.
23:35
I didn't have the passion to do it.
23:37
So in 2022, I got a hold of Lummy because Bubba was looking
23:42
for some clip. And, and if you had a gun to my
23:44
head, I couldn't tell you what that clip was.
23:46
I don't remember what we were looking for the time, but I
23:49
basically said, hey, man, not only will I help you look for
23:51
this, but just so you know, I know how to video edit and I
23:55
know how to audio edit. And if I could ever do anything
23:57
for you, I would love to do it. And it's, it was something where
24:01
he told me, hey, man, there's, there's no guarantees.
24:03
Obviously we're not paying anybody to do this.
24:05
I said no, no, I will volunteer to do this.
24:08
And so for the next two years, I started doing all this various
24:12
work, audio editing, video editing, because again, I feel
24:15
the best way to get on somebody's radar is to offer
24:18
value, to give them something that they can use.
24:21
And boy, did we generate some crazy content.
24:24
The Andre the Giant never brush his teeth story from Hogan.
24:27
It's like 8 million on YouTube, dude.
24:29
I never thought that would happen.
24:30
I never could see that in a million in a million years.
24:34
And there's a couple other ones that are 7 million, two million
24:37
and it's been like 50 million in views just from vertical shorts
24:40
that were created. We'll continue this
24:42
conversation, continue talking about Bubba and Gear Talk and
24:47
some content stuff coming up. I want to dive more into that.
24:51
Millions of views on that vertical stuff.
24:53
So we'll be right back. Thanks for sticking with us.
24:56
We're back with Gary Cantrell talking a little Bubba Army and
25:01
wrestling too. But we were just, we were just
25:04
wrapping up. Look at that.
25:05
Look at that koozie, that fine koozie.
25:08
You've got it over there. Get that Bubba army and we got
25:11
some alpha. Oh yeah.
25:13
Get that out. There we go.
25:14
That'll. Get the same croc you know I.
25:16
Bet that I bet that hat has had that tigs bit beautiful tigs
25:20
bits hat that you were wearing. Blasey has had so much.
25:23
Just a little bit of spray, but it smells like alpha.
25:27
You need to win, and you win all the time, right?
25:30
That's exactly what he's. Alpha head to toe, baby.
25:32
Ain't nothing. Ain't nothing on Alpha.
25:34
Ain't nothing beta about blazing.
25:36
Gun sticking out, man. He's.
25:38
Got. This guy, That's right.
25:40
That's right. He's trying, he's trying to,
25:42
he's trying to get in shape because him and Doctor Dan are
25:45
going to do a death match at at Bart next.
25:48
Year. I'll be there to film it.
25:49
I like that story to the death match now, yeah.
25:51
Blazing like please quit trying. To get me a doctor dad to fight
25:55
like no. You get to it'll be great it.
25:57
Started as a pose off and now they're what?
25:59
Somebody's going to die? Yeah, somebody's really.
26:02
Feels like we're doing we're being claymation Mills Lane to
26:05
to referee the match. It's.
26:07
Going to be great and then he'll pull up in his Ferrari and his
26:10
Lamborghini and be like, do you really want to do this?
26:12
No, I don't. But you pull, you pull up in a
26:14
paid vehicle with a with a gas card.
26:16
I don't know who's winning here. That's true too.
26:20
That is true. That is true.
26:22
Well, when we when we when we were leaving, when we went to
26:25
the commercial break, just last, we were talking a little bit
26:28
about these videos, these vertical videos that you make
26:31
for Bubba. How did you get started into
26:34
making these types of videos? Because they're fantastic.
26:37
Number one, I love this could be the rest of the show as far as
26:41
I'm concerned, but I won't, I will spare the boys on this.
26:45
You and I will do this solo at some point.
26:47
Just have a conference call, let her do something like that, do a
26:51
little zoom meeting and and exchange ideas.
26:53
But how did you start doing verticals for him?
26:57
Because they have taken off. They're they're fantastic.
27:00
Yeah, well, I appreciate that this this was around the time
27:02
where we were talking about how the Mr. Beast thing like really
27:06
just like blew my mind and gave me some PTSD from tell me how
27:10
bad my channel suck. But this I, I always follow
27:14
different creators when they go on these kind of podcasts and
27:16
Mr. Beasts are going these live streams and Darrell leaves and
27:19
all those guys. I mentioned Colin Samir, another
27:21
great channel to follow when it comes to content talk.
27:24
But around this time, shorts were being heavily prioritized
27:28
on YouTube. I think they've dialed that back
27:30
just a little bit, but they used to be very prioritized.
27:33
You could drop, it's almost like a slot machine.
27:34
You hit it down 1,000,000 views, bam, you know, it's like there's
27:37
no rhyme or reason to it at that time.
27:40
But so basically we had Kurt Angle on the show in October of
27:45
22. I'd saw him at A at a signing
27:47
and I texted Lummy. I said, hey, man, would you
27:50
think you'd be interested in having Kurt on?
27:51
He's like, yeah, if we can get him.
27:52
I'm like, well, he's sitting here right in front of me
27:55
signing autographs. Let me see if I can get his
27:57
information. So we get him on the show and I
28:00
start cutting these clips of him talking into the vertical short
28:03
form. And Rhett would go in and add a
28:07
little bit of something to it because he would throw in like
28:10
some two or three second clips of the actual WWE footage, which
28:14
is kind of a kind of a Gray area a little bit.
28:16
I mean, I think if you're at like 3 seconds or less, you're
28:19
fine. But that's not official.
28:22
Please don't take those words as official advisement.
28:25
And you know, he even threw some captions on, which is what got
28:28
me to do captions in the 1st place.
28:31
He gave me that great idea and I started adding them to all these
28:34
videos. But basically it was Kurt
28:38
telling these stories and I thought, what if we do this with
28:40
like Hogan's stories? That would be fun because
28:42
there's like 100 million Hogan audio things.
28:44
Here's a story about Andre never brushing his teeth.
28:47
Here's a story about The Ultimate Warrior gassing out at
28:49
WrestleMania 6. We don't know if these stories
28:51
are true, but fuck it, you know, like we're just let it go and
28:55
Texas Tornado, how he like talked to him like a day before
28:58
he died and all this stuff. So these stories people just
29:01
found very interesting. So the idea would be to find
29:04
some various photos and clips, splice them in.
29:08
I, I actually have ADHD officially.
29:09
Like before everybody thought it was cool to have it and say they
29:12
had it. Like I actually was diagnosed
29:13
with it in the mid 90s. And so if I see something that
29:17
bores me like within the first 3 seconds, I'm clicking off.
29:20
I don't even give it 5 seconds or 10 seconds.
29:23
But that's the typical behavior of most people watching these
29:25
vertical short form. So you have 3 seconds to hook
29:29
these people and if you don't, you're done.
29:31
So that's the kind of formula that I try to use.
29:35
One of the pieces of the formula to use is to try to catch their
29:38
eye in the first 3 seconds. Show them something crazy and
29:42
try to get them to stick around for the story.
29:44
That's, that's kind of what I've discovered here as I've been
29:48
fine tuning some of our shorts and things like that and it's
29:52
amazing. It's all about the hook.
29:54
You got to hook them. You got to have a hook, even if
29:56
it's ridiculous and it doesn't make any sense to what the video
29:59
is actually about a little bit if it's close, you know, like
30:03
you've just got to throw something up there.
30:05
Food videos because I love to cook and I'm always cooking.
30:08
I do a lot of cooking at the house.
30:10
So easy content for me to just set a camera up, chop it up, put
30:15
it out there because our content of us just sitting here talking,
30:19
yes, if we have something that we're talking about
30:21
controversial, those, those clips will pop, but you have to
30:24
put in something else. You have to put pictures of
30:26
them. You have to put a video of
30:28
something. You've just got to keep it
30:30
moving. I have ADHD as well.
30:32
So it had it for a long time and it's and I had to kind of resort
30:37
to that. So it's interesting to hear you
30:39
say that because that's kind of what my mentality went to is.
30:42
Would you watch? This.
30:44
Yeah. Would you watch this?
30:45
No. Would you watch the 300 videos
30:48
that you've done? What about?
30:49
So I went back to the well, let's look at the ones that have
30:52
done well. Why?
30:54
Very easy. They had a hook.
30:56
All the ones that did well had hooks.
30:58
You want to see Tigs get punched in the face?
31:00
Watch this. It's.
31:02
Like it's like it's like a good it's like it's like in music,
31:05
the same thing. A good song title will get you
31:07
to go look at it just because like, well, that's an
31:09
interesting song title or an interesting band name.
31:11
It used to be what the album cover look like or the CD cover
31:14
like, Oh, this looks weird. Let me see what this disco Rick
31:17
and the dogs is all about. And same and same with the, with
31:21
the with the with the song. When it comes in, if the hook
31:23
hooks you, if it's a, you say it best.
31:26
When you say nothing at all, yeah, boom, there's your hook.
31:29
That's your hook. You know, you go back to it.
31:31
Well. And there's a lot of
31:32
similarities between entertainment and and and and
31:35
and athletics and and and all and music and wrestling.
31:38
I mean it's all it all intertwines while.
31:41
It's all a sound bite, baby. It's all a sound.
31:43
It's the same thing in sales. You got to gain favorable
31:45
attention right out of the gate, and then at that point you can
31:48
tell your story, but you can't tell your story and then try to
31:50
gain favorable attention at the end.
31:51
It just does not work that way. I got to tell you this and
31:54
speaking about the music, I follow a lot of these artists on
31:57
like Instagram and whatnot. And one of the things that
31:59
really captivates me is a lot of these guys are making these
32:02
videos like Movies Now. Like whoever's on tour that
32:05
weekend, here's the three dates we filmed.
32:08
Here's clips of them on the stage.
32:10
Here's some photos, here's them walking out on the stage.
32:12
I mean, these things are like actual movies in less than a
32:15
minute. It, it inspires the heck out of
32:17
me. I got to tell you, like, I don't
32:19
know that I'll ever enter like concert videography necessarily
32:23
because I really love the art of the pictures.
32:24
And I think there's a fine line to do both, but that's like a
32:27
whole nother level because they're doing like motion
32:29
graphics. They're like, you know, all
32:31
these crazy videos I've seen, they're literally like the
32:34
cinematic one minute movies. It blows my mind.
32:37
It's fun, man. It's it's amazing the stuff that
32:40
people are able to do now and I'm glad y'all brought that back
32:44
up. I'm glad we brought music back
32:46
up because when we come back, we're going to probably finish
32:49
the rest of this show talking about music.
32:51
We'll be right back. We are back and this is probably
32:55
this is this is the bread and butter of what we love to talk
32:58
about over here at Tigs Bits, I would say is music.
33:02
And we kind of ended that and we've tap danced around it this
33:07
whole show. But you Sir, are a music
33:11
aficionado, go to a lot of concerts, have an amazing camera
33:15
and take some just unbelievable concert footage.
33:20
Let's talk a little bit about music man.
33:22
What are some of your current favorite bands that people need
33:27
to check out that they may not have heard of?
33:30
Cool man. Cuz he turned me on to a couple
33:33
which which. One could you tell me that one
33:36
first and then I make sure I don't?
33:38
I'm trying to remember the name of them right now that you talk.
33:41
You post them a lot. Though was it good terms?
33:44
Yes, good. Terms.
33:45
Yeah, they're out of LA. Yeah, I keep getting them.
33:48
You didn't turn me on to these guys, but I get them and there's
33:51
a band named Soft Cell. They're punk.
33:54
I they're they're like, they're British punk.
33:56
They're awesome. They somehow, because I think I
33:59
started following those guys, then they showed up.
34:03
Yep. So then they showed up on my
34:05
Spotify list and. I found good terms on on Reddit
34:08
in a pop punk subreddit, like they were just like, you know,
34:11
they were sharing their stuff. They're out there grinding their
34:13
hustle and they're trying to make some vertical videos and
34:16
get people to watch their stuff. And they just, they just
34:18
captivated me. So there's somebody that I'm
34:20
super excited about. There's another guy.
34:22
Well, it's a band, but it's a guy that runs band.
34:24
Bill Murray. Have you heard of these?
34:26
Have you heard of this guy, Bill Murray?
34:27
Not the actor. It's a.
34:28
Band. There's a band named Bill
34:31
Murray. Yeah, he's done songs with
34:33
Mitchell Tenpenny and Cameron Marlowe and all these guys.
34:37
I mean, it's great stuff. I actually recently saw for the
34:41
very first time in the country world, a guy by the name of
34:43
George Burge, who I really enjoy.
34:46
I got a chance. I met his photographer.
34:48
He invited me out to take some photos of him down in Charleston
34:52
on the Sam Hunt tour. So that guy I think is going to
34:55
be George. Yeah, he's going to be a force
34:57
to be reckoned with here in the next couple of years.
34:59
So those are kind of people I'm really excited about right now.
35:03
Yeah, George, I've got to meet George.
35:04
I'm buddies with George and Matt Stale.
35:06
They're big buddies, got to got to hang out with him.
35:09
They've came and done our Saint Jude event we do in Little Rock
35:12
every year, a golf tournament because George was an All
35:15
American golfer at University of Texas.
35:18
Too he's. A.
35:19
Golf course too. So one of those yeah, he's one
35:22
of those guys. But good guy, yeah.
35:24
Big fan of George Birds, no doubt.
35:25
And great, great human being. I know I say that a lot, but
35:28
most of these I won't if it's not true, but he is.
35:30
He's a great dude and yeah, I can't say enough good things
35:33
about him for sure. Yeah, Gary, I hadn't met him
35:36
yet, but the live show was just out of this world, man.
35:40
And I think he's got a song coming out this Friday.
35:42
I don't know when this is posting, but on the 20th he has
35:44
a new one coming out that I've already heard the on the
35:47
Instagram he's been sharing. It's it's unreal, man.
35:50
Nice. I got to check this dude out.
35:52
Got a heck? Yeah, dude, I've already written
35:53
it down for sure. Yeah, have you ever listened to
35:56
Dexter and the moon rocks, Gary? Do you know who they are?
35:59
They call themselves space grunge.
36:03
They're cowboy grunge. You got check them out.
36:06
They're different. They they they're the kind of
36:09
emo Y in a way, and they're not country at all, but they have
36:15
some. I don't know.
36:16
I don't even I don't know how to explain them.
36:18
I think them calling themselves Space Cowboy grunge is probably
36:23
about the most accurate way you can explain them, but I think
36:26
you'd like them. You need to check them.
36:28
Out. I will.
36:28
I will check them out. Yeah, they'll have to add them
36:31
to my Apple Music. I just opened that to kind of
36:33
see some of the stuff that I was listening to.
36:36
Another country guy, Austin Williams.
36:38
Are you familiar with him Jr. I'm not.
36:40
Broken things break things. As a new EPA guy I went to high
36:43
school with actually Co wrote the song.
36:45
This guy, Nick Bailey, he's a, he's a writer, producer.
36:49
I think he's actually based in Nashville now.
36:51
Used to be in LA. We weren't like really close
36:54
friends or anything. We went to high school.
36:55
He actually played in a couple of bands that I knew over it and
36:58
runner runner. They were like pop punk, that
37:00
kind of genre. And now he's doing songwriting
37:02
in Nashville and he he likes to share stuff on his stories.
37:06
That's actually all I found out about the earnest years ago
37:09
before he became a country guy, he was doing like rap and R&B
37:12
and Nick had actually Co wrote a couple of his like R&B rap
37:16
stuff. Yes, no, there you go.
37:18
The oh God was that Damn it, Trouble with Us.
37:23
That was a song I remember that Nick worked on.
37:26
That was 2017. He had put out Bad Boy.
37:29
That was the first song he had put out that I remembered 'cause
37:32
I think FGL was like gassing his stuff up too at that time.
37:35
So yeah, that was, I find out a lot of stuff from Nick 'cause I
37:38
follow him on Instagram. He's always sharing what he's
37:40
working on. But Austin Williams, he sounds
37:42
like a good one too. Love.
37:44
It. There you go.
37:45
There you go. Well when we come back, we're
37:47
going to wrap this up, finish out with a little bit of music
37:50
and we'll be right back. Y'all stay tuned.
37:53
We are back and we're in the home stretch here with Mr. Gig
37:56
Cantrell. Unfortunately, we can't talk on
38:00
here for five hours straight because if we could, we would go
38:04
into gear. But if you want to hear the gear
38:06
talk, I got a feeling that Tiggs and Gary are going to make a
38:08
separate show just talking about gear.
38:11
I'm. Game that for the geeks.
38:13
We'll do it for the geeks, Gary. Yeah, we got to and we got to
38:16
get Gary to come on our live one week.
38:17
Too, so we can really go all. In and not have to worry about.
38:20
Time, Yeah, we can and just do what we want to do.
38:22
But first of all, Gary, show us that fine camera of yours.
38:26
This is why people like him so much.
38:28
This is the Sony A7S3. I spent way too much money on
38:31
this. I got it as a YouTube camera but
38:34
it does incredible photography stuff as well.
38:37
This Sony is really good in low light and at the concerts,
38:39
especially some of the smaller shows with the the kind of
38:43
terrible lighting you need something like this with the
38:45
higher Isos that really comes out well.
38:48
Is that what you take? I know that you and I have
38:50
texted at times because I've seen you take some some photos.
38:54
Your comment is the best camera that you've got is the one
38:57
that's in your hand. I agree with that typically.
39:00
But I'm not. Advocating people that spend way
39:02
too much money on a camera. You're better off using your
39:05
phone. This was just something that we
39:07
were filming. YouTube.
39:08
My cousin and I, we when we're doing food reviews and every
39:11
camera we would use would overheat.
39:12
Could be in the car and it's too hot and this thing's like a
39:15
tank. It does not overheat, so this
39:17
thing is a beast. Well, that's a That's a good
39:20
thing to know. Is that what you've got there?
39:21
Jr. Well, I've got the Sony.
39:24
It looks like AA60. 6100. There you go, a 6100.
39:29
I used to have that camera the. Only thing I've noticed on it is
39:31
it it would get it would get a little hot sometimes but great
39:36
great camera I. Don't have you got kick ass you
39:38
got what are you? Using it for.
39:40
I was using it to film podcasts. Oh, very nice, yeah.
39:43
Yeah, but I when when I did before, when I used to do the
39:46
Justin Moore podcast, we would record our audio and video
39:50
separately, dump them down. The producer would put them
39:52
together. So now there we go.
39:53
Use one of these services, but this is what I used for that 4K
39:56
and it's really good for, you know, the video part of it.
39:59
I mean it, the capturing the faces and all that stuff is
40:02
nice. It's beautiful, beautiful I.
40:04
Used to use, I used to use a GoPro as my webcam, but that was
40:09
what would happen. And we were in the middle of an
40:11
interview with DDP of all people and I lost, lost the camera for
40:14
30 minutes. I just sat here, he could hear
40:16
me and can see them. But it was what a nightmare.
40:20
So. Been through so many cameras.
40:22
Why do they get so hot? It's just it's when you're
40:26
recording locally. So I'll give people listening a
40:28
little pro tip if if you will, but if you, if you just stream
40:33
on the cameras and not record anything on the camera, if you
40:36
just stream from it most of the time, most of the time it will
40:40
be OK. It won't necessarily get hot
40:42
because it's not recording to an SD card.
40:45
You're just piping it through a computer.
40:47
Or if you have one of those monitors, I used to have one,
40:49
it's it's called a Ninja 5 monitor.
40:52
Really cool monitor records raw native video straight from the
40:55
sensor and that takes all the work off of the camera and
40:59
allows the camera to stay nice and cool.
41:02
OK, All right, let's see this. It gets pretty daggum technical
41:07
when you start getting into all of these things, and we haven't
41:09
even scratched the surface on what we will be doing on this
41:12
show. But.
41:15
We're going to need a well, at least J Rs got that good camera
41:17
that's a. That's a very nice camera we got
41:19
to start. We got to start.
41:22
We got to start. Oh yeah, those are those are
41:24
those are very solid and you just plug them up and you let
41:28
them go and you know anything Sony, I mean I'm just I'm an
41:31
advocate for Sony. They don't pay me a dollar they
41:33
don't even know exists. But I, I love Sony truly I, I
41:37
think their products are the best around that you can get
41:39
when it comes to photography, videography.
41:42
Some of those photos we talked about earlier, all that stuff
41:45
was taken on this camera. Although as Jr. might know, in
41:48
the concert world, you know, any Tom, Dick and Harry can't just
41:52
walk in with a camera like that. You need to be properly
41:55
credentialed. So how I got my start is point
41:58
and shoot was completely fine to bring in and I would just bring
42:01
that in and I'd be that guy in the very front row.
42:04
I have this one photo of Maren Morris from like five years ago
42:08
that is like one of my favorite photos I ever took.
42:09
It was shot on a damn point and shoot that I paid 300 bucks for
42:13
and it looks just incredible. And so some of your best photos
42:17
can be off of these smaller cameras.
42:19
You just got to, you got to go with whatever you have and if
42:22
you want to take it from there, then you upgrade from there as
42:25
you need be. That makes sense.
42:28
That makes sense. And hey, look, we're going to
42:30
have to wrap it up here, but we appreciate you coming on with us
42:34
today, Gary. You guys.
42:36
Thank you, Sir. Yes, Sir.
42:37
Give everybody your handles on socials.
42:39
How can they follow you? Go to your YouTube channel and
42:42
all of that good stuff. I'm going to make it very simple
42:44
for you at Gary Cantrell. That is Gary.
42:48
That's one RCANTRELL. Just think of Jerry Cantrell
42:52
from Alice In Chains. No relation, certainly don't
42:55
have the money, but just think that name put a Gary with 1R in
42:59
front of it and you got me right there.
43:02
I got. I got one last question, Gary.
43:04
Do you think do you think Perry Pharrell and Dave Navarro will
43:09
be at WrestleMania wrestling each other after the concert
43:13
incident this past weekend? They certainly should.
43:15
If, if, if they want to make some money, they want to make
43:18
some real money. Let's do it.
43:19
Sign it up. I'll see it right.
43:21
Get it while it's hot. Right.
43:23
Get it while it's hot. Good job Jr.
43:25
We'll see you guys next week later.