The SmarK Rant for Coliseum Video Presents Piledriver the Wrestling Album

The SmarK Rant for Coliseum Video presents Piledriver: The Wrestling Album

This is one I never actually reviewed back in the day, but the recent death of Rick Derringer made me decide to give it a look. This was actually not rental priced, but rather sold for a cheap (at the time) $20 retail due to the short runtime.

Derringer himself was a fascinating guy, who I didn’t really know about at the time that he was making these songs for the WWF. His big hit was of course “Rock N Roll Hoochie Koo” as a solo act, but before then he was a pretty prolific session player and actually featured on “Hang on Sloopy” and then as a member of the Edgar Winter Group before breaking out on his own. As always, I direct you to the esteemed Todd in the Shadows for a more thorough breakdown of his life and works:

https://youtu.be/NIAp8-cnRxQ?si=Z5Inc-pSBL4F8-Ru

The fact that Rick also produced all of Weird Al Yankovic’s music makes me respect him even more.

Anyway, of course Rick was heavily involved in the original Wrestling Album and then returned for the iconic sequel, which was somehow EVEN MORE AWESOME. But is now sadly impossible to find outside of streaming unless you want a used copy. Rick’s biggest contribution to the wrestling world, of course, was “Real American”, still a banger of a track no matter how you feel about Hulk Hogan as a person and/or a gaslighting son of a bitch. Originally composed and used by the US Express in late 1985, their breakup meant that Hulk got a new theme song, because otherwise you’d be letting an all time great riff go to waste.

So of course in 1987, Derringer returned in between all his other projects, and co-wrote and produced Piledriver The Wrestling Album II along with Jimmy Hart and others, and gave the world another set of classic theme songs that people are still rocking to this day.

Hosted by George Stevens (?), who I guess is the producer of the video.

First up, we hear from the construction foreman at the site where they shot the title video, and he puts over the giant wrestlers who were “throwing around tires like they were toothpicks”.

“Piledriver” by Koko B. Ware

So we start off with a banger, as the wrestlers have to work in a construction site to make ends meet due to terrible downside guarantees in the 80s and/or costs of steroids eating into their paydays. This includes Hulk Hogan, Don Muraco and Superstar Billy Graham having what seems like a dangerous concrete pouring fight that is, uh, a tad questionable. Like yes, that’s a big hose spraying all over the foreman, Hulk. Koko meanwhile is busy singing the song on his own building while random women walk through the site in the middle of nowhere and the wrestlers ogle them. WHY ARE THESE WOMEN HERE AND WHERE ARE THEY GOING? Luckily, despite Arnold Skaaland getting covered in cement and then trapped in an outhouse and carried off, he’s still a good sport about the whole thing.

“Honky Tonk Man” by Honky Tonk Man

Before the video, Honky complains that he was supposed to be the star of the previous video and the producers gave him the wrong address, and then his pink Cadillac got all dusty! So now he gets his own video, doing a pretty good job of singing in fact. So the story for this one is that he’s doing a concert in what looks like a high school gym while the women throw themselves at the stage trying to get a piece of the Honky Tonk Man. Also we get an impressive behind the back solo from Honky despite no acoustic guitar being in the song. Not much of a story to the video but the song is a classic and one of the best things written by Jimmy Hart. And we’re informed that “characters in the video were paid for by the Honky Tonk Man”. Whew.

“Demolition” by Rick Derringer

This is why we’re all here. Apparently they wanted bombs going off in their video and footage of their matches, so that’s what we get. And in fact they manage to time a lot of the beatings to the beat of the song, which is pretty awesome. And nuclear explosion footage? YOU BET. Man poor Brady Boone and Jim Powers just get the shit kicked out of them multiple times here. Probably suffer some burns from the all the nuclear radiation as well. This one stands along as something I’d throw in my Spotify playlist just to listen to.

“Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo” by Mean Gene and Rick Derringer

Yes, Gene gets another song on one of these, this time doing his cover of Rick’s most famous song. The storyline here is that Gene is Professor Peabody, introducing his newest classical composition to a class of high school music students. But then it turns out to be a ROCK AND ROLL SONG! WON’T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!? Gene is…not good as a vocalist, although Hulk Hogan seems to be a passable bassist in the background at least. Also it turns out that the stuffy teacher just needed to take off her glasses and let her hair down all along! Gene with Bret Hart glasses and blue wig reminds me more of Joe Exotic than a rock star.

“Girls in Cars” by Robby Dupree

This one was actually written by Jim Johnston, who does an interview before the video talking about how Strike Force was only interested in GIRLS and CARS and so that’s what the video was about. The things you learn! Ok, so the singer here, Robbie Dupree, was a one-hit wonder from the 80s with a song called “Steal Away” in 1981, which is considered a yacht rock classic now and hit #6 on the Billboard Hot 100 at the time. I’m not actually familiar with it but I wasn’t old enough at the time anyway. It’s very Michael McDonald. Anyway this video has lots of girls and lots of cars, plus Robbie playing guitar on the beach without an amp, which is probably a smart idea. Honestly this would have worked better with the Can-Am Connection and noted man-whore Tom Zenk as the subject, but it’s fine for what it is.

“Jive Soul Bro” by Slick

The Slickster joins us before the video, enjoying a nice bucket of fried chicken. Yes. So the storyline of this video, in between the closeups of his lips while rapping, is that he’s a pimp walking the streets trying to take care of his ladies and they just won’t believe that he’s got their best interests at heart! Poor guy got thrown on the floor by a 10 foot tall lady of the evening and put into a figure-four, or so he claims. And in the end, he gets run off the street by the very people he’s trying to protect and enrich. There’s an important life lesson there, along with a sick beat. And then Slick tries to dine and dash his KFC and gets caught. I wasn’t aware fast food places brought you the food first and took payment later. I’m kind of surprised no one has ever sampled this one and made it into a mainstream hit, in fact.

“Stand Back” by Vince McMahon

So this one actually gets repurposed into a video about Andre the Giant despite the self-referential psychoanalysis lyrics by Vince. Nothing to the video, just some footage of Andre while Vince lets us know that everyone needs to STAND BACK and get off his case about wiping out all the territories already. Of course the more famous rendition came from Vince at the Slammy Awards.

And we finish with the “big” finale…

“If You Only Knew” by various wrestlers

This one is a series of soundbites from Ted Dibiase, Honky Tonk, Slick, Bobby Heenan and others, with Jimmy Hart singing the chorus and various montages of wrestlers in the background. A catchy enough song but definitely the least memorable hook and video.

And then the credits reveal another fun fact, as Joel Watts is credited as the producer for the videos! I didn’t even know he was working with the WWF at the time, but IMDB says it’s the same guy.

Anyway, this is a fun slice of nostalgia that kind of peters out by the end of the short 35 minute run time, but I’d say it’s worth a look if you’ve never seen the actual videos before. RIP to Rick Derringer!