Former 14-time WWE world champion Triple H recently spoke to Revolver about NXT, and his love of heavy metal music being infused into the yellow-and-black brands bi-monthly Takeover specials. During the interview The Game would discuss the collaborations he’s made with the band Code Orange, as well as with singer Poppy who has even been included in some NXT storylines. Highlights are below.
Details his first meeting with Poppy and how he knew her persona and music would be a great fit for NXT:
Poppy this week came on our show, and she’s played before and done various stuff. We’ve got five tracks we have access to, she came in and did collaborative merch with us, released those tracks on live TV. What other platform or genre can do that? It doesn’t feel forced or like you’re sticking a square peg in a round hole. Our fans can smell that from a mile away, if it’s not authentic. I can tell you, I don’t think Poppy knew that much about us at first. When we met for the first time she came off her bus at Full Sail, as I was walking across she had full-body pajamas on as she’s walking across the parking lot. Neil, our music guy said, “She might stay fully in character today, I’m not sure.” We walked over, I introduced myself and she was like “Hi, I’m Poppy,” in her voice. We walked away, I looked at Neil and was like, “Yeah she’s perfect for us, this is gonna work out great.
Talks the band Code Orange and their performance at NXT Takeover: In Your House 2020, which was right in the middle of the pandemic:
So we went to this warehouse and they played live for me, and I thought they were awesome, and they were just these kids! Now we’ve got this amazing relationship with them. For last year’s In Your House, we reached out to see what they were doing, and they literally they rented a van when COVID was so big, they put all their gear in a U-Haul van and drove from Pittsburgh to Orlando. We did the performance when nobody was there earlier [in the day], so we spliced it together because we couldn’t have that many people in the building. They set up all their own gear, they did their thing and they were gonna drive back, but were able to set up a room for them to stick around and see the show.
Says it would be a dream come true to get Metallica to play a WrestleMania:
If we can get Metallica, it’s a dream come true, if they play Wrestlemania I’ll be happy. I’m constantly throwing ideas at people at every level. The bigger they get, you’d be amazed at the level of people who are like, “I’d love to do something with you guys,” it’s just a matter of coordinating to make things work and to get them in place. When we’re three or four months out from a pay-per-view, we’ll have two or three ideas on the line, sometimes they work sometimes they don’t. We’ve got a lot of epic things. If something doesn’t work, there’s always the next time.