New Doc Delves Into Dallas' Ties To Pro Wrestling Entrance Music.

To those in the business, the '80s are known as The Golden Era of professional wrestling — thanks in part to the surge in popularity the “sport” enjoyed on cable television.

The fact that wrestling aligned itself so closely with rock music during that period didn't hurt, either. During the WWF's “Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection” promotion wrestlers like Hulk Hogan and Junkyard Dog began using original rock songs as their entrance music. Matches were being shown on MTV, Cyndi Lauper was appearing in storylines and, in turn, wrestlers like Captain Lou Albano were appearing in a string of Lauper's music videos as well.

Sure, entrance music had been around for several decades prior — Gorgeous George was widely known to march to the ring to “Pomp and Circumstance” as far back as the '50s — but it was in 1984 when the rock thing really took off. And that's the year when former Sportatorium staples the Fabulous Freebirds began using the “Badstreet U.S.A.” theme penned by Irving drummer Jimmy Papa and Michael “Purely Sexy” Hayes of the Freebirds. The song is widely considered the first rock 'n' roll entrance song in professional wrestling history.

Hence Jimmy Neutron co-creator Keith Alcorn's upcoming, hour-long Back on Badstreet documentary, which takes a long hard look at the seminal tune.

Below, check it out the official trailer, which was released yesterday:

The film, which is currently in production, should be available on DVD by November. And this is cool: It'll be screened as part of this October's Dallas VideoFest. At that screening, audiences will finally be treated to rare, 30-year-old footage of Hayes taking vocal lessons and hitting the recording studio — not to mention playing a pretty important role in kick-starting the enormous rock-fueled wrestling boom of the '80s.

Talk about a real American.

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