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It takes a lot of things to succeed in the UFC – intense training, expert skill, heart and guts, a bit of luck – and that’s just inside the Octagon itself. To actually become a UFC superstar, a fighter has to have all of those things, plus a marketable personality, a great deal of charisma, and ability on the microphone.
One underrated key to becoming a major star inside the world’s biggest MMA promotion is to be able to pick the right walkout track – a song that gets the fans pumped for the fight and can also be easily associated with the fighter’s personality and style.
Often we’ve seen big-name fighters switch tracks regularly, preferring to change it up or to pick songs that fit whichever fight they’re going into – the likes of Luke Rockhold and Georges St-Pierre have followed this pattern – but most of the time the UFC’s biggest stars have a recognisable theme, and none more so than the following 10 fighters.
Here are the 10 best UFC walkout tracks of all time.
#10: Matt Brown – Hail To The King by Avenged Sevenfold
Former top Welterweight contender Matt Brown liked to switch up his entrance music from time to time when he first debuted in the UFC in 2008, but when he began to make his climb into title contention in 2014, he ended up settling for one of the most intimidating walkout songs of all time.
Fighting in his hometown – Cincinnati, Ohio - at Fight Night 40 against Erick Silva, Brown entered to the sounds of Hail To The King by Avenged Sevenfold. With its thumping drum-beat, driving guitar riffs and lyrics that talk of war, death and blood, the song fit Brown’s all-action, ultra-aggressive style down to a tee.
Hearing the song, you instantly got the feeling that Silva simply had no chance – and sure enough, after three violent rounds later, Brown had won by TKO. Brown would only go on to win a further 2 fights of his next 7 following the victory, but every time that song hit, it was hard not to be scared for whoever ‘The Immortal’ was facing.
#9: Jose Aldo – Run This Town by Jay Z featuring Rihanna
Interestingly enough, legendary former UFC Featherweight champion Jose Aldo actually selected Jay Z’s Run This Town for a specific reason back in 2010, at WEC 48. Faced with the challenge of Urijah Faber, in Faber’s hometown of Sacramento, California, Aldo choosing Run This Town sent a pretty clear message to everyone – and in the cage, he proved that for one night at least, Sacramento belonged to him.
Aldo clearly liked the walkout track so much that he ended up sticking with it for the 13 fights that followed that 2010 victory, both in the WEC and then in the UFC too. And every time the lights dimmed and the song began to play, it usually meant one thing; that wherever Aldo was fighting, whether it was at home in Rio de Janeiro, or somewhere like Newark or Las Vegas, the town was his for the night.
#8: Brock Lesnar – Enter Sandman by Metallica
Current WWE Universal champion and former UFC Heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar has a pretty generic walkout theme in WWE – a slice of rock with a somewhat heavy beat that’s instantly forgettable to anyone listening. The opposite was the case during his UFC career though, as he used the ultra-intimidating Enter Sandman by Metallica for the majority of his fights.
The foreboding beginning to the song before the crushing guitar riffs fit Lesnar’s bulldozing fight style perfectly, and when he walked to the cage for his third title defense against Cain Velasquez at UFC 121 – shoving a security guard out of his path in the process – you couldn’t help but feel awed by ‘The Beast Incarnate’.
Lesnar might be a huge underdog when his much-talked about fight with current UFC champ Daniel Cormier comes around in 2019, but should he use his old walkout track again, it certainly won’t feel like it for a few minutes at least.
#7: Wanderlei Silva – Sandstorm by Darude
In the modern-day UFC, most fighters choose a walkout track from one of two genres – heavy rock or hip-hop. Only a handful of fighters would pick a track from the trance genre, but for Wanderlei Silva, no song fit him as perfectly as Darude’s 1999 hit Sandstorm.
Sandstorm is a song that builds slowly to begin with, but quickly explodes into insanity. With its repetitive-but-thumping beat and frantic feel, the song fit Wanderlei’s berserker fighting style down to a tee, and prepared the fans perfectly for the carnage that would usually follow.
Even now when MMA fans hear the song played in the nightclub or on the radio, it’s a bit hard not to copy Wanderlei’s trademark death stare and wrist-rolling action. The song will simply never cease to be associated with ‘The Axe Murderer’ – which makes it one of the best walkout tracks of all time.
#6: Conor McGregor – The Foggy Dew by Sinead O’Connor
Okay, so this one is kind-of cheating as Conor McGregor technically uses the haunting Foggy Dew track by his fellow Irish patriot Sinead O’Connor as an introduction to another track – usually Notorious or Hypnotize, both by the Notorious B.I.G. But it’s the intro track that’s by far more associated with him and it’s that part of his entrance that sticks in the mind.
For those who don’t know, The Foggy Dew is in fact a traditional Irish ballad that refers to the Easter Uprising of 1916 – an uprising led by Irish Republicans during World War I to attempt to overthrow British rule in Ireland. Its lyrics are all about encouraging Irishmen to fight for Ireland – not for the British Empire – and considering McGregor’s status as an Irish patriot, it fits him well.
When he walked out to a live rendition of the song at UFC 189, with O’Connor singing in the arena, it was arguably the most memorable entrance in promotional history. If anything, his walkout to this track is as responsible for his popularity – particularly in Ireland – as his ‘Notorious’ persona.
#5: Anderson Silva – Ain’t No Sunshine by DMX
For the best part of a decade, when the lights dimmed and UFC fans heard the voice of DMX mumble “It’s dark, and hell is hot” before the famous refrain of Ain’t No Sunshine – a cover of an old song by Bill Withers – everyone knew what was about to go down. A fighter competing in the 185lbs division – or sometimes at 205lbs – was about to get their ass kicked by Anderson Silva.
The legendary former Middleweight champion used the song for the majority of his UFC career – particularly during his legendary title reign from 2006 to 2013 – and the lyrics, which were changed by DMX to state “ain’t no sunshine when it’s on” fit ‘The Spider’ perfectly. Strangely chilling, but somehow still massively intimidating.
When Silva surprisingly decided to “retire” the song for his fight with Derek Brunson in favour of a rap track written and performed by his son Kalyl, MMA fans were up in arms. Usually, changing a walkout track wouldn’t be a big deal – the fact that this change was a big deal simply showed how iconic Ain’t No Sunshine had become.
#4: Urijah Faber – California Love by Dr. Dre & Tupac
The UFC has had plenty of fighters from California over the years, but perhaps no other fighter is as heavily associated with the Golden State as Urijah Faber. ‘The California Kid’ was a UFC superstar and a top contender at both 145lbs and 135lbs for years, and his choice of walkout song – California Love by Dr. Dre and Tupac – was absolutely perfect for him.
Initially used during Faber’s run in the WEC – he debuted the track in his hometown of Sacramento prior to his Featherweight title defense against Jens Pulver in June 2008 – California Love fit Faber’s personality perfectly; the cocky-but-loveable surfer dude from Isla Vista strutting his stuff to Dre and Pac, and then destroying an opponent in the Octagon with his high-paced offense.
Despite being a classic song, no other fighter has used California Love as their walkout song since Faber’s retirement in December 2016. It’s hardly a surprise as the song just wouldn’t fit anyone else as well as it did for ‘The California Kid’.
#3: Chris Weidman – I Won’t Back Down by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
An All-American wrestler from New York state, Chris Weidman was using Tom Petty’s I Won’t Back Down as his walkout music as far back as 2012, but it didn’t really ‘click’ until his 2013 fight with legendary UFC Middleweight champion Anderson Silva.
Silva hadn’t lost in almost 7 years and he’d won 16 UFC fights when he faced Weidman – and so suddenly, Petty’s lyrics about standing his ground in front of the gates of hell fit the challenger’s story perfectly. And sure enough, despite Silva’s best efforts to get into his head, Weidman did just as the song said – he didn’t back down, and eventually he pulled off a classic UFC upset and took the title away from the legend.
Weidman has fallen on hard times since – he’s now lost 4 of his last 5 fights and appears to be on the downswing of his career – and yet when the classic guitar riff hits for his entrance, you can’t help but be taken back to UFC 162 in July 2013. I Won’t Back Down remains perfect for Weidman’s personality – in victory and in defeat.
#2: Matt Hughes – A Country Boy Can Survive by Hank Williams Jr.
Few fighters in UFC history are quite as iconic as former UFC Welterweight champion Matt Hughes, and although his legacy as “the greatest Welterweight of all time” has now been surpassed by his once-rival Georges St-Pierre, one area that Hughes will always have GSP trumped in is their choice of walkout tracks.
For the majority of his UFC fights – particularly during his legendary title reigns of 2001 to 2006 – Hughes used A Country Boy Can Survive as his theme, and the classic track by Hank Williams Jr. became intrinsically linked with the wrestler from Hillsboro, Illinois. With its distinctive acoustic beginning, the song hardly sounds like an intimidating walkout song – but when you added in Hughes’s ultra-confident walk to the Octagon, it just worked.
A true ‘country boy’ who was equally at home hunting bobcats and working on his farm as he was smashing an opponent to pieces inside the Octagon, Hughes showed that the lyrics of Williams’ song were true – a country boy could survive. The walkout track was so good that UFC announcer Joe Rogan once referred to it as his favourite of all time.
#1: Ronda Rousey – Bad Reputation by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
We’ve seen from the rest of this countdown that a great entrance theme has to be an iconic song, intimidating in some way, and fit the personality of the fighter who’s using it. Well, when it was used by former UFC Women’s Bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey, Bad Reputation by Joan Jett ticked all the boxes and then some.
For a long time – 4 years if you count her run in StrikeForce that saw her use the same walkout track – the sight of Rousey, hood pulled up, mean-mugging all the way, marching to the Octagon to the frenzied sounds of Jett and the song’s stop-start guitar riff was both one of the most iconic and intimidating sights in the sport.
Some opponents – like Sara McMann and Alexis Davis – simply seemed beaten before ‘Rowdy Ronda’ even stepped into the cage.
With the song’s lyrics speaking of not giving a damn about reputation, and a girl “doing what she wants to do”, it was the perfect track for a trailblazer like Rousey – and the fact that she’s been allowed to keep the song as her walkout music in WWE speaks volumes about its effectiveness. It’s by far the greatest walkout track in UFC history.
