Tony Khan “Not F*cking With Madonna” At All In
Tony Khan was not about to mess with Madonna for a moment at All In.
It all started with a radio interview to promote AEW All In and despite it never being part of the original plan, it all ended in Wembley Stadium for Scottish wrestling sensation Grado.
The former IMPACT Wrestling star appeared in a TalkSPORT interview with Jeff Jarrett where Jarrett was hyping up All In at Wembley Stadium. Grado made one quip too many at Jarrett’s expense and found himself on the receiving end of B flat to E minor as Double J cracked a guitar over his head.
This led many to speculate that Grado and Jarrett could be in line for a match at All In despite the Scottish star having absolutely no affiliation with AEW. But the people who knew what Grado had meant to the British wrestling scene in recent years wanted their man.
No match was made but Grado did get his moment in Wembley before the show where he accompanied Anthony Ogogo and Paul Wight to the ring to confront Jeff Jarrett and his crew who were running down the entire country.
Speaking to Cultaholic, Grado opened up on finding out late on that he was set to be part of the festivities in front of the huge Wembley crowd:
“I got [called] probably Thursday night to be at Wembley. Nothing was ever confirmed. I had people congratulating me after the TalkSPORT spot, ‘Oh my God, you’re wrestling at Wembley, you vs. Jeff Jarrett.’ People were making graphics. I felt so uneasy. I never tweeted anything since the thing with TalkSPORT. ‘I’m staying out of this.’ I didn’t want [to upset anyone]. People were asking ‘why don’t you jump on the hashtag campaign?’ I felt so uneasy.
“I need to thank everybody that sent a heartwarming and positive Grado tweet in the last seven days because I reckon that had a big part to play in the fact that I ended up being at Wembley. At the end of the day, it’s an AEW show. Those are guys that have worked hard for years to get on a show like that on the AEW roster. I always knew, if it doesn’t happen, I don’t really deserve to be at their show, so I’m going to go with the flow and hope for the best.”
Tony Khan wasn’t ready for a fight with Madonna for Grado
One thing that was missing from Grado’s appearance was his trademark ‘Like A Prayer’ entrance music sung by Madonna. Grado used to have whole crowds singing along as he made his way to the ring but the song was notably absent from his time in IMPACT Wrestling as well.
Grado explained that he spoke to Tony Khan about using ‘Like A Prayer’ in Wembley but it was never going to happen:
“There’s a wrestler who was going to speak on my behalf to secure Like A Prayer. I was like, ‘I’m only here for one night, I’ll speak to him. I don’t care.’ ‘Okay.’ ‘Tony my man! How are you? Thanks for bringing this event to the UK! Big fan of your work.’ We make small talk. Elephant in the room, Like A Prayer.
“Maybe he wants to see me wrestle, maybe he’s interested in seeing me wrestle. ‘Is there any chance we can get it? Mute the feed, play it through the host. We turn off any audio, send a message to the truck, cut the audio, blast it through the arena, and let’s party.’
“He was like, ‘Absolutely not. I’m not [f*cking] with Madonna.’ We had ideas if I could sing it walking to the ring. There was the whole rip-off stuff. Even at that point, we were getting lawyers involved. ‘I need this song.’ I didn’t want to piss him off. At the end of the day, he’s got the biggest wrestling show of all time, and he’s worried about some jabroni coming in his office [before the show] pleading, ‘Can I get my music.’ I thought, I’m only here for one night, what’s the harm in asking? I was clutching at straws.”
Tony Khan did spend big on music for All In with Saraya making her way to the ring to Queen’s ‘We Will Rock You’ and Sting & Darby Allin entering Wembley to the strains of Metallica’s Seek and Destroy.