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Mike Johnson: Has there been a moment yet where there's been too much chaos and you're like, "Alright, this went a little farther than we thought"?
Billy Corgan: Oh yeah. Of course.
Mike Johnson: As the promoter and the owner, do you want to tell the guys, "Hey you've got to reign it in a little bit." Or do you just feel like, "Ah, you know what we just got to go with it because it's what happened."?
Billy Corgan: No, that's really on me. I'm the one who's put all this together, and I'm the one who's creating the wide open parameters. If it spins out of control, and it has a few times, that's really on me, it's not on the talent. That's something I think we'll work harder to be clear about going forward, and obviously it's on me to write a clear narratives and make sure that the direction is there. I like to throw a little praise to my old boss John DeBord because John DeBord used to make us walk through segments boyfriend TNA shows. I used to go, "Oh my god, do I have to walk through this segment for 30 minutes." But to his credit, that is something we should've done a little bit more of because there were times where because we were shooting too much in one day, people were just getting confused. Like I said, that's really on me.
Billy Corgan: I think we'll run a tighter ship next time, and I think we'll keep the into the fire flame at a low boil.
Mike Johnson: You know what, here's one of the number one questions I've received is, why was the decision made to use Dawkin for the theme song of the show, when you've got obviously a massive catalog of your own? Was that a conscious decision not to use your own music?
Billy Corgan: Oh yeah. I really don't want the show to be about me. I really want it to be about the talent. I thought, okay if were going to kind of do a good wink here back to another time, can we find a song that I think will embody the spirit of what I'm after. It's really funny because I did a deal to get this song, and I've actually played with George Lynch the guitar player of Dokken. I know him a little bit so that may have helped to get the deal done. I arranged to get the song licensed for the show, and I sent it to Nick Aldis, and I sent it to Dave Lagana. Of course, they didn't say anything until after the show aired, but they later told me they weren't completely sure about the song. And that's when I told Lagana, "I think you can trust me in the music department." You know what I mean? You can question all you want my wrestling acumen, but when it comes to music, you might want to get out of the way.
Mike Johnson: I think that one's an understatement. The announcing team...Dave Marquez, Joe Galli, and Jim Cornette. Talk about the decision making to make them the voices of the NWA. The Cornette one obviously speaks for itself. I don't think there's anybody alive who could embody that sort of knowledge, education, and passion for what you're trying to do, but talk a little bit about Joe Gali and Dave Marquez growing into those roles and why there were tapped.
Billy Corgan: The relationship with Dave Marquez came of course through David Lagana, and working with championship wrestling from Hollywood. When I would go out there occasionally for shows, Joe Galli at that time was the week to week announcer for Dave Marquez. I remember pulling Lagana aside, probably a year and a half, maybe even two years ago and saying, "That's the future voice of the NWA." There's so much talent, and Joe is just starting his stride. I think we'll look back at Joe in ten years and see him at the level of other great announcers in the business. To wrestling fans that are sort of in my age group, I think you'll appreciate, the thing that made Gordon solely so great was he was straight in his announcing. He announced the wrestling a little bit more like a sports play by play guy. He of course knew what he was doing, and he was great at working in the business but he kept it kind of sober, and I think Joe Gali is that type of voice. I'm not a fan of people who over hype. I think Joe is just pitch right. When you've got a guy who's very hyperbolic like Jim Cornette, I think that's a nice balance. Jim can be caller. Jim can go off the rails, and there's Joe just keeping it straight. Dave Marques, what can you say, he's built his own empire with the championship wrestling series. He's been a great partner to us since the very beginning. It was Dave who had recommended that I should consider buying the NWA. I had actually looked into buying the NWA for TNA at one point, because of TNA's history with the NWA because I wanted to try to bring back some credibility to TNA because everybody remembers it. There was a lot of struggle there with credibility. I had considered it in another frame, but it was Dave Marquez who focused me and said, "I think you can get it." And we talked about what he thought I could get it for, and so that kind of led me down that path. Dave's just been an incredible partner. It's a real joy to have him involved because as somebody who worked with a Harley race, and somebody who really loves the era of wrestling that Dave Lagana and I love, Dave knows exactly what he's doing on that set. One quick funny story, he had a bunch of notes, interview notes and things like that that we'd gone over in the production meeting. I think maybe the second or third segment Bram, Tom Latimer knocks the podium over, and not only do Dave's notes scatter everywhere, but they get water on them and they all smear. He had to work the first day with no notes. There's you're NWA Power behind the scenes moment. There's some moments in some of these shows where I'll text Dave Lagana and say, "Why is Marquez doing XYZ?" Because he didn't have his notes.
Mike Johnson: He's the perfect mix of a ham for television, and someone who knows how to get the most out of someone during the interview segment. He does enough to endear himself, but not so much that it's overbearing. That's not easy in television in general to kind of have that sort of balance. I think he does a good job. It's funny you mentioned Joe Gall being this straight laced sort of announcer. I almost felt like they were shades of early 1993-era Joey Styles with him. Not the Joey Styles we saw later on, but very early on in the ECW Run where Joey's sort of like, "Joey Styles here reporting on blah blah blah, and the franchise Shane Douglas just had this happen." And it was almost like it was a broadcaster throwing to the different things. I felt like Joe Galli was kind of like a more, I don't want to say hyped up, but a more passionate version of that version of Joey Styles, but had his own way of calling things. It wasn't like a knock off, but you could see like, alright there's some shades of Gordon Solie in there, a little Lance Russell, and a little Joey Styles. All of which to me are like huge compliments if I'm thinking that when I'm watching someone.
Billy Corgan: Just one quick note, even if I didn't own the NWA, a Lance Russell or a Gordon Solie, that's the style of announcing I would want for any company that I had. The fact that it's the NWA makes it even easier, but that is the style I think that best helps the type of wrestling that I want to get across.
Mike Johnson: Obviously we're still very early on in the run here, but given the huge passionate response that you've gotten thus far, and the number that we're seeing this far for the series, how do you keep yourself from getting too far ahead of yourself, and going, "Alright, let's go run New York. Let's go run Nashville again." How do you kind of stay the course and not suddenly burn this out? What's your mentality for that as someone who's watched bands rise and fall very quickly, and you've gone through your own highs and lows over the years. Building this, it's never going to be done. There's no such thing as perfection when you're creating content, but how do you keep yourself from just running off the rails and deciding, "Alright, we've got the people here. We've got them, and let's go run the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York in two months." How do you keep yourself from doing that?
Billy Corgan: I think it's pretty easy. I think the fact that I own the company 100% and I'm my own boss, and that's with Dave Lagana. We just set goals, and so the next goal is to run the wide pay-per-view December 14th. I think how many people tune in to see that pay-per-view, and the results of that pay-per-view, and whether or not we can run a successful pay-per-view out of that studio as opposed to a traditional larger venue with the LED boards and stuff like that. Certainly NWA 70 and the Crockett Cup proved that we can run a successful pay-per-view. In this case we'd be running the pay-per-view on our own where in the last case we ran in through Ring of Honor thanks to Joe Koff. Our motto is always walk before you run. That's why I always tell people, this is really a 20 year plan and we're not going to go any faster than anybody wants us to go. It's tempting sometimes. I would love to be on the phone right now with you and tell you that we're running 25, 30 shows in the next year, like the New Japan of America, I can't remember what it's going to be called, but how their announcing they're going to run about 25 shows. I'd love to tell you that, but I think it's a very tough market. AEW is obviously sucking up a lot of the oxygen as far as what they're doing. They're selling a lot of tickets on top of the WWE product, and WWE at times has struggled to sell tickets. I think you got to be really careful sort of throwing yourself out there because why would we? We're winning right now with where we're at. We'd like to just slow down and savor it for a second. We're very honest and transparent with our talents what our expectations are, and thankfully many of them have come along for the ride and hopefully they'll feel it's a positive experience.
Mike Johnson: I've hit on everything I wanted to discuss so is there anything that you want to tell the wrestling fan out there that hasn't had the chance to experience NWA Power for themselves, or looks upon a small studio show and goes, "Ah, I want to see Pyro and things like that." And kind of pitch them is why they should look at this more intimate version of professional wrestling that is more chaos based, and more talking based, and more along the lines of the type of DNA for pro wrestling that worked for so many years in different parts of the country for many decades before the [inaudible 00:52:28] man pushed the, destroyed all the little territories. Why should they sample the NWA if they've kind of dismissed the idea, or they've never had the chance to watch it before?
Billy Corgan: This was one of my big complaints when we were in TNA, like, "Why do you want to be like the other companies?" The NWA is set out on a journey to be unlike any company in the world. We've begun to do that. We've begun to separate ourselves and we say that proudly and that's not to denigrate what everyone else is doing. In my estimation, and this is my own personal opinion, in terms of the production side, nobody does it better in the world than the McMahons. I was at WrestleMania last year. The size and scope of whatever those LED walls and the sound systems, and the pyro. It just blows your mind. If you're a company like the NWA, you're so far away from that. That's not even remotely on our radar, so what we have to do to the fan out there is prove that what we're offering is worth their time in a different way. Maybe were a little bit more creative. Maybe were a little edgier. Maybe we have a different sort of take on how to use particular talents. Over time I think, and give us a year or two, I think you'll start to see that there's a very different vision, and I don't mean this negatively against what you were saying. If you look at the NWA right now, and you think that's the NWA two years from now, five years from now, you're sadly mistaken. That's just one piece of a much bigger puzzle we're going to put together. If we get where we want to get, we'll be like no other content generating wrestling company in the world. It'll be very apparent the way we do our business, the way we utilize our talents, and the way we market our talents. There will be nobody even remotely close to the way we do it. We think that'll be a good thing. Very much the way I feel about my music career, if somebody doesn't like what I do I'm cool with that as long as they respect why I'm doing what I'm doing. I don't see any upside for us being like the other kids on the block, especially when we don't have the kind of money to burn. If I had money to burn, would I be using pyro? I can't say I would be. I think I would probably spend it in developing young talents, or I think I would put the money elsewhere because I just think that in many ways, in my estimation, those facets of business just sort of burn themselves out. I'll give you a perfect example, the fact that we don't use entrance music on NWA Power. Some of the talents didn't understand. David Lagana certainly was confused by the whole idea, but I think it's part of what sets the show apart, and it sets a different pace for the show. Now, we'll have entrance music for the pay-per-view, which is fine, and it'll feel special because we're doing it there but in terms of the show, I wanted the show to run at a certain pace so as far as I was concerned the entrance music was the sacrificial lamb on that. That's the way I want to do stuff, and people criticize and they go, "I don't like it." Or, "I want this or that." That's totally fine. That's totally cool, but we have a vision for a reason. I could blow more money, I mean, I've got money. I'm only going to blow money if I think it's going to get us where we want to go.
Mike Johnson: Fair enough. Alright, so before we get out of here I have one last question for you. You have mentioned many times, and even during this interview you mentioned you have 20 year plan. At this point how far along are you from where you were expected to be in that 20 year plan?
Billy Corgan: I'd say we're probably more on year three than year two. I'd say that's pretty good.
Mike Johnson: Hey, if you're ahead of the curve that's a good thing.
Billy Corgan" Yeah. When I bought the NWA, I was looking at landscape that didn't have AEW and Tony Khan. The Khan family's worth somewhere in the neighborhood of six billion dollars. They have an NFL franchise, and they have a United Premiership league, English Premiership League team. They have vast resources. They have access to media that I don't have. We have to go about building this in a much different way to much different pace. What we're really relying on is the credibility. The credibility of the talent in the ring, and the credibility of what we're trying to offer people like yourself. We're not wasting your time. We're an alternate type of product for a good set of reasons that like I said, if you don't like what we're doing you can at least appreciate why we're trying to do what we're doing. We're definitely ahead of that curve, and I feel pretty good about where we're standing.
Billy Corgan: If you had told me that we would've had, I think we're in excess over two weeks of 800,000 views between the two shows, that money would [inaudible 00:57:06] start to pour in, that people would be for commercials, that we'd actually start getting money to run commercials on the show, we'd have no network, we'd have complete control and I wouldn't of given up one percent of the company, I wouldn't have believed it. I would've said, "Wow, how is that even possible? That would take three, four years to even get somewhere like there." We're really excited about where we are, and I can't thank those who've given us a chance, we can't thank you enough, and those who haven't seen it, give it a shot. It's a fun quick hour.
Mike Johnson: So, I just want to thank you for sitting down and giving us so much of your time. Is there anything that we didn't cover that you kind of wanted to touch upon before we get out of here?
Billy Corgan: No man, just the old saying "More is more." Right? So more wrestling is more wrestling. It's a good time to be in the business.
Mike Johnson: It's a good time to be a wrestling fan, it's almost like you have to have a full time job to enjoy wrestling.
Billy Corgan: Like you.
Mike Johnson: I know. Some days I wonder how I'm going to continue to keep up this pace, but that's life. You can't be upset with the blessings that you've been given.
Billy Corgan: The old saying is, "Be careful what you wish for."
For more on the NWA, visit www.NationalWrestlingAlliance.com.
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