Insight with Chris Van Vliet - Gangrel set himself on fire during The Brood entrance, Luna Vachon, Edge & Christian

Episode Date: October 1, 2020

Gangrel sits down with Chris Van Vliet for a conversation in person at the Independent Wrestling Expo put on by Fighting Words Promotions in North Richland Hills, Texas. He talks about the fangs he wears and how they used to be permanent, his wrestling school "Gangrel's Wrestling Asylum", how he once caught on fire during The Brood's entrance, what it was like working with Edge and Christian and then The New Brood of The Hardy Boyz, his memories of Luna Vachon, the blood he spits during his entrance and more!Please subscribe and support the show by supporting our sponsors!  DOORDASH- Get $5 and zero delivery fees on your first order of $15 or more when you download the DoorDash app and use the promo code BLUEWIRE BETONLINE- Head to http://betonline.ag and use the promo code BLUEWIRE for your new welcome bonus! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Ladies and gentlemen, Chris. All right, welcome back to the Chris Van Fleet Show. This episode is brought to you by DoorDash and Bet Online, and it's always such an honor to sit down with one of the chillest wrestlers of all time. The vampire warrior himself, Gangrel. This interview was done in person, by the way. Yeah, got a few of these every now and then. And as much as I appreciate the ability that we have right now to have these conversations over Zoom or Skype, there's nothing like sharing a conversation in person.

So this was done at the Independent Wrestling Expo put on by Fighting Words Promotions in North Richland, Texas. It's the same place we did the interview with Jake the Snake. Also the same place we did an interview with jazz, which you will be seeing and hearing very soon. So take a screenshot. Let us know that you're listening to this one. Tag us both. I'm at Chris Van Fleet. Gangrel is at Gangrel 13 on Twitter. And if you haven't subscribed yet, perhaps this is the interview. This is the episode that changes that for you. And let's just keep going with that thing where we read one review from Apple Podcasts on every single episode. I mean, yeah, you don't have to pay for a shout out here. Mm-mm. Just leave a review. Shout one out on every single show. That's it.

Mike 711 says, first time. comment, long time listener. Chris, I absolutely love the show. You're truly one of the best when it comes to interview style and content. I'd love to see you get Sean Michaels or from the indie scene, Anthony Green. Keep up the great work, brother. Thanks for all the entertainment. Well, thank you, Mike. And I think both of those would be great interviews. HBK. Wow. I think if we did an interview with Sean Michaels, I feel like we'd need five hours for that one to cover everything. that I'd want to talk about. And then I'd be like,

hey, can we come like to part two sometime? Like this. This is part two with Gangrel. This is the second interview. Yeah, that we did. The first one that I posted on the podcast, though.

The other one was posted just on YouTube. This was from like two and a half years ago. So, I mean, technically speaking, I guess this is the first interview on the podcast. But Gangrel's wrestling school was like 20 minutes from where I lived in Florida. So I got to know him pretty well. I mean, we shot a few segments.

there for the TV show I was working for. I mean, I went to many of his indie shows. Great stuff. So his wrestling school is called Gangrel's Wrestling Asylum. He's just such a good guy and so knowledgeable when it comes to in-ring psychology. And he's also still wrestling. He's 51 years old, looks great, moves great in the ring. Oh, man.

I can't say enough good things about him if you couldn't tell. We talk about the epic brood entrance music. We talk about entering. with the flames, and if anything ever went wrong there, working with Edging Christian and then the new brood, the Hardy Boys. He reminisces about Luna and does a phenomenal, phenomenal impression of her. And he does this whole interview with his vampire fangs in. It's great.

All great stuff here. So please, enjoy this chat with a live crowd, by the way. Yeah, here you go. It's Gangrel. All right, well, ladies and gentlemen, give it up for my friend, Gangrel. You know what? Let me give it back to you because thank you. We couldn't do this without you.

And I don't get to do these very often. We are live here at the Independent Wrestling Expo. Yeah. How do you like that? How do you like that you like that you got the fangs in for this? Fangs and a vampire tan. Yeah, this is it. Tant pyre.

I think that a tan pyre. Tant pyre. I'm changing things, man. I think that people thought, like, there were rumors that you actually had like actual fangs implanted into your mouth. I did. You did? I did, but not in WWF. Okay.

Prior, 90, 94, 95, 96-ish, I had fangs permanent. Wow. Okay, so what's in your mouth right now? Fangs. Okay, all right, well, there we go. This is more of a clasp. Like, anybody knows you think about a retainer? Okay.

It's a spider clasp. Yeah. Right before we... These are the same ones since 98, though. Oh, these are the actual WWE ones. Yeah. Wow. Yeah.

Well, I went through a few when I first started there, then I figured these out. Wow. But they get loose now. I have to fix the denim up, you know. You look good, though. Oh, well, you too. California suits you well. Thank you.

It's very kind of you to say. And now to work out for you there. Oh, my gosh. Don't need to start. You guys need to tell them it's Waterburger. You got to tell them it's Waterburger. I don't even. I said it was Waterburger or anything.

You don't mess it in and out. It's Waterburger. There's an in and out down the street from my house, and I've been there far too many times already. Didn't even want to give you a bag or buy. It's crazy. I like my stuff packaged and handed to me properly. We could go all day about the best burgers. Water burger.

You are looking like, wow, we're getting a plot. We are in Texas right now. You're in fantastic shape. I wouldn't say that. Look at this camera, but thank you. No, it's true. It's a good angle, but thank you. It's a good angle.

It's your camera. You're still working a ton. Obviously, COVID's probably changed a little bit for you, but you're still in the ring a lot. Yeah, we'll schedule the, Up to this COVID situation in March, to be like, to be honest, it's not even sound cheeky or funny or anything, but I was going to make more money than I did in my base contract

in the W&E on Independence scene this year. Then COVID hit, boom, with a roaring elbow, like rah! A vicious K.O. But the school, the school was weathered the roaring elbow of COVID. The school was weathered it, but I'm still working. Last week, I was in Crown Point, Indiana. I did a show here today, New York tomorrow. So very blessed to be working.

So I pulled through it and made it. But yeah, I was super, super busy, super blessed. And I was working Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday shows, and then running to school, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday, pending upon travel. You've got two big things when you work an indie show that people want to see and hear. The entrance music, for sure. And then the spitting of the blood, of course. Right, which I got to ask about that tonight.

I know that when you do the spitting of the blood, you basically say to the promoter, all right, if you want me to do this, you've got to provide. provide me with a shirt? Well, no. No, I don't. I say if you want me to wear the white shirt, you get to a white shirt. So what I'll do is any promoter, any promoter that's even listening, I have nothing against the white shirt. They don't make them the same. They don't look the same. I don't like them. This is the Jerry Seinfeld Pirates shirt. I like my original Seinfeld version, but they look more now like the Seinfeld shirt now than they did the ones I was wearing the hot topics morbid, but they changed the style. But I have nothing against them because, you know,

when you work shows like this, you're getting different rings. This one has white ropes, say you're getting rings with black ropes. What do they do? They spray the ropes. Or the canvases don't get clean. It's not the blood itself. The blood is the stage blood. It'll come out. But I just would run through, once I started doing any of these, I'd run through a shirt a night. It would just like, you couldn't get them clean.

They looked dingy. It just wasn't the same. So I moved over to black. But I do tell promoters, if they ask, if you want to hunt a shirt down, no matter how awful it is, you get the shirt, I'll wear it, I'll sign it. I'll sign it, leave it with you. You can auction it off or do whatever you want to a charity, yourself, or whoever. But they have to remind the shirt. I'm not hunting it down anymore.

And I'm not putting the 40 bucks out every day. What happens? I am a cheap vampire, by the way. What happens when you go through TSA with vampire blood? Ice. What's up, girl? That's it? I believe every TSA agent is a fan of pro wrestling.

Okay. Well, I carry, I break it down. I don't carry like gallons of blood. Like, I carry my, the shampoo bottle, you know, the gimmick size. Yeah. Within the law. And I know you've got a flavor that you like, too. I got the clear, you know.

Oh, yeah, yeah. Clear. Yeah, you travel so much. They're like, yeah, come on through. What's the flavor that you like? Zesty mint, Ben Nye. Not just mint. No, no, zesty man.

You got to have fresh breath. Yeah. Yeah. Because, you know, a lot of these wrestlers don't. They come in there with onions. and that, but I want to make sure I have a destiny man. Vampires got to have good breath. The first time you heard the brood entrance theme, what went through your mind? I thought they stole it from the TOTES, Pawsome Kingdom.

Okay. Nobody hears it by me. Nobody hears it by me, but I know I gave them that music to listen to. So the first time I heard it was a dry rehearsal under the ring on a Sunday, like literally an hour before the show. And it kicked in, but I could hear it. the underlying things from like Possum Kingdom and the reverse masking and all the stuff they did in it. They just jammed some things up and slowed some things down. And again, I apologize with the fangs. It's like a Gallagosome. You're going to get splashed. Chris already knows. He's already, it's okay. You see him rolling like maybe whether. Should have had that shield on.

Yeah, you should have came in with a full face shield and this deal. Like, but I heard that, but then I got up, but then it would get kicked in and the fire. So I couldn't just hear the music. It was a fire. It was a combination of everything. And then like, It was like, oh, that was pretty cool, but it was like, whatever, it was like super cool, but I was super nervous. But then when it happened in front of a live crowd, so that when the music would hit and you're down there on the elevator, you would already be swaying, and then you get up the fire and go, you're like, this is cool. And then you get up there and the people go, oh, and then that rush, you know, it was great. You know, they, for like two months, they kept telling me, you can't be smiling when you come down the ramp. You're supposed to be a mean vampire, you know, you're supposed to be this, like, creature of the night.

And I go, I am. And they go, oh, you come down the ramp and you're like, hey. And I would try. I mean, I would just try. I'd hold it to the elevator. I'd walk through the fire. They get halfway down the ramp. And then they finally, I think it was Bruce Pitcher, came back.

All right, man, you're like a vampire that's happy. I don't know. You're a menacing vampire. Minishing smile. Because I couldn't stop smiling because it was just such a rush that, like, it would all come together. Then when they put it together as a brood, which was a man. was always the original pitch.

It wasn't just me as a vampire. I wanted the brood deal, you know, like the lost boys, because I was a big fan of the lost boys. Sure. And that's what triggered me to wrestle as a, be a vampire, which I originally started out is Lestat, the vampire in Puerto Rico. And then became vampire warrior, rest of peace, French Martin, Pierre Montelieu, he changed it to the vampire warrior, which evolved into Gangrel and WWF, or E, whatever you want.

Did you ever have a moment where the elevator got stuck halfway up or you didn't go all the way? I had a moment, all right. Oh, no. Well, at first, the first night, the Sunday night heat. If you watch your back, you'll see they clip away and come back. So we did one drive rehearsal, I said, right? Before the show, the first time ever, they said the elevator has a shimmy in it, right? Like a little, it has a boom, boom, and it'll go up, give it a second.

Well, that drive rehearsal didn't have all this fog and the dark arena and all this other stuff and people there, you know. So I get in there and the music goes and I can see the fires are going. And I'm like, ah, you know, I don't know if it's me swam, but I thought I felt the shimmy. I thought I felt the elevator to do the thing. So I went to turn and step and go, well, it wasn't done. So my foot, planet, it's right in there as I was turning in between the elevator and stage. So it shut, sling.

So I'm stepped over and the flames going, ah, I'm holding the goblin. Oh, man. So they cut away when I'm going, there's flames burning up around me, like my foot. And that's why I ended up with the, when they got it down, I just hobbled to the ring. My foot was black and blue for months. Oh, my gosh. They all said, oh, that's a great vampire.

That's a great swag you had when you walk. They go, no, that was just a hurt foot and a grizzled knee walks. So I ended up getting that, that's how that started. Like, it didn't ever change. So I've been walking like that since. Wow. Yeah, because my foot was crushed. And my knee was, I didn't tell my knee was hurt already.

Jeez. And the brood was basically created. as a vehicle to make Edge look like a star. Absolutely, 100%. They told me from day one was to help bring Edge in and get around. What people don't realize is, I've been wrestling 33 years of September.

It'll be 33 years. Congratulations, by the way. 87, I started, thank you. 33 years. Wow. And I started out. You know, I went from, I was trained by Boris Milko,

and then I went to Stampede. I trained in the dungeon for a while with the hearts. And then there I went to All Japan, and then Puerto Rico and Memphis. But in between all that, because the first thing I was told when I was breaking in was to get a passport. You know, I've been in the room

and they go, they come in a room and look like this is a locker room and they're looking at everybody. Who's got a passport? Good, kid, you want to go to Malaysia? Yeah. It was like that back then, you know, so I had the passport.

So I did a lot of older tours with all the Rick Martel, all the different guys like that. So I knew all the older guys. And plus, I was with Luna for like 18 years. So I met Luna was 18. She knew everybody. So I kind of like just knew everybody and kind of been around without being around.

You know, I was always, I guess, a journeyman, that guy had to fly on a wall. I was always there. So he knew I knew everybody. So they just said, hey, look, he's our future. We're strapping a rocket to his cry, you know, his back, to his back, his butt. To his crotch, sure, whatever. Well, rated R superstar, not X, I guess. But they knew he was their future.

That was the deal. And it was just help, help get in with everybody and help take care of him. Don't get him hurt and stuff like that. And how did Christian come into that then? Edge Brung him in back to order. Okay. I think that was supposed to be Chris Daniels spot. That's right.

Yeah. Wow, isn't that crazy? Yeah. Edge, Chris Daniels. And we're not promoting us. I just need energy. You got vampire energy. Not today.

It's early. It's like 121. What was it? What was it about Edge when you first met him when you first saw him that you went, yeah. Like he's got. I think when I first met him, I chipped his tooth. Yeah. We worked on that.

I think he was already under contract, and I was on a show, and they said, oh, this is Adam, whatever, he's doing sex and violence or something. But Christian went there, but he did a singles. And I worked him in the singles, and I gave him one of those, whatever, and shipped his tooth or something. That's my first met him. But he was a great guy then. He didn't have a problem about it or anything. He was like super.

It was probably an accident. I don't think I've ever heard anybody on purpose or anything like that. But first time I met him, and then he just has a presence about him. You know, not that he's from Orangeville or Toronto. or anything like, you know, Eastern Canada or anything like that because, you know, I know.

For these Eastern Canada guys. But he grew up half an hour for me. Yeah, yeah, no. It was just a great human being. There's something special about him. You know, there's a lot of people. You'll go through the world and meet a tremendous amount of people and shake a lot of hands.

And then you'll meet a handful of people that are just really good people. And he's a really good person. Yeah. Yeah. Were you able to appreciate how cool the attitude era was when you were in the heart of the attitude era? Oh, no, I never realized.

And Luna used to tell me, she goes, one of the things I love about you is you don't even realize you're like a star or you're doing anything. She goes, you think you're just still, you know, Hollywood, Florida, just work in an indie show. You don't look at it like anything because I didn't appreciate it. Now I do. Now I look back going, oh, man, this is really cool. And nothing against anything else on TV now. I put it back and forth. Like, oh, I really was different.

But we weren't much different. But way we ran matches. They were just, we would shoot for no reason. there was a thousand reversals for no reason. So it wasn't much different in that sense, but everybody had a storyline in a cake, you know. Yeah, that's the thing. Everybody, whether you were at the top of the car,

middle of the car, to the bottom of the car, everybody had a storyline. And, you know, everybody was, you know, to be, like a cruiserweight or something, you were like, you had to be like 220. I'd be a cruiserweight now. Right. Yeah, when I started, even when I started in 87,

they were like, oh, kid, you're just going to be a junior heavyweight that's all it could be. I was like 230 pounds, you know. Guys were monsters in, you know, like, and then slowly wrestling, pro wrestling, evolved to pro wrestling entertainment and then whatnot. As everything does, it kind of takes on its own thing as things go. But I believe it cycles, because I believe wrestling's going to come back.

I do. As much as I secretly like to have a glass of wine and watch Lucille, I'm in my underwear. In your underwear. In my underwear. Not jewelry, but no, I love all the flips and this stuff. People think I don't like them. I really truly do like all the flips and flaps.

I just don't do the flips and flips. But having a school, I don't let them know that I like it because then that's all they're going to want to do when I'm trying to teach them a foundation. I'm super glad if they can do the flips and flops and they have that athletic ability as long as they have their foundation and their footwork to get there. They don't know where to be.

They won't be running to catch a dive. They won't be looking awkward. Everybody's standing now, no, no, no, no. You know, like, so they're going to be better off, you know. But I'm secretly, do love all that. Well, now that you have this school, Gangrel's wrestling, Asylum. How much has changed in the way that the fundamentals,

what you're teaching people, how different is it from what you learned 33 years ago? It's absolutely the same. Wow. It's absolutely the same. I was watching, it's funny because I watch back, and I do a lot of cardio, so I'm on the elliptical. You got an hour to kill. So I watch old stuff. So I was thinking about, let me watch the

mass superstar. And then, you know, he came up under Malenko, right, Boris Malenko. So I go back and I go, wow, he's running the same basic matches I teach, you know. Here, so that's there. So now, I teach that. Now, what might have changed maybe is psychology-wise. Like, I don't believe in psychology is always,

I do appreciate good versus evil when I can understand it, but I don't always preach that now. Now, first six months or first three months, I'm teaching them the good versus evil. Babyface this sword heals, hands back, right? I teach that the first few months. But as they move advanced and characters come along, Then I teach, okay, it's more about characters of psychology.

How do you, is Chris Van Bleak is this character? I'm Gangrel, I'm this character. How do I get Chris Van Bleak over without killing his character? But keep myself strong and get my character over, but tell the story that's here and there. And, you know, so it's not necessarily, you know, you're the bad villain and I'm the good guy or vice versa. But it's about characters, but it's where you're going in a long run with an angle or on the card and everything. Yeah, but I still like traditional stuff, but I don't hold to that, you know. I'm not going to say the world revolves around that.

Sure. But Lorraine the fundamentals. It makes sense? Or did I confuse you. You had that look. I just have a weird looking face. I just have a weird looking face. Yeah, that look when you talked to Vampiro, that look.

Oh, geez. Wow. You had a look. You gave me that look, that. Is there, uh, is there vampire heat between you and Vampiro? No. Who's the real vampire here? You ask him, you'll tell you, he is.

Yeah, he thinks he's a vampire. Yeah. I don't know. I don't want to pick on them. That's fine. You have like the vampire, like, you have the neck bite. These, yeah, this is, well, we didn't get wedding rings. I mean, Luna got married.

Instead of getting wedding rings, we went out and got matching vampire bites on the neck. Wow. And I don't, I don't want to get. On Halloween. On Halloween. That's, yeah, it was 10 years. It just passed. It's, uh, the 27th that she's been gone.

Wow. You have such a special relationship with her even still to this day. Like, even when you talk about her now, it's just like, like, I can tell you're still very much Love, yeah, I do. I wouldn't be here today doing what I do. She's the one that encouraged me to do the vampire character. Two, she just taught me the ropes, you know, like, because she's been around. She's second generation, you know, her father was butcher Vachian, her uncle was Matt

Doug Maurice Fichon, her aunt was Vivian Vichon, her aunt was married to Buddy Wolf. And so it's just a wrestling family of knowledge and stuff passed on. So she's passed me all that on, and she was like married to Dick Slater. or with Dick Slater for a while. Plus, she worked Florida at a young age under Kevin Sullivan and Steve Kern. So the knowledge that was passed on to her, she's passing on to me. It didn't necessarily help me in something. Sometimes it killed me, buried me.

But sometimes you're better off just not knowing, you know. Better off just walking in instead of seeing the world for exactly what it is. But once I learned to appreciate that knowledge and use it the right way, it's turned out to be very valuable. What's your best memory of Luna? When you think about her, what's the thing that comes in mind? I don't know, man. So many things come by just hear a voice talking to me like this, you know, trying to describe me as like using a screwdriver.

That cop rouse bad, crust, brain, pain and pleasure go together, contributing to that ultimate illness, and you are not my bliss. You are a pain and my... Wow. I feel like Luna was here for a second. See that guy like a spray zone? I said, look. I did see a little bit.

Wow. No, yeah, everybody says, can you do a promo now? I said, I could do Luna promos because she did them all the time. Why I said they're going, there's a black bar. We're doing it as a vampire. You've counted on restaurants, and now they are counting on you. And while their dining rooms may be closed,

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that you had as you were coming up and who was it from? Well, I'm going to also say, Luna, you know, Penn is mightier than a sword. Don't believe the hype, you know. Don't believe your own hype? Yeah, I don't believe any hype they put on it because, especially if it's a pencil, though there's a race it, pen need to scratch it out, but Penn's my ear than sword. You know, all these guys, they tell you, like, they get in there, they get to push this and that, but it just takes one swing in the office and one other person, and it's just like, ah, There we go, and it changes it, yeah. But, like, I took most of it in.

Under Jake, he taught me a lot of things, promos and this and this and that, yeah, over there. But he's also written on my hand when I tried to shake his hand. Still the same old Jake, but he taught me a lot about especially promos that I never applied or understood. Until now, now I apply a lot of his techniques and stuff that he taught me when we're in Puerto Rico together. to my students when I run a promo classes and stuff like that. Yeah, what makes

Jake the Snake such a great promo because legendary he's the best of all time? He just draws you in and you can look at him now he's going to draw you in and he talks to

he makes it very personal and you know when he brings it in he just draws in so on TV he draws it in and then you know he's taking lyrics

out of songs so people have heard before or somebody's connected to lyric quotes out of the Bible different thing and then he applies it to that situation. So now these things are familiar to you. You know, you've heard these things here and you before,

but now Jake is applying to the situation. He's involved in that you've been watching on TV. So that and that, and as you're talking to you, you think that he's talking to you, you know, and you and meanwhile, he's talking to everybody at home, but he draws you in and you personally go like, oh, I do it's heavy. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, he's tremendous.

One of the best promos there is. It's not the best. You talk about wrestling being cyclical. We're obviously in a real. really weird situation right now with COVID and everything is going on. What do you think, how do you think it rebounds from this? Well, if you're a conspiracy theory guy, you think everything goes away in November. Next year is normal.

But I don't know. I'm scared. I'm afraid what you're seeing now with all sports and WWE is the virtual fans and stuff that they may not go. Now, am I worried about it? No, because I think it's going to have. help me in a long run because I think small shows and stuff like this are going to excel. Sure. And I think big arenas and stuff like that are going to not run as much and they're going to cut

the productions or they're going to keep in-house residences like the Thunderdome, right? They do this big residency. You can't move that from town to town to town. Yeah. It may become an event there for that place or they'll build their own, you know, something like that because they realize they're getting by without fans from WWEs publicly traded stocks. They're going to say, why are we going to go backwards, spending this money if we're in here. So I worry about

stuff like that, but I believe it's going to be good for independent wrestling and territories. I think they'll pop back up again. I think regional... This is my opinion. I don't have a fact finder and study, but this is what I believe. I believe things are cycles, and I believe wrestling's going to come back. And, like,

I'm working my best on it in South Florida to try to bring back a regional Florida wrestling. Like, we're moving to a bigger venue that we can tape in all the time. It's 5,000 square foot, as I was telling you. It's got three rings. for the 18-footers going to stay up permanent. We got the LED lights already ordered for, like,

NXT on the polls and everything, the lighting rigs. Oh, my gosh. Trust, trust. That's a very professional independent company. Don't, like, we're really looking at that to run TVs there, and I'm looking to pick little towns and go regional again and bring that back, because I think they're going to start neglecting all these people in live events,

and then they're going to be outrageous ticket sales to get into what live events in that main city. I think they're going to cut it down. I don't think they're going to hit as many towns as they used to. Yeah. And so I think there's a big chance that could be good for up-and-coming wrestlers and people like myself that have a wrestling school or trying to run events to come around. This is what I'm hoping. Sure. I mean, I don't want to see the big venues go away.

Yeah. I love, I'm not a, what do they call it, a cinematography. I don't want to see. I wasn't a big fan of the Undertaker, AJ Styles and stuff like that. I want to see the cinematic matches. I want to feel the crowd. I want the vibe of the crowd. I want to get the atmosphere.

I want to smell the popcorn, stale beer in the arena, whatever. So I go to a live sporting events and all that. I love that feel. I don't want to miss it. Hockey. Love it. You know, I'd go to all the Panther games. I'm not even a Panthers fan.

I'm a Red Wings fan. But you're a hockey fan. Yeah, I'm a hockey fan. But I love the live event. I don't think I want to sit home in front of my computer to look out of here going, hey, it's me on TV. I can all do that. I want to go to a live event and feel that event.

Just like everybody's here live for this. And I like to say, thank you to all of you coming out. out here in Texas. Thank you. Give yourselves a round of applause. Yeah. Thank you. And working towards this, it's a big step in this time of the COVID and everything else and to come out here. And hopefully we get a good crowd tonight for the show. Thank you all. Thank you for coming in early for this. And, you know, we've got about five minutes left here. So I'm going to open it up to you guys. If you have a question you want to ask, Angrel, you know, we'll repeat it back into the mic. So, yeah, shoot your hand up and, yeah, what you got?

What's the night working with the entertainment with the minister? So what was it like working with the undertaker and the ministry? There's the death of the brood. Oh, no, it's a touchy subject here. Yeah, yeah, it is touchy subject. But, no, in a sense, okay, yeah, great, you're here, the ministry, right? The biggest evil faction is, and you're in a small group here, so you got the small group, the brood, three of you, right? So I was against it, but I never spoke up or fought from my rights way.

Edge was, I thought it was cool, but I don't think he comprehended where it was going because, once you went to the ministry, we went in the ministry, and they'd bring us all out on the stage. And, you know, they want that big heel reaction, that big boo. Well, they would boo first, but then you start hearing chance, brood, brood, brood, brood, it takes over brood. And I leaned over the edge, I said, we won't be in the ministry long. What do you mean?

I go, ah, we're done. He goes, what do you mean? About three weeks later, and they go, hey, we think we're going to break you up and few of the ministry. And then I go, and I told him, next step, brood's done. So it was cool in a sense, but deep down aside with the knowledge, like I told you earlier, I mentioned that Luna showed me worlds and angles and things that I wish you could get back because it took away from me enjoying that moment that was there because it should have been a great moment.

I was already foreseeing the, you know, I want to say the butterfly effect, but I knew where it was going. So exactly what happened. So, but it was cool. I mean, but I couldn't get past seeing what. I knew everything was actually going to end up. What's your name, by the way? Eric? Thank you, Eric.

Anyone else have a question? Little man? Yeah, and what's your name, by the way? Jaden. So Jaden asked, what made you get into wrestling? I thought it was, I wanted to make some money and beat people up, to be honest. Wasn't quite that when I got there. It was a little bit more complicated than that.

But, well, I, uh, ah, I see my fangs are loose. Ah. I didn't put the stuff in the hall of them in, Jade. I broke my name. I wanted, believe it or not, people don't know this. Some people do. I wanted to play football and be a preacher. As it. I gave sermons every other Sunday in church. When it came along when I was playing Pop Warner football, they said, what pro football do you want to play for? I said, the Miami hurricanes. So I just wanted to play football on that. But then I broke my neck when I was 13. And then I took a different path. So I lost out on all the sports and stuff. And I really, really missed it. And I actually saw that in the newspaper and it said, become a pro wrestler. I was already living on my own. I moved out at like 15. I moved out on my own. I got myself in a lot of trouble and everything. I saw an ad to be a wrestler, and I thought, oh, here's another chance of sports.

It went down there, took a chance on it. And 33 years later, here I am. And it was the best chance I ever took. Wow. I'm grateful for it. I owe wrestling everything. Wrestling owes me nothing. So, like, that's why I do run schools and I keep putting into them and want to build bigger things

because I want to give other people that might have been in that same spot I was in a desperate time in my head and in my home. heart, my feeling, soul, feeling it having anything, or even kids, like, also like me that was in the streets and in trouble, another opportunity, because we're not all super, like, college smart and this and this and that. Some of us are just a little bit different and meant for something else. So if I could find those ones and guide them and turn caterpillars into butterflies and off they go, here we do it. That's it. Thank you, Jaden. Yeah, what's your name? AC. AC. What's you got?

with today being like the internet age and there's being outlets with so many different you're able to watch multiple opinions and multiple companies work what are some who are some lessons

that you would want to work with today? So, you know, yeah, so yeah, who would you want to work with today basically? Because there's so many, there's so much availability and accessibility now.

I think maybe a Jungle Boy just once you'd always small because, because I met him when he first came in and all that. He was going to see where he's coming. He came out of that. I have a special heart for a lot of guys out of that North Cal area that came out of there.

You and Darby Allen, I think, would be really interesting. Yeah, Darby would be cool. I've already worked him once, but I want the revamped Hammerstone, Alexander Hammerstone. I want that hammerstone now. Yeah. Here's another one. Believe it or not is Jacob Fatt, too. I trained him.

But I'd like to have a heavyweight one-on-one with him somewhere online. because I know what I've taught him, and I know where he was when I left him, right? Now, he's here, he's gone here, he's got experience here. I'd like to get there and see what's going on with that there. Scorpio Sky, look, Scorpio Sky. Yeah, Scorpio Sky. And Lance, I worked Lance, I think, once,

but I like to get another chance at him. He's not beating me up, yeah. Thank you, A.C. We'll take one more, and then Jazz is our next one. And what's your name, by the way? Andy. What was it like working with the hearts? How bad did he strux?

You ever see porkies? When he goes, he got the pigs, too? Stu got mine. Oh, wow. Stu got my, too. He never came down, like, like, I went there, like, I was like 220, 225 when I went there. Needless to say, I left it like 199 pounds. They trained the heck out of you in the dungeon.

You know, it was a lot of cardio, a lot of things. But there was a tremendous experience. Stu never came down in the basement when I was there. He got me at Sunday dinner. He came up and he- Kind of dinner is that. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, so, you know, I was there and Stu was coming down the steps and, you know,

I was Stu Hart. I'm like, oh, hello, sir. He's like, ah, come here, you're a big guy. You're the guy they're talking about. Oh, my gosh, that'd be terrified. So he asked me what, I was working with Bruce Hart that day. And he asked me what Bruce Hart was working on. I said, well, we're working on punches.

Well, he used the word I'm not going to use about Bruce's punches. And, like, it wasn't the S word. It was a P word. Punch is like a whatever. So he comes over. Fish hooks me, turns me around like this. He's standing on the stairs. It takes his knuckle.

And boom. Catch me there. And I was like, ooh, good one. And he said, ah, let's go eat. And I was sitting there and I knew it hurt, but I didn't know what he sent up. But the next morning I woke up and then it kind of took my tongue because I could feel it pushed over. And the whole tooth came off. He sheared it off with the gum.

So I never fixed it. That's just too hard there. That's there. He didn't get a body part, but he took the tooth. Wow. This has been such a pleasure hanging out with you. I hope you guys enjoyed it as well. Give it up for the legendary Gangrel.

Always a pleasure with you, Chris. And all of you fans. Thank you. Thank you so much. I just love that, man. Thanks to Gangrel for this. I'm sure there'll be many other interviews with him because I just love hanging out with him. And thank you to you for hanging out with us on this.

And thanks to the Independent Wrestling Convention, put on by Fighting Words Promotions for inviting me so we could do these live interviews. And it was so cool. Being in front of a live crowd with, you know, those live immediate reactions there. I'm hoping we can do more of these. Actually, you know, the plan is to start taking the show on the road and inviting you to be part of it. You know, different cities, different venues. Just be cool to be able to do these interviews in front of, you know, a few hundred people. So cross your fingers with me, please. We'll see what 2021 has in store for all of us. So if you enjoyed this or any,

other episode, please subscribe to the show on whatever app it is that you're listening on. And if that app happens to be Apple Podcasts, I'm hoping I could persuade you to leave a review. Enjoy your week. And in the words of Stephen Covey, the most important thing is to keep the most important thing, the most important thing. Be great. Be grateful. Have a great week. We'll see you soon. sports. Why? Because I have a job to do. With rapid fire takes. So I don't want to hear from you lava pigs on this notion today. No idea what you're talking about. You're complaining more than you like to breathe air. It's like you get up in the morning only to complain and cry and moan on

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