Originally published at Trick Williams on 'Whoop That Trick' chant: 'It was totally organic'
While Trick Williams is best known for being the current NXT Champion and one of the top stars on Tuesday night’s WWE brand, he’s also certainly known for having one of the most hype entrances in wrestling at the moment.
Williams’ bouncy, bassy theme is always accompanied by an enthusiastic “Whoop That Trick” chant from live crowds, always providing an exciting atmosphere before his matches. It’s a huge plus to Williams’ presentation, and yet, the champ says the movement was something created completely organically by the fans.
In a recent interview with Chris Van Vilet, Williams described when he first heard the chant as a heel when he was teaming with Carmelo Hayes. He mentioned how the chant only took off once he received an entrance theme inspired by Baby Keem and Kendrick Lamar’s 2021 hit “family ties.”
“I was rocking with [Carmelo Hayes] at the time,” he said. “We used to come out to his music, and people were chanting ‘Whoop that Trick, whoop that Trick.’ I looked at Melo, I said ‘Yo, are they with us or they against us?’ ‘I don’t know.’ I hit a move or something, got a bodyslam, [they said] ‘Whoop that Trick!’ Oh, I think they like this! Those ‘Whoop that Trick’ chants, it was started by the crowd. Just continued to grow, and grow, and grow. It was totally organic. But I think it really took off when I changed my entrance music. This is something else I’m not sure people know, but, I went to production team, I said ‘Hey, I would like to change my music. I want to go with ‘Family Ties,’ Kendrick Lamar. I want heavy horns in the beginning, I need 808 drums and heavy bass.’ They came back to me with this instrumental that I have now, I was like ‘Yeah, that’s the one right there.'”
With the new entrance music, Williams started to notice the chants more. He remembers the chant especially catching on before his singles match with Ilja Dragunov at last year’s NXT Heatwave.
“When the beat dropped, the people right there were on beat with it [saying] ‘Whoop that Trick,'” he recalled to Van Vilet. “If you look at my face a little bit, you see a little smirk. I was like ‘Oh shoot, we just started something.’ We went out there and had a banger match. I think that’s the day ‘Whoop that Trick’ went to a whole other level. Shoutout to the NXT crowd, man, there’s nothing like them.”
The full 30-minute interview with Williams can be watched here.