“I was just doing my warm-up, my stretches, and I said to somebody, ‘Hey, what’s my music gonna be?’ And they were like, ‘I don’t know. I guess we should have thought about that.’ No rehearsal or anything,” Ciampa said. “And they were like, ‘What do you want it to be?’ And I said, ‘Well, the new one is very good. I like it a lot.’ I said, ‘It is also very slow and fantastic when I’m like a methodical heel.’ 

“I said, ‘But I do have this old ‘NXT’ music that is probably better for this specific scenario, where I’m just gonna come be a surprise.’ And then that was it. That was the whole conversation. That was probably three minutes before I went out. And then seconds before I went out, it wasn’t even to me, somebody did thumbs up looking past me, and went, ‘No One Will Survive.’ And I was just like, ‘Wait. What?’ I was amped when I heard it, and then the crowd reaction was so darn good.”

Ciampa’s most recent televised match took place on the July 10 episode of “Raw,” where he tasted defeat against Miz in a No Disqualification match. The 38-year-old has not returned to performing on WWE’s house shows as of this writing, with his latest non-televised bout coming on September 17, 2022. 

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit “Out of Character with Ryan Satin” with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.