Designer Paul Galvin's second clothing line 'PUSH' has hit the rails, so there is no better man to judge WWE’s best dressed superstars
I watched enough WWE, or WWF as it was known back in my childhood days, to know a fraud when I see one. Not only that, but I feel fully qualified to have my say on the sport as well. I’ve paid my dues. My friends and I had all the moves. We knew our chokeholds from our headlocks where I grew up.
I considered a career as a pro wrestler in fact.
It was a live option up until I reached around 16 years old. Two things happened around this time which convinced me to forge a different path. The first was the Kerry minor hurlers came calling for me to play. The second was more of a blip, a turn in the road, on my journey to becoming a fully-fledged grappler. A friend and I, inspired out of our minds by WrestleMania VII which raged on in our sitting room on our Multi-Channel TV box, went out to the front lawn to test out a clothesline move we had seen The Ultimate Warrior carry out on Macho Man Randy Savage seconds earlier.
It was one of those seminal moments between friends when a mutual understanding takes over and there is no need for words, only actions. We both knew what had to be done. Agog on adrenaline we headed for the front lawn and stood back about 10 paces from each other. We paused for about three seconds facing each other down in silence. Words were pointless at this stage. Without further ado we sprinted full-pelt at each other, the adrenaline hurtling at even fuller-pelt through our central nervous systems, our right arms outstretched from our bodies ready to execute the double clothesline.
Adrenaline is a bitch in these scenarios. It blinds you to danger. Our outstretched arms simultaneously met each other around the windpipes, and we took flight on collision, hitting the ground with a thud on the small of our backs like relief packages dropped from a helicopter over a refugee camp in The Congo.
Whatever way my arm wrapped around my friend’s neck I corkscrewed as I took flight and landed on my ribcage. His arm wrapped itself around my head and split the back of my ear on impact with the ground. I was horrendously winded, moaning breathlessly, trying to verbalise the pain I was feeling and the real fear I was harbouring internally that I had no oxygen in my lungs and was on the verge of asphyxiating. My buddy was similarly winded but he wasn’t bleeding from his ear like me.
As I said, the Kerry minor hurlers came calling shortly after and I was forced to abandon my wrestling ambitions from there. I have no doubt I had the necessary reckless abandon to make a career of it though.
But I digress. To get back to the point. I know a fraud when I see one and that leather trench coat The Undertaker wears, my un-initiated friends of the WWE, is a fraud. A fake. A schnide. A knock-off. An imitation. It’s most likely made from the underbellies of family pets stolen from front lawns the world over on a Sunday morning while the gang are at mass. Then transported to the nearest port, shipped overseas, slaughtered, skinned, stitched up and sold as cowhide to a stall-dealer on a backstreet punctuated by smelly sewers in some Chinatown that skirts along the banks of a freezing cold industrial river full of garbage bags.
That said I do like The Undertakers leather mittens. Very Versace.
Which brings me to Tugboat. There’s no way Tugboat is winning WW-anything wearing a naughty nautical vest and a pair of hoiked-up white chinos. He might win first place and some admiring glances down the YMCA though.
Speaking of admiring glances I do love a waistcoat. I fucking hate The Godfather’s though. It’s orange and not on point at all. Orange waistcoats never went out of fashion because they never even came into fashion. No tailor in any sensible atelier would make one. This is high-stakes, high-pressure mortal combat we’re talking about.
What I know I’m right about is that Grand Master Sexay’s zebra print suit was purchased in Korea. Zebra print is a massive trend over there right now and has been ever since they started serving up zebra on their restaurant menus in the mid 80s. Haute cuisine meets haute couture as they say in Italy. Where Grand Master is winning in style however is the double sunglasses look he likes to push. This is major. Why would anyone wear a second pair of sunglasses across their foreheads you ask? It’s very simple. He’s a dickhead, and dickheads have eyes too.
When it comes to WWE style I’m with Goldust all the way. Onesies are the epitome of wrestling. They’re practical first of all not like the other pretenders mincing around in waistcoats, leather jackets and skimpy vests. The onesie, latex if I know my prophylactics and I think I do, is durable, dependable and ultimately stretchy. The use of stretch fabrics is everything in menswear today. It allows for flexible movement and athletic performance. Perfect for WWE. Not only that but this particular jumpsuit looks extremely well – the colour story, black and gold, couldn’t be more current, more high fashion, more directional.
Bottom line. Goldust is very, very Versace.