Ilja Dragunov Explains Why He Brought Back His Original Entrance Music In Aew

Ilja Dragunov says the entrance music he used for his AEW debut at WrestleDream brought back memories of the earliest years of his professional wrestling career.

Dragunov made his AEW debut on October 17 with a new entrance presentation featuring “Soviet March,” the same music he used while wrestling on the German independent circuit.

Speaking to Ariel Helwani, the former WWE United States Champion explained why the music was so important to him and how it reflects his wrestling persona.

“Because it’s putting together so many layers of my persona. I’m Russian-born but German-raised, and I have a lot of roots through to my German side of culture, but also to my family Russian side. And in the beginning, of course, when you try to find your own persona in professional wrestling, everybody was portraying me, of course, when I started, like, okay, you’re the Russian, so we need Russian music,” he said.

“But I love classical music, so it has this classical vibe, but it also has this other vibe, and it’s also very heavy. And it also just fits so perfectly with my over-the-top, artsy, orchestra-composer-like persona. It fits just all the boxes. So if you hear this music, it exactly tells you how I perform,” he added.

Dragunov said the entrance presentation was developed collaboratively with AEW, with both sides contributing ideas.

“That is the best part about this, that since the work has begun, it has been always a collaboration. It has been always working together. So all the ideas that came from the company side and all the ideas that I had in my mind creatively were just flowing so well into one another,” he said.

“That was such a beautiful procedure to work. And even just to get one little detail, that was one that touched my heart the most, is that even the entrance music, that it was possible to get this specific entrance music,” Dragunov added.

The song accompanied Dragunov during his early career in Germany and remained an important part of his journey through European wrestling before he joined WWE.

“This guided me through the youngest, youngest years to my biggest moments that put me on the platform in Europe, got me to the United Kingdom, got me to the States. So much of my career is based on that music. And when I heard this music and did my entrance on Saturday at WrestleDream, I felt like a child again in the business,” he shared. “And I was craving this feeling for a very, very long time.”

Following his appearance at WrestleDream, Dragunov made his AEW in-ring debut on the October 21 episode of Dynamite, where he defeated “Speedball” Mike Bailey in the main event.