Show: Wrestling Epicenter
Guest: Maxx Payne AKA Man Mountain Rock
Date: 12/11/2025
Your Host: James Walsh
Doing wrestling interviews for over 23 years now, I find I often know who I will or won’t “click” with. I knew I would have a lot in common with Maxx Payne. But, I didn’t realize he’d give me the time he did when we spoke. In fact, he gave me so much time, I divided our conversation into 2 parts. But, it wasn’t just the time. It was also the gold he gave me within that time. This is a very good conversation with a very talented man who did some amazing things in the world of professional wrestling and beyond!
In part 1 of our conversation, we discuss everything from him learning the guitar, his early days in pro wrestling, his thoughts on Chris Benoit’s legacy in spite of him being a friend in life, The Kliq being a big part of why Louie Spicolli died, and so much more!
Maxx Payne has a movie that we’re all anxiously awaiting. The movie, which will feature a soundtrack consisting of Maxx Payne on guitar and “Road Dogg” BG James on lead vocals (and I’ve heard some of, it is GOOD!) was filmed with a video camera back during his final tour with the WWE in the mid 1990’s. According to Maxx, it contains footage of the Kliq openly mocking him to his face and treating others like garbage, the mid 1990’s WWF roster interacting in a way you never thought you woudl see, and a whole lot more. You’ve heard a whole lot about the politics backstage in WWF at the time that Man Mountain Rock was there. For the first time, when this gets put out there, you’ll see it for yourself!
Part 2 of our interview will be sent out in a press release in a few days. If you want to listen to both part 1 and part 2 right now, you can! Follow the YouTube links below:
Part 1 on YouTube: https://youtu.be/ddDLgknLZpo
Part 2 on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Q47JTgO1m6w
Don’t forget to check out http://www.wrestlingepicenter.com for our catalog of 900 plus interviews conducted over the past 23 years! Also, check out our store and buy somethin’, will ya?
MAXX PAYNE AKA MAN MOUNTAIN ROCK:
On the “State of Euphoria” introduction:
“Oh man, I’ve not heard that introduction since I left WCW. Thank you for that! I’ll never forget when Gary Michael Cappetta came up to me. He said, “Where should I say you’re from?” I said, “How about the State of Euphoria?” He just looked at me like, “Oh God, that’s good!” (laughs)”
On getting his first action figure recently hopefully soon to release:
“I am excited. I’m anxiously waiting like everyone else to see it happen. The guy who is making it, he’s a great guy, he does a lot of these. I’m excited to see the finished action figure. It is awesome to finally get an action figure! I’m hoping, if the Man Mountain Rock figure sells well, I can convince him to make a Maxx Payne action figure as well.”
On learning to play guitar:
“Well, my guitar playing started at a pretty early age. Unfortunately for me, my brothers had said they wanted to take up a musical instrument and then the instrument would end up in the corner collecting dust. So, my parents didn’t take my guitar playing too seriously when I was young. But, I started relatively young and kept tinkering with it. My brother had literally bought a guitar, silver style guitar and had that with a broken amp, he handed that down to me hoping that would pacify me. It didn’t. But, I kept tinkering around with the guitar and finally, my parents got me guitar lessons. The lessons were still like with the dog on the page and you are to follow the notes,. It was like (singing) “Rubin, Rubin, I’ve been thinkin’!” And, I wanted to be playing Alice Cooper, not that those stupid old songs. So, I wanted to continue learning but I repressed it. Then, I went to college. And, my roommate in college was a drummer. In fat, I’ll tell you how good of a drummer he was. He is currently in a band called No Quarter, it is an international Led Zeppelin tribute band. Anyway, he was a good collegiate wrestler. I had talked him into coming to this school. And, one day, we were sitting around smoking a joint and he looked at me and he said, “I don’t want to hear this story from you no more (about playing guitar) if you don’t even have the balls to go out and buy a guitar and learn to play rock and roll.” Well, that struck a chord with me… (laughs) Well, I had built this truck. And, the truck had like a thousand dollar stereo in it. I went down to the guitar shop and I traded in my thousand dollar stereo for a guitar and an amplifier. It was like a Fender Squire and a little side-kick amplifier. I’ll never forget the look on his face when he came home and saw that I had done it. It was like, “Hey, mother f***er! Say your shit now!” (laughs)”
On musical skill coming from his mother:
“We all have regrets in life. One of those was that I can still remember everything about playing the piano. But, at 5 years old, I refused to practice because my mtoher wanted me to. I wish I had practiced. Anyway, I remember when my mother took me to go see the movie The Sting in the early 1970’s. There was a song called The Entertainer written by Marvin Hamlisch in it. In fact, it won the Oscar. Well, my mother came in the house, sat down at the piano, and played that song note for note from memory. That was really impressive. I wish I had realized how impressive that really was when I was young. But, she could play anything! She would hear that melody and she could replicate it. She could play Bohemian Rapsody! She loved Queen! She wasn’t of the era of rock and roll. But, she loved Queen, especially A Night at the Opera. I remember driving around in her Lincoln and listening to Queen while it was raining and lightning out – She hated lightning. But, we would listen to A Night at the Opera and talk about it and bonded over it. She loved Queen!”
On applying his mother’s natural skill to the guitar:
“I realized I could figure out a lot of songs on the guitar. I knew nothing about playing guitar. But, I realized I could kind of listen to them and figure them out. I’ll tell you, the first solo I ever learned was the Motels’ “Only the Lonely.” I can still hear that in my head. And, if I can hear it in my head, I can play it sort of how my mother could on the piano. Then I started tinkering with a song by Atlanta Rhythm Section called Spooky which was kind of their take on Love Potion #9.”
On getting better with the guitar:
“My wife, at the time, got me Guitar Player magazine. I don’t think it is still going. In fact, I think Guitar World might be the last one still standing. Anyway, she got me this edition and it had an interview with Eddie Van Halen. In that interview, he said, “If you want to learn to play guitar, if you want to play rock and roll, all you really need to know is 1, 4, 5.” All rock and roll, especially the older stuff from Chuck Berry onward, centered around what he called 1, 4, 5. That’s the blues! Anyway, in that same article, I also learned how to do it without learning to read music because I learned tablature.”
On being a collegiate wrestler:
“I put myself through college on a collegiate wrestling scholarship. Part of the reason I went to Iowa State was because they had a commercial television station. I wanted to learn production of television and film. What better place to learn than at a commercial television station?”
On losing Louie Spicolli:
“I was on the phone with him the night before he died. I begged him to stop but he was too far gone. He was very betrayed by the wrestling business. Another classic example of “The Kliq” taking advantage of somebody at that time. It devastated Louie. He was in the throws of some very serious drug addiction. It broke my heart, man. I begged him to stop… He’s in my movie that is going to be coming out very, very soon. But, Louie was a very special guy and it was all because of Bill Anderson. I have a soft spot in my heart for Bill Anderson.”
On learning under Red Bastien:
“You know, I have nothing but good things to say about learning under Red. He was old school minded for that, I look back with nothing but admiration. And, as far as wrestlers go, he seemed to have a lot of integrity in terms of how he took care of me. To have someone like that to be a mentor, man, I have nothing but nice things to say about him.”
On the death of the territories:
“You could say it is a bad thing. But, I’m also an evolutionist. Was it bad? Well, at the time, yes especially for the local talent that was looking to improve and have a place to work to do so. But, on the other hand, would the territories have failed if something better hadn’t come along that had something to offer the people? If the WWF show wasn’t better than the territory, the TV stations wouldn’t have taken it over the territory show. At that time, the territories were stumbling dinosaurs. Wrestling has to evolve. And, it is evolving right now.”
On how open wrestling is with no more kayfabe:
“You see it right now with the WWE Unreal series. It is the same as the movie I have ready to come out. I thought of this 30 years ago! I believed 30 years ago that the biggest problem in pro wrestling was continuing to try to preserve kayfabe. I always believed kayfabe was bullshit. I always did. There is no need for it anymore. WWE Unreal proved it. Fans will gladly suspend their disbelief while watching the show. They can know how every aspect of it works now and still go out and spend thousands of dollars to go see a WrestleMania. WWE Unreal proved it! Every single aspect of it is planned. That part, kayfabe, is now irrelevant. And now, with that out of the way, in my opinion, wrestling can now go to heights that it never dreamed of!”
On working in the WWF as an enhancement talent in the late 1980’s:
“I did that and I did that because of Bill Anderson. He was the West Coast enhancement guy. He booked all of us for those appearances. The downside was there were no territories for us to go work. So, the only place to get some experience and go work with any regularity was to go and do those enhancement matches. I was getting nowhere after Japan. I had gone to Memphis. But, what better way to get more exposure than to go and rub elbows with the WWF doing enhancement matches?’
On the pros and cons of Memphis Wrestling:
“Well, I wasn’t making any money. I still have my pay stub from Memphis. It was like $200. S, you weren’t making money. But, working in Memphis Wrestling is where I really learned about the wrestling business. Being on the road, learning to deal with Lawler, his comebacks. I had the belt. In fact, I had two belts at one time in Memphis. IT was hard as f***! But, I had nothing but good memories in Memphis.”
On trying to find a place to plant his feet:
“Everywhere I went, the territory closed down. Red got me booked in Montreal, they closed down. Stu Hart called me (ding a Stu Hart impression), “Why don’t you come up here, you big salty bastard?” I thought Memphis was long road trips, my God! I had heard all the stories. I was roommates with Chris Benoit. But, I was scared to death of Calgary. It is so massive. I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t. It was the last sacrifices I couldn’t make after working in Memphis and not making much money. So, I knew if I went to Calgary, everything would fall apart. So, I started trying to run my own territory at home and hoped that would get me out. It didn’t. If it wasn’t for Chris Benoit getting me booked in Europe, I don’t know what I would have done.”
On Chris Benoit:
“Chris Benoit got me booked on a tour of Europe. If it wasn’t for that, I don’t know what I would have done. I say this whenever I start talking about Chris Benoit… You have to be careful what you say. It is like saying, you know, Adolph Hitler did something good. You know? Who cares that he built the f***ing Autobahn. He’s responsible for the deaths of 50 million people! Chris Benoit’s legacy is tarnished and nothing can repair it. And, rightfully so. But, the Chris Benoit that I knew, that got me booked, that stayed with me in Atlanta. He wouldn’t have done those things. So, the good things he did for me, it would besmirch his name in my mind if I didn’t give him credit for those things. But, it doesn’t take away from the hideous nature of his demise.”
On Chris Benoit’s death resulting in change:
“I’m very forgiving in that when it was discovered what was wrong with Chris, he was very important in uncovering the truth of the devastation of CTE. Everybody wanted to say it was due to steroids. But, it was really due to the multiple concussions he had. I mean, 2/3rds of his brain was damaged from concussions. The reason center of his brainw as literally destroyed. I’m not making any excuses for what he did. All I’m saying is if you don’t understand the damage that is done by severe concussions and how it damages your brain, you don’t really understand what happened to Chris Benoit. And, you see now that CTE is taken very seriously by all pro sports including the NFL.”
On Bill Watts:
“I can’t say anything bad about the Cowboy because he gave me my job! Basically, after he gave me my job, that was the last time I ever saw him! I just wish he realized what he had. To be honest, I could be really mad at him. He really f***ed up with me. He let a lot of money go off the table. If he had realized what was going on when I was playing the National Anthem, he could’ve made money he couldn’t have evend reamed of.”
On if WCW took advantage the National Anthem moment:
“I have always said if someone like Vader had come out and smashed my guitar while I was playing the National Anthem, could you imagine the heat that would have gotten? That would have started a feud that could probably still be happening today! They only let me play the guitar a one other time in WCW after that. The f***ing crowd went nuts! Nuts! I just don’t think they got it.”
On playing the National Anthem on guitar before a WCW PPV and the fans loving it:
“It was huge. I went out and played and as I played, you could tell the fans realized I was really playing. And, they got really into it! Before I went out to do it, Jesse Ventura came up to me and he was like, “Are you going to throw in a little Hendrix?” I was like, “yeah, man!” And, I did, especially at the end, paid homage to Hendrix’s version. Everybody who plays the National Anthem on the guitar is paying tribute to Hendrix’s version in some way. I didn’t play it exactly like him because, who could? But, that was huge!”
On Jesse Ventura:
“I come from a Union background. So, if you say the word “Union” in wrestling circles, it doesn’t turn out well. I liked Jesse Ventura. He was always nice to me. I remember riding the elevator with him and him telling me the story about him and Gene Upshaw, the guy who started the NFL Players Union the year of the strike. He had Hogan on board, he said, up until they got to Vince McMahon’s door. But, I liked Jesse.”
