"Trump... took the stage to ominous instrumental music. He stood on stage for several minutes as it played out."

Writes Jake Traylor (of NBC News) on X, inviting the world to look upon Trump and wonder at his weirdness...

Trump (who was 3 hours late to his rally this evening) took the stage to ominous instrumental music.

He stood on stage for several minutes as it played out. pic.twitter.com/Ruwlyg1idG

— Jake Traylor (@jake__traylor) October 26, 2024

... which is going to feel different to different people, perhaps depending on whether the music has any context for you. Me, I know the music is called the "Undertaker" theme, and though I know what an undertaker is — and I don't think you want the leader of your country analogized to a professional who disposes of the dead — I don't know who "The Undertaker" is — some movie/TV/video game character? Just off-hand, I'm reading Trump's message there as a threat to his antagonists, the so-called "enemy within," to whom he's going to say "You're fired" when he wins, which he wants them to believe he will. It's some scary music for them, but it's delightful to his admirers.

I got to Traylor's tweet from "Meanwhile in Michigan, Trump has finally arrived" (Intelligencer): "He made it to the stage of his Traverse City rally three hours late, then stood there as they played the full Undertaker theme song (instead of the typical Lee Greenwood)."

The link on "Undertaker theme song" to YouTube: "WWE The Undertaker Theme Song 'Rest In Peace.'" We can listen to the song, which takes 6+ minutes and look at an image of a sneering man in a black leather hat and a low-cut black leather coat. Presumably, this person is a wrestler with the stage name The Undertaker. 

But let's read his Wikipedia page. I don't follow wrestling — not since the days of
Gorilla Monsoon and The Golden Terror — but I don't want to be a complete ignoramus about a significant cultural figure, and I can see from Wikipedia that he was a big star in World Wrestling Entertainment. The character, The Undertaker, played by Mark William Calaway, persisted for 3 decades, and I'm not going to try to summarize how that got started and changed over the years. It's a complicated story that's been entertaining people for a long long time. I suspect that those people look with disdain on callow newsmen who hear the theme and call it, generically, "ominous instrumental music."

Let's remember that Trump will put on the biggest show of his campaign tomorrow at Madison Square Garden, and Madison Square Garden is the biggest wrestling venue of the modern world. I think Trump wanted to establish that great wrestling theme as his theme so it will work especially well when it plays over his entrance into Madison Square Garden.

Perhaps the newsfolk who'd be inclined to just call it something like "ominous instrumental music" will be up to speed by tomorrow. But perhaps not. They might prefer to string along their own followers with whatever descriptions they can type out that make Trump seem weak, weird, and confused. They're so dishonest!