 You know I gotta say it, right? Yeah. Here we go. Wrestling has more than one royal family. Anywho, Cody Rhodes may be the talk of the wrestling town these days, but it took him many years, gimmicks, and entrance theme songs to, pardon the pun, build his kingdom. From dashing to, well, undashing, and undesirable to goshdarn, unfriking deniable, let's take a historical look at the career of Cody Rhodes behind the themes. In 2006, a young Cody Reynolds debuted in the WWE's Developmental Territory of Ohio Valley Wrestling. Now, when I think of upbeat and peppy 1970s glam rock, Cody isn't necessarily someone I associate with that genre of music. At least nowadays, but back then he was a vanilla white meat babyface. So using the darknesses, I believe in a thing called love, worked for what it was trying to accomplish. Portraying him as an energetic good guy, but keeping his family history and legacy at bay. At least for the time being. If you want to talk about underrated, wrestling-themed song guitar riffs, we'll look no further than this southern rock banger from Billy Lincoln called Out to Kill. Now sure, this track doesn't stand out in any way, shape, or form, but neither did Cody when he was first called up to the main WWE roster. He was just a mid-card guy with a mid-card theme and a mid-card look that was… Lacking the charismatic personality of his father at this point in his career, the only logical next step was to turn Cody heel. Let me talk to you about some things that I consider to be priceless. My grandfather's old shot glass, an autographed WWF turnbuckle by my favorite wrestler of all time, Mr. Wonderful Paul Orndorf, and this pick of a young me with a young rock. Now what do I not consider to be priceless? Well, that's easy. This boring and generic Jim Johnston theme and Cody's tag team run with Ted DiBiossi Jr. Now don't get me wrong, because making the son of the blue-collar common man be all about the money was the right call. Just poorly executed. It's no coincidence that WWE, the music Volume 9, is also titled Voices, because the E was placing a ton of focus on Randy Orton as a main eventer. However, it's a shameful thing, Lobsterhead, that this remixed version of priceless, while heavier and more aggressive, unfortunately just comes across as dull and uninspired. Kinda like Ted and Cody's new partner, The Man, The Myth, The Legend, Manu. And a little fun fact for ya, this theme is sung by the same guy who sang Sheamus's old entrance music Too Many Lines. Finally, Cody's career takes that step in the right direction, with the iconic theme music of the legacy by Adelida's way called It's a New Day, the OG New Day song before the New Day even existed, slaps hard right out of the gate, giving this trio of second and third generation superstars the hard rock anthem they deserve. And a quick fantasy booking alert, the legacy versus the elite, the elite. Tell me who you got in the comments below. As part of the legacy, Rhodes was groomed to become a prime time player, and soon enough he would make a mad dash, tore the top of the card as a single star. When Cody became dashing, he not only needed to exfoliate his skin and wax his back a whole lot more, but he also needed a brash and cocky theme to complement this new personality. Inspired for real by the Baywatch theme song, smoke and mirrors by the band TVTV reflected all of Cody's narcissistic traits in a 2010 pop-pump kind of way, as opposed to the classical entrance music of old school self-absorbed jerks like ravishing Rick Rude, Rick the motto martel, or the narcissist Lex Luger. Obsessed with his handsome and well-lotioned face, mind you, a 619 courtesy of Ray Mysterio Jr. would cause the dashing ones dreamy appearance to turn quite literally into a nightmare. Cody, as the Narca Prince, worked as a setup for the next chapter of this gimmick, with his run as undashing. Blaming Ray Ray for disfiguring his face was all just a mental issue that helped Rhodes develop more range as a shattered sports entertainer. As for the ugly remix of Smoke and Mirrors during his masked phase, you really have to appreciate this subtle character tweak because the theme went from up tempo to distorted and dangerous, matching his Cody Von Doom persona naturally. So what we have here with the third version of Smoke and Mirrors is quite the departure from the original. Intense, edgy, and dare I say emo, this jacked up on Mountain Dew rap rock alternative tune remains one of his most popular, unlike that disgusting moustache he used to try to rock when Cody Lander formed an underrated partnership with Damien Sandow as Team Rhodes Scholars. However, he would eventually reach a point when the time had come to stop running away from his past and start embracing it. I'll say this about the Coatster that's very apparent from covering his early career. The man has always tried to carve his own path and stayed away from using his last name as an advantage for as long as possible. So when he was unable to find a strong footing as a singles act, Cody teamed with Brother Goldust, calling themselves the Brotherhood, and mashing together their entrance themes to create the wonderfully weird Gold and Smoke. Now I get it, not every song that Jim Johnston produces turns to Gold, and that's literally what we have here. Goldust has one of the most iconic WWE themes ever, and yes, Smoke and Mirrors is also a bop and a half. However, when you put the two together, it ain't peanut butter and jelly, but more like pineapple and pizza. Don't at me, bro. Once the Brotherhood's momentum slowed, Cody took his character to cosmic new levels, finding his inner quirkiness that was allegedly on another planet, and became the space oddity known as Stardust. Now it could be argued that Stardust's entrance theme called Written in the Stars is his best song because it works flawlessly on so many levels, paying homage to his brother's Goldust theme while also being undeniably influenced by Ziggy Stardust himself, the late great Sir David Bowie. This tune is like a sci-fi opera rock mixture that captures the otherworldly intergalactic nature of the Stardust character that Cody tried his best to get over. But even with all the pageantry that came along with this gimmick, it truly must have been written in the stars that all of this would lead to Cody's departure. Feeling disappointed in his creative direction and yearning for the opportunity to be a top star in the business, Cody asked for and was granted his WWE release in 2016, with Adrenaline in his soul and his career solely in his hands to manage. Cody constructed the now infamous list that took him around the world wrestling for indie promotions large and small, which would lead to the forming of a new brotherhood that would eventually become all elite wrestling. Along the way during this pilgrimage, so to speak, Rhodes would tap the band downstate to craft a tune that lyrically speaking conveyed not only the historical importance of the classic Rhodes family name, but also his daring dash away from Vince McMahon's wrestling empire. And the result was Kingdom, a rock ballad telling the tale of the road that Cody has traveled and how the Prince of professional wrestling changed the industry before making a triumphant Prodigal Son return at WrestleMania 38. It was truly a pleasant surprise to see Cody continue to use this theme in WWE, as it indicated the company was all in on the American nightmare character. Plus, the rights to the song are owned by the Codyverse, which is why he's been free to bring it with him from Ring of Honor to New Japan, the NWA, Impact Wrestling, AEW, and the WWE. Kingdom has played in the forefront of all of Cody's most memorable moments and will continue to be his entrance anthem for many more to come.