As soon as the doors opened for Grindhouse’s Summer Sweatfest, an older couple made their way to the gimmick table with the mini-coffin on top. Both husband and wife wore wrestling shirts, and it was clear they were long-time fans. But they were in the Jeffersonville Arena today to see the wife’s current favorites, the special guests making their second appearance at Grindhouse.
How do I describe the look on her face? You know the look a 12-year old girl gets meeting Taylor Swift in the flesh? It was that look. Only this was not Taylor Swift selling photos and figures and stickers out of that mini-coffin. Barnabas the Bizarre stands over six feet tall, his height exaggerated by the green and black striped top hat. His long-tailed coat is hand-painted, greens and blacks matching the hat. He sports a black mustache, curled on both ends, and a black and white-striped gotee. He looks down on his biggest fan through vintage, round shades with eyes that are attentive and – despite his eerie aura – incredibly kind.
Barnabas is the senior member of the trio, 50 years young and incredibly grateful for the ride he is on. It’s been a year and a half since Juggalo Championship Wrestling rolled the dice on him and his partners Jacksyn and Abel, the Walking Dead/ Resident Evil zombies who form the unstoppable, incurable team known as The Outbreak. They’re always front and center on JCW television, and the demand for special appearances grows by the week.
In many years attending local wrestling shows, I can recall three instances seeing something for the first time and knowing in that moment this was something special. Beth Phoenix was one. Her look, her ring presence, the way the fans at OVW responded to her, it was undeniable. She was a Superstar, and the only question to ask was, “Why isn’t she on the main roster already?”
Then came The Outrunners. I didn’t recognize them from their previous lives as Shiloh Jonze and Randall Floyd right away, but one look at them with their fluorescent tights, their Miami Vice, their South Florida cool, I knew they were Superstars.
The Outbreak is worlds apart from Beth Phoenix and The Outrunners. In a business filled with imitations and reinventions, they’ve created something wholly unique and original.
No one moves like them. No one wrestles like that. They’re fully committed to the gimmick, and it’s launched them to superstardom on the indies.
David Barnabas Spector knows just how precious this moment is. He began his training in Schenectady, New York under “Danger” David DeJohn and Scott Scarsdale and rubbed shoulders with my fellow author Kenny Casanova. For many years he went back and forth, training and dropping out, making stops in Las Vegas and then Cincinnati along the way. He’d give wrestling another chance, then another, but he couldn’t stick with it. “Life, my own immaturity, I kept stepping away from the business.”
The wrestling business never lost its pull on Barnabas. He came back as a photographer under the name Demo Blast Studios. He started getting paid for it, but he knew he wouldn’t be truly happy unless he was performing.
“I was too old to wrestle full-time, but I could wrestle now and then, and I can sure as hell talk!”
Barnabas saw so many talented kids coming up, kids who could benefit not only from a ring manager but a mentor in the locker room. He went back to training with the legendary Cody Hawk, finishing properly this time, and rebooted his career as David Barnabas Spector.
Until, that is, he met JJ Maguire.
The long-tome songwriting partner of Jimmy Hart met Barnabas when the two crossed paths at some shows in Somerset, Kentucky. “JJ was very instrumental in my career. He’s the one who told me I should go just as Barnabas. I was so resistant. I said, ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about!’ But what do I do today? I am just Barnabas! He knew. I miss that man every day!”
Barnabas managed a number of wrestlers in various promotions, but it’s The Outbreak that thrust him into the national spotlight through JCW. The duo of Jacksyn and Abel could pass for brothers, even without their makeup. Both men come from the same small town in Northern Mississippi, but being seven years apart, it wasn’t until Abel made his way into the wrestling business that they actually met.
Jacksyn is the older of the two and the acknowledged mastermind behind their matches. “He’s the ring general,” said Barnabas. “He’s the one who puts everything together in the ring.”
A veteran of eighteen years, Jacksyn spent many years working with the full name Jacksyn Crowley.
“I dropped the Crowley because… I’m dead now,” he quipped.
After playing wrestler in the backyard with his friends growing up, Crowley started training to wrestle during the Myspace days of 2007. “My brother and I trained with Sarge O’Reilly, a long-time fixture in the Memphis scene. We also trained with Motley Cruz and Brennan Barbwire.”
Abel’s introduction to the pro wrestling business came through Jacksyn via Facebook. “One day, Jacksyn came up as a suggested friend, and I clicked on his profile,” said Abel. “I saw he was from the same hometown, and I recognized him from his Jacksyn Crowley character. So I DM’ed him and asked how I could get into wrestling.”
Abel started training, spending a year and a half attending classes and refereeing matches. He wore a mask for his first matches, calling himself The Red Demon.
Jacksyn and Abel were both working under Bert Prentice, and Abel had the opportunity to get many reps in the ring. He listened to the veterans, and learned everything he could.
Jacksyn, meanwhile, was just developing his first horror gimmick. “I wrestled ten yeas before I did anything scary. It wasn’t a zombie, though. It was more of a cannibal type character. My real brother and I formed a tag team, the Sons of Salem, playing off the witch trials and the horror imagery.”
The resemblance between Jacksyn and Abel, coupled with their hometown connection, drew them together. In 2022 Abel moved down the street from Jacksyn and started working alongside Jacksyn and his brother.
Jacksyn and Abel began tagging more and more as a duo. When Barnabas met them backstage in Memphis, they were calling themselves the Twins of Salem. Barnabas fell right in. He brought a business sense to the group backstage. He also added a new dynamic with his evil ring master presence at ringside.
The trio spent six months getting to know one another and honing their act. Then Violent J came to a show.
“He changed our lives,” said Jacksyn.
Violent J, co-founder of the Insane Clown Posse and Juggalo Championship Wrestling, saw the dark trio as a perfect fit for JCW, but there was one tweak to the act he wanted to see first.
“It was Violent J’s idea for us to become zombies,” said Jacksyn. “But to be clear, he let us decide what that would look like. He told us, ‘This is your baby.’ He trusted us to make it our own.” It took one night, their debut in JCW, for Violent J to realize he had a new star attraction on his hands.
What makes The Outbreak so entertaining – and terrifying – is the physical work they do. From the slow, hissing walk to the ring, to the way they come back to life after taking a bump, to the ever-present threat they might actually bite someone It’s captivating, especially live.
“A lot of our movements came from watching old cartoons,” said Jacksyn. “Just looking at how zombies walked. And there’s a lot of The Walking Dead too. I absolutely love that show.”
Some fans nitpick (as fans are wont to do) that The Outbreak doesn’t sell for their opponents the way wrestlers traditionally do. Jacksyn and Abel would remind those fans that they do not feel pain. They are, in fact dead. The way they come back from taking a bump was inspired largely by the Resident Evil video games.
“It’s the way the zombies reanimate in those games,” said Abel. “You don’t know if the zombies are dead or not, and then they start to twitch, and move, and stand back up.”
The commitment to the character runs deep. It begins before they walk through the curtain, still sitting in the locker room, and it carries over to the gimmick table. They stay in full character taking photos, even signing pictures.
It’s creepy. Unsettling, even for some of the wrestlers.
It’s very easy to suspend disbelief and think to yourself, “They’re going to bite someone.”
“So many people have told me over the years that spooky gimmicks don’t work any more,” said Barnabas. “You can’t do the Undertaker. We’ve proven that’s bogus. There are still monster kids and horror lovers. And the way these two commit? There’s nothing like them in professional wrestling today.”
The Outbreak is incredibly thankful for Violent J and JCW, and very happy to be where they are. They certainly wouldn’t say no to an offer from AEW, TNA, or WWE, they want to keep the band together. Barnabas and The Outbreak are a package deal. They’re fully committed to the act and one another.
“This isn’t the Barnabas Show featuring The Outbreak, or The Outbreak Show featuring Barnabas,” said Barnabas. “We are all of a like mind, and we all bring something to the table. From our entrance, to my introductions, to the way they work, it all comes together to make a one of a kind horror wrestling experience.”
What matters more to Barnabas, Jacksyn, and Abel isn’t a Wrestlemania moment but creating as many dream moments – and dream matches – that they can. And yes, they definitely have a list.
“The Outrunners are near the top,” said Barnabas. “I can imagine us having such a great match with those two. What we do, and what they do, it would be very entertaining.”
The Righteous, The Bullet Club, The Good Brothers, and The Motor City Machine Guns are all on the list as well, but one team sits at the top – and it’s not even close.
“The Hardys,” said Jacksyn with a grin. “That’s a dream match for us.”
“I can’t even describe to you how much I am salivating at doing a cinematic match at The Hardy Compound!” said Barnabas.
The boys know nothing is out of reach in today’s business. The more the fans show up for this trio, the more that memorize and recite Barnabas’s electric ring introduction, the more they chant for The Outbreak and revel in their undead antics, the greater the demand for a Hardys vs. Outbreak will become.
Come on, Matt and Jeff. I know you’re out there, and I’m hopeful you will see this the same as I hoped Tony Khan would one day see my plea to sign The Outrunners.
Hardys vs. Outbreak. You’re going to need more than a Dilapidated Boat to save you from Barnabas, Jacksyn, and Abel!
Top photo courtesy of Barnabas the Bizarre.