Words and Music

Since this will be the first rambling that I will make public following all of my past posts from the previous twelve months that stayed in my own little part of cyber space but are still viewable, this edition will be somewhat of a generational thing, because of the musical topic, but it’s my musing so it’s all good, right?

Recently I stepped back into the iPod time warp machine to listen to some Alan Parson’s Project (APP) tunes from the early 80’s and I was quickly reminded of how certain songs have had an impact on the sports world.  This lead to a mind-less , never-ending train of thoughts that kept me up for a few hours, but it was a fun train ride. 

For those of you unfamiliar with APP’s work’s  and are wondering why my mind suddenly switched to sports mode, you need to only look at the Chicago Bulls of the 90’s.  Sirius was the first song from the Eye in the Sky album, but was more famously used as the starting five intro music for the six-time NBA champion Chicago Bulls during the run of titles with MJ and the gang.   Never has a song been so ingrained with a generation of NBA fans as that song was for a dozen or so years.   As the song came through my earphones, I kept waiting for Ray Clay to say “from North Carolina….Michael Jorrrrdan!”   Sort of glad he didn’t though since I actually liked the tune long before it was commercialized and still do to this day. 

Let the fun begin with that starting point of useless knowledge, because Sirius was not the only song used from that album by a sports entity, albeit the second song is not quite as famous and its use was less glamorous.   The early 80’s were also the toddler years of a new sports network called ESPN.  During this time, the four letter network showed everything from Australian Rules Football , mountain climbing and also a late afternoon show called Mazda Sports Look hosted by Roy Firestone.  Sportscenter came twice a day at 6pm and 10pm and the programming was anything they could get, unlike today’s cable monster of multiple channels and live events around the clock. 

About 2 minutes before the top of the hour on ESPN, a sports host would come on to give a brief update on the news of the day followed by a legal message stating the use of satellite dishes to receive ESPN’s signal was illegal and punishable by law.  While this message scrolled from the top of the screen to the bottom, with images of satellite dishes in the background, a song called Mammagamma played during the thirty second spot.  Yes, you guessed it, song number two from the Eye in the Sky album.   I can hear my wife Rocky saying right now, “How in the world does he remember stuff like this?”   If Jon Ray were alive today, he could vouch for my stupid amount of useless knowledge and I am sure there are others out there that do remember this little piece of musical history.  At least I hope so.    

For many years, sports and music have always gone hand in hand with many different looks and listens.   Local radio stations in the 50’s used to make up fun songs about their sports heroes like “Say Hey, Say Willie”, “Joltin Joe DiMaggio” and a favorite of Cleveland Browns fans in the 80’s “Bernie, Bernie”.  Who could forget the “Super Bowl Shuffle” from the Chicago Bears in 1985?

Music within sporting events themselves crept further onto the scene as  top 40 hits made their way into the mainstream of stadium/arena musical libraries like “We will rock you”, “Car Wash”, and more recently “Sweet Caroline”.  Each venue rushed to find the perfect intro song whether it was “Enter Sandman”  at home games in Blacksburg,  “Back in Black” for da Raiders or “Sweet Home Alabama” in Tuscaloosa.  The evolution went even further with individual players requesting their own walk up music for baseball games.  My son thinks of Stephen Strasburg every time he hears the White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” and personally it is tough to not think about Matt Witkowski when “Never Gonna Get it” is played on the radio.  The latter song is only something that a few people in Wichita might understand.    

What would a game be without the Rolling Stones’  “Start Me Up” being piped throughout every stadium across the country as the game begins, a few rock anthems in between to keep the fever pitch and then finished off with a playing of “Closing Time” as fans exit and return home or if you are in Fenway Park, the playing of “Dirty Water” after a Sox victory.   

For the last 17 years or so, all of this music could be played with the touch of a mouse thanks to a program called Click Effects which also included various sounds effects, the obligatory playing of ”Run Forest Run”  as an opposing pitcher came out of the bullpen ( A minor league favorite) or the Law and Order theme when the umpires were announced.

All of the above is a far cry from Ernie Hayes banging on his organ at Busch Stadium with such tunes like “Game Time “for the exchanging of lineup cards or “Here Comes the King” (a.k.a. the Budweiser theme song) during big rallies.  Ernie also had his own person songs for certain Cardinals players so that no matter where you were in the stadium, you knew who was coming to bat.  My personal favorite organ song was played at the Mecca in Milwaukee during Bucks games and the home team would bring the ball up the court, in the background was the organ player playing “Bennie and the Jets”.  Don’t know what that had to do with anything, but I remember it like it was yesterday.     

Yep, that is pretty much a review of the train wreck that was in my head a few nights ago and now it is in your head as well.  I am not the best writer and I am sure my grammar teacher might faint if she could read this, but it is what it is and it is for fun.   As the quote from Eddie and Cruisers goes (great music flick by the way) ….”Words and Music”.

You might notice that my ending phrase from each post is a mixture of Walter Cronkite and a former ESPN reporter from the early days whose name I can’t recall and I can’t find it on the web, not even wikipedia…hmmm.

That's what it is in the world of the Sports Grapevine.......