Bummers & Rynos & Officer Frank Drebin
Last night was the big Arcade Fire show, and if you’re familiar with my previous posts, you will recall my having mentioned more than once how much I was looking forward to it. Funny thing about that—not once did it occur to me that the show might sell out. Major, major bummer. Jason called me with the bad news, and I ended up meeting him down at the Hi-Dive, and later to Gabor’s, for drinks anyway. 
As usual, thought-provoking conversation ensued. I’m currently in the process of persuading him to join our loose-knit circle of bloggers, and I have high hopes he will come around to the idea. His is definitely a voice to be reckoned with. So anyway, I can’t remember the last time I slept in ‘til 11, nor the last time I saw the first Naked Gun. (Ah, the good ol’ days, when baseball’s biggest problem was stopping a hypnotized Reggie Jackson from killing the Queen of England! A true American hero, that Frank Drebin.)
In more benign baseball news, I’m really interested to see who makes the Hall of Fame in the next two years:
I’m not nearly the baseball fan I once was, but I do like to reminisce, and these are the guys I grew up with. Both Sandberg and Gwynn were, at different times, my favorite player. And just reading these guys’ names conjures up so many memories—great memories—of baseball and youth, of trading cards at Hoepker’s Saw Shop, clutch hits in 8th grade little league, and the long-running trials of Cubs fans. Baseball is another subject in which thenoiseboy and I have a bit of shared history. More on that at a later date.
But when you look at Sandberg, Sutter, Rice, Dawson, Gossage, Smith, and Morris, I’m not really sure who, if any, really deserve enshrinement. Or maybe they all deserve it? It’s getting more and more difficult to make the HOF calls these days. Dawson and Rice had similar careers, so if one got in you would think the other would as well. But I don’t know if they have the overall numbers. Same with the relief pitchers’ trio of Sutter, Gossage, and Smith—if one gets in you probably have to let ‘em all in. Morris, I’d have to say no. Not dominating enough for long enough. Sandberg probably has the best shot—the premier player at his position for nearly a decade.
Elsewhere, it appears that rock music, or rather, hip hop, is still revolutionary somewhere. This reminds me of a book I read a few years back called Guerrilla Radio: Rock 'N' Roll Radio and Serbia's Underground Resistance. Or go further back and it is suggestive of a band of revolutionaries from the former Czechoslovakia, The Plastic People of the Universe, whose sprawling mid-seventies opus Egon Bondy’s Happy Hearts Club Banned found its way into my collection this summer. (One of their biggest supporters, the playwright dissident Vaclav Havel, is now Prime Minister of the Czech Republic. More on this, for certain, to come.) It would seem that the significance of music to a nation evolves inversely in accordance with its prosperity and accompanying complacency. Or perhaps I’m reading too much into it.
Speaking of revolutionaries, Bob Dylan’s first TV interview in 19 years airs tomorrow on 60 Minutes, I believe. The media byline? "I’m no prophet." Hell, that ain’t news, he’s been saying that for years! Anyway, now’s a pretty good time to be a Dylan fan, what with the opening of the bootleg vaults and the release of Dylan’s first volume of memoirs, plus "Like a Rolling Stone" was just named the greatest rock 'n' roll song of all time by Rolling Stone. Check out this great article in the Times on how the song was almost never released.
Someone started an online petition to try to convince legendary black-metal band Emperor to reform. Hmmm…mixed feelings about that one.
Secretly Canadian posts unreleased Jens Lekman material to promote his upcoming debut US tour.
Terminal Lovers: A band you will hear much more about in days to come. Ex-Pere Ubu, Cobra Verde, & GBV, and possibly better than all three.
Report: 44% of Americans Medicated
Oh yeah, and HERE’S A SHOUT-OUT TO MY FAVORITE SISTER DOWN IN TEXAS! All ya’ll Texas cowboys better treat her right!!
On the turntable:
Lynyrd Skynyrd – Second Helping
Prefuse 73 – One Word Extinguisher
Pavement – Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain
Gandalf – s/t
NRBQ – Scraps
Pinback – Summer in Abbadon
The Misunderstood – Lost Acetates 1965-1966
As usual, thought-provoking conversation ensued. I’m currently in the process of persuading him to join our loose-knit circle of bloggers, and I have high hopes he will come around to the idea. His is definitely a voice to be reckoned with. So anyway, I can’t remember the last time I slept in ‘til 11, nor the last time I saw the first Naked Gun. (Ah, the good ol’ days, when baseball’s biggest problem was stopping a hypnotized Reggie Jackson from killing the Queen of England! A true American hero, that Frank Drebin.)
In more benign baseball news, I’m really interested to see who makes the Hall of Fame in the next two years:
The next two years present as good an opportunity as there will be for players who might have been shortchanged in recent elections - Ryne Sandberg, Bruce Sutter, Jim Rice, Andre Dawson, Rich Gossage, Lee Smith and Jack Morris. Wade Boggs is the only one of the 12 first-time candidates on this year's ballot who figures to draw strong support and there is nothing distinguishing about any of the 21 potential first- time candidates a year from now. While newcomers in 2007 will include all but certain Hall of Fame locks Tony Gwynn, Cal Ripken Jr. and Mark McGwire, Rickey Henderson (2009) is the only other lock between now and 2010. That means voters could give a more serious look to those who have come up short of the required 75 percent support from veteran members of the Baseball Writers Association of America who vote in the annual election.
I’m not nearly the baseball fan I once was, but I do like to reminisce, and these are the guys I grew up with. Both Sandberg and Gwynn were, at different times, my favorite player. And just reading these guys’ names conjures up so many memories—great memories—of baseball and youth, of trading cards at Hoepker’s Saw Shop, clutch hits in 8th grade little league, and the long-running trials of Cubs fans. Baseball is another subject in which thenoiseboy and I have a bit of shared history. More on that at a later date.
But when you look at Sandberg, Sutter, Rice, Dawson, Gossage, Smith, and Morris, I’m not really sure who, if any, really deserve enshrinement. Or maybe they all deserve it? It’s getting more and more difficult to make the HOF calls these days. Dawson and Rice had similar careers, so if one got in you would think the other would as well. But I don’t know if they have the overall numbers. Same with the relief pitchers’ trio of Sutter, Gossage, and Smith—if one gets in you probably have to let ‘em all in. Morris, I’d have to say no. Not dominating enough for long enough. Sandberg probably has the best shot—the premier player at his position for nearly a decade.
Elsewhere, it appears that rock music, or rather, hip hop, is still revolutionary somewhere. This reminds me of a book I read a few years back called Guerrilla Radio: Rock 'N' Roll Radio and Serbia's Underground Resistance. Or go further back and it is suggestive of a band of revolutionaries from the former Czechoslovakia, The Plastic People of the Universe, whose sprawling mid-seventies opus Egon Bondy’s Happy Hearts Club Banned found its way into my collection this summer. (One of their biggest supporters, the playwright dissident Vaclav Havel, is now Prime Minister of the Czech Republic. More on this, for certain, to come.) It would seem that the significance of music to a nation evolves inversely in accordance with its prosperity and accompanying complacency. Or perhaps I’m reading too much into it.
Speaking of revolutionaries, Bob Dylan’s first TV interview in 19 years airs tomorrow on 60 Minutes, I believe. The media byline? "I’m no prophet." Hell, that ain’t news, he’s been saying that for years! Anyway, now’s a pretty good time to be a Dylan fan, what with the opening of the bootleg vaults and the release of Dylan’s first volume of memoirs, plus "Like a Rolling Stone" was just named the greatest rock 'n' roll song of all time by Rolling Stone. Check out this great article in the Times on how the song was almost never released.
Someone started an online petition to try to convince legendary black-metal band Emperor to reform. Hmmm…mixed feelings about that one.
Secretly Canadian posts unreleased Jens Lekman material to promote his upcoming debut US tour.
Terminal Lovers: A band you will hear much more about in days to come. Ex-Pere Ubu, Cobra Verde, & GBV, and possibly better than all three.
Report: 44% of Americans Medicated
Oh yeah, and HERE’S A SHOUT-OUT TO MY FAVORITE SISTER DOWN IN TEXAS! All ya’ll Texas cowboys better treat her right!!
On the turntable:
Lynyrd Skynyrd – Second Helping
Prefuse 73 – One Word Extinguisher
Pavement – Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain
Gandalf – s/t
NRBQ – Scraps
Pinback – Summer in Abbadon
The Misunderstood – Lost Acetates 1965-1966
posted by Jonathan Wright at 2:42 PM EMAIL POST
