Showing posts with label rock and roll. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rock and roll. Show all posts

Monday, July 26, 2010

What took you so long, Cooperstown?

As long as there is a Baseball Hall of Fame, there will be a debate among fans regarding who belongs and who should forever be on the outside looking in.  Cases can be made for, and against, Bert Blyleven, Don Mattingly, Dale Murphy, Alan Trammell, and Roberto Alomar among several others.  For entirely different reasons, cases can be made for and against Roger Clemens, Pete Rose, A-Rod, and Barry Bonds.  Aside from all those, one guy was denied entry into the Hall far too long, and the recognition he received over the weekend rectified what I consider to be the longest snub in the history of Cooperstown. 

John Fogerty wrote the OTHER National Anthem for baseball fans, "Centerfield", as an 8 year old kid.  He recorded the song and released it in 1985.  His ode to the game of baseball and gift to the fans got him into the Hall......25 YEARS LATER!!!  If he had been a player, his enshrinement ship would have sailed 10 years ago with his only hope being the long shot of the Veterans' Committee.  He was also a "first ballot" Rock and Roll Hall of Famer in 1993.  Kudos to the baseball writers for eventually doing the right thing in finally recognizing one of the all-time greats who never swung a bat at the big league level, along with his guitar, Slugger..........about 10 years too late.
Fogerty is a MUST SEE if he comes near you on tour.  The guy is ageless, and he's playing the best shows of his life the past few years.  He has one of the best bandmates in the biz, and his song catalog stacks up with any rock & roll musician in history!!  I saw him w/ John Mellencamp in 2005 in Raleigh, North Carolina and again w/ Willie Nelson in Birmingham.  Phenomenal shows!!!  But don't take my word for it...........

Sunday, April 25, 2010

They do NOT put their pants on the same way....

Have you ever heard someone try to knock a celebrity or athlete down a few notches from their pedestal and try to "normalize" them by saying, "He (or she) puts his (or her) pants on the same way I do?" These days the internet seems to exist solely for the purpose of proving them wrong. There's TMZ, thousands of celebrity gossip blogs, a site dedicated to the best and worst celebrity restaurant tippers, and my personal favorite, the "Backstage Pass" page from thesmokinggun.com. Seriously, 80's hair metal band Poison, A CASE of condoms? For ONE stop on the tour?

Turns out Major League Baseball players have as many strange contractual demands as other celebrities. Just substitute condoms and brown M&M's backstage for a bulldozer and an apartment complex in Memphis.

Further proof that celebrities do not put their pants on the same as you and I. They have it written into their contracts and riders to have someone do it for 'em.

Weird baseball contract clauses

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Another music legend gone......

Seems like I'm blogging the deaths of folks whose work I respect immensely far too often over the past week. If you don't know who Alex Chilton is, read this article, go discover his music (readily available on YouTube + my link to "September Gurls" on here), and thank me later! If you want to know who helped shape the sound of R.E.M., The Replacements, The Smithereens, and some of the other great rock bands of the 80's, it all goes back to them.

May he rest in peace......

Article from the Memphis Commercial Appeal, his hometown paper