Music Blog 1/2/2010

Only A Game Senior Producer Gary Waleik writes about his music selections for this week's program.

Yea Alabama by The All-American Marching Band (from Fight On: The Greatest College Fight Songs, Laserlight, 1993)

Gary's take:  Wow, I just read the lyrics to this fight song, and there’s a rather clever reference to the Alamo as well as the lines:

For ‘Bama’s pluck and grit have writ
 Her name in Crimson flame

I had no idea that they were so scholarly down there in Tuscaloosa, aka T-Town, aka The Druid City (no one knows who they were, or what they were doing, but their name remains hewn into the living rock of Stonehenge!!!)

The Pond Song by The Zambonis (from 100% Hockey…and Other Stuff)

Gary's Take:  From The Masters of Hockey Rock, a charming musical memoir of simple days when pond hockey was a raison d’être.

La Dolce Vita by Xavier Cugat and His Orchestra (from Swingin’ Singles: Cocktail Mix, Vol. 3, Rhino, 1996)

Gary's Take:  Apertif, anyone?

Nutrocker by Emerson, Lake and Palmer (from I Believe in Father Christmas EP, Rhino, 1995)

Gary's Take:  This song, more than any other I can think of, brings me back to those heady days in the early ‘70’s when my cousin, Jeff, and I would hunker down during the holiday vacation and watch the Boston Bruins maul the rest of the NHL. I can still see Bobby, Cheesy, Doaky, Espo and Chief dancing like Sugar Plum Fairies on the Rangers, Flyers and Canadiens. Good times.

Scooby-Doo, Where are You? by Matthew Sweet (from Saturday Morning: Cartoon’s Greatest Hits, MCA, 1995)

Gary's Take:  What next, The Ramones playing the Spider-Man theme? Oh, that’s on there, too…nevermind.

Lies by The Rolling Stones (from Some Girls, Rolling Stones/Atlantic, 1978)

Gary's Take:  Mick Jagger’s rakish, modern variation on the timeless, more solemn “Thou shall not bear false witness against thy neighbor” theme.