Post by Joe on Jan 12, 2010 19:35:43 GMT -5
Because you asked for it...or someone asked for it. On this 20th anniversary of Dylan's famous Toad's Place concert, the longest show of his career:
This is not really much of a stretch. Dylan himself is a huge baseball fan. He's written one baseball song, "Catfish," about Catfish Hunter. His Theme Time Radio Hour on XM devoted an entire hour-long show to the music of baseball; it was available as a free bonus CD to those of us who bought his Modern Times album at Circuit City back in '06. And of course there have been the summer minor league ball park tours. There was the '04 tour with Willie Nelson, '05 with Merle Haggard, '06 with Elana James, Junior Brown, & Jimmie Vaughan, & '09 with John Mellencamp, Willie Nelson, & the Wiyos. The '04 ball park tour didn't come around here, altho' that fall the Bob on Piano Permanently/Farewell to Larry Campbell tour came to the Petersen Center. He skipped this area entirely in '05 for the It Takes Three People to Replace Larry tour & the subsequent OK So It Only Takes Two People to Replace Larry tour. Finally the '06 Hello, Circus Organ tour came to the ball park in Washington, PA, then known as Falconi Field. A 2-year hiatus from the ball park tour brought His Bobness back to the Pete in '07 for the College Tour of Knowledge tour & to the South Side in '08 for the Bob the King of Swing tour, but it was back to Washington last July, the ball park now called CONSOL Energy Park, for what was, sadly, the Farewell to Denny Freeman tour. But I digress.
During the period 1963-64, while Dylan was fermenting social change with songs like "Blowin' in the Wind" & "The Times, They Are a-Changin''', these same radical changes were being seen in baseball. The Yankee dynasty that existed almost since 1927 was crumbling. They would lose in the World Series in '63 to the Dodgers & in '64 to the Cardinals, the latter seen by many as a sign that the Establishment was giving way to a new, younger attitude. The Cards were seen as symbolic of the hippie movement, with militants like Bob Gibson, never afraid to dust off a hitter, & Curt Flood, who would go on to challenge baseball's reserve clause & ultimately usher in the era of free agency. Further symbolic of the Establishment's demise was the Yanks' firing of mgr. Yogi Berra after the Series & the fact that during the broadcast of game 7, won by Gibson, the legendary Voice of the Yankees Mel Allen would lose his voice on the air, never to broadcast again. As guys like Mickey Mantle & Whitey Ford retired, the new Yanks consisted of long-haired Joe Pepitone, who introduced hair dryers to MLB club houses, & Phil Linz, who played blues harmonica on the team bus. As the Yanks then gave way to upstart teams for the remainder of the '60's, never to return to the World Series until '76, Dylan fermented more change in music, going electric & adapting the blues & folk tradition of long songs sans choruses to popular music. Just listen to Bringing It All Back Home & Highway 61 Revisited & try to tell me that Dylan didn't influence every record that was made after '65.
The '70's came along & with it, experimentation, regardless of whether the ideas were any good or not. Baseball moved away from "ball parks" to modern, circular stadiums of ugly concrete & Astroturf. The AL would adopt the Designated Hitter, the biggest departure ever from the general principal of the game that everybody bats & plays the field. Uniforms became garishly-colored double knits & the long-haired, mustachioed A's would become a dynasty in the early '70's, before the Big Red Machine would take over & define the brashness of the decade. Dylan, meanwhile, turned in a few good albums, but was not without experimentation himself---the violin sounds of Desire, the big-rock-band sound of Street-Legal, great on the album but a disaster on the '78 tour, & finally the beginnings of his Christian period.
The '80's came & Dylan & baseball were suddenly uncool. As the punk movement raged, Dylan experienced his worst decade & biggest case of identity crisis, from the synthesizers & horns of Empire Burlesque to the uninspired unevenness of Knocked Out Loaded & Down in the Groove. Even his concerts were marred by excess, with the horn sections to the gospel singers drowning out Dylan's best qualities. Baseball, too, was taking a back seat in the public's conscience as fans tired of the ugly artificial turf, impersonal stadiums, & the cocaine scandal of '85.
Soon Dylan & baseball would realize that the old ways were the best & regain their foothold. Dylan would begin the Never-Ending Tour in '88, still going on today, with a small band, sans the gospel singers & horns. In '91 he would return to his blues roots with Under the Red Sky, unpopular with critics but with several good songs still performed today. In '92 & '93 he would return to his folk roots, with 2 albums of old folk & blues tunes, recorded in his garage, accompanied with just his acoustic guitar. Time Out of Mind would briefly return him to the type of album he made in '80's, but by '01 he would hit his stride again with Love and Theft, a collection of blues, swing, folk, & country melodies set to lyrics borrowed from old writers & poets. The formula would be repeated with Modern Times in '06. Even this year's Christmas in the Heart has an old-time feel to it.
Meanwhile, in the '90's baseball would return to the old ball parks & a classic old-uniform look, with the erection of Camden Yards in Baltimore. Politicians in other MLB cities made fun of it coz now Baltimore had to maintain 2 stadiums. Soon Jacobs Field would crop up in Cleveland & gradually the rest of the nation would catch on & build their own versions of Camden Yards in every MLB city, returning fans to the ball parks of yesteryear.
So in closing....well, I don't really have an ending for this, after carrying these thoughts around in my head for years & being asked to organize 'em & write 'em down for the first time. I'll let one of you come up with an ending for this.
This is not really much of a stretch. Dylan himself is a huge baseball fan. He's written one baseball song, "Catfish," about Catfish Hunter. His Theme Time Radio Hour on XM devoted an entire hour-long show to the music of baseball; it was available as a free bonus CD to those of us who bought his Modern Times album at Circuit City back in '06. And of course there have been the summer minor league ball park tours. There was the '04 tour with Willie Nelson, '05 with Merle Haggard, '06 with Elana James, Junior Brown, & Jimmie Vaughan, & '09 with John Mellencamp, Willie Nelson, & the Wiyos. The '04 ball park tour didn't come around here, altho' that fall the Bob on Piano Permanently/Farewell to Larry Campbell tour came to the Petersen Center. He skipped this area entirely in '05 for the It Takes Three People to Replace Larry tour & the subsequent OK So It Only Takes Two People to Replace Larry tour. Finally the '06 Hello, Circus Organ tour came to the ball park in Washington, PA, then known as Falconi Field. A 2-year hiatus from the ball park tour brought His Bobness back to the Pete in '07 for the College Tour of Knowledge tour & to the South Side in '08 for the Bob the King of Swing tour, but it was back to Washington last July, the ball park now called CONSOL Energy Park, for what was, sadly, the Farewell to Denny Freeman tour. But I digress.
During the period 1963-64, while Dylan was fermenting social change with songs like "Blowin' in the Wind" & "The Times, They Are a-Changin''', these same radical changes were being seen in baseball. The Yankee dynasty that existed almost since 1927 was crumbling. They would lose in the World Series in '63 to the Dodgers & in '64 to the Cardinals, the latter seen by many as a sign that the Establishment was giving way to a new, younger attitude. The Cards were seen as symbolic of the hippie movement, with militants like Bob Gibson, never afraid to dust off a hitter, & Curt Flood, who would go on to challenge baseball's reserve clause & ultimately usher in the era of free agency. Further symbolic of the Establishment's demise was the Yanks' firing of mgr. Yogi Berra after the Series & the fact that during the broadcast of game 7, won by Gibson, the legendary Voice of the Yankees Mel Allen would lose his voice on the air, never to broadcast again. As guys like Mickey Mantle & Whitey Ford retired, the new Yanks consisted of long-haired Joe Pepitone, who introduced hair dryers to MLB club houses, & Phil Linz, who played blues harmonica on the team bus. As the Yanks then gave way to upstart teams for the remainder of the '60's, never to return to the World Series until '76, Dylan fermented more change in music, going electric & adapting the blues & folk tradition of long songs sans choruses to popular music. Just listen to Bringing It All Back Home & Highway 61 Revisited & try to tell me that Dylan didn't influence every record that was made after '65.
The '70's came along & with it, experimentation, regardless of whether the ideas were any good or not. Baseball moved away from "ball parks" to modern, circular stadiums of ugly concrete & Astroturf. The AL would adopt the Designated Hitter, the biggest departure ever from the general principal of the game that everybody bats & plays the field. Uniforms became garishly-colored double knits & the long-haired, mustachioed A's would become a dynasty in the early '70's, before the Big Red Machine would take over & define the brashness of the decade. Dylan, meanwhile, turned in a few good albums, but was not without experimentation himself---the violin sounds of Desire, the big-rock-band sound of Street-Legal, great on the album but a disaster on the '78 tour, & finally the beginnings of his Christian period.
The '80's came & Dylan & baseball were suddenly uncool. As the punk movement raged, Dylan experienced his worst decade & biggest case of identity crisis, from the synthesizers & horns of Empire Burlesque to the uninspired unevenness of Knocked Out Loaded & Down in the Groove. Even his concerts were marred by excess, with the horn sections to the gospel singers drowning out Dylan's best qualities. Baseball, too, was taking a back seat in the public's conscience as fans tired of the ugly artificial turf, impersonal stadiums, & the cocaine scandal of '85.
Soon Dylan & baseball would realize that the old ways were the best & regain their foothold. Dylan would begin the Never-Ending Tour in '88, still going on today, with a small band, sans the gospel singers & horns. In '91 he would return to his blues roots with Under the Red Sky, unpopular with critics but with several good songs still performed today. In '92 & '93 he would return to his folk roots, with 2 albums of old folk & blues tunes, recorded in his garage, accompanied with just his acoustic guitar. Time Out of Mind would briefly return him to the type of album he made in '80's, but by '01 he would hit his stride again with Love and Theft, a collection of blues, swing, folk, & country melodies set to lyrics borrowed from old writers & poets. The formula would be repeated with Modern Times in '06. Even this year's Christmas in the Heart has an old-time feel to it.
Meanwhile, in the '90's baseball would return to the old ball parks & a classic old-uniform look, with the erection of Camden Yards in Baltimore. Politicians in other MLB cities made fun of it coz now Baltimore had to maintain 2 stadiums. Soon Jacobs Field would crop up in Cleveland & gradually the rest of the nation would catch on & build their own versions of Camden Yards in every MLB city, returning fans to the ball parks of yesteryear.
So in closing....well, I don't really have an ending for this, after carrying these thoughts around in my head for years & being asked to organize 'em & write 'em down for the first time. I'll let one of you come up with an ending for this.