Today's Stuff...

Baseball & The Dead. Opening Day at Wrigley for the Cubs and tonight is the Mets home opener at their new Taxpayer Field. This is a good time of year!

And, oh yeah, The Dead kicked off their tour last night in Greensboro, North Carolina. Lots of excitement out there, I think. I'm not goin'... unless anyone wants to fly me somewhere and give me a ticket... but I am gonna enjoy the recordings from the Internet Archive. Maybe, after Ratdog plays this summer, they'll have a Fall Tour. I wouldn't count on it, I wouldn't even bet 5 bucks on it. But maybe and perhaps then I'll get to see a show or two.

But hey, wanna take a look at a few more pics from Night 1? Go here.

Tunes!

The Music Never Stopped, 2009 -- Volume 38

It ain't exactly gorgeous weather in Chicago for baseball but Hall of Famer Ernie Banks, a.k.a. Mr. Cub, used to love the game so much, he's known for saying, "Let's play two!" Nowadays he might want to rest a little on the cold, rainy days but cold, rainy days are great for music, eh? So, kinda sorta to go along with baseball's Second Opening Day, a musical doubleheader is what I had in mind... but I got tied up in this and that so I'm hopin' to "play two" tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Part 1 of what was going to be today's doubleheader is what you get today. A couple weeks ago or so, a new commenter came around these parts of the intertubes -- Dogstarz -- and he commented on my Bruce Hornsby 4-12-96 post. That was from way back when I was barely immersing myself in the world of mp3 and there was no download for the show... sort of. I had listened to and downloaded it courtesy of the Sugarmegs website which featured shows for downloading but only in one long .wma file. How lame. Kinda lame. I mean, they sounded just fine, I enjoyed a bunch of shows that way and took up very little space: a whole show might be only like 40 MB or something like that.

Anyway, Dogstarzeseses comment reminded me of my desire to get a copy of that show because A) it's sooooooo good B) it's important in the history of the post-Grateful Dead years and C) I wanna be able to share it with whoever's interested!

SO... thanks, Dogstarz, for gettin' me thinkin' of this one again! I know you have it but for anyone else interested, here ya go!

from my original post: Bruce Hornsby 4-12-96 The Fillmore S.F., CA ** with Bob Weir & Phil Lesh ** (Shortnin' Bread)-» Spider Fingers-» (Tighten Up)-» (First There Is A Mountain), White-Wheeled Limousine, Tango King, Talk Of The Town-» (So What), Hot House Ball, Stranded On Easy Street, Every Little Kiss, Rainbow's Cadillac-» (Walk on the Wild Side)-» (Shaft Theme), Cruise Control, China Doll-» Pastures Of Plenty, Down The Road Tonight-» The Valley Road-» (Breezin'), Sugaree, On The Western Skyline-» When I Paint My Masterpiece, Jack Straw, Truckin'-» Turn On Your Lovelight-» Not Fade Away Encore: The Weight First thing to say is -- holy crap and glory hallelujah! If certain places on this planet could be labeled as Heaven On Earth, the Fillmore on this night over 11 years ago 5,000% most definitely qualified!! Same deal right here tonight in 2007. Did I say holy crap yet? It wasn't very far into Spider Fingers before knowing it was time to dance! The ensemble on stage is so tight and so blistering at times. At over 10 minutes, that was one heckuva way to start the show! Bruce didn't know how hot the Fillmore can get and he had to do a shirt change before the next song. (Actually wasn't for a couple years after this when I was first there but I remember sweatin' my ass off for Ratdog and Phil & Friends.) I imagine the backstage crew even set up an electric fan or two for Bruce to stay cool. The show beautifully meandered on from there. I am no expertise on the catalog of music from this other Bruuuuuce, but in this Deadhead's ears, he played some fun music and outright jazzy and jamming at times. Without Jerry on guitar throughout Pastures Of Plenty, Bruce seemed to be channeling his dearly departed friend for a little inspiration to make the song flow here and there like any great Dead jam does. Outstanding! The same can almost be said for The Valley Road... while Jerry didn't originally played on that sort of early Hornsby tune, Bruce in this era of musicmaking surely could extend that basic song into a 10 or 12 minute jammed out crowd pleaser. It could've ended the show it was so great! But this night wasn't over yet! Haha... far from it! Bruce starts up Sugaree and is playing it gorgeously, a great tribute to Jerry and midway through out walks a special guest, a close and dear friend, one Mr. Bob Weir. What a freakin' moment! The crowd wouldn't shut up, they couldn't quite down, not only was Bobby jamming Sugaree with Bruce, the song was hitting an incredible fevered pitch just moments after he came out. And here I am listening to this show for the second time in the past 48 hours and I'm not embarrassed to say, there are tears in my eyes as Sugaree comes to end. Why? Contextualize this, okay... Jerry had died the summer before, just 9 months ago. Here in San Francisco, at the Fillmore, is Bobby on stage with Bruce, his former bandmate, playing together for the very first time since the Dead were in D.C. at RFK on June 24th, I believe, a couple weeks before Jerry's last show. This is a darn great moment. Bruce's On The Western Skyline came next. The Dead never played this one and I wish after Sugaree they'd done another GD tune here but eh, with Hornsby on accordion and Bobby adding some interesting lead guitar (in his own style,) it wasn't bad. Masterpiece with Bruce on vocals was interesting. But it wasn't long before he got Bobby to take over the singing and he obliged. The song had almost a Cajun feel to it and wasn't quite at the same speed and rhythm Bobby was used to with the Dead and continuing with Ratdog, but the professional musician he is, twas not a problem. Two numbers with the accordion was enough and with Bruce back on piano the band started up a familiar tune -- Jack Straw. It would be almost two years before Bobby busted this one out Ratdog style so this was the first time since last summer for him. This version of Hornsby's band had no guitar player so again it was quite interesting hearing Bobby on guitar. He knew all his rhythm parts but he tried to fill in some lead as well. No, he wasn't trying to be Jerry or to take the place of Jerry or anything like that, just doin' his own thing. And the end result -- they smoked it! I got up, I danced my ass off like I hadn't since Spider Fingers and yeah, again some tears. This was great... and bittersweet, too. What a great way to end the show! But wait, there's more! "Ladies and Gentlemen -- Phil Lesh." Okay, well, I knew it was coming but really, this night gets better?! Just hearing him warm up that bass of his was awesome in itself! And the song they launched into is one of the most popular Dead songs ever, but could it get any better than this? After Jerry, probably not. So this was amazing! Seriously, Bobby, you can play lead guitar that well?! HOLY CRAP!!! No way. Way! No, he's not Clapton or Hendrix or even Garcia up there but for a few moments he shines like Garcia never needed to exist. BLASPHEMY and yes, I'm just kidding! Anyway, when the Furthur Festival rolls around a couple months after this show, Bobby does Truckin' a good handful of times during the Encore Jam at the end of the show but like Jack Straw, this is the first time post-GD. What a long strange trip it's been indeed but the music lives even if Jerry's gone. The wound is still fresh, and even if many Deadheads thought it was over, these guys clearly wanna keep the music alive. And that theme just keeps going with the next songs. Both Lovelight and NFA are tunes, yet again, not played since the previous summer. Freakin' sweet. I'm really now at a lack of words because these three guys jamming NFA is just delicious, awesome, great, groovy, splendid, bitchin', gnarly, kick-ass, Heavenly. Phil's rockin' that bass and Bobby not just bein' Bobby but the guitar he adds is, well, it's just interesting and I've gotta use that word once more -- bittersweet. It's very cool what he adds but it's where something's missing. Still while there's sadness there's also the joy of this music being played. Bruce, Bobby & Phil -- reunited and it sounds so good!! The Weight for the encore is just the perfect capper. Not a Dead song but a much-loved GD encore for many years. It gives all three guys a chance to be heard singing and for them to join together for the last verse just like they have many times before. As it comes to and end I've got tears in my eyes again. It was a monster blowout of a Bruce Hornsby show at just over 2½ hours. The last almost 1 hour was a seminal moment in this post-Jerry age. For the first time since the days of Jerry's funeral and memorial, these three guys got together and made some great music on this night in San Francisco. There's no doubt that the crowd at the Fillmore left that place as exhilarated as I feel now. If life was about music then this would be king and my world would be nothing less than incredible. Above the greatness that spilled forth and filled me with all sorts of tingly good feeling, one other word needs to be said and related to the music I just experienced... and that word to describe what this night musically really was, and is -- special. Bruce, Bobby & Phil -- Thank You, for a real good time!

As of 4/13/09, Bruce Hornsby is not at the Internet Archive.

Download The Show Here Source: shnid=24461 ♦ Audio Quality: SBD Lineage: Soundboard -» DAT SHN 4/12/96 - Hornsby - Part 1 Part 2 - Hornsby - 4/12/96 Fillmore - 4/12/96 - Part 3

4-12-96 aka 04-12-96 aka 4/12/960 aka 04/12/96 aka 96-04-12

Bruuuuuuuuuce Run... no, the other Bruuuuuuuuuce

I got nothin'. I feel like I need a topic to be given to me. Then I could type away. Otherwise -- eh, whatever.

Slept with the window open last night. That was cool. Literally.

Other than that -- yada yada yada, same ol' crap, same ol' life. It's a good life... just ain't got nothin' a-comin' to mind right now to type about ('cept what's below.)

I think I miss Alaska. I'd probably have to be wearing socks and jeans and a light fleece jacket everyday right now as the calendar approaches October. No wearing of jeans and socks in South Carolina, at least not in this part of SC just 15 miles or so miles from the ocean. The cold weather I do miss... but shorts and bare feet all the time is nice!

Sometimes I need socks... like when I run...

Wednesday Afternoon Run: 22 minutes 18 sec

+ :55

1:10 p.m. - 76°, sunny, light wind, warm but not horrible
XXXXXXXXXXXX ·Sept :: +21 sec· XXXXXXXXXXX

September: 2 hours 40 min August: 2 hours 39 min July: 2 hours 11 min June: 1 hour 47 min May: 4 hours 46 min

Under practically the directly overhead midday sun, today's run at 76° was way warm. 76° and overcast wouldn't a-been so bad... not that today was really bad, it went along just fine, but twas just a little too warm for my liking. Oh well, whaddya gonna do? It's good GREAT to get that exercise! Hmm... I guess I coulda waited until the sun started going down but this is when I wanted to get it done today.

Felt good the whole run. Around the halfway point through my time I turned around so I could arrive back at my Gatorade. The thing is, I didn't really need to do that. I had some Vitamin C drops with me that woulda been just fine had a ran straight out and hiked all the way back. Previous hot temperatures really dehydrated me and so water or Gatorade was mucho important. Days like this I could really make my time without even bringing anything liquid with me. This not-so-warm weather is just excellent for running!

With today's run I added on nearly a minute and with today's time I just passed last month so that's awesome. Hopefully I can get three more runs in before the end o' the month and I can finish an HOUR over August! Sweet!

Tunes for Wednesday...
	Bruce Hornsby and the Range The Way It Is 1986
On The Western Skyline Every Little Kiss Mandolin Rain The Long Race The Way It Is Down The Road Tonight The Wild Frontier The River Runs Low The Red Plains

This is the debut album from Bruce Hornsby, the album that garnered him (and the Range) the Best New Artist Grammy. Whoopee. I think I've got to stop mentioning those awards; they don't really mean squat. Do they? No.

In any case, I'm not sure when I first got into Bruce Hornsby. Of course I was aware of him before he joined the Grateful Dead, probably knew all his most popular songs, but wasn't necessarily a fan. Then Brent Mydland died and Vince Welnick joined the band... and so did Bruce for awhile. That mighta been when I started to care more for his music.

At some point around that time I recorded a friend's original LP of this to cassette tape and had that in my car/bus for a long, long time. The Way It Is might be the only one I've ever had/listened to. Reacquiring it recently was something I was happy to do. A good listen! Not really a bad song on here. It's no wonder some stoopid music organization awarded them with Best New Artist. The piano on here is just so good. Interestingly, another friend of the Grateful Dead is on here -- Huey Lewis provides vocals (and supposedly harmonica which I can't really hear) on Down The Road Tonight. And another friend of Bobby & Phil plays on here -- John Molo, on drums. I knew he was Hornsby's drummer -- who later played with The Other Ones and Phil & Friends -- but I didn't know he went all the way back to these early Bruce days. He maybe even met Brent and Jerry, Bobby & Phil (and Mickey & Billy) back when Bruce & the Range opened for the Dead in May of '87 at Laguna Seca. Cool.

Anyway... this is a great collection of tunes and a few listens recently even had me dancin' around the living room a bit. Gotta dig music that can make you get up and move!

252 kbps dload @ nong sey nyo

320 kbps mp3 download

"Mandolin Rain"
Bruce Hornsby, Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder
Ferst Center, Atlanta, Georgia ~ March 29, 2008
* CAUTION: video kinda sucks and should be banned from Youtube! *

PLAY BALLLLLLL!!!!!!

"In our sun-down perambulations of late, through the outer parts of Brooklyn, we have observed several parties of youngsters playing "base", a certain game of ball. We wish such sights were more common among us. Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our close rooms... The game of ball is glorious!"

-Walt Whitman, 1846

Jerry, Bobby & Vince
"The Star-Spangled Banner"
Candlestick Park, San Francisco
SF Giants Opening Day - April 12, 1993

Today is the greatest day of the year... the Final Four is set.
Wait... that's not it... watching paint dry is more exciting
than college basketball! It's Opening Day, baby!!

Once again this year for Opening Day I have arranged my work schedule to make sure that I had yesterday afternoon off from work (for last night's game) and today, as well.

At 8 a.m. this morning it was time to have some baseball for breakfast -- Toronto Blue Jays at the New York Yankees -- final Opening Day at Yankee Stadium, well, at the one that has had games played on the diamond since Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig. (Unfortunately it's rainin' in The Bronx and they're in a Rain Delay but ESPN's got on the Kansas City Royals at the Detroit Tigers... borrr-rinngggg. On ESPN2 the Milwaukee Brewers at Chicago Cubs just came on... but it looks like another Rain Delay. Yup. Sheesh!)

Anyway... games will be on all day long up until about 10 or 11 o'clock tonight. That means all day long (for the most part) I'll have my butt firmly planted in place watching games on this Opening Day 2008. Now where's my peanuts and Cracker Jack?

There may have stupidly been a couple games already played in Japan, but last night in our nation's capital it was the celebratory Opening Night for North America. The former owner of the Texas Rangers threw out the first pitch... and Ryan Zimmerman gave the fans an exciting ending as he hit a game-winning Home Run in the bottom of the 9th for the Washington Nationals in the very first regular season game at the brand new stadium there.

Unfortunately the New York Mets, my one and only favorite team, they won't be on TV today. Hooray, I say sarcastically. Normally they're on ESPN on Opening Day... but after last September's, ummm, most unfortunate collapse, they really do not at all deserve to be on national television today. Let's face it -- they suck. First place all year and then they blew it BIG TIME. Part of me thinks the Mets can just kiss my ass... but I can't turn my back on 'em. I grew up goin' to Shea; the Mets are my team. It's not gonna be easy to regain confidence in them this year. Things could be great all season long but no matter what, there's still September. Ugh.

Yet somehow I'm still excited for the season. All through the winter I complained that we'll have 162 games that are once AGAIN this year filled with talk of steroids and human growth hormone and what deserving players will NOT get elected to the Hall of Fame because of allegations of possibly using banned substances. It's still kind of a bleak time for our national game ... but I'm gonna take what excitement that I do have and watch what games I can. In October, a World Series victory for The Amazin's would make everything a whole lot better. But it's gonna be a long (and hopefully not too agonizing) time between now and the push for the Playoffs. This initial excitement will wear off some, the season will go on... and on and on and on... then come September, oh yeah, gonna get exciting again! Until then, today will be a great day of baseball!

Well — it's our game; that's the chief fact in connection with it; America's game; it has the snap, go, fling of the American atmosphere; it belongs as much to our institutions; fits into them as significantly as our Constitution's laws; is just as important in the sum total of our historic life.

-Walt Whitman

	Baseball A Film By Ken Burns Original Soundtrack Recording 1994
196 kbps Baseball - part 1 Baseball - part 2

	Walt Whitman (Quote) -- Garrison Keilor			Kansas City Call (Quote) -- Ossie Davis
	Take Me Out To The Ballgame -- Jacqueline Schwab			The Star-Spangled Banner -- Jacqueline Schwab
	The Star-Spangled Banner -- Big League Orchestra			The New Black-And-Tan Fantasy -- Duke Ellington
	Hurrah For Our National Game -- Jacqueline Schwab			Jackie Robinson Radio Call (1956 World Series) -- Bob Wolff
	Take Me Out To The Ballgame -- Harvey Hindermyer (1908)			Did You See Jackie Robinson Hit That Ball? -- Natalie Cole
	Gee, It's A Wonderful Game -- Dodworth Saxhorn Band, -- vocal: Juliet Lambert			Baseball Boogie -- Mabel Scott
	Sol White (Quote from History Of Colored Baseball, 1907) / Dark Was The Night, Cold Was The Ground -- Ossie Davis / Blind Willie Johnson			Bobby Thompson's Shot Heard 'Round The World -- radio call by Russ Hodges
				Take Me Out To The Ballgame -- King Curtis
	Steal Away -- Bobby Horton			Say Hey (The Willie Mays Song) -- The Treniers
	Babe Ruth Radio Call -- (circa 1927)			Take Me Out To The Ballgame -- George Rabbai
	Clubhouse Stomp -- The New York Hawks			Hank Aaron HR #715 Radio Call / When You And I Were Young, Maggie / New York Times (Quote) -- Milo Hamilton/Jacqueline Schwab/ -- Studs Terkel
	If You Can't Make A Hit At The Ballgame, You Can't Make A Hit With Me -- National Pastime Orchestra
	Pound Cake -- Lester Young with Count Basie -- and His Orchestra			Take Me Out To The Ballgame -- Dr. John
	The Minstrel Boy -- Jacqueline Schwab			Eulogy for Jackie Robinson/ Steal Away -- Jesse Jackson/Jacqueline Schwab
	Joe DiMaggio Radio Call (1937) -- Red Barber			Take Me Out To The Ballgame -- Carly Simon
	Joltin' Joe DiMaggio -- Les Brown and His Orchestra -- featuring Betty Bonney			The Sporting News (Quote) -- Amy Madigan
The Star-Spangled Banner (320 kbps) Bruce Hornsby & Branford Marsalis

Eddie Vedder -- Take Me Out To The Ballgame
(Wrigley Field ... I think 5-14-06)
mp3 download grateful dead jerry garcia vince welnick bob weir ratdog phil lesh brent mydland mickey hart bill kreutzmann pigpen ron mckernan

Let's Go Mets (1986)
Let's Go Mets 12"
Meet The Mets (1963)
Meet The Mets (1999)
unfortunately the quality of these blows and there's no Ralph Kiner.

Top of the scoreboard at Shea Stadium in Flushing, Queens (NYC)
(image opens a little bigger but not much)
Notice the ribbon on the twin towers of the World Trade Center