The Sweet Music Of Summertime
The Mets have had a rocking season, with songs fans will forever associate with 2022, something that Ryan Kelly finds isn't new, as tunes tracked an Amazin' rise and fall through the 1980s
Project ShaqBox Trivia: Sometimes, these get written in advance. Sometimes, you put “Sweet Music” in a headline and need to quickly put together a trivia question about Frank Viola, so here goes: from a Wins Above Replacement standpoint (Baseball Reference version), did the Mets wind up sending more to Minnesota in the trade for Viola in 1989, or the trade for Johan Santana in 2008?
Shazaming the Mets’ Soundtrack
By Ryan Kelly
There is no human social endeavor to which music cannot add vibes.
Backyard BBQ? Tailgate? Road trip? SiriusXM has stations dedicated to these activities for a reason — vibes, vibes, and more vibes. Scientifically speaking, music taps into the “Vibes Center” of our brains — this was recently a big plot point on “Stranger Things,” so you know it’s true. Music can make anything more itself - maybe the right music doesn’t add vibes so much as it brings out the vibes within? Much to think about.
Baseball is no exception. In the sport’s beginning there was the Base Ball Polka (1858); I wish I was an old-timey base ball player so a pianist could play this as I strode up to bat.
In 1861 a new track dropped, the Home Run Quick Step, described as “haunting” by the Library of Congress (I gotta be honest, I’m not picking up “haunting” vibes from this).
Today, baseball players choose their own dedicated entrance music. It gives them just the right vibes to reach peak mental performance, and in special circumstances, for special players, it becomes synonymous with them. (Unless you’re Luis Guillorme and you just don’t care, allowing your employer to choose a song that’s a play on your name, which itself is a vibe!).
Back in the 80s, Mets broadcasts went to commercial with little snippets of popular music. This really doesn’t happen anymore, except at the very top end of sports television; most outlets commission their own suites of branded musical score packages for intros and outros (and let’s be fair, the SNY open absolutely gets you going for Mets baseball). But 40 years ago, music usage was a little like the Wild West – I’m not going to say that the Mets’ two television partners at the time, WWOR and SportsChannel, didn’t pay to use this stuff, but… I would be surprised if they paid to use this stuff. I’m not complaining, because these songs became like the soundtrack to the best run in team history (so far). If you want to feel what the 80s Mets felt like, these tracks bring out that vibe.
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