Mariano Saves, Rodriguez Kills

Monday, just seconds before I dashed out the door for work, I watched Mariano Rivera record his 602nd save. Like, watched it on the TV. I was standing there in my work clothes, my wife was sitting on the couch in complete disinterest, and my child was clinging to my pants trying to get my attention. It was a magical moment.

I understand my wife's apathy, actually. The "save," in my opinion (and hers, but for different reasons) is overrated as a statistic. There are a very specific set of circumstances that must be met before a pitcher can be credited with a save. It's somewhat farcical and mostly unnecessary. The last pitcher pitches his inning or two. If the score is close enough he "saves" the game. Good job. If he blows the lead he may be credited with the loss. Bad job. If the score is not close then he gets nothing at all. Good game butt pat.

But there's no questioning Mariano's dominance. He's not there to close the door. He is there to slam the door. So watching Mr. Rivera do his job Monday was less a celebration of him setting the all-time saves record and more a celebration of Mariano's tremendous pitching career.

I remember when Jeff Reardon set the all-time saves mark in 1992. I was staying the night in a motel in Cooperstown, New York. I was 10-years-old. The next day was super awesome Hall of Fame museum day. But that night, after a long day of traveling, my family and I crashed at the motel and watched whatever game was on the TV. There was Reardon. There were his final pitches. He had won the saves record formerly held by Rollie Fingers. Reardon smiled his big beardy smile. I fell asleep.

Jeff Reardon held the all-time saves record for one season. I have no recollection of what I was doing when Lee Smith became the all-time saves leader in 1993.

I have no recollection of what I was doing when Trevor Hoffman became the all-time saves leader in 2006.

But, by golly, I was standing there in my living room at 4:30 pm Monday, September 19, 2011, when Mariano Rivera became the all-time saves leader. Documented history.

The active player second on the saves list? Francisco Cordero. He's got 323 saves. He is also 36 years old. This record will stick around for a while.

I can tell my child that she was there in front of the TV as well, even if she was wasn't paying any sort of attention to it.

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Speaking of baseball (and I usually do), I was at a game this past Sunday in Toronto. Blue Jays versus Yankees. I wanted to get a picture of Alex Rodriguez hitting a baseball because I thought that would be pretty cool. I wanted the precise moment the ball came in contact with his bat. And so I chose the pitch I would snap the shot. As the pitcher wound up I steadied my camera, but I was having trouble zooming in and focusing. The pitch was thrown and I snapped my shot late. But holy cow! A-Rod had lost grip of the bat and helicoptered it into the seats. And then I looked back down at my camera and holy cow! I took a picture of this...



Nice.
Everybody in the seats where the bat landed was okay. I think. Actually I hadn't heard anything at all about anybody in the bat-landing area. People might've died. There might still be a baseball bat impaled in the abdomen of a Toronto Blue Jays fan. Who knows?

Yankees lost, 3-0. Mariano Rivera did not record his record-breaking save that day.

Use ample pine tar, please. It will save lives.

Back. Or Front.

Two months.
Hiatus or laziness?
Or distractedness?
Who cares.

Currently I am sitting here sippin' my sippin' whiskey and listening to a handful of recommended tunes via hand-delivered memory stick. This is what I need sometimes, people to tell me the good new stuff.

My new music lag used to be one year. Something new to me would've already been out for one year. That was okay, especially when bands and singers took two years between albums. But now my lag is, like, three or four years. Unacceptable.

Does anybody else want to play the memory stick game? You give me a stick full of songs you think are the best, and I'll empty it and return it full of songs I think are the best, plus new music that's actually three or four years old.

Seriously, drop me a message. We'll do it postal. And I promise not to steal your stick and sell it on eBay.

Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before

The first few seconds of "Spanish Bombs" by the Clash sound very very similar to the first few seconds of Tom Petty's "Christmas All Over Again." Whether or not this was done on purpose, I have no idea.

Compare. Contrast.




I'd never noticed before. Now the two songs are inseparable in my head. Christmas in July.

Also, the first few seconds of "Sowing Seeds" by The Jesus and Mary Chain sound just like the first few seconds of one of their other songs, "Just Like Honey." Both are from the same album, so maybe this shouldn't be as surprising.

But you will notice that both songs sound similar to the beginning of "Be My Baby" by the Ronettes. This was probably done intentionally as the J&MC were going for that dense atmospheric Spector-esque wall of sound.

Boom. Ba-boom. BAP.





I've got a ton of 'em. I'm sure you do too.

Whether done purposefully as inspiration (as above with these Psychocandy songs), purposefully as an I-hope-nobody-notices rip-off (as with Oasis' "Cigarettes and Alcohol," stolen from T-Rex's "Get It On"), or unintentionally (as with George Harrison's "My Sweet Lord," unconsciously zapped from the Chiffons' "He's So Fine"), there are only so many notes and chords and rhythms and noises. Somebody somewhere is going to double up, and it's going to temporarily cause me to wonder what a Tom Petty Christmas song is doing in the middle of a Clash album.

My iPodding Habits

I am very particular with my iPod.


I don't mind repeating tracks, but I can't stand the idea of there being tracks I never get around to hearing. As a result I almost never do a random play. Sometimes I'll run a Genius playlist for consistency's sake, but for the most part everything is organized for optimal listening efficiency.

I pull my tracks from my computer's library. It's a robust library, and I'm always adding to it. Obviously it's not all going to fit on my 4 gig iPod. So I organize my library chronologically and, starting from the earliest year, fit as many whole years onto the iPod as possible.

On the iPod I then play the tracks alphabetically by song title. This prevents the monotony of hearing the same artist fifteen times in a row while also providing a little bit of musical diversity. It's like a controlled randomness. And if I stop the iPod it's easy enough to remember what song I left off on.

I only ever listen to my iPod in the car, and only on drives that are 15+ minutes long. It's just what I do. As a result it takes several months to go from one end of my iPod to the other. Often times if I hop in the car, push play, and find I'm midway through a song already, I'll back it up and play it from the beginning. I'll rarely outright skip a song. Each tune gets the attention it does (or does not) deserve.

Sometimes I'll get on a radio kick and not listen to the iPod for weeks. That always sets things back a bit.

I get from the mid-50's to the late-70's in one 4 gig clump of files because there wasn't a whole lot of music during that era. Also, the music that did exist tended to be very short in length.

Clear iPod, reload.

I'm currently listening to songs spanning from the late-70's to the early-90's. Despite my love for 80's music there's not actually a whole lot of 80's music represented in my library. I suppose I relegate my 80's listening to the radio.

Clear iPod, reload.

As I progress to the current year the spans will shorten. More music made. Longer songs. By the time I get to the 2000's I'll be filling up the iPod one year at a time.

It takes over a year to go through my entire library, and by that point I've already added a truckload of new songs. And we begin again.

-------------------------------------------------------

Hey, Niels Nielsen just added a ton of new tracks. They're actually old tracks, and I haven't actually taken the time to listen to them yet, but they're probably good by virtue of the fact that they're Niels Nielsen tunes.

http://nielsnielsen.net/site/2011/06/29/sounds-from-the-past/

Moneyball: The Theatrical Trailer

Further proof that an actual Moneyball movie is being made, here is the official trailer.

Once again, for those who don't know, Moneyball: The Movie is based upon Moneyball, a book written by Michael Lewis about the Oakland Athletics' statistics-minded approach to baseball in the 1990s. You wouldn't think something like that would translate well to feature-length film, but lo!

And look! It stars Brad Pitt (who is all the reason you need to see a movie anyway), that fat guy who cusses a lot, and Philip Seymour Hoffman as an old baseball guy who apparently has no lines.

So make sure you line up early for the midnight screening! And wear your Moneyball-related costumes. I'm going as Miguel Tejada.

Here, Eat Some Free Music

Noisetrade, in their continuing efforts to exude awesomeness, have these two noteworthy things up for download:

Josh Rouse - Summertime
A 25-song sampler covering bits from several albums as well as live material and unreleased stuff.

The Civil Wars - Live at Eddy's Attic
It's the Civil Wars! Live! At Eddy's Attic!

Both are good for mellow late night listens, which is precisely what I'm doing now. Ignore the timestamp, it's 4:30 in the morning here.

There's scads of great material scattered throughout Noisetrade, and one day you should spend some time to do some musical perusing.

Your Favorite Forgotten Team

To help out a friend I've started a series about the Seattle Mariners. I completely understand if this is the most uninteresting topic in the world, but it's there if, you know, you need to read about the Mariners for some reason.

The team is as irrelevant to me as it is to you, so I'll try to keep the posts somewhat interesting.

I'll gloss over the history of the M's (mostly with regard to my growing-up years), cover some key players and key moments, and armchair analyze this season's team.

http://reallyquitemanic.blogspot.com/search/label/Mariners

Check it periodically as I intend to update it with semi-regularity (i.e. whenever the Spirit moves me).