Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
January 12, 2004
Old Fart

Well, we didn't last too long at the Hot Stove Cool Music fund raiser last night. The event changed a lot since I attended two years ago. At that time, you needed a ticket to get into all parts of the event. Last night, you only needed a ticket to get to the music. This caused both the music area and the silent auction area to be extremely crowded. Secondly, two years ago there was no Red Sox involvement. John Henry had just bought the team days before the event, and was surprised the Red Sox were not involved. At the last minute, he donated a four tickets to a Yankess-Red Sox game with him, and it went for $3000. With the smaller crowd, it was easy for everyone at the event to say hi to Gammons and the other local Boston celebrities who were there.

The involvement of the Red Sox is great. The crowd was much bigger, and I'm sure the Jimmy Fund is raking in a lot more money. Red Sox players and management were there. There were game tickets, lunches with players and broadcasters, and Sox memorabilia for auction (I lost out on a Jason Varitek bat). But the music was too loud.

Now, I'm an old fart. This was firmly established at the 1997 All Star game in Cleveland when I was at a club in the Flats with the ESPN crew. Another 30's something member of the crew and I were trying to talk and really couldn't over the extra loud dance music. We decided we were old farts because we no longer liked getting our ears blasted.

Well, last night was even worse than that. The Paradise is a small club. I estimate the room where the bands were playing at 40 ft by 120 ft. But all the bands had the volume cranked to 11. When Buffalo Tom started their set, we listened to the first song, which was a duet, but then the whole band came out, and I could feel the shock wave from the base drum hitting my chest. At half the volume the bands would have been loud enough. As my wife said, "The band is drowning out their own singing." Maybe with five different bands, no one has time to do a proper sound check. Maybe they just want to play loud enough that no one can talk above them. Maybe I'm just an old fart. But it wasn't pleasant listening to the music last night, and that was disappointing.

So we didn't stay to listen to Theo, and it since the VIPs didn't seem to be mingling in the auction area, we left early. Still, it was fun seeing Millar and Francona being so enthusiastic about the Red Sox season, and the crowd returning that enthusiasm. This event as grown with the Sox involvement, and that's a great thing. But I think it's time to move to a bigger venue, where there's more room to be loud and more of a chance to meet and mingle.

Correction: Fixed two typos.


Posted by David Pinto at 09:30 AM | Other | TrackBack (0)
Comments

That was a great time ... seeing Gammons sing is something everyone must experience.

Posted by: jim at January 12, 2004 02:48 PM

what no pictures?

Posted by: john beard at January 13, 2004 09:38 PM

can gammons actually sing? i don't guess anybody really cared. and david, i'm lots younger than you and i always wear earplugs when i go to concerts or clubs because it's too loud for me. some people have sensitive ears.

Posted by: lisa gray at January 15, 2004 03:38 PM

I have 2 Official Program and Score Cards for 1946 in excellent shape one for the Boston Red Sox and one for the Boston Braves can u help me with the value?

Posted by: Phyllis at September 13, 2004 03:17 PM