Every baseball fan has a favorite song about the game—mine happens to be “A Dying Cubs Fan’s Last Request,” by Steve Goodman—but who has a favorite band about the game? Only those who know about the Baseball Project, that’s who. Currently including Mike Mills from R.E.M., Scott McCaughey from the Young Fresh Fellows and Minus 5 and Steve Wynn from the Dream Syndicate, the Baseball Project has, since 2007, committed itself to writing, recording and performing songs about the nation’s greatest pastime.
If you hate baseball, stop reading now. But if your Giants cap is covered in Croix de Candlestick pins, or you have the winning Harey Carey call from the 1984 Sandberg game memorized, or if you’re either shedding a tear or shaking a fist every time Derek Jeter airs a tribute to himself and takes his ceremonial goodbye bow at ballparks around the country this month, well, the Baseball Project is basically the soundtrack to your life. (At least through October.)
Passion for the game underlines every Baseball Project song. The band’s new album, 3rd, contains a stab at Alex Rodriguez (“13”), a dissection of Lenny Dykstra (“From Nails to Thumbtacks”) and a psychological rumination on Hank Aaron (“They Don’t Know Henry”). But Bay Area fans will note “They are the Oakland A’s,” which chronicles the surprise that the rest of the nation feels each September when the A’s grand-slam, come back or walk off their way into the playoffs: “Beyond logic or all reason, they keep goin’ to the postseason / Who are these guys? They’re the Oakland A’s!”
At the Chapel this week—while the A’s struggle to get out of their post-Cespedes-trade slump—there’s sure to be a lot of Oakland fans singing along.
