Music Blogs

As last Sunday's millions of afternoon widows well know, football season has begun. At this point, there's no arguing that the sport is truly America's national pastime, religion, obsession, whatever. But even though pigskin antics have ascended to the pinnacle of national popularity, football still hasn't surpassed baseball (or even basketball) as pop's sport of choice.

For starters, there's no football equivalent to Paul Simon's immortal Joe DiMaggio shout-out on "Mrs. Robinson." Football doesn't have its own version of John Fogerty's, "Centerfield" or, to dig really deep, Warren Zevon's "Bill Lee" (named after the former Red Sox pitcher). "The Super Bowl Shuffle" didn't exactly set anyone's ears on fire.

The connection between music and baseball is also about more than just songs. When rockers look to play iconic gigs, they head for classic baseball stadiums--Springsteen at Fenway, Billy Joel at Shea. When they look to rake it in, they head for Giants' stadium. There's also a nostalgic aspect to the game that musicians dig. When Bob Dylan played at Brooklyn last month, his only words to the audience were, "I wish the Dodgers were still in Brooklyn." Even indie rock is not immune to baseball fever: Stephen Malkmus is a noted rotisserie baseball junky and the Hold Steady's Craig Finn often dons a Minnesota Twins jersey at gigs.

Basketball too has a close relationship with music. Vats of ink have been spilled about the supposed relationship between jazz and hoops, but I'm more down with oddball intersections like Cheech and Chong's funny, funky '70s jam, "Basketball Jones," or the fact that Pearl Jam was originally called Mookie Blaylock (the name of a former guard for the New Jersey Nets). Albums from superstar players like Shaq, Allen Iverson, and Ron Artest are just the most obvious links between rap and roundball.

Football? The gridiron's de facto theme song is Hank Williams Jr.'s "Are You Ready For Some Football?" All respect to Bocephus, but that song is not exactly the stuff of the legends. And sure, the Super Bowl halftime show might be the biggest musical event of the year, but that massive ad sales pageant is more about math than music. If the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest drew 100 millions viewers, U2 and Justin Timberlake would've played that too.

I'm not sure why football and music mix so poorly. Maybe the fact that helmets obscure the players' faces, which makes them seem remote and hard for musicians to relate to. Or perhaps the game's stop-start rhythm is too hard to groove on. What's your take? Post them in the comments section. In the meantime, I've got some serious thinking to do-Tom Brady's injury has totally messed up my fantasy football team.