Card Show, Post 2: Atypical

When I asked for musical recommendations on Saturday, the very first responses I got came from Crackin' Wax and Zippy Zappy. Crackin' Wax a/k/a Chris f/k/a Topher jumped in immediately with his personal favorite band from 10 years ago, and Zippy Zappy chimed in with his favorite music from 1000 years ago.  Huh?

Yeah, really. 

ZZ is rocking the medieval, while Crackin' Wax is all over Mutemath. Considering that this post is really just a way to show off the rest of my non-Topps Brewers purchases from a card show six weeks ago, all the retro feels appropriate. 

Starting things off: Vox Vulgaris - Cantiga 166

Be sure to listen to at least the 3:30 mark, where there's a drum solo that would make Dave Grohl jealous. No, seriously, there's actually a pretty decent drum break in the middle of the song. To be fair, this song is a good representation of medieval music in many respects. There are a lot of folks who really dig this music. 

To me, well, I have to admit: it's a bit of a yawner. Granted, I didn't expect to start dancing in my chair as if it were a medieval version of Lil Jon or something, but this one was quite subdued.

Subdued is an appropriate way to feel when the Donruss reboot brand shows up. If only Panini could figure out the fact that the damn D doesn't need to take up a quarter of the card, they might have a decent design. Panini is just so frustrating. Maybe if they had logos. Maybe if they had a better designer. Maybe if they stopped making baseball cards.

ZZ must have been in a very quiet, pensive mood when I caught him on Saturday. This medieval waltz is slightly more upbeat, but man...

Medieval music is less engaging to modern ears not because it is medieval. It is because of technology and musical evolution. Musicians did not start using polyphony -- playing intervals of the same chord rather than playing in unison -- until the last half of the ninth century. It took quite some time for that to spread. 

Further, written music did not evolve until later in the Middle Ages. Church music was learned by singing along with the group and listening to match pitch -- no one read music, and harmonizing just did not happen in the Church until the 10th or 11th century.

Finally, the instruments of the Middle Ages tended not to have great range in dynamics -- in how loudly and softly they could play. For instance, the harpsichord was probably invented in the Middle Ages, and it could only play either loud or soft -- not in between. 

While there are certainly going to be outliers from these general points, I'm going out on a limb and saying that orchestral music today is better now than it was in 1400.

There was a rich vein of Diamond King cards in the dime boxes I was going through. I have to admit that I really liked the cards too -- in hand, they feel special...almost like canvas. Perhaps Panini should use that to their advantage and make the set more about forgotten players of the 1910s through the 1950s more than about current players. 

Give me a card of George "High Pockets" Kelly (a Hall of Famer, by the way, and perhaps one of the worst decisions of the Veterans Committee of the 1970s, but still...) or Dolf Luque or Carl Furillo rather than yet another card for Babe Ruth. I know -- could be more difficult to get permission and all -- but wouldn't a unique set be worth it?

Okay, time to switch gears.

MuteMath came out of the New Orleans music scene in the early part of the 2000s. I recall this song best from them -- it's one that would get stuck in my head constantly about 10 years ago. 

Excitingly, MuteMath will be coming to Atlanta to play the Shaky Beats Festival in early May. Joining them on the bill are The Chainsmokers, Kaskade, Griz, and one of Dayf's recommendations -- Bonobo. 

You know, I miss going to shows sometimes. I haven't been to one in quite a while, but I find that the music I like tends not to draw 45-year-old men. I look a bit out of place, to say the least.

Speaking of "out of place," finding these Score Dugout Collection cards from 1996 in a dime box was a bit out of place to me. I don't believe I have ever seen these before, so finding what appeared to be a complete set threw me off. I knew immediately that I did not have these, so into my stack they went.

When Chris recommended MuteMath to me, he thought initially that the band was from Atlanta. We quickly figured out that was wrong and that they are New Orleanians. Whenever I think of New Orleans bands, there are a number of bands I think of, but the one of recent vintage that really grabbed me was Cowboy Mouth. 

Cowboy Mouth was really big around here about 20 or so years ago. They had a really big hit with "Jenny Says" in 1997. Okay, "really big" is relative -- the song hit number 26 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and Number 33 on the Modern Rock chart. It was huge here. The lead singer, Fred LeBlanc, is also their drummer, and he played in a band called Dash Rip Rock for a while in the late 1980s as well.

Rally caps might be some of the dumbest things I have ever seen on a baseball card. Even dumber than Jay Johnstone with the Budweiser umbrella hat. That's just ghastly.

On the other hand, the Ben Oglivie card in the Ted Williams set is downright beautiful. Benji was always a favorite thanks to his flailing swings at the plate, his high-energy warm-up cuts between pitches, and his real love for the game that always showed itself when he played. He is also a very smart man, too.

Okay, can't quit that soon -- so let's hear that "big hit" by Cowboy Mouth:

Thanks for stopping by tonight. 

Red, Red Foley

Can we all agree that this pub where the video is set is the world's worst pub in the history of mankind? It's too full of people, there's a random dude wandering around without a shirt, the bartender is slow because of being on crutches, you'll get your pocket picked, it's totally smoke-filled with everyone smoking like fiends, it's a world fully in black and white, and at the end of the night the only person you end up with is the random dude walking two dachshunds. 

That really doesn't have much to do with this blogpost other than the whole "red" thing. I was doing some searches on eBay recently for things that I've had stuck in my head lately -- in particular, Red Foley stickers. For whatever reason and despite seeing these available for sale from time to time, Red Foley stickers have evaded me. I probably should have bought these with my random Amazon credit instead of those stamps, but I didn't.

Anyway, I found a buy-it-now of a seller on eBay who must have loaded up on a bunch of Red Foley books from 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, and 1993 because the seller has a ton of "mega lots" of Red Foley Stickers for a total of $8 with shipping. Mega lot? $8? Count me in.

So, what did I get?

Lots of Younts:

And, other than that weird one at the top with the big green circle impinging on the photo of Yount, I've got at least four of each of these. It is interesting to see the two stickers both numbered 103 -- from 1992 and 1993 -- appear to have been photos taken from the same at-bat. 

Another interesting sidelight that I just picked up on is the fact that it appears that Yount must have had a shoe deal with Pony. That's a brand that I had totally forgotten about before seeing these stickers. Also, I don't ever remember seeing this ad for the shoes:

I didn't see Robin in there, though.

The good thing about buying lots like this that I often get multiples of players that I collect as PCs. With my oh-so-strict rules I've created for myself (which I break regularly if I choose), I try to get one card/sticker for my PC and then another for my team collection. As I have gotten into this more, though, I've started establishing more lines -- things like, "for cards serial numbered under 100, I only will list PCs on my want list rather than trying to build team sets for each" and, "I don't care if super old stuff isn't serial numbered...if the oddball is tough to find, having one copy of it is enough."

The downside to this lot buying is getting tons of doubles, of course. Also, for whatever reason, none of the different years contained any Paul Molitor stickers. I'm guessing that the seller parted those out in a separate sale.

Anyway, here are the rest of the 1987s:

Next, 1988, featuring "generic sticker with generic font yelling team name in manner that one need not worry about licensing!":

Here's 1991, even though the Deer Sticker features a photo taken at least a couple of years earlier:

1992's book included Gary Sheffield in his high-top Nike spikes (obligatory E-5 not included):

And, finally, 1993 only had one other than Robin:

Buying lots on eBay can be frustrating at times, in large part because most lots end up comprised of 80 copies of one card followed by just one or two of others that should have been equally available and, then, the lot ends up missing some key cards or players. At the same time, though, when a lot like this comes up -- of something I had exactly zero previously -- I'll take all the extras in order to get a cheap kickstart on completing the team sets and PCs.

And can't we all use a good kickstart on our collections like that?

Christmas with Angus

One of the newer bloggers around the blogworld this year is Angus of Dawg Day Cards. He introduced himself to me through commenting here. He then started sending me cards -- here's the first time -- and even aided me in the War with JBF by delivering the final blow which led to peace in our time between Hazel Green and Sandy Springs/Dunwoody.

Around our Thanksgiving Day, Angus started spreading Christmas cheer around by sending out Christmas cards filled with baseball cards. 

From the very beginning of the packages of cards that Angus has sent to me, he's been quick to feed my oddball fixations. The Christmas Present was no different. 

It started a little slowly, though.

I wondered to myself why Angus had sent this card, and then I saw the fine print on the card noting that Parker was listed as "Now With Brewers." I thought then, "wait, I don't recall Topps doing that on Parker's card for 1990."

So, while initially a bit of a question mark, it all became clear once I read the fine print on both sides of the card. You'd think a lawyer would know better than to ignore that small print, but there we are -- a new addition to the O-Pee-Chee collection.

The remainder of my Angus Christmas special were all larger than life Donruss cards:

Donruss Action All-Stars and the Donruss Champions sets are some of my favorite regular-issue oddballs from the 1980s. The postcard size make them perfect for autographs that aren't cramped, and that same size makes it easy to find plastic sheets to store them in.

With such a great package of Brewers greats in large form, it's a perfect time to post my favorite Christmas song again: The Pogues & Kirsty MacColl.

Angus, thanks as always for the great cards. I'll keep an eye out at my local shows for more Cleveland Browns relics and autographs as well. No offense, but the Browns continued failure at being a good NFL team keeps those relics and autographs quite affordable.

Backing up the Truck

As I was envisioning this post, I thought about the sound that a truck makes when it's backing up...you know:

And, if you watch/listen to all 60 minutes of that video, well, wow.  I've got nothing in response to that.  But, in the interest of trying to find something weirder than that, I put "beep beep beep" into Google.  It then suggested, "beep beep beep beep mexican song".  No lie, this is what came up:

Apparently, that song got included in Grand Theft Auto V by Rockstar, leading the gaming boards to make El Sonidito a big hit.  And with me typing El Sonidito so much, Google Chrome is now offering to translate this page for me into English.

Thanks, Google!

All of that is just to introduce a big box of Brewers that just appeared on my doorstep late last week from Johnny's Trading Spot.

And those are just the stacks of cards.  It took me part of Sunday -- at which point I found problems in my spreadsheets and started over -- and into yesterday to finally get everything sorted.

Let's see some of the cards that John sent my way.

Now, I didn't need this 1987 Fleer Jim Gantner. But, geez, Gumby, you went from looking like a mean SOB who flick his Marlboro Reds at kids who dared come too close to your 1978 Datsun 280Z...this one, probably:

...into the guy on that 1991 Bowman -- that's just four years, for God's sake -- who looks like the next step is to buy this blue car from the old man in the driver's seat for $450 on a $50 a month payment plan:

It's sad, really.

Before I leave Gantner, though, I have to admit that as a kid I always liked Gantner as a person but not as a player. He seemed like an automatic out at the plate when he came up with runners on base, but man, the guy loved playing for the Brewers and he made tons of time for every kid seeking autographs.

Anyway...thought I'd say something nice about him after ragging on his fashion sense and apparent installation of contact lenses later in his career in an effort to fool fans and the front office that he really was younger than he really was.

Johnny sent me some pretty cool cards other than Gantner. I mean, look at those stacks -- there has to be some cool stuff in them!

Like this Big Ben McDonald Topps Finest from 1996. I know a lot of people buy cards for investment purposes, but how did anyone keep from ripping that film off guys like Ben McDonald's card? I mean, the guy's shoulder was put together with baling wire and bubble gum by the time this card was made -- did people really think that he'd suddenly regenerate a real arm, push his ERA below 4, and suddenly turn into a 20 game winner for 10 years in a row to push himself to 250 career wins?

Yes, that's more like it.  Actually, John sent me two of these, so the one with the film still on it will go into my duplicates box and the peeled card will be displayed proudly in my Topps 1994-2009 binder (base sets only in that binder, of course).

Now, I have to admit. John sent me so many cards that I needed for my collection -- over 100 of the cards he sent were ones that are waiting currently to be sorted into the PC binders or the manufacturer collection binders I've slowly-but-surely been putting together -- that I'm almost overwhelmed to try to select cards to highlight.  So, let me go to the oddballs, because I love oddballs:

Cecil Cooper.  The man was pure style. Smooth in the field. That pause in the middle of his last practice swing that he always made -- and which that Donruss Champions card captures perfectly -- was one of the more frequently imitated batting stances in Wisconsin in the 1980s.

I started messing around with switch hitting just so I could hit left handed and swing the bat in my warm up like him.

Or, like this guy:

Oglivie always looked incredibly agitated and impatient at the plate.  This clip doesn't do it justice, but it's such a great video I want to share it...even if the game ended badly:

Such great memories of a year now 33 years in my rearview mirror. I hope I will see another Brewers' trip to the World Series in my lifetime.

Okay, one more video that has to be shared before I get to the grand finale of John's box.  It's this great video of Pete Vuckovich and the home plate umpire before Vuke's start at home in the World Series:

Now that we're all buttoned up, on to the coolest items John sent:

Bobbleheads! On the left is the Lyle Overbay commemorative bobblehead from 2005 celebrating his team record for 53 doubles in a season.  Jonathan Lucroy broke that record last year by racking up 54 doubles.

The other one looks like John Axford, but it's 10 years before the Ax got to Milwaukee and instead is a commemorative bobblehead for the Bud-Selig-tie-game-All-Star Game in Milwaukee. I swear, sometimes I think Bud could suck the fun out of a trip to Vegas. Anyway, maybe Axford saw this bobblehead around Miller Park and thought, "Damn, that bobblehead looks dope! Imma do that!"

Or not.

Funny thing, though -- these two guys are overshadowed GREATLY by the final bobblehead and ticket stub that came my way:

Yes! The Robin Yount Bobblehead from the 25th Anniversary celebration from 2007!  He may be smaller than the Ax-wanna-be or Overbay, but I much prefer Robin.  All day, every day.

Even if he is only second in team history for home runs now.

John, thank you very much for all the great cards and especially for the bobbleheads.  Admittedly, when I got back into collecting, I never expected to have a bunch of bobbleheads around. Now, though, I'm glad I do!