PWEs, Accompanied by Song

I decided to write a post tonight comprised of recent PWEs that I've received in the mail lately accompanied by songs that have been randomly going around in my head.

First, a word of explanation as to how some of these songs got in my head. My wife and I have a game that we play on Fridays and Saturdays. I put together playlists of songs for her to guess the artist name and song title. We mute the TV and usually put baseball on (or some other sport if it's not baseball season) and have a couple of drinks and unwind and catch up on the week. 

It almost always goes the way that she has to guess the songs and titles. I don't want to sound too cocky here, but she gets really frustrated with me because I get way too many songs correct way too quickly for her tastes. Then she plays music to "challenge" me -- read as literally stuff I have never heard before in my life -- and it stops being fun because she doesn't like the music she's playing either. I've gotten to the point where I'll act like I can't remember a song or artist just to listen to the song!

In any event, the songs to accompany the cards are ones that came up in some of the playlists that I put together for my wife and which now I can't get out of my head. 

Let's start with the PWE that my good pal Kenny a/k/a Zippy Zappy sent my way -- a couple of cards that missed his initial package of Brewers and Bucks and Packers:

Kenny sent me a two Brice Turang cards -- one of him as a Brewer and one as a 15U USA team member. Turang, of course, was the Brewers first round draft pick in 2018 out of Santiago High School in Corona, CA. The Brewers paid him the money not to go to LSU to play baseball. 

MLB.com pointed out a couple of interesting facts about Turang when this selection occurred last year. First, Brice's dad Brian was selected by the Milwaukee Brewers in the 20th round of the 1987 draft out of Long Beach City College. He didn't sign, and then ended up and total afterthought selection of the Mariners in 1989 -- the 51st round from the University of Hartford. Despite that less than stellar draft record, the elder Turang worked his way up to the majors and got 283 plate appearances over two years in 1993 and 1994. 

The second interesting fact about Brice Turang is that he is the first shortstop that the Brewers have selected in the first round of the draft since 1987, when the team led off the draft with Billy Spiers. Before that, the Brewers had a bunch of notable shortstop selections, including Gorman Thomas (1969 by the Pilots), Robin Yount (1973), Paul Molitor (1977), Gary Sheffield (1986), and Spiers. But then it took 31 years for the next one.

He also sent me an Adrian Houser card with Houser on the Astros. Since I got this card, Houser has been godawful, so I may just start the card on fire as a sacrifice to the baseball gods to get Houser back on track.

One of my wife's favorite songs to chop vegetables by in the kitchen is "Starships" by Nicki Minaj. Its chorus is incredibly catchy and gets stuck in my head with regularity...and having found it on YouTube and let it play for a bit, I'll probably wake up with it in my head too.

In a related idea, does anyone listen to a lot of podcasts? I got turned on to a podcast from the Vox Network called "Switched on Pop." It features a musicologist (Nate Sloan) and a songwriter (Charlie Harding) who try to figure out what makes songs or artists hits. The episodes stand alone well, and the first one I listened to featured the lead singer from indie-pop band Joywave -- which featured in Kenny's "What I'm Listening To" post -- wondering why so many alternative hits seem to have very similar sounding choruses. I won't spoil the ending for you if you do listen, but I will say that this was the first time in 30 years I'd heard the term pentatonic scale. It's quite an enjoyable podcast if you enjoy thinking about what you're hearing as music and what makes it good.

The next PWE I received came from the potato chip largesse being enjoyed by Mark Hoyle in Massachusetts, as he scoops up all the Utz chips in sight and keeps the cards he needs while sending away ones he does not. Thanks to Mark, I now have two Utz cards -- Jonathan Schoop and Lorenzo Cain. I'm still looking for Jesus Aguilar and Christian Yelich, so if anyone sees these floating around, I'm up for them.

My wife loves country music. Her favorite artists are Carrie Underwood, Luke Bryan, and Sugarland, but she likes a lot of country music generally. One guy whose music kept being recommended to be played was Luke Combs. His song, "When It Rains, It Pours" is one that gets stuck in my head all the time -- again for its chorus. 

The things I like about Combs is that, well, he doesn't look like a male model, he doesn't try to be a country rapper, and he sings well without much help from the autotune. He just seems like a good old boy who is relatable. Others agree with me; the Associated Press, of all outlets, had a story last year that was headlined, "Country singer Luke Combs' unassuming appeal makes him a hit." The guy built up a fan base not because he's got good looks, but instead he just played over 200 shows in 2016 alone all over the Southeast. 

Maybe all that is why I like him, I guess. 

The final PWE I got during the last week of June came from Matt Prigge. Matt puts together custom cards for the Brewers season to fill in gaps for Topps Now or, more to the point, to put cards together that he likes. He had made up four of these Keston Hiura "Rated Rookie" cards and gave three away through a Twitter giveaway. I was lucky enough to catch the last one of them.

"Yeah!" by Usher f/Lil Jon and Ludacris is pretty old school at this point. Having not been a big dance club guy or pop music guy at all in the mid-2000s, I missed this one when it came out in 2004. It was pretty ubiquitous -- it was, after all, the top ranked song of the year in 2004 and it was the second overall song for the entire decade of the 2000s according to Billboard -- so you can tell I was totally in my own little world in 2004...probably just playing FIFA 05 over and over. 

Anyway, this song gets stuck in my head pretty regularly in the day after my wife and I play our game. It's not a bad thing with this one though -- it's upbeat and a pretty fun song.

Thanks go out to Kenny, Mark, and Matt -- I greatly appreciate y'all being so kind as to send me cards.  

EA Sports Introduces Zippy Zappy

Back when Zippy Zappy was in elementary school in 2005 and 2006, I was in my 30s and single and happily antisocial. It was a blissful time in 2005 and 2006 -- before social media, after all -- so no one really noticed if I sat home on a Friday night with my dog, a bottle of wine or two, and my PlayStation (and then PlayStation 2) just playing FIFA 2005 and, later, FIFA 2006.

I have to admit that I sort of miss those relatively carefree days. There's a lot more pressure being more "grown up" with a wife and all kinds of other responsibilities. I don't play video games anymore either -- I stopped after the PS3 became obsolete and, well, I stopped when I got married. Playing video games to me was a solo event, and now my solo time is spent with baseball cards.

At any rate, those FIFA games had absolutely brilliant soundtracks. In fact, I found myself going down rabbit trails finding more music by the bands featured on these two games. Since Zippy Zappy likes to share with me what he's been listening to, I thought I'd share some songs that perhaps he's heard and perhaps he has not heard. Oh, and since he sent me cards, that's my excuse for doing it.

Let's start with something that he has a chance of having heard:

Japanese rap trio Soul'd Out starts us off with their bouncy little ditty called "1,000,000 Monsters Attack." It appeared on the FIFA 2005 soundtrack, which was put together by noted British DJ Paul Oakenfold. Oakenfold only included one of his own songs on it, but the soundtrack was very diverse and included songs from artists from nearly 20 countries. This wasn't the only rap song on the soundtrack, but it was the only Japanese song.

It would be poor form if I did not pair the Brewers 2017 first round draft pick with this song since Keston Hiura is a Californian of half Japanese and half Chinese descent. This guy can flat out rake. He got a long look in spring training this year and did well against lesser competition, and he's destined to move quickly up the chain if his defense can keep up with his bat.

When it comes to the music on FIFA 2005, this is the song that got stuck in my head with regularity -- to the point of my buying the album on which it appeared and, then, multiple albums by The Streets. I absolutely love this song, "Fit But You Know It." It's off a concept album called A Grand Don't Come for Free that some people know for the sappy slow song near the end of the album called "Dry Your Eyes" that Mike Skinner (who is The Streets) did with Coldplay lead singer Chris Martin. 

A wonderful song from FIFA 2005 deserves a wonderful football player. Juan Mata is the one Manchester United player that literally everyone in the world loves. Strangely, his name means "John Kills" in Spanish, but he's a true gentleman. He started a charity called Common Goal to which he and nearly 40 other international stars donate 1% of their salaries to a collective fund to support football charities that promote social responsibility. Its members include American women Megan Rapinoe, Alex Morgan, and Heather O'Reilly as well as German defender Mats Hummels, Danish goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel, Japanese star (and Mata's former Man Utd. teammate) Shinji Kagawa, and Bournemouth defender Charlie Daniels.

Speaking of Manchester United, here's the song that was considered Morrissey's major comeback single in 2004. He had been without a record deal for over seven years when the album You Are the Quarry came out and featured this song and "First of the Gang to Die." That second song was seen as a direct paean to Morrissey's massive following that had built up sort of oddly among the Mexican American community.

Jesus Aguilar is Venezuelan, not Mexican. He's also seemingly a man without a place on the Milwaukee Brewers. Last year, he served well in a semi-platoon role with Eric Thames at 1st base. This year, with the logjam in the outfield, that's more likely to be Ryan Braun's role. The Brewers have to hope that they either can sneak him through waivers or that he can be traded. 

He's also a massive human being -- so massive that Zach Davies and Orlando Arcia can fit in Aguilar's pants together:

Okay then...that's a large man.

Indeed, Japanese rap and English rap were also joined by Brazilian rap from rapper Marcelo D2 with a song called "Profissão M.C." or "Professional M.C." Marcelo is from Rio, and was a member of a band called Planet Hemp. I wonder what it was that they rallied around. The album in 2003 from which this song was drawn was known worldwide for its collaboration with will.i.am from The Black Eyed Peas. But don't hold that against Marcelo.

Speaking of large first basemen, I wonder if Jesus Aguilar could fit into Prince Fielder's pants. They'd probably be a bit short for Aguilar, since Jesus is 3 inches taller and weighs 25 pounds less than big Prince. 

FIFA 2006 brought a different feel to the music. It's less rap, I feel like, and more straight ahead rock, like Bloc Party's "Helicopter." This song was my introduction to Bloc Party, and I ended up buying this album, which had other great songs like "Like Eating Glass" and "Banquet".

I don't think Josh Hader has anything to do with Bloc Party at all that I can discern. I just think that this photo of his Medusa-like hair is pretty awesome and deserved a good song.

LCD Soundsystem got this song on six different games -- FIFA 06, SSX on Tour, Burnout: Revenge, Forza Motorsport 2, and two Dance Dance Revolution games. Critics loved this album. Well, I should say, really, that critics LOVE this band. The types of reviews you get for LCD Soundsystem are fawning and absolutely fall all over themselves to give out plaudits. I think they are a pretty good band, though nowhere near as good as the critics make them out to be.

In the interest of finishing this post today, I am putting up both Tristen Lutz and KJ Harrison. Lutz is still miles and miles away from Miller. I would anticipate that he might play in short-season in Helena again or perhaps move up aggressively to Single-A Wisconsin. I'm just not sure that the Brewers will put him in full-season ball already this year. 

Harrison is a Hawaiian whom the Brewers drafted in the third round out of Oregon State. As with any catching prospect, he may take some time to work his way up to the major leagues. But, we'll see -- perhaps he can move relatively quickly and make the Brewers forget Jacob Nottingham.

Finally, yet another song that convinced me to buy a complete album based off an awesome song on the FIFA 06 soundtrack, this is "Strasbourg" by The Rakes. The Rakes album Capture/Release starts off with this song, and it's actually a bit heavier of a song than much of the rest of the album. I also really like the song "Open Book", and it's worth a listen too.

Caden Lemons was a second round draft pick out of high school from suburban Birmingham (Vestavia Hills High School). The school is a baseball powerhouse which has also produced Chris Hammond, Josh Hancock, and Colter Beam in addition to golfer Smylie Kaufman. Lemons is a 19-year-old pitcher. Remember, TINSTAAPP.

Similar warnings go with Brendan Murphy, who was a fourth round pick out of Mundelein High School near Chicago. Neither one pitched a lot for Milwaukee's farm teams last year. Both might become something in a few years. Murphy had control issues in his 16 innings (12 walks), and Lemons only threw 2-2/3 innings as a professional. 

We'll see if they ever become something. It would be a nice change to have the Brewers produce a star pitcher from their farm system.

My thanks, as always, go out to Kenny. What did y'all think of the music? 

It made me nostalgic.