Photos: RISD Museum's Music Friday with Sit Down Baby

Live Reviews

Peter Gammons's doubleheader

Hot Stove, Cool Music, the Paradise Rock Club, January 6 and 7, 2007

By JIM SULLIVAN | January 10, 2007

THEO: Why do baseball guys look so serious when they play guitar?

There’s no question that a close relationship has developed between Boston’s music scene and its baseball team. And we’re not just talking Dropkick Murphys’ “Tessie.” No, last weekend, the seventh annual Hot Stove, Cool Music benefit brought players and, uh, players together for a two-night charity event at the relatively cozy Paradise Rock Club, with Red Sox GM Theo Epstein’s “A Foundation To Be Named Later” as the benefactors. (Actually, eight charities supporting under-privileged youth will share the funds.)

Sportswriter Peter Gammons and the Hot Stove All Stars were ripping through the Byrds’ “Feel a Whole Lot Better” when I arrived Saturday, and it was great to see ESPN baseball guru Gammons, who missed last summer’s Hot Stove event at Fenway after suffering an aneurysm, playing some bluesy guitar centerstage. He addressed the “How do you feel?” query with Richard Thompson’s “I Feel So Good.” Later he was joined by Buffalo Tom singer/guitarist Bill Janovitz for a raucous “Powderfinger.”

Sunday, Kay Hanley, fresh from singing “The Star Spangled Banner” for the Pats, called Gammons’s recovery “a fucking miracle.” And he was once again in the house, this time to introduce the only current Sox member on the bill, pitcher Lenny DiNardo. “In my 35 years in baseball,” Gammons gushed, “this man knows more about music than anyone I’ve ever met.” Epstein was on stage too, playing serious rhythm guitar. “You ever notice how baseball guys, when they play guitar, they’re really serious about it?” noted Janovitz backstage Saturday. Epstein smiled.

Neither of the Paradise shows quite sold out. But there were plenty of people there to see the Figgs do Talking Heads’ “Love Goes to Building on Fire” on Saturday and the Downbeat 5 bring a little garage-punk kick to the proceedings on Sunday.

Topics: Live Reviews , Baseball, Sports, AL East Division, More

| More

See more deals

view all

[ 02/20 ] "Optical Noise: American & British Prints/Films from the 1960s-1970s: @ David Winton Bell Gallery

[ 02/20 ] Third Annual Providence Children's Film Festival @ Cable Car Cinema

[ 02/20 ] "The Providence Postcard Project" @ Brown University's Granoff Center, Martinos Auditorium

ARTICLES BY JIM SULLIVAN

INTERVIEW: CARL HIAASEN | July 22, 2010
Novelist Carl Hiaasen likes to create scenarios where very bad and tremendously satisfying things happen to despicable people: crooked politicians, real-estate scammers, environment despoilers, greedy bastards of all stripes.

AFTER IMAGES | May 28, 2010
Karen Finley won’t be naked, or covered in chocolate. Candied yams will not be involved. If there are neighborhood morality-watch squads in Salem, they’ll have the night off.

INTERVIEW: SARAH SILVERMAN | April 23, 2010
Recently, “Sarah” — the character played by Sarah Silverman on Comedy Central’s The Sarah Silverman Program — was upset because in today’s world it just wasn’t safe anymore for children to get into strangers’ vans.

TATTOO YOU | April 06, 2010
Dr. Lakra is no more a real doctor than is Dr. Dre or Dr. Demento. The 38-year-old Mexican tattoo artist’s real name is Jerónimo López Ramírez. As for “lakra,” it means “delinquent.” Or so I thought.