8/21/07

Peter Paul and Mary

Then again, Peter Paul and Mary are sort of a case study on how aging gracefully isn't all that likely.



Sic transit gloria.

I forget sometimes when I talk about the first concert I ever saw. I say it was Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, where I got the Hook t-shirt I still wear too much from a radio station booth. But it wasn't.

I saw Peter Paul and Mary. If I was 8 when I saw Mark Wahlberg take off his pants and dance in front of 20,000 people, I would have been 6 when I saw PP&M. I don't remember much. I remember that I had to dress up in a suit. I remember being in the balcony. I liked it in the balcony. I remember them playing "Puff the Magic Dragon." I remember being awed because they didn't use sheet music. I asked my dad, "how do they know what to play without sheet music?" He told me they had the music memorized. I thought that was impossible. All I'd ever seen were orchestras and symphonies, and they all had sheet music. I remember my dad wanting me to be thrilled when they played "Puff the Magic Dragon," but really I was devastated that they didn't play "Right Field," their ode to being okay with yourself, even if you're kind of a loser. It was my absolute anthem as a child, even when I had friends and played left field in little league and stuff. I was an initiate of awkwardness from jump.

Saturday summers, when I was a kid
We'd run to the schoolyard and here's what we did
We'd pick out the captains and we'd choose up the teams
It was always a measure of my self esteem
Cuz the fastest, the strongest, played shortstop and first
The last ones they picked were the worst
I never needed to ask, it was sealed,
I just took up my place in right field.
Playing...

Right field, its easy, you know.
You can be awkward and you can be slow
Thats why I'm here in right field
Just watching the dandelions grow

Playing right field can be lonely and dull
Little leagues never have lefties that pull
I'd dream of the day they'd hit one my way
They never did, but still I would pray
That I'd make a fantastic catch on the run
And not lose the ball in the sun
And then I'd awake from this long reverie
And pray that the ball never came out to me
Here in...

Right field, its easy, you know.

You can be awkward and you can be slow

Thats why I'm here in right field

Just watching the dandelions grow

Off in the distance, the game's dragging on,
There's strikes on the batter, some runners are on.
I don't know the inning, I've forgotten the score.
The whole team is yelling and I don't know what for.
Then suddenly everyone's looking at me
My mind has been wandering; what could it be?
They point at the sky and I look up above
And a baseball falls into my glove!

Here in right field, its important you know.
You gotta know how to catch
You gotta know how to throw
Thats why I'm here in right field
Just watching the dandelions grow!

You remember how, in the beginning of the decade, people were getting really angry when songs they really liked were getting used to shill crap in commercials? Well, I never got mad that the Shins were selling McDonalds, or that Nick Drake was wailing a dire message from beyond the grave... "Pink moon! Pink moon! OOOH I'm so depressed! Buy a Volkswagen... Pink moon!"

But I'll tell you. I get pissed to this day when I watch old VHS tapes with the Pizza Hut commercial that used "Right Field." In the ad, this kid is a loser, and then he makes a grab in right field, so his teammates reward him... with a trip to Pizza Hut.

I was like, fuck you, Pizza Hut. That's my childhood you're sullying. What on earth could you possibly have to do with this song? Apparently the song's not about being okay with yourself. It's about happy accidents that temporarily cause your social betters to treat you to an afternoon of Pepsi products. Motherfuckers.

Over the years, my relationship with Peter, Paul and Mary has changed quite a lot, and now mostly revolves around their cover of Pete Seeger's "If I Had a Hammer." It's always a little bit astonishing to see them perform this song in the 60s, when they were at the height of their powers, before they had turned into the kind of group that middle-aged men took their sons to see as bonding experiences. They were dangerous, and it showed. They played it during the march on Washington ("I have a dream...") and all three of their albums were in the top 10 when Kennedy was assassinated. And all the danger, the alluring leftist chic, it all hinges on Mary Travers. She's so beautiful, so on fire, having a ball and dying inside at the same time, looking something like Claire Forlani playing Brigitte Bardot.


In the seventies, she got all wacky. She was still really beautiful, but she put on some weight and took to doing the song in a weird kind of Vegas-cabaret style, with a gold lamé tunic and everything.


Then again, Peter Paul and Mary are sort of a case study on how aging gracefully isn't all that likely.



Sic transit gloria.

1 comment:

SenorStephenUrkelDaedalus said...

Does Pete Seeger consciously hold the guitar that way every time he gets interviewed, or is it merely a marvelous coincidence?