Steven Rubio's Online Life

throwback thursday to 1970

Once again, a cut-and-paste from an old post (comment, actually) where I described my final stage performance as an actor. I took drama from 7th through 12th grade. My first play was The Wizard of Oz ... I was 11 years old, and played The Scarecrow. Don't remember much about it, but I think I was already establishing myself as the guy who knew not only my own lines, but everyone else's. And in 7th grade, knowing your lines is all that can be asked of you. My last play was 1984, where I played the "hero", Winston Smith. It ran for three nights, the last of which was 49 years ago today, February 14, 1970. Here is what I wrote back in 2007:

The last play I was in was 1984, where I played Winston Smith. It was done in the round, so there were no blind spots where we could trick the audience, plus they were very close to us. Near the end, as I'm being tortured/reprogrammed, I say the wrong thing and I get smacked in the head for my mistake. During rehearsal, the guy would be standing in front of me, I'd see the fist coming, and I could time my flinch. I guess I was flinching too soon or something, because the director decided to have the guy be standing behind me when he smacked me, so the audience would think I didn't see it coming. We had some cue to let me know when it was coming, but it didn't matter ... my flinches were even more poorly timed because I was scared. So finally I told the guy I was willing to take one for the team ... and for the actual performances, he'd walk behind me, I'd say the wrong thing, he's smack me one ... and I wouldn't move an inch, because I preferred getting clubbed than flinching like a wussy in front of an audience.

Thankfully, we only did three performances.

Not sure what video I can use to liven things up for this post. How about this one?

40 years ago today: the clash play their first u.s. concert

In the spirit of Throwback Thursday, I recall an event from 40 years ago that I have written about on this blog at least twice. Why write something new on Throwback Thursday? So here is a little cut-and-paste.

From November 29, 2007, "The Clash and Bo Diddley":

We actually saw the first show The Clash ever played in the USA, it was in Berkeley, not their first North America show, I think they played Vancouver first. Anyway, the band was asked who they wanted to have as an opening act, and they said they'd love to play with Bo Diddley. And they were told hey, that might not work, can't you come up with an up-and-coming punk band? But no, they wanted Bo Diddley, he was one of their idols and they wanted him to play. And they got their way, which is why, on February 7, 1979, I saw Bo Diddley play for the first and only time. He was great, of course.

Time sure does fly. I remember that part of Bo's act that night was to make fun of his age ... he'd bend down and as he did so, he'd have his guitar making creaky noises like his bones were too old to take the stress. Well, I just looked Bo Diddley up on Wikipedia, and damn, he sure was old back in 1979 ... 50! Yep ... Bo Diddley was younger the time I saw the old geezer than I am now. Geesh.

And from five years ago, "Music Friday: 35 Years Ago Today":

Next up was the legendary Bo Diddley. As I have mentioned before, as part of his act, Bo played up how old he was compared to all the young punks. He’d bend down, and his guitar would make screaky noises as if his bones were too old. This story seems less funny to me with each passing year, since Bo was only 50 at the time. Here, he talks about what it was like opening for The Clash:

Here's something that wasn't in those older posts: The Clash from later in 1979, playing "I Fought the Law":

 

throwback thursday: the 1993 royal rumble

The 1993 Royal Rumble took place 26 years ago today in Sacramento, and we were there. Fans of that era of rassling will feel a bit of nostalgia when I listed some of the performers in the matches before the Rumble: Doink the Clown, the Steiners, Shawn Michaels, Marty Jannetty, Bam Bam Bigelow, Big Boss Man, Bret Hart, Razor Ramon. (Three of those grapplers have since passed away ... rassling is a cruel sport.)

The Rumble that year wasn't particularly good, especially compared to the year before, when the legendary Ric Flair won after lasting more than an hour in the ring. Flair returned in '93, and he was the first contestant in the Rumble (he lasted less than 20 minutes). Again, some names from the Rumble, for nostalgia fans: Bob Backlund, Papa Shango, Mr. Perfect, Koko B. Ware, Irwin R. Schyster, Typhoon, Earthquake, Tito Santana, Owen Hart, and Randy Savage. The winner was Yokozuna. Five of those have also died, including Yokozuna. This was also the WWF debut of Giant Gonzalez (aka El Gigante), billed at 8 feet tall. He's dead now, too.

Here are highlight from the finish, with Yokozuna and Macho Man Randy Savage going at it while Yokozuna's manager Mr. Fuji encouraged his man. Yokozuna was billed as Japanese but was actually Samoan-American. Mr. Fuji (waving a Japanese flag during the match) was billed as Japanese, but was a Japanese-American from Hawaii. Fuji is dead now, too. The announcers are Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby "The Brain" Heenan, also both dead now, although Heenan did live to be 72.

Finally, here is something I've only recently discovered, people who use the WWE video game to recreate matches:

throwback thursday: thank you, bruce and ann

Five years ago today, I posted about an interview Ann Powers did with Bruce Springsteen about his then-new album, High Hopes.

I mentioned on Twitter that I had a favorite part of the interview, but that I wasn’t sure why. It comes when Bruce is describing what it was like making records when he was in his 20s: “It was terrible, you know. In truth, it was awful, an awful way to make records but it was the only way we knew how. Everybody simply suffered through it and the endless, endless, endless hours I can't begin to explain.”

Ann’s response was the part I loved most: “We thank you for those hours.”

I’ve had a couple of days to think about it, and I think I know now why this resonated so deeply with me. When I first heard she was going to interview Bruce, I thought she was a perfect choice, that people like myself would be well-represented. That one sentence is what I meant, when she stepped back momentarily from her professional role and briefly spoke as a fan. I am not the only Bruce fan to spend too much time wondering what I would say if I met him. Part of me thinks I’d just ask him to play “Back in Your Arms” the next time he comes to the Bay Area. That’s part of why people bring signs requesting this or that favorite song … it’s a way to talk to the man on the stage.

But the truth is (and from talking to friends over the years, I know I’m not alone in this), if I had a chance to meet Bruce Springsteen, the one and only thing I’d want to say is, “Thank you”.

So consider this blog post my way of thanking Ann for thanking Bruce on our behalf.

I included a video that is one of my favorites. Here it is again. As always, I tell people, look at the faces ... if you've never been to a Bruce concert and want to know what it's like, look at those faces. As wonderful as Springsteen on Broadway is, it is missing one thing: those faces.

 

throwback to bruce springsteen

For some reason, we've seen Bruce Springsteen a lot of times in October. I've seen him 36 times, which by the averages means we should have seen him 3 times in October. But the first two times we saw him were in October, and there was the road trip in October of 1980 where we saw him five times in a week. In total, we have seen him 16 times in October.

Since it's October 25, I'll play the Throwback Thursday game and look at the three times we saw him on October 25.

First was 1980 in Portland, the first day of our 1980 Road Trip. It was our 6th Bruce concert, and the only time we've seen him outside of California. That was the year Mount St. Helens erupted, and while the most damage was done in May, in mid-October there were more eruptions. In honor of this event, Bruce played "On Top of Old Smokey" for the first and only time in his career. Here is the audio of "On Top of Old Smokey":

Our second Bruce/October 25 show came 19 years later, in 1999. This was the Reunion Tour ... we saw three shows in Oakland, the first of which came on the 25th. Not much is easily found from that show, so here is "Out in the Street" audio from one of the three:

Our third, and thus far last, Bruce on October 25 show came in 2007.10-25-07. I saw "Our", but in fact, Robin didn't go to this one, the first time I was there without her ... she went with me the next night. One advantage was that I was in the pit for the show on the 25th ... Robin doesn't do pit. Here is a photo of me and my friend Tom at that show:

This was the only one of these three shows that came after I started this blog, so:

"Night One"

taking throwback literally

On this date in 1988, the Giants and Dodgers played a doubleheader at Candlestick before 50,000 fans. The first game started at 5:35, so you knew it was going to be a late night ... and it was, beginning on Tuesday but not ending until the wee hours of Wednesday.

As is always the case, my memories are hazy, but looking through Google, I find those memories mostly supported by evidence. Those of you who remember Candlestick will understand that it was cold. Fans regularly came dressed in layers, and as I recall I wore shorts (it was July, after all) but had warmer clothes, including long pants, in my backpack. At some point during the first game, I announced that I wasn't going to put on my long pants until the Giants won. Since the Dodgers won both games that night, I never managed to get my long pants on. The temperature for the second game was 49 degrees. It didn't end until 1:21 AM ... I don't know what the temperature was by then.

The first game was a pitchers' duel between Terry Mulholland and Orel Hershiser, tied at 1-1 until Rick Dempsey hit a 2-run homer to put the Dodgers ahead. The Giants grabbed a run back in the bottom of the 8th, but it all fell apart in the top of the ninth. Craig Lefferts, pitching his second inning, started the inning giving up a home run to Jeff Hamilton, after which he put the next two batters on. Scott Garrelts came in to pitch, and gave up a 2-run triple to Steve Sax. Finally, to pile on the embarrassment, Garrelts was then called for a balk, with Sax trotting home with another run. (To understand about balks and 1988, check out "Balks: The Story of the 1988 Major League Baseball Season" by Theron Schultz.) The Dodgers ended up winning, 7-3.

The second game began at 9:10. The Dodgers scored four runs in the 4th inning, but the Giants slowly came back to tie the game, 5-5, in the bottom of the 9th, leading to extra innings. (Did I mention it was cold? That I had on short pants? That we had now moved into Wednesday?) No one scored in the 10th. In the top of the 11th, Garrelts (back for his second appearance of the night) gave up a lead-off double to Franklin Stubbs. A ground ball moved Stubbs to third base with one out, bringing Dave Anderson to the plate.

Garrelts was called for a balk. Stubbs crossed the plate. Dodgers 6, Giants 5.

After the balk, Giants manager Roger Craig and pitcher Mike Krukow, who was on the DL, were ejected. The Dodgers ended up winners by that 6-5 score. The elapsed time between the first pitch of Game One and the last pitch of Game Two was 7 hours and 46 minutes. It was cold. I had on short pants.

Accounts vary, but there were around 30 arrests and 100 fans were escorted out of the park. I've always had one memory that I assumed must be false, but according to the book 100 Things Dodgers Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die by Jon Weisman, that most amazing of all my memories was true. A fan in the lower deck, close to home plate, caught a foul ball and threw it at the home plate umpire.

A lot of stuff was thrown on the field. That foul ball was the one that looms largest in my memory ... he gave up a souvenir! ... by throwing it at the umpire! But there were more infamous items being thrown. In particular, batteries. Dodger left-fielder Kirk Gibson was a popular target ... this is when Candlestick had that empty space between the left-field fence and the bleachers, a space that was filled with joyous kids when a home run came their way, but on that night, the space allowed unruly, pissed-off, drunken fans to climb on the fence, the better to locate the target of their missiles.

Gibson was later quoted as saying, "I've got to go out there again tonight. I'm not saying anything."

The best quote, though, came from Giants president and general manager Al Rosen. Rosen won an MVP award as a player, and was remembered as a bad ass who was Jewish and was always ready to fight opposing players if they offered up anti-Semitic insults. Rosen had spent four years in the Navy during World War II, and was a part of the initial landing on Okinawa during that war. He knew what he was talking about. After the doubleheader, Rosen said, "The beach at Okinawa was safer".

Little kids never again flooded the space in left field after home runs ... the Giants filled the space with barriers for the next game, and never made the space available again. The Giants, who at the time were the defending division champions, ended up in fourth place, while the Dodgers went to the World Series, where Kirk Fucking Gibson hit one of the most memorable home runs in the history of baseball (the fucker). There was some good news ... after 1988, the Dodgers didn't make it to the World Series again for 29 years (and when they finally made it, they lost), while during the same time period the Giants won three World Series. In a new park. Candlestick itself served as the home of the San Francisco 49ers for many years. It was demolished in 2015.

In 1999, as the Giants played their last season at Candlestick before moving to their new park, the Chronicle interviewed some people about their memories of the old dump. One of the best was a guy named Jesse Stirling:

My most vivid Candlestick memory would have to be the twi-night double-header against the Dodgers: an evening so rowdy, it ended the phenomenon of everyone jumping out of their seats to catch home run balls hit beyond the left field fence.

In a move never to be repeated by Giants management, a doubleheader was scheduled against the Dodgers on July 26, 1988, with both games taking place after nightfall. This meant 18 solid innings of drinking for the Giants faithful. Throw in two Scott Garrelts blown saves in a span of four hours, and you have a recipe for disaster. In the middle of all this was a young lad (me) and his dad. 

I saw no less than seven fist fights around me. Every curse word imaginable was hurled at the few Dodger fans who dared to brave the cold Candlestick night. Trust me, those Dodger fans weren't making a peep by the second game. The crowd was screaming "Beat L.A." so loud, it sounded like a rock concert at college.

A drunk guy sitting two seats away from me caught a foul ball, and the crowd started chanting, "Throw it back!" The mob mentality prevailed, and with a beer in one hand, the drunk proceeded to whistle a throw toward home plate that barely missed the home plate ump.

In left field, Kirk Gibson was getting pelted with everything from batteries to empty whiskey bottles. Fans were running out of their seats, climbing the chain-linked fence, and throwing stuff at Gibson's head. This is while the game is going on!

It was out of control. They put the barricades up in left field the very next game. The drunk who threw the ball onto the field was cuffed and escorted out of the park faster than you can say, "Humm baby."

The evening even made its way to the Urban Dictionary:

battery chucker

No-Cal, (Northern California) Fan, for his perceived tendency to throw batteries at opposing players, especially those from So-Cal. Mostly Giant's Baseball Fan.

 

Here is the game played the previous night (Giants win!):

throwing it back to 1976: randy newman and ry cooder

On this date in 1976 (the Bicentennial year!), we saw Randy Newman and Ry Cooder at the San Jose Center for the Performing Arts. Newman wasn't pushing an album, far as I can recall ... Good Old Boys was a couple of years old, Little Criminals was still a year away (Cooder would play on both of those albums). Newman was 32 years old, Cooder 29. Cooder released Chicken Skin Music later in '76, so I imagine he played some of those tunes ... clearly my memory is shot, I can't even picture Cooder in my mind from that night.

We enjoyed Newman ... only time we saw him, but whenever I see him on TV or YouTube, his personality reminds me very much of that night.

They both appeared on the soundtrack to one of my very favorite movies, Performance, back around 1970. Here are a couple of examples. First, the opening of the film, which features a few bars of Newman singing "Gone Dead Train". Note: some S&M sex in the clip, if you click on it.

Performance opening

And "Hashishin" by Cooder and Buffy Sainte-Marie:

Might as well include the most famous song from the movie:

 

throwback thursday: my first prince concert

Saw Prince for the first time, 37 years ago, at The Stone in San Francisco, capacity around 700. Greil Marcus was there, and wrote the following:

Fronting a band of three blacks and two Jews from Minneapolis, Prince stormed into town on the heels of last year’s breakthrough Dirty Mind, was greeted by the most excited and diverse crowd (black and white, punk and funk, straight and gay, young and old, rich and poor) I’ve been part of in a long time, and sent everyone home awestruck and drained: “That was the history of rock ‘n’ roll in one song!” a friend shouted before the last notes of “When You Were Mine” were out of the air. All barriers of music, sex, and race were seemingly trashed by Prince’s performance, and leering organist Lisa Coleman walked off with the 1981 Most Valuable Player award—edging out Junior Walker, whose sax work on Foreigner’s “Urgent” is the closest he’s come to hoodoo in a twenty-year career.

The setlist:

Do It All Night
Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?
Gotta Broken Heart Again
Broken
When You Were Mine
Sexy Dancer
Sister
I Wanna Be Your Lover
Head
Still Waiting
Partyup
Crazy You
Gotta Stop (Messin' About)
Dirty Mind

Everybody Dance
Bambi

 

throwback thursday: love has gone away

I picked up a CD the other day, and I assure you, I rarely buy CDs anymore. But this one can't be found on streaming. It's a couple of Lou Reed concerts from 1978, when he was touring behind Street Hassle. The concerts happened a month or two before the ones memorialized on Lou's official live album, Take No Prisoners.

One of the concerts on the CD I got, Waltzing Matilda (love has gone away), was from The Old Waldorf in San Francisco, recorded 40 years ago today, March 22 1978. And we were there. I think it was the third time we'd seen him, first time in a club (so this might have been the night my wife looked at Lou's hands ... we were right up against the stage ... and informed me that they looked like her grandfather's).

There are no easily available cuts from the night we went (hence my buying the CD), so here is one from Take No Prisoners:

 

throwback to 1980

I wrote about this 12 years ago ... thought I'd just cut-and-paste for Throwback Thursday:

25 years ago today [ed. note: now 37 years], I attended a double-header at Candlestick Park that shows the way sports works its way into our lives not only in large ways but also in small ones.

1980 was a nondescript season for the Giants. They got off to a slow start, and by June 29, they were already 11 games out and well on their way to a fifth-place finish in a six-team division. On offense, they had Jack Clark, Darrell Evans and very little else ... the pitching was a bit better, with Vida Blue and Ed Whitson having decent years (and making the All-Star team) and the bullpen pitching well.

Anyway, a bunch of us decided to take in the double-header, which was against the hated Dodgers. My then-brother-in-law Randy came with us, and my then-sister-in-law [ed. note: actually she's my niece] Julie (lotta "thens" in this story) ... Julie was attending her first-ever baseball game (I guess she was also attending her second-ever baseball game). I don't remember who else went. The only thing going on for the Giants was the impending retirement of Willie McCovey, who was closing down a Hall of Fame career, and would be leaving the game at the All-Star break, which was a little more than a week away.

McCovey wasn't in the starting lineup for the first game. That spot belonged to Rich Murray, a 22-year-old pheenom who had just come up to the majors earlier in the month. (Murray's tenure as McCovey's replacement didn't last long ... he only played 57 games in the majors, and is mostly known now as Eddie Murray's brother.) The game was to-and-fro, Bob Knepper dueling with Don Sutton, and as the Giants came to bat in the bottom of the ninth, the score was tied 3-3. (It should be noted that the prospect of extra innings at a double-header wasn't quite so frightening in those days ... the game I am currently describing, for instance, only lasted 2 hours and 12 minutes.) The Dodgers brought in Bobby Castillo to relieve the tiring Sutton, and after a leadoff single by Rennie Stennett, Castillo retired the next two hitters, bringing up the pitcher's spot in the lineup.

And pinch-hitting for Bob Knepper was Willie McCovey.

There were 50,000 people at the park that day, and this was what we'd come to see: our old hero taking one last shot at our archrivals to the south. McCovey had managed only one homerun all season, the 521st of his career, but I think we can be forgiven for thinking hoping begging praying that he had #522 somewhere in that tired body.

And Castillo pitched to McCovey, and he got ahold of one. It went flying towards the right-centerfield fence, and 50,000 of us leapt into the air while Rennie Stennett circled the bases towards home. And then, since this is real life and not a made-up story, the ball fell just short of a homer, bouncing off the fence for a double that won the game for the Giants.

And I remember that game to this day.

Everything after that was anti-climactic. The Giants were shutout by Burt Hooton in the second game, and McCovey did not make an appearance. The most legendary occurrence in that second game was that Randy, who's gotta be like 6'5", fell asleep, which is hard enough with 50,000 people making noise, and even harder when you can barely fit into the seat in the first place. I've never let him forget that little nap.

The next Thursday, McCovey played his last game at Candlestick, and I played a little hooky to be there. In the third inning, with Jack Clark on third, Mac dribbled a ball past Dan Driessen at firstbase for a single and an RBI, his last at Candlestick. In the top of the 8th inning, McCovey went out to his position, and then, while everyone stood and cheered, Pheenom Murray came out to replace him. (There were 26,000 of us, not bad for a midweek day game.) Stretch McCovey was gone.

McCovey had one last shot in him, it turned out. On Sunday in Los Angeles, in his last game ever, he pinch-hit late in a tie game and lifted a sacrifice fly that gave the Giants the lead. It was his last major-league at-bat.