New Pep Band CD!

[Rico]

How about just playing the Mickey Mouse Club song when the opponents come on the ice and then "Davy" when the Big Red hit it?

Well that is what we do for the pregame and first period. Unless say it's Harvard, and we replace mickey mouse with Love Story. Or Vermont and we replace it with Baby Elephant Walk.

In fact, in thinking about it some more, I think it would be tremendous to have some songs that the fans can/would sign along with when the Red come out to skate around. If all the fans were singing, it would create an impressive wall of sound and add to the Lynah legend.

I dunno.. again this might be one of those "well if you can think of something..." sorta situations.

On the record, I hate Imperial March. ::yark::  ::yark::  ::yark:: I'm not the only one that regards it as one of the lamest things in the world to play. But not as much as Star Wars Cantina. So I really think the chances of that beating out "Gonna Fly Now" are slim to none. :-D

[rhovorka]

After reading CULater and Jason's comments about the 3rd period song, I have to strongly disagree.  For the sake of argument, let's assume the alternative is "Imperial March" as Jason suggests.

1) your concern that it's painting Cornell as underdogs.  I think you're thinking about it waaay too much.  The connotations I get?  Rocky = Good.  Darth Vader = Evil.  Rocky tends to win at the end and is still portrayed as strong-willed and in top physical condition by the ending fights...unable to be knocked down.  The Empire tends to get it's ass kicked...by a little, puny team, too.  I understand the "strength" theme of the Imperial March...but in the Rocky movies, that song is used during the rigorous pre-fight training montages.  And the tune itself is more...inspirational than the Empire theme.  Also, if you associate the tune with underdogs, what's so bad about that?  Americans LOVE underdogs and stories of overcoming the odds.  Look at the Patriots!

2) Tempo.  Imperial March is a march.  Rocky's music is titled "Gonna Fly Now."  Great title.  Better tempo.  You want our team coming out of that door marching or flying?  I've got my choice.  At the end of "Gonna Fly Now" you can almost see Coach Schafer with a peacoat and one of those knit hats that Mickey wore screaming "speed...speeeeed....SPEEEEEED!"  (Ok, maybe I got a little carried away there).  Speeding up Imperial March to match would sound pretty lame.

3) Crowd involvement.  I've never in my 10 years of attending hockey games and 4+ years in the band heard a crowd get fired up or louder for Imperial March.  I mean never.  "Gonna Fly Now" is just a more clappable tune.  From the fanfare as the goaltender first bursts onto the ice to the strong inspirational melody as the team warms up it works with the crowd.  Not to mention it's more singable, too.  And it meshes right into Rock and Roll Part II (aka Gary Glitter, aka the "Hey" song, aka the "sieve" song...) wonderfully.  Same tempo, people are already clapping...it's the best pairing of songs since "We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions"

Great.  Now you'll have me dreaming about a hockey game between Rocky and Darth Vader.

[Tom Lento]

Great. Now you'll have me dreaming about a hockey game between Rocky and Darth Vader.

Cool!  Best game ever!

Hey, Age, think you can find a smiley for that one?  :-))

Great job on the board, too.  Gets better by the day. . .  eventually I should get around to creating a name and logging in, eh?

[Josh '99]

Rich Hovorka '96 wrote:

2) Tempo.  Imperial March is a march.  Rocky's music is titled "Gonna Fly Now."  Great title.  Better tempo.  You want our team coming out of that door marching or flying?  I've got my choice.  At the end of "Gonna Fly Now" you can almost see Coach Schafer with a peacoat and one of those knit hats that Mickey wore screaming "speed...speeeeed....SPEEEEEED!"  (Ok, maybe I got a little carried away there).  Speeding up Imperial March to match would sound pretty lame.

I gotta say, though, Schafer in full black body armor would be pretty cool too.

[jason]

I guess I like the sense of "power" projected by the Imperial March, but I concede that it lacks the up-tempo to get the crowd clapping and would not mesh well with Rock-n-Roll Part 2 (aka Gary Glitter). But the Rocky Theme (for me) is too strongly associated with "underdog" which is not the feeling I want when welcoming back the team -especially for the more recent Cornell squads. (Yes, I'm bored and antsy waiting for Cornell's next game and hence have taken to arguing about song selection in order to pass the time. :-))

Rich, I'm probably "thinking about it waaay too much" as stated, although I'd like to note that you did construct a 3 point argument in response (I particularly liked the Mike Schafer-Bergess Meredith imagery). :-P (Rich, forgive me, I was itchin' to make a wise-ass remark.)

BTW, Darth Vader wins the game with relative ease, but Rocky wins the hearts of the crowd.  The following night -in a shocker- Brown steals a win from Vader in a low scoring affair.

[Josh '99]

Jason N '95 wrote:

BTW, Darth Vader wins the game with relative ease, but Rocky wins the hearts of the crowd.  The following night -in a shocker- Brown steals a win from Vader in a low scoring affair.

After which, many fans of Vader's rivals post to USCHO saying, "I guess Vader wasn't so good after all, he lost to a COLOR!"

[CUlater \'89]

I agree that "Imperial March" may not be right for the Red, but that doesn't mean "Gonna Fly Now" is right either.  My impression (and I would think many others') is that the song represents the underdog making good (from the first movie).  We are rarely the underdog these days.

Just because Mickey Mouse and Davy are played in the first two periods, it doesn't mean something different must be done before the third.

[Beeeej]

It's never really occurred to me to associate "Gonna Fly Now" with anything other than a great song that the Pep Band plays really well, and that sounds great leading into "Rock and Roll, Part 2."  I mean, really - while we're at it, shouldn't we replace "Rock and Roll, Part 2," since I now associate it mostly with Gary Glitter's conviction on child pornography charges?

Beeeej

[jason]

Child Pornography? ::twitch:: Beeej, you just ruined Rock and Roll Part 2 for me.  :-))

With all this debating, *sniff, sniff*, I smell a new poll (Age, take note :-) ).

[CUlater \'89]

What about the first time you heard the band play it (or the first time they played it when we were leading going into the third period)?

I distinctly remember being confounded.  The same for my wife.

Ditto for playing "Underdog", except when we are.

[jason]

Surprisingly, the Underdog Theme doesn't have the same effect on me, it justs strikes me as a goofy/amusing song (and Underdog is not an underdog, if that makes sense), plus now that some folks have contrived lyrics that replace "Underdog" with "Underhill" its place in the Pep Band's repertoire seems all the more appropriate.

[CowbellGuy]

Lyrics are in the Cheers section at eLynah. And I'll just preface that by saying it was a very slow weekend...

[rhovorka]

What about the first time you heard the band play it (or the first time they played it when we were leading going into the third period)?

Honestly?  The first time, I thought "why don't we save this song for fights?"  Since Rocky = boxing to me, I thought it would be cool to start into it as soon as the gloves drop.  But then I realized that big brawls are somewhat less common in college hockey.  

Rich, I'm probably "thinking about it waaay too much" as stated, although I'd like to note that you did construct a 3 point argument in response

LOL...true.  You got me.  :-))  I guess as a former bandie, it's in my blood to overanalyze anything musical.

So would Vader's team consist of easily checkable Stormtroopers?  For some reason that would remind me way too much of the hockey scene in "Strange Brew."

[Greg Berge]

> So would Vader's team consist of easily checkable Stormtroopers?

Yes.  And despite years of training, they would miss all their checks and be whupped by a junior B team of Ewoks.

An Ewok in a hockey uniform would actually be pretty cute.  If I didn't f::yark::cking hate Ewoks.

Since most of the PR insanity about Gary Glitter has died down (let's burn The Importance of Being Earnest while we're at it...), I'm all for keeping it.  It's one of the few things the crowd can still get it together on, and the a capella (sp?) portion during play is downright frightening.

May I just add that I also hate the Imperial March (talk about an old, dried-up reference).

[Mike Steinfeld]

In defense of the "Underdog" Theme... it's actually one of the two songs that the trombone section uses as their 'anthem', the other being an excerpt from "New World" and both are usually played at any given hockey or football game. There are "Underhill" lyrics to "Underdog", and besides that, there are also "Underbone" lyrics for it. The trumpets have their own lyrics that they generally sing to it, but they're pretty much all assholes, so we ignore them.
Here are the Underbone lyrics for those curious:

When trumpets in the band appear
to menace all our fun and cheer
What hero should then appear
and bring to us our precious beer
Underbone, Underbone
Slide of lightning
Sound of thunder
Drinking all to the table under
Underbone
Un-der-bone

Yeah, I'm a tool.

Mike