Athletes in Music

By: Kendall | in: General, Music |

I think back at my high school years and I wonder how I made it through all of them. I couldn’t make up my mind if I wanted to be a jock, or an artist, or if I wanted to be the cool rocker, smoking out by the B&J quick mart just off of school property. Depending on the semester one of those ideas would always take precedence. My core groups of friends were nothing like one another, ranging from theater kids, to the AP Calc guys that studied 24-7, parts of the football team, to the clam bakers. Something kept us together. I guess I was lucky in ways to be exposed to a lot of different types of people. But today I realize that I am a lot more forgiving of the over-emotional rock kids than I am of the Jocks. I think it may be partly the hulking line backers that used to laugh at me for being the receiver that they constantly crushed, or if it was the nasty hockey players that got more blow jobs than I did, yet still had talk about playing the cookie game together. Don’t ask…. That being said, there is good and bad from each group, but for the purpose of entertainment I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt. What would happen if more jocks were in the music industry?

shaq

I have seen the studio that Shaq recorded his first album in. In fact, I have spent hours inside of it, and know it fairly well. The recording console is about 80 faders wide and I have to push myself from side to side on a chair to cover its immensity, and I can totally imagine that immense man with his outstretched arms dwarfing the whole console. The thought of this leaves me in awe. I have also heard his first album. In fact I just went and dug it out of a closet, and I’m again in awe. I don’t know how many of us out there can actually say we have really heard it, but it did go platinum! I don’t know if it was excitement over the then pepsi/nike backed wonder of the world, or if it was people really thinking they were getting something special. With titles like “Shoot Pass Slam” “Game Over” and “I hate to Brag”, I’m sure you can get the idea. If you think he is a lazy player, you should hear his record. Good thing he had some strong help from from the likes of Eric Sermon, Def Jef, and the Fu Schnickens.

Shaq is one thing. What if we looked at an earlier example like Mary Lou Retton, America’s 80’s gymnastic Olympian sweetheart. She put out an entire album, without ever really singing on it. It was called ABC Fun Fit. She actually gave aerobic instruction to kids, along with a beat that sounded like it was made on a cheesy wal-mart keyboard. But hey, kids around the country loved her. Another Olympian that released an album was Oscar De La Hoya. I laughed when I heard this, and then discovered he got nominated for aGrammy in 2000! The album consists of both Spanish and English Latin pop songs.

Moving on, it may be worth taking a look at songs that are a little less serious as far as material, but VERY serious in super group star power. Remember the 1985 Chicago Bears? They were about to go into Super Bowl XX, and put together the The Chicago Bears Shufflin’ Crew.

It was the first sports team to ever get nominated for a Grammy award. It was a Super Bowl rap song, and was nominated under the Best hythm & Blues Vocal Performance—Duo or Group. All proceeds were donated to Charity, and the song topped at #41 on the Billboard music charts. The performers included “Sweetness” Walter Payton, “Punky QB” Jim McMahon, and “Samurai” Mike Singletary. The music was composed by Bobby Daniels and Lloyd Barry, and the lyrics were written by Richard E. Meyer and Melvin Owens.

In 1966, Toronto Maple Leafs Goalie Johnny Bower, and the rest of the team were approached by song writer Chris Young to perform some songs he had written. Johnny volunteered after finding out that the proceeds would go to charity. Before all was said and done he found himself in a studio recording with a bunch of kids under the monacher: Johnny Bower and Little John with the Rinky-Dinks. What followed was a set of Christmas song titled “Honky the Christmas Goose and Banjo the Mule”. The song made it all the way to #29 on the Canadian music charts. A great article on this can be found here.

elvis

Not to be outdone by his Canadian Ice brother, figure skater Elvis Stojko announced he has an album completed, but doesn’t appear to be released yet. He describes the album as “hot” adult contemporary, but with a twist. “It’s just more edgy,” he said. Sounds like now might be his time with the release of Blades of Glory about to take the movie industry by storm.

Ok, last one I swear. Sometimes we have musicians that even try to tap the popularity of their jock/actor counterparts to try to make something big. Take Wyclef as an example when he had wrestling star The Rock join him on the song “It Doesn’t Matter” on his second album titled the Eclectic. One other wrestler we all know decided to go at it on his own in 1995. Hulk Hogan released his album Hulk Rules by Hulk Hogan and the wrestling boot band. The Hulkster is in the house and if you want to check him out, you better go HERE!

hulk

Musicians take their careers seriously. They want to gain critical acclaim and make money. Most are not good athletes. Most of us are too skinny, smoke, and haven’t run in years. Athletes already get paid millions of dollars to do what they do, and do it well. Even the worst players in professional leagues make more than most musicians. I believe this is the reason that many of us musicians, can’t handle the encroachment (pun intended) that athletes perform (pun also intended) when they try to move into musical territory. As I have done my research here, I have really wanted to think that what they do is a joke musically, and won’t ever make anything worth while. Then I come to find they sell more records in many cases, and help kids, and donate money. How can musicians compete? We often weren’t popular in high school, and we still lose to the jocks in our careers, even with better music.

Hulk Hogan - Hulkster’s In The House

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Posted on March 17, 2007

Comments

8 Responses to “Athletes in Music”

esofthub on March 18th, 2007 6:01 am

I didn’t know Shaq was a muscian, too. Those giant hands over the console must have been a sight to behold. I had an ex-Army buddy (SPC type) that had him in an English class at LSU. He said he was pretty cool dude.

Charbarred on March 18th, 2007 8:52 am

I guess it takes more than the ability to play basketball to reach the level of Shaq. You have to be a pretty intelligent guy to market yourself as more than a ball player.
Saying that, the surprising thing is that he actually succeeded with his music…

paddy on March 18th, 2007 11:14 am

AQnd he is in Miami police as well. Correct me if I am wrong.

esofthub on March 19th, 2007 2:11 am

Charbarred, no doubt, he has done very well marketing himself. Signing 100+ million dollar contracts helps. too.

Paddy–You’re right. He’s a reserve police officer.

Shaq left LSU early for the NBA as junior in 1992 and then came back to graduate (Business) in 2000. In 2005, he earned a master’s in business administration from the University of Phoenix. He now wants to earn a degree in criminal justice. The Big Aristotle has an affinity for learning.