Stars on Sports Intro: It's time for Stars on Sports! A podcast-radio show dedicated to sharing stories about our athletic program at Lansing Community College. LCC athletics has a strong tradition. 23 national championship wins! Over 170 All-Americans! 19 MCCAA all sports trophies! Stars on Sports will introduce you to individuals that have contributed to our program success and give you the backstory on what it takes to develop it. We'll also dive into and break down the topics and issues facing athletic departments across the nation and right here at LCC. This is Stars on Sports!

Hello and welcome to another episode of THS on sports. And today's exciting because Stephen is on spring break down in Mississippi for some baseball games in warm weather. So I'm joined by Daedalian, our producer today. And, you know, it's exciting. Daedalian has been behind the scenes for our podcast for a number of episodes, and it's good to have him on the air because he provides valuable feedback. But his background is music, so I thought today we would combine music and sports and how much they're integrated. You know, Stephen and I always talk about how music and sports are the two platforms that bring people together. And I like music. It's one of my ways to relax or debrief and calm myself. I was in the band back in the day, so I'm not afraid to say that. So I've always tried to have a good working relationship with the music departments in the high school setting or in college, because they're an integral part of our college and the athletic department. And there are very similarities between the two. I mean, the music department, they practice every day and then they usually compete at a festival or a contest. Very similar to athletics. Practicing and then using that to compete and then reflect and either get graded. I remember back in the solo and ensemble days, you got a one or two rating, or even at a festival as an orchestra or band, you'd get a rating that's similar to a performance in athletics. You either get judged by a rating in, like, gymnastics or you compete against another team and you do similar things in music. So there's a lot of similarities there today. And athletics relies on music for a lot of things. Student athletes rely on them to calm them down or pump them up. Administrators use them to fill time or to pump up the crowd or so many different things. We start the contest with national anthems. And it's funny, I've been in this business for 25 years, and there's one that lasts a minute and 14, and there's one that lasts over two minutes. And some people get mad if you're not patriotic enough to play a very professional one. And some get mad if it's too long. And sometimes they don't work at all. I was telling dad Dion before we went on the air. I always joke if I get through the Nash anthem, I'm good to go. Because then the officials hand to start the game. But I gotta make sure the national anthem plays. And there's been times where students have said the wrong words and run out crying. There's been times where I've had it on my phone and it skipped.

Or like the student that was singing

yes, saying the wrong word. We had a packed gym a couple years ago in a big tournament and she just lost her train of thought, you know. And you know, we've had some bad performances over the years that we went to. Getting recommendations from the music department and making sure the student practiced or tested before then, before they came to them. Cause I got a lot of requests saying hey, I'd like to sing the national anthem forum. And you want to showcase your students ability, especially from other departments. And they're really good. It's much better than playing a recording or such. But yeah, there's probably been two or three times over my career where the student unfortunately forgot the words or got caught up. And you know, we've had some. They're performing in front of large crowds.

That's a nerve wracking situation no matter who you are.

It is.

It's like public speaking. And doing it in the classroom in front of your teacher is much different than doing it in front of 2000 which were. And she ran out of the gym crying and we went to try and console her and take care of her. And you've seen it on TV and other events. And the backup plan is always the pledge allegiance if it doesn't work. But it's the first thing of your event, you want it to go well, you want to start the event off right and you want to be patriotic. There's discussion on should you do it before each game or just the first game of the night or the highest level of the night. And you get feedback on good or bad, on why don't you play it before every game or why do you only play it once? You're not patriotic. And so it's a very important part of event. And every sporting event across the country plays the national anthem. You know, we had protests a couple years ago during that. So you tried to figure out to make sure you're Prepared for how to handle those situations. You have situations where you just want to make sure that it's played in the right way so that it's respectful to your country and the veterans in the crowd. So it's an important way to start meet. There's discussion of not playing it. There's discussion of who needs to be out there when you play it. There's some level that the teams aren't out there for the national anthem, at least in the other discussion of if you have a band or a pep band that plays. And I'm a big believer of having your other departments on campus. I would love for us to get a pep band here at LCC. Some prefer just playing DJ music. Some schools hire a DJ for athletic events to play music. So there's a lot of different options. But it's very important. You know, it's fun. When I'm athletic events, you know, I was at a hockey game this weekend and you know, I'm downloading songs that they were playing. I think I need this on my playlist. And again, it's the way of music just making you feel good.

I would have never thought that that much would go into the Star Spangled Banner and the process of that. And that's one of the things that I love about sitting in on the shows with you and Steve is listening to you guys talk about a lot of the things that I wouldn't realize goes into what you do. And that just isn't one of the things that I thought would be that big of a concern. You throw somebody out there, they sing and then you're done. But it makes sense as you say it. Yeah, yeah.

You want everybody standing again. I use an instrumental by one of our military bands. Usually is what I use to play. And you just want it to be right because it's important to many people. And it's a set the tone for the event too. If something goes wrong, then you're thinking, this is a good first impression. And that's the first thing we do at an athletic event. Then we go into our introduction and then again then it have to carry over to the rest of the event and to the point of how important music is. And as I talked about warm up music at the high school level, my principal would come to me at least once a year and want to cancel us playing warm up music because he got a phone call because it was inappropriate and had bad words or bad connotations in it. And there's companies out there now that will provide it for you again. You can hire a dj, but we usually screen it before we play it. At this level, there seems to be a little more, I don't want to say acceptance of different genres, but the older people in the crowd might think the music's too loud or I didn't come to a band concert or a concert. I've had people complain to me before. But the events for the student athletes and your student body that you want to try and cater them and find genre that interests them. The portable speakers are huge. We have one up in our storage room and some bring their own and set it underneath the basket. Baseball Cutter would tell you would have walk out songs, which is pretty cool. Determining what those are, you know, at tactical level, we had an app on the phone, every kid that came up, you push their name and you know, 22nd blurb of their song would come out. And you want it to be cool. I mean it does set the environment for the event. So I love music. It's an integral part of what we do. What do you think? What's the first song that you think of when you, when you think of a sporting event that comes to your mind?

I'd have to say there's two that, I mean, as you've been talking, two that came to my mind automatically. You got AC DCs thunderstruck, always been a favorite of mine. And then of course too unlimited. Y' all ready for this? You know, that always comes to mind. There's a lot of that Jock jams kind of stuff.

Yeah, Jock jams with a big cd it was.

And they sold those like crazy too

because it's such an important part of the event. And now it's even again, an administrative technique to pump up your crowd throughout the game or you know, in my eyes, to minimize crowd levels of dissatisfaction that you can drown them out a little bit by playing a song. And it's been proven that that music helps you feel better. It helps you control your emotions. And that's why a lot of student athletes use it in warm up music. You know, AirPods now they all have their own music in the locker rooms. You can hear it blaring to get them pumped up. But there is a lot of research out there that it does help you control your emotions. One, it distracts you, but two, it might help you remember something good that will prepare you to succeed in a high moment of the contest.

Oh, definitely. Music pumps adrenaline just as much as anything. And I found the inappropriate thing, the comment there, that, that is very interesting and the Fact that as we were talking about jock jams, I was thinking of some of the songs that used to play on there. And I remember Whoomp, There it Is. That back in my day was considered inappropriate. But now you hear it. Not a big deal.

Yeah, and that's the tough thing with music is the different standards, the distinct taste that people have. As I mentioned, when you have an athletic event, you bring a lot of diverse people together and mainly age, where some of the older people might not like the younger music that's heard. And there's some classics out there. Sweet Caroline, Eye of the Tiger, you know, that you hear Don't Stop Believing. That's probably one of my favorite that you hear at a lot of athletic events.

Well, even Sweet Caroline's, though, that's got, like, a hollerback. And if you're in the wrong place, the hollerback has some pretty graphic lyrics. We'll say. Or hollerback.

I believe one institution banned it. A large institution. Because of. Because of that. Yeah.

And you can't even win for that. I mean, you know, Sweet Caroline, you don't get much more chilled out than that.

That's exactly right. Certain situations, you can't win. And to your point of what's appropriate, not appropriate, we all probably have our own set of values. I mean, there's probably a general set of values.

And it changes with time.

It sure does. It sure does. But it's cool. And it is an important part of the event. And some stadiums are known for the song they play. Like, I believe Wisconsin this year in football, I think they play Jump around or Pump it up. And the whole stadium is just rocking and shaking. And then at the University of Michigan, they play Mr. Brightside, and they play the song for 30 seconds and then they turn it off. And 100,000 people sing the chorus line.

That's pretty cool.

It is cool.

Jump around. I'm assuming you're talking about House of Pain, and that was another one that was not quite accepted back in the day. Yes, but great tune. And it definitely hypes up the crowd.

They are great tunes. And that's what you want the environment to be, a positive. It's not a band concert. We didn't come to a band. It's definitely an athletic event. But if you're clever enough, and it's an administrative skill because you have your public address announcer that wants to talk, too. So you have to balance when the music plays and when the public address announcer is supposed to speak and how to coordinate that. And we've had issues where certain people were mad because they spoke over them or the music played over the public address announcer. And good public address announcers know to try and balance that and let it play. And in some institutions, the public address announcer is in charge of the music. That way they can play it and certainly. And definitely when they're done talking. So it's definitely an art of even managing throughout the game of, you know, when to play and when not to play, what to play, what not to play. And some are very funny and creative and tie right into the event. You know, like if there was a long video replay, they play the Jeopardy. Theme. And, you know, so it definitely is an integral part of athletic events. So I'm trying to do better here at LCC, we don't always consistently play, and I'd like to do more than that. I had some discussions with our music department last year about getting a pep band at our basketball games. And again, I mentioned that there's some people that like that idea and there's some people that want the music from a DJ or stereo system. But showcasing your student athletes or students is what it's about. And whether it's your students singing the national anthem or having your pep band, we have our media class that livestream all our events. Jeff Hamlin does an excellent job with his classroom, and they have four cameras out there and they live stream our basketball and volleyball games, indoor events. We're hoping to get them to do outdoor events and the future, but the same with the music department, that they can become an integral part of the athletic event, at least at certain contests. And, you know, they would play the classic songs and even the national anthem, which would take one task straight off of me because I'm the one making sure my phone's on silent and I have the right song and not the one before or after playing. And, you know, now I use a chord because last year, twice when I Bluetooth, it skipped in the middle of the song. So you just. I just gotta. It's crazy how much time I do prepare.

Text from the wife right in the middle of the high note there.

Exactly. Anything can happen. You gotta prepare for everything in this business. And music adds a whole nother level to that. And that's why some people don't use it or. And we haven't utilized it to our advantage yet. And even across all sports, at cross country meets and track meets, they now have music in the background when they're running. And that's good. It usually helps you when you're Running long distance. Obviously the easy ones are the basketball and volleyball ones. Indoor. Our baseball team, they play music in between innings and have walk up music. And I'm hoping our softball team can get to that too. And again, some of it is that coordination with the public address announcer and them buying into that environment. And that's not always the case. Some public address announcers want to hear themselves talk and think it's about them. But fortunately here at LCC we have good ones that I think we can make it happen. So that's a goal of ours, to continue to integrate music into our athletic events. You know, I meant to have it prepared here. We have a fight song here at LCC that I love.

Oh, you should have said something.

And an alma mater.

You know, if you give me a little time, I might be able to pull that up. We'll have to see.

It's an older version and there has been discussion to modernize it. But how important fight songs are to sports teams. And you know, they rate them every year you play it after every big event at the athletic contest. So you rally behind it. It kind of goes with your brand, who you are and what you're known for, whether you like it or don't like it or you don't want to get caught up in the rivals fight song. But you know, going through the archives, we did find that LCC had one that was developed back when in the.

I think it was like the 50s or the 60s.

Which athletics started in the late 60s here.

So before the college itself was established in 57. So yeah, it had to be early 60s is what I'd guess.

And from the sound of it, it sounds like from that air too especially, you know, fight songs have a lot of different motives and some are real like fast and energetic and some are more melodic and even keel. But. And I think that's more on the LCC side. We also have an alma mater that a lot of schools play at the end of their game for their alumni. The incident happened at Michigan State a couple weeks ago and they had to go play at the arrival Michigan. Right after that they chose to play the alma mater instead of the fight song. Try and balance that rivalry. Yet, you know, the alma mater is a little more professional and classy. As opposed to the fight song is the more rah rah music rendition. What's your go to karaoke song, Daedalian?

My go to karaoke song is because the only guy that I can sing like at all is Johnny Cash. It's generally Ring of Fire. Just because I love that one. But I've also been known to do full. Some prison blues every once in a while, too.

Good stuff. Now I'm gonna have that song now

through the help of modern technology. Whenever you want to play the song, you let me know.

Okay, excellent.

Because we've got the pep song ready to go.

Excellent. We can end with that. All right, sounds good. Sounds good. But, yeah, it's. You know, that was about. You know, with your music background, I can't go without saying I'm a big Bon Jovi fan, so. Living on a Prayer.

So is that your song? When you do. Do you do karaoke?

I love kara.

I love singing.

Okay. I was in the choir a little bit, too, in high school. I went to a small school, so I was able to do all three. Choir, band, and athletics. So I don't think I'm a singer, but I like to sing, and I. I don't. I have a hearing problem, so I don't always understand the lyrics, and my family gets mad at me because I make them up, and I think mine are sometimes better than the artist I love.

Well, first of all, I don't. I don't. I don't think that's a hearing. I think that almost any lyrics you can mess up. I can tell you there have been times I've been doing karaoke with somebody, and I'm like, oh, is that what they say there? I didn't know that. And I think almost anybody can attest to that.

That is true. And that's what's nice about Google, that you can go on and search the lyrics if you need understanding. And you're right. It's funny hearing what some people think they said, and it kind of catches and it might stick with you. So, again, just another way music. Music is instrumental in our society and helps, especially, you know, coming out of a pandemic. And you hear. You saw all the musicians step forward and have concerts and sing because it is good for the soul.

I will tell you that. Steve Miller's Jungle Love. When I was growing up, I used to sing as a kid. Chug a lug. Strawberry man. He's driving me mad. He's making me crazy.

Isn't that great? And you remember that.

Chug a luggage.

Yeah, exactly. Again, that's even sometimes better than the song.

I agree.

And even in today's society, whether you have one of the platforms like XM Radio or Apple Music or Spotify or Pandora, that you can tailor it like Greg Lattig's playlist Or Bon Jovi radio and that CPR last week. And the instructor had Bon Jovi radio on playlist on the computer. I'm thinking he's getting a high rating for me. This is all good stuff. Keep playing all day, buddy. Forget the CPR. Although that is life saving. This is good music.

Now that isn't. I believe it is.

The.

Is CPR where you do the hard. Okay, so is it Queens? We Will Rock youk. Is that what it is?

There's a couple. I thought it was supposed to go to the beat. I thought it was staying alive.

That would make sense too.

Happy Birthday Twice. They said there seemed like one of the Queen song. Maybe it was. And Queen's another great band that had a lot of athletic.

We Will Rock youk. We Are the champions. Yeah, we could go on.

And again, Queen's.

And the one song I'm trying to think of it, it's kind of gotten a refreshed one. I don't know if it's actually been played at sporting events, but it's the. I can't even think of it. You know, it'll come to me probably by the end of the show, but.

And the other neat thing is I talk about how we tailor these radio stations to our platform, like 60s on the sixes. And the nice thing about athletic events is it's all genres. There's country music played out there. There's 80s rock, there's Eminem and ACDC and rap. And it's pretty neat. It ties in a lot of different songs. Who would have thought that the songs we mentioned earlier would become popular at stadium? They might not even been as popular on the radio. So again, it's pretty cool that it can be different genre that are played at. It's not just one that everyone has to listen to throughout the athletic event.

Yeah, and sometimes you got to get tortured by them too. Do they still do tub thumping from Chumbawamba back in the day?

I don't know.

Greg's like, I gotta lick that one up.

Yeah, I do. But again, each stadium it can be either whoever's in charge of the music that determines that. But again, when I've had the hockey game, you could tell different songs that people were rallying, hiding behind ymca or ones that are crowd entertainment, especially with video cameras now to get them dancing or something. So there's other motive there too for the entertainment of what music can provide.

Throw a little trivia at you. 1985, what song was done by a professional team? 1985 would have been The Bears.

Yeah. Super Bowl Shuffle. Yeah, the Super Bowl Shuffle. You know, they had the icky shuffle couple from the Cincinnati Bengals. You're right. Even athletes have done their own songs in the past, so that's what's cool and that's what's neat when we talk about sports and music bringing together, but how much together they are without us even noticing it.

Yeah, definitely.

So good. That's, I think, all I had regarding music and how important it is at our athletic events at LCC and all athletic events across the country. So maybe we'll end with the fight song.

Yeah, we will. And I will say one more thing. When we put this podcast together, the podcast radio show, I should say, I gave you guys full license to go ahead and pick whatever intro song and it fits well. And I will say that I had my doubts at first, but I will tell you that every single time I walk out of here, I sing that song for at least a little bit longer after you guys have left. So you picked a good one.

That's good to hear.

Well done.

Well, you had a lot and we wanted something catchy and something that kind of tied into sports. And you're right. I like it too. It has turned out well. And. And again, just another way music impacts you, because I'll be singing Ring of Fire the rest of the day. I love that song.

All right, let's finish up with that pep song. This is taking you all the way Back to what, 1960 something, we think.

That's right. We'll find out.

Onward we work together faithful may we ever be. No matter the type of weather. Bravely we'll fight our battles and believe we'll be success what the things for which we strive are honor and happiness.

There you go. You know, it goes on. Goes on for about another minute or so, but it's about a two minute song and yeah, just a little bit of nostalgia from back in the day.

That is great stuff. And it's awesome that we have a fight song and it'd be nice to get it out there. And, you know, I don't know if we need to update it or not because I like. I like the history of music too.

So you can definitely tell that was pulled off of vinyl there.

So, hey, we love vinyl.

Classic 45 for you. 45 spin.

Well, again, this was an exciting conversation. You did an excellent job in filling in for Steven. So thank you to Dalian for joining me today.

Happy to Pitch hit. Did I get it right? Pitch hit.

Yeah. Okay, good. Very good.

I can never remember if it's pitch or pinch again.

Just like music, what you hear. Well, again, thanks for joining us everybody. And until next time, Go Stars.

Stars on Sports Outro: Stars on Sports is recorded live at the WLNZ studios. Engineering and production assistance are provided by Daedalian Lowry. You can listen to this episode and other episodes of Stars on Sports on demand at LCCconnect.org to find more information about our athletic program, visit LCCstars.com thanks for listening. Go Stars!