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Legislators once again try to go faster miles an hour to get Roadrunner declared Official Rock Song of the Commonwealth
By adamg on Wed, 04/05/2023 - 4:55pm
State Rep. David Linsky (D-Natick) and state Sen. Bruce Tarrr (R-Gloucester) have both filed bills, again, to get "Roadrunner" declared the state's official rock song.
2023 is the tenth anniversary of a so-far fruitless struggle to get the song its official due. In 2013, then state Rep. Marty Walsh first officially proposed the honor for the song about driving pn 128 and past the Stop & Shop with the radio on (and in one version, through Mattapan and Roslindale).
Walsh perhaps came closest, but some South Shore legislators tried to cut him off the pass with Aerosmith's "Dream On," despite the fact that the song has nothing to do with Massachusetts, and then Walsh got diverted by getting elected Boston mayor, so his bill, initially proposed by Dorchester rock booker (and later Walsh aide) Joyce Linehan, went unpassed.
Both Linsky's and Tarr's bills have been referred to the Joint Committee on State Administration and Regulatory Oversight.
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Comments
The state song should be
Charlie on the MTA.
Sure - Original version
We could all use some progressive party blacklisted socialism union organizing vibes in our legislature.
http://archive.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/12/26/c...
well..
People forget, there is a large portion of the state that exists outside of 495. I dont know that our Wmass friends care about the "MTA".
As long as you can stop the boomer crooning on about Aerosmith, "Roadrunner" should be a no brainer.. for the WHOLE state.
These guys...
...obviously don't have anything to do.
radio on!
There is no other song. I hear that and I'm on 128 when it's dark outside or driving past the Stop & Shop. I understand why people say Charlie on the MTA (my username checks out) or that song by the BeeGees, or something by Aerosmith, I get it, I do, but Roadrunner IS Massachusetts.
Love that Bee Gees song: check out
their live acoustic version on The Tonight Show in 1973: lovely harmonies, and they were way ahead on disco hair. But the band admitted they had never set foot here when they wrote it, just liked the sound of the name.
Maybe a nod to the Great Northeast Blackout of 1965, but otherwise not locally detailed enough to be anthemic: same reason "Dream On" doesn't rate in my book. "Dirty Water" and "Let's Go to the Rat" both have enough of that grungy Masshole vibe to make my short list, but each is too Boston-specific to represent the whole commonwealth. "Roadrunner" has some local markers like Route 128 references, but it still speaks to my inner teenager who had rarely visited Boston.
Stop it, you have jobs
The infamously most opaque legislature, the one that won’t even touch the MBTA and its problems despite being the most powerful branch of state government, has the time and resources to dick around with this.
You are right, but I don't mind it when
legislators try to do more than one thing at once. Your point stands as a symbol, but the issue isn't really that voting on a state song is a major distraction from more pressing problems like the MBTA's woes.
Willie Loco Alexander
Let's Go to the Rat (1976)
Now that's Boston rock.
I'd rather have "Mass Ave"
I'd rather have "Mass Ave" but perhaps that's more Boston anthem material.
Literally every building in that video
has been torn down for a life sciences office.
I've Said it Before and Will Say it Again
If this ever goes to a referendum, it has to go on the ballot as Proposition 1-2-3-4-5-6. And I will vote "yes."
I have always been struck by this. The Ramones
probably had the best "1-2-3-4" in rock, but who else went on to 6?
Quick poll: best "five six
Quick poll: best "five six seven eight"?
Laverne and Shirley
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6tRnbz90R4
Seriously?
It's obviously The 5.6.7.8's.
It starts on the 3!
There's method to Jonathan's madness. Most songs start at the beginning of a measure, so a 1-2-3-4 count is appropriate, but "Roadrunner" starts mid-measure, with the first two beats ("da-da") coming on the 3 and 4 counts and the long "dahhh" on the 1 of the next measure. When he counts to six, he's going through one full measure and the 1 and 2 of the next one, so that everything lines up properly.
And yes, the Ramones elevated count-ins to a higher level!
Stop
Oh!
Sarah Vowell seemed to think that Stop & Shop wasca convenient store chain, or at least her writing in her book Radio On seemed to mean that.
She should write a follow-up and expose how the national radio market has shifted so dramatically.
Hmm ...
I read somewhere that Richman grew up in Natick and was referring very specifically to the Stop & Shop at the intersection of routes 9 and 27 (in the same plaza where there used to be a Building 19 and some fraction).
Actually it was likely the
Actually it was likely the Stop & Shop on 3A in Cohasset when he lived down there for a while, played at CHS dances (back when there were places you could rent for cheap. He wrote the song when he was living there.
Vowell's book Radio On: A Listener's Diary
It's a good read and got it me (back) into the Modern Lovers, and got me into her writing. It was a real twofer. But yeah, having grown up a little less than mile and a half north of Route 128 (close enough that 128 traffic could be heard clearly on cloudy days when the sound bounced off the clouds instead of being absorbed by the forested hills of the Mill Pond Conservation Area, as it usually would), Road Runner paints a good picture of what being a teenager or early twenty-something living in one town along 128 (or really any suburban belt highway) and gathering or being gathered by friends in Wakefield, Lexington, Waltham, and Norwood,etc. to do whatever from there (the Stop & Shop I always pictured was the one in Woburn next to the Zayre at the Main Street/Route 38 exit, even though I knew that Richman was from the other end).
With respect to the other artists and songs
suggested here, "Roadrunner" most trenchantly encapsulates a vivid feeling for me of growing up in a small nowhere Masshole town. "I'm in love with rock 'n roll, and I'll be out all night."
Idly passing the time with a group of my closest fellow idiot-teen friends, feeling free and glad to be alive, needing nothing more than a couple of ragweed joints and an aimless cruise in someone's shitty old sedan, with a beloved dumb butt-rock song blaring from the FM -- maybe "Dream On", a slickly-produced wailer from a pretty good New Hampshire band.
For me, "Roadrunner" remains the most ineffable and genuine rendering of a very specific moment of my Massachusetts youth. It's shoddy, shouty, garage-y and earnest, and it relentlessly rocks: a reflection my imagined best Masshole self. I didn't discover it until my college days, but it's the only song I ever really wanted to be our commonwealth anthem. I fervently hope it gets the official nod.
I remember The Modern Lovers....
... playing for free in the middle of Cambridge Common (with VERY modest sound equipment).
There's no competition...
Massachusetts by the Bee Gees is an Adult Contemporary tune.
Massachusetts by Ylvis is a pop/satire tune.
Roadrunner by Johnathan Richman in 1977 turns the Rock version into a Folk feeling tune.
The State Of Massachusetts by Dropkick Murphys is a Punk Rock tune that paints a dismal version of our wonderful State.
Hands down, Roadrunner by the Modern Lovers from 1972 is the Rock song of Massachusetts!
Questionable Categories
"Massachusetts" by Arlo Guthrie has been the official state "folk song" for decades. But, if you listen to that song, there isn't a "folk" thing about it. It might be considered "adult contemporary" or maybe "soft rock", but "folk" it is not, even though it's author and performer is often considered a "folksinger". But a folksinger does not always a folk song make. Especially in the wide open, experimental times when Arlo Guthrie was originally making music. The people making these "state song" decisions don't know a whole lot about music.
I would like to offer one
I would like to offer one reason not to use Dream On as the official state rock song: it sucks so hard, you could vacuum a floor with it from a mile away.
If you needed proof they need
If you needed proof they need to be audited.
Both Linsky's and Tarr's
Yeah there's definitely nothing in this entire state that could use the focus of that committee right now.......
It's a fine song, but I'm
It's a fine song, but I'm surprised it would win Official 50-Year-Old-Relic-That-Still-Somehow-Hasn't-Been-Replaced of Massachusetts over such stiff competition as the I-91 viaduct in Springfield and Red Line car #1632.
Elephant in the room
is that a roadrunner is a bird native to the southwestern United States and Mexico.
real talk express
Roadrunner is a bad song.
Stop trying to make this happen.
There are countless other bands with better songs which should be in consideration. Hell, Dirty Water should be the option over crap ass roadrunner, even if the standells were from California