Take me out to the ball game...in 1948?

I attended my first Indians baseball game here in Cleveland over the weekend, and first let me say, as any of you who know me well already know, I love baseball. I really do. There is nothing like being outside on a sunny evening eating a hot dog or soft pretzel while rooting on your team. But at this game, which we lost 3-4 (not bad given Cleveland's disastrous season), I realized how much a certain component adds to the overall experience of a baseball game....the music.

The stadium decided to make this particular game a sort of "flashback" to 1948 when the Indians won the championship. Upon entering the stadium we were all presented with old-style looking posters with the 1948 front page newspaper article printed on them. The scoreboard displayed the original Indians logo. And the music...for all nine innings...was the kind of music they would have played back then. Apparently in 1948 they listened to nothing but harpsichord melodies reminiscent of what you hear on a merry-go-round. This was supposed to be endearing, nostalgic, refreshing, but all I felt was annoyed. I missed the peppy country songs (although no one in Cleveland listens to country music...so sad), the classic rock, pop, anything other than this music box crap.

And so I have realized that while I still love baseball, I kind of need the music. I would have surely never survived in 1948. And you know what? If they really wanted to take us back, they would have sold concessions at the 1948 price. Sure glad I'm not a beer drinker...$7 a pop inside a stadium...a 2008 stadium, that is.