Boston Herald asks Can Dropkick Murphys help break the curse?
`Tessie' Up! Can the Dropkick Murphys' Red Sox anthem break the curse?
By Larry Katz
Friday, September 17, 2004
Can ``Tessie'' do what ``Cowboy Up'' didn't?
The Dropkick Murphys - and the Red Sox - are hoping that this year they've found the right song to help carry Boston's beloved baseball team to a World Series victory.
Last year the country music import ``Cowboy Up'' became Red Sox nation's theme song, but only took the team as far as an ulcer-inducing loss to the Yankees in the seventh game of the ALCS.
Boston punk/rockers the Dropkick Murphys expect better results from their update of ``Tessie,'' a fan favorite from that ancient era when the Red Sox were frequent World Series winners.
This much is certain: The 2004 Sox got hot the day the Dropkick Murphys first played ``Tessie'' live at Fenway.
``They had us play the national anthem and `Tessie' at a game in late July,'' bassist Ken Casey says during a rehearsal break in the band's South Boston studio. ``That turned the season around.''
``Not us. That game.'' Casey and his bandmates laugh. ``The Sox were playing the Yankees and losing pretty bad. Then they had the bench-clearing brawl and (Bill) Mueller hit the walk-off home run. Regardless whether `Tessie' had anything to do with it, the theory behind it is that the song brings the team good luck.''
The tale of ``Tessie'' goes back to 1903, when Boston won the first World Series. The Royal Rooters, a group of rabid Southie fans led by John F. Kennedy's grandfather ``Honey Fitz'' Fitzgerald, sang the Broadway show tune ad nauseum to antagonize the opposing Pittsburgh team. The Rooters continued to use ``Tessie'' as an inspirational weapon until 1918 when the Red Sox won their fifth and final championship.
At spring training this year, Red Sox public relations chief Charles Steinberg wondered aloud why no one had ever revived the song. Herald sportswriter Jeff Horrigan told him, ``I have just the guys to do it.''
``I e-mailed Ken Casey who was in Europe with the Dropkicks with the idea,'' Horrigan says. ``Right away he typed back, `We're in.' Then I sent him an MP3 of the original recording of `Tessie' and he e-mailed back, `We're out'.''
``It sounded like a 300-pound elderly woman sitting in her apartment in Beacon Hill singing some silly song about her parrot,'' Casey recalls. ``We just looked at each other and said, `What the hell does this have to do with baseball?' I was a fan to the point that I was willing to damage the band's career and do it whether the song was good or not, but the rest of the guys were not so positive.''
Casey urged Horrigan to write a new version of ``Tessie.''
``One night I listened to the song over and over,'' Horrigan says, ``and then I rewrote it to tell the story of the Royal Rooters. I only kept one line from the original, `Tessie, you are the only, only, only,' and at Ken's suggestion, we also included one of the original verses.''
The new ``Tessie'' describes the rabid Royal Rooters cheering for the stars of 1903 - pitchers Cy Young and Bill Dinneen and the Stahl brothers, Jake and Chick - and their custom of marching to and from the team's Huntington Avenue Grounds ballfield to Michael ``Nuff Said'' McGreevy's bar at the intersection of Tremont and Ruggles.
``McGreevy's place was called Third Base,'' Horrigan says, ``because it was the last stop before home. It was probably the first baseball bar in the country.''
The Dropkicks not only recorded ``Tessie'' for the Red Sox, but with them. To the band's delight, Johnny Damon, Bronson Arroyo and Lenny Dinardo, as well as Steinberg, showed up at the studio to sing backing vocals. The ``Tessie'' CD includes three other songs as well as a computer-playable version of the ``Tessie'' video featuring Colleen Reilly - the winsome Fenway Park between-innings base sweeper - in the title role. All proceeds from the sale of the CD go to the Red Sox Foundation charity.
``Tessie'' does not yet rival ``Sweet Caroline'' as a Fenway fan favorite, but it's played when Trot Nixon steps to the plate and, following ``Dirty Water,'' after every Red Sox victory.
``People are responding more and more to it,'' Casey says. ``Hopefully by the playoffs the fans will know the words. I really think this is gonna be the year for the Sox.''
But - perish the thought - what if it isn't? Will the Dropkicks drop ``Tessie'' from their playbook if the Sox stumble yet again?
``The story is that the Royal Rooters would sing it over and over again the whole game to annoy the other team,'' Casey says. ``So if the Sox don't win it, the reason will be that the crowd didn't know the lyrics. We're not giving up. We'll just have to wait till next year for the fans to learn it.''
Learn the words to ``Tessie'' so you can sing along at Fenway Park. Who knows? The Sox' future may depend on you!
TESSIE
(by Jeff Horrigan and Dropkick Murphys)
Tessie is the Royal Rooters rally cry
Tessie is the tune they'd always sung
Tessie echoed April through October nights
After serenading Stahl, Dinneen and Young
Tessie is a maiden with a sparkling eye
Tessie is a maiden with a love
She doesn't know the meaning of her sight
She's got a comment full of love
And sometimes when the game is on the line
Tessie always carried them away
Up the road from third base to Huntington
The boys would always sing and sway
CHORUS
Tessie, Nuff Said McGreevey shouted
We're not here to mess around
Boston you know we love you madly
Hear the crowd roar to your sound
Don't blame us if we ever doubt you
You know we couldn't live without you
Tessie, you are the only only only
The Rooters showed up at the grounds one day
They found their seats had all been sold
McGreevey led the charge into the park
Stormed the gates and put the game on hold
The Rooters gave the other team a dreadful fright
Boston's tenth man could not be wrong
Up from third base to Huntington
They'd sing another victory song
CHORUS
Tessie, Nuff Said McGreevey shouted
We're not here to mess around
Boston you know we love you madly
Hear the crowd roar to your sound
Don't blame us if we ever doubt you
You know we couldn't live without you
Tessie, you are the only only only
The Rooters gave the other team a dreadful fright
Boston's tenth man could not be wrong
Up from third base to Huntington
They'd sing another victory song
CHORUS
Tessie, Nuff Said McGreevey shouted
We're not here to mess around
Boston you know we love you madly
Hear the crowd roar to your sound
Don't blame us if we ever doubt you
You know we couldn't live without you
Tessie, you are the only only only
Don't blame us if we ever doubt you
You know we couldn't live without you
Boston you are the only only only
Don't blame us if we ever doubt you
You know we couldn't live without you
Red Sox you are the only only only
Chances to hear `Tessie' live :
Sept. 24: On Yawkey Way, outside of Fenway Park before the start of the Red Sox-Yankees game.
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