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Aug 24, 2023 Web Exclusive By Frank Valish

The Baseball Project may be the unlikeliest of supergroup projects to consist of four volumes. Consisting of Peter Buck, Mike Mills, Linda Pitmon, Steve Wynn, and as its centerpiece power pop legend Scott McCaughey, The Baseball Project features each of these songwriters extraordinaire contributing baseball-themed pop tunes that will satisfy even the most casual of fan.

Over 15 songs and with commentary and baseball-related background provided in the liner notes for each, Grand Salami Time! is not only a lot of fun, especially for baseball fans, but also a rollicking slice of some of the best power pop you’ll hear. Songs tackle the screwball (“Screwball,” written by McCaughey); the journeyman pitcher (“Journeyman,” written by Buck and Wynn); the famed night in 1979 in Chicago where disco records were destroyed on the field between games of a doubleheader (“Disco Demolition,” written by Wynn); pitchers doctoring their baseballs (“Stuff,” written by Mills); and Vin Scully (“The Voice of Baseball,” written by Buck and McCaughey).

Grand Salami Time! was performed by the players live in the studio, with another power pop luminary, Mitch Easter, at the helm, and the live nature of the performances lends a certain energy to the proceedings. The only qualm is that, at 54 minutes, the album runs the risk of having its baseball concept peter out with those listeners who might not be so amenable to baseball-themed music. But The Baseball Project has never catered to this mindset anyway. One senses that the music is created for the players themselves as much as for anyone else. So let the album be 90 minutes if they’d like. And heck, they’ve already done three other of these Baseball Project records, so there obviously isn’t any worry that the concept might get stale. Instead, what we have with Grand Salami Time! is a bunch of musical heroes having fun together and celebrating music, each other, and America’s favorite pastime to boot. (www.baseballproject.net)

Author rating: 7/10