Hot on the heels of mentioning Donna Summer's disco hit Bad Girls, today I heard a story on NPR's Morning Edition about the bewilderingly popular singing of Neil Diamond's hit song Sweet Caroline in the middle of the 8th inning at Boston's Fenway Park.
The point of the story was to dig down deep and do some investigative reporting that would connect the dots between baseball, Boston, Fenway Park, Neil Diamond and Sweet Caroline. But when all was said and done, there was no real connection at all. It was simply a fun song that people liked to sing, and is now a Fenway Park tradition. Baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Sweet Caroline? I guess.
I was much more interested (and highly amused) at a mysterious musical phenomenon they never discussed: Why, when anybody sings the first line of the chorus
Sweet Caroline
they always following that by singing
BOM BOM BOM!
-- the next three notes from the brass section?
I don't know the answer, but I know that I do it too. Every single time. It's just like saying Bad Girls and then being compelled to immediately add TOOT TOOT! BEEP BEEP! I don't know why. It's just the way it's done.
And so in the story of Sweet Caroline every single person who sang that line, ALWAYS followed it up with the BOM BOM BOM! You can hear it at 2:27 into the story, and again at 4:25 into the story, this time multiplied by thousands of voices. Despite the fact that I was laughing hysterically at the overly-exuberant BOM BOM BOM, I felt a great deal of comfort knowing the Shui of Universe is in alignment, thanks in no small part to Neil Diamond and Sweet Caroline.
BOM BOM BOM!
1 comment:
Maybe Sweet Caroline is the key to world peace. Once we can get the world to sing "BOM BOM BOM" in unity, everything will just fall into place.
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