Leeeny's Mien: The 12th Man Song, and Outing Yinzers

Blogging the City Of Champions. Burgh Sports and other randomness. You never know. I certainly don't.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

The 12th Man Song, and Outing Yinzers

The 12th Man, a very twangy country ditty about this year's Steelers, their fans, and God (that's Him in the title), is getting major airplay on all of the Froggy country-FM stations in and around the Burgh. Not exactly my genre of choice, but my 7-year-old monkeyboy can't get enough of it. Click on over to this MySpace page, and the song will start playing. (Or you can click on the player on this page, which I've added to the top of the right sidebar. Scroll all the way up if you need to.) At the moment your only purchase options appear to be a 99¢ DRM'd download at iTunes, or on the Froggyland website where you can buy it as a CD single for $5.99 (including shipping). Don't look for a free mp3 file anywhere, just buy the darn thing if you like it. What are you, some kinda cheapskate?

A little bit of web-poking has revealed that the singer, a honkytonk crooner going by the name of Dusty Drake, is originally from Monaca. Aha. And this guy (who doesn't post his name) hails from Coraopolis, is a friend of Drake's, and wrote the lyrics. Double Aha. I knew there wasn't a chance in hell that those words were penned by a non-native. Steeler Nation may be a planetary phenomenon, but there ain't no Primanti's in Nashville. I was right, just like I was right when I told Dogboy that Billy Mays, the Pitchman From Hell, had to be a Yinzer. Turns out he's from McKees Rocks - just listen to him talk, it's so obvious.

Anyhow, Dusty Drake is going to be back home to sing his song (dare we call it an Anthem?) at the big Heinz Field Super Bowl XLIII pep rally tomorrow night. Yeeee haw!

--addendum, Thursday night 11:00pm-- More web-poking. This is excerpted from John Hayes' 1/13 article in the Post-Gazette:

Nashville country singer Dusty Drake is better known back home in Monaca as Dino Buffalini, former front man for the Pittsburgh country cover band Silverado. Mr. Drake moved South and changed his name a decade ago. He touched the country music charts a few years ago, but over the past few weeks he's had the top-requested song on Pittsburgh's Froggy radio stations with "The 12th Man," a tribute to Steelers fans worldwide. The song parody was co-written by Mr. Drake and Moon's Steve Yurjevich over the lyrics to Kevin Fowler's "The Lord Loves a Drinkin' Man," a hit for Mark Chesnutt.

"Unless you're a Steelers fan, you don't get it," said Mr. Drake. "This kind of passion for a sports team -- how do you put it into words? I live in Nashville now and there are thousands of Steelers fans down here and they're not all from Pittsburgh. There's just something about that team that brings it out."

Dino Buffalini? Yikes. No offense, Dino/Dusty, it's a Yinzer name to be proud of, but I agree that it's not quite the thing for the marquee at the Opry. And now we know the name of the lyricist: Steve Yurjevich. I also admit that I didn't know it was a cover/parody of another song, but as I said, this ain't my genre. Now when is somebody gonna write cool Steeler lyrics to some Floyd? I've already posted previously about what I consider to be the best (and most obscure) fan song I've ever heard. Hold the twang, please.