Among the three mid-2001 additions, Unknown Song #49 is probably the weakest. It's still better than most of the tracks that didn't last, though. It also—unlike US #48 or the one I'll be posting next during Super Bowl week—doesn't appear to have been used in 2002 for some reason. Anyway… accompanying US #49 is the Cardinals/Lions season opener from 2003 where Anquan Boldin set the rookie debut receiving record. Enjoy!
Oh, as an aside, it sounds like Chris Berman & Tom Jackson will be returning to host NFL Primetime for the conference-title games this weekend. That's pretty cool…
*EDIT* - This song was used a couple times in 2002 (thanks to Robert Enriquez on youtube for the info).
Unknown Song #47 is the last of the moody & ambient NFL Primetime songs. It was also the only new track from the beginning of 2001 to last beyond September of that year. US #47 certainly isn't a memorable piece, but it at least accomplishes its goal of being, well, moody & ambient. The accompanying highlight is probably the most famous game to use this song. The Minnesota Vikings, in the midst of a freefall after starting 6-0, completed their collapse with a bizarrely improbable loss in the desert.
Contained on - MusicHouse MHE7 - Jingles, Bumpers and Donuts (KPM search link) Featured Highlight - Cardinals @ Bengals, 1997
*SONG IDENTIFIED* - 12/17/21
1997 was the last year where the NFL Primetime producers attempted to do a large-scale overhaul of the show's music. I say "attempted," though, because most of these new tracks didn't stick. Week 1 of '97 was particularly bizarre. There were 13 highlights that week (not counting the SNF recap on the non-live broadcasts); more than half of them used songs that were, to my knowledge, never used any other time on the show. Most of these tracks just didn't work, so kudos to the producers for both realizing that early and for replacing them with better new songs later (like Total News).
The very first Primetime highlight of 1997, featuring two teams that would not end up winning a lot of games, sadly includes one of the better oddball songs of Week 1. I apologize for the video quality of these Oddball Week clips in advance. Fortunately, the audio quality does not suffer nearly as much.
Featured Highlight - Points War, 1999 (Cardinals @ Packers/Saints @ Panthers)
*SONG IDENTIFIED* - 6/12/20
So it's come to this: the holy grail of NFL Primetime music. International Statement is the most famous Primetime track, but it was identified long ago (well before I started this project). Unknown Song #23 is, instead, the piece I've received by far the most requests to ID. I'm also pretty sure it's Primetime's most often used song that hasn't been identified—it was used quite regularly for the last 15 years of the show. I wouldn't say it's my favorite Primetime piece, but its strong hard-rock edge makes its appeal obvious for football highlights.
I don't have much idea where to look for US #23. The only clue was when some follower on youtube sent me a message that he had contacted John Colby and that Colby replied that he thinks he did it but he's not sure and doesn't know the name. Maybe it's in that mythical place that also contains the full-length versions of Gothic, Terminator, and Gelman. Regardless, it's not on Colby's website.
Accompanying this holy grail of NFL Primetime music is what may be the most well-known highlight in the history of the show. In 1999, a murky tiebreaker scenario emerged during the final week of the season involving 4 teams fighting for one 8-8 playoff spot (the Lions also finished 8-8, but had already clinched a berth). The Cowboys just needed to beat the Giants, the Giants were basically screwed (barring, like, a 100-point win or something), and the Panthers & Packers had to win the scoring-margin tiebreaker in order to break a 3-way tie with the Giants should the Giants beat Dallas. This points war didn't ultimately matter since the Cowboys won, but it was still—as Chris Berman says—"unbelievable football."
Since the NFL season is about to end, my updates will be less frequent for a while. I plan on being a little more active than the last couple offseasons, though—probably 2 posts a month. There are still quite a few unidentified tracks left to post. Thanks for reading/watching!
My third post from David Reilly's Success album is the one that was used least on NFL Primetime. That's a shame, though, because "Inter Conference" is a punchy & fun track that effectively fits highlight videos. At the beginning of 1989, both the Phoenix Cardinals & Detroit Lions were beginning major transitions. The Cards were adjusting to life without longtime QB Neil Lomax (Lomax was still on the roster, but would never again suit up in a game that counted), while the Lions were beginning Wayne Fontes's & Mouse Davis's NFL experiment with the run & shoot offense. The run & shoot wouldn't last more than a few years in Pontiac, but another major addition would pay long-term dividends. This opening-week contest against Phoenix, the only highlight I've seen with Inter Conference, was also the first time Barry Sanders ever played in an NFL uniform (he sat out the preseason). Sanders played pretty well, too, averaging nearly 8 yards-per-carry and scoring Detroit's only touchdown. It wasn't quite enough for the Lions to win, but it was a great sign of things to come for Sanders and the franchise. Enjoy the clip.
The next couple weeks will feature two songs from the same album that may have been used as little as one time on NFL Primetime. The only highlight I have of "N.Y. Giants," by Grid Lock guitarist/composer Ray Russell, was for a game that ironically had nothing to do with the New York Giants. In 1988, the Cardinals had just uprooted themselves from tepid fan support in St. Louis and had to get ready for nearly 20 years of similarly apathetic support in Phoenix. Despite this, and the franchise's historically underwhelming win/loss record, expectations were high for the 1988 Phoenix Cardinals. The still had Neil "The Grand Cannon" Lomax who, though not on the level of a Joe Montana, was still one of the top quarterbacks in the NFL. They also had star WR Roy Green and a decent chunk of other talented players. An 0-2 start that included a loss to an ultimately terrible Cowboys squad in the Cardinals' first ever game at Sun Devil Stadium probably dinged their egos a bit, but they won 7 of their next 9 games (including a 23-point comeback over eventual Super Bowl champ San Francisco) and were actually leading the NFC East after Week 11. Unfortunately, 1988 then became the ultimate "what coulda been" season for the Cardinals franchise. Lomax suffered a leg injury in that last win over the Giants and, though he would eventually return, the team wasn't the same and they lost 5 straight to end the year. Even worse, Lomax never played a regular-season down again following 1988 due to a chronic hip condition and the Cardinals wouldn't see anything resembling consistent QB play again until 2007. The franchise's near misses in the late '80s (they also choked away a postseason spot in their final year in St. Louis) combined with the sudden post-Lomax loss of offense led to just one playoff appearance for the franchise from 1983-2007 and largely terrible home attendance over that span. It's easy to speculate how things could've been different if only Lomax hadn't been hurt or if he hadn't had to retire or even if the team had been able to rally once he returned with 3 weeks to go in the '88 season. Things are finally going well for the Cardinals now, but it really seems like it shouldn't have taken anywhere near that long.
Anyway… the aforementioned highlight showcasing N.Y. Giants was the first-ever regular-season game for the Phoenix Cardinals. Against the Cincinnati Bengals, who would surprise everyone by dominating the AFC that year, Phoenix would kinda foreshadow the tail end of their season by blowing a perfect chance to win the game late. Oh, as for the song itself: nothing from the Good Morning America! album was ever released beyond vinyl, as far as I know, so trying to find a bootleg rip online is probably your only option.
If you've encountered any of the downloadable NFL Primetime mp3 sets or youtube postings of said sets that have been floating around the net at least a decade, you've noticed that they sometimes have names attached (some are even accurate!) and that they sometimes are denoted simply by "NFL Primetime Theme #XX." "Leading Edge," by Tom Blades, is the track from those collections usually referred to as "NFL Primetime Theme #17." It's just as synth heavy as most of the Primetime songs that debuted around 1990, and the best way to describe the feel of it is probably "laid-back electricity." It's also surprising, given the style & instrumentation similarities to the briefly used Sonoton stuff, that Leading Edge would end up having one of the longest tenures of any music track on NFL Primetime.
I can't find really any biographical information regarding Tom Blades, so there's not much to say here about him. This is the first Primetime track I've found from the Atmosphere (ATMOS) library, however, and I'm motivated to check out some of the other early CDs from that service in the future. Also… special thanks to Will Pitts on youtube, whose posting of this song randomly showed up on my "Recommended Videos" section so I could identify it.
To profile Leading Edge, here's a game with Emmitt Smith & Jerry Rice suiting up for teams we all forgot they played for. It was also Smith's final 100-yard game…
Nucleonics, by aliased Sonoton regulars John Fiddy & Gerhard Narholz, is one of the more unusual music offerings from NFL Primetime. It doesn't sound anything like a football song at first, but it grows on the listener and makes itself fit in subtle ways. The track slowly rises in tension and works best for games where two teams spend much of the contest feeling each other out. Nucleonics was also used a disproportionate amount of time for the Buffalo Bills during their initial Super Bowl run in 1990 (a minimum of 6 games, perhaps more). It didn't get a long-term exclusive "contract" with the Bills like Powersurge, though, as Nucleonics was never used again after the 1990 season.
Like many of Buffalo's 1990 games, this track's featured highlight wasn't real down to the wire. A weak Cardinals team in Joe Bugel's first season came to Rich Stadium and got whipped. Still, there were some interesting plays and even more interesting punts.
One of my posts last week mentioned that a couple songs used in NFL Primetime's first year (1987) eventually returned. One of those was Powersurge, which I already profiled, and the other was the similarly titled "Powerhouse." There's a twist here, though, in that three different versions of Powerhouse were ultimately used on the show. The original, base version and the underscore (no horn section) accompanied highlights in 1987, but then ESPN brought back the song in a cut-and-paste edited form that increased the excitement and removed the quiet bridge section in 1991. Powerhouse, though a simple song in many ways, provides more energy than most NFL Primetime music and is particularly suited toward games with frenetic comeback attempts.
Powerhouse was composed by early FirstCom regulars John Bähler & Mary Therese Matthews, who I've mentioned multiple times on this blog already. This song never officially made it off of vinyl, as far as I know, so it isn't easily accessible. There is an updated remix, titled "Powerhouse 2K" available on FirstCom's website, but it sounds quite a bit different. It wasn't written by the above artists, either, and is instead credited to associated (related?) FirstCom composers James Griffith, Mark Matthews, and Kathryn Matthews. I don't know who was responsible for the custom ESPN edit used in the '90s, but I would guess it was then-ESPN music director John Colby.
In honor of the holidays—or something—this post gets a whopping three(!) highlight videos. Also, in an unintentional oddity, all three have one of the secondary hosts presenting the game instead of Chris Berman. The first, which features the original version of Powerhouse, features Gayle Gardner showing the Cowboys visiting Busch Stadium & the Cardinals in the 1987 opener. The highlights really underplay the craziness of how that game ended; the Cardinals overcame a 13-3 deficit by scoring 3 unanswered touchdowns in the final 2 minutes! This was also their first home opening win in 12 years in what would also be their final home opener in St. Louis. The Powerhouse underscore highlight has John Saunders showing the Bills, in their last bad season for a while, losing a close game to the Jets at home. The final video, profiling the '90s custom edit version of the song, has Robin Roberts accompanying the post-Moon Oilers in their last "Battle of Texas" in Irving against the defending champion Cowboys.
