US #31, the first segment of Oddball Week, has been identified as "Go For It" by Ray Russell. This is weirdly the second Week 1, 1997, song to come from a late-'80s MusicHouse album. It's also the third Ray Russell track to be identified as an NFL Primetime track. Oddly, two of Russell's three pieces were one-offs used for Cardinals @ Bengals games in the first week of their respective seasons (N.Y. Giants was used in Week 1, 1988). Special thanks to Noah S for discovering this one.
For some reason, Go For It doesn't show up on KPM's album listing for MHE7, so I added the KPM search link instead. LINK
Also, one additional note: "Hard Attack," whose Kosinus album was absent from streaming services for some reason, has now been posted on YouTube. Thanks to Seth Campbell for noticing this. YT LINK
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.
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.
One of the staples of late '90s/early '00s NFL Primetimes, "Grid Lock" most often associated itself with the less prominent games on the schedule. It makes sense on two levels. The name of the song implies stagnancy & frustration, something that fits well with teams that aren't doing too well. Also, the music—though good—sounds rather neutral emotionally and therefore works best for highlights that are more about the individual plays & accomplishments than about who wins. Grid Lock was written by prominent guitarist, session musician, and production music composer Ray Russell. Fortunately, this isn't Russell's only Primetime track, as he has one other (much more obscure) song that I have yet to cover on this site.
You likely won't be able to find the original CD cut of this track. FC-A33 is one of many early albums in the FirstCom Action series that are no longer available on the FirstCom website. I've never seen it show up on eBay or anything like that, either. On the plus side, however, Grid Lock is easy to find online if you don't care about obtaining it or listening to it in a fully 100% legal way. A google search for "Grid Lock" with either "Ray Russell" or "NFL Primetime" should suffice.
This post's highlight choice is ironic given Grid Lock's tendency to accompany undercard games. The Jets & 49ers, who both were coming off winning seasons & would both win double-digit games in 1998, played each other in a high-octane season opener in what was then known as 3Com Park. Glenn Foley, who would soon be replaced by Vinny Testaverde, threw for a career-high 415 yards for New York. This game is mostly remembered for one other reason, though: Garrison Hearst's 96-yard touchdown run on San Francisco's first offensive play of overtime.
