Dan McCarthy has been spinning in local clubs for the
past 20 years; for the last five, he has been the DJ
for the Celtics and Bruins at the FleetCenter.
(Globe Staff Photo/Matthew J. Lee)

Arena Rocker

When the Celtics and the Bruins take on teams at the FleetCenter,
DJ Dan McCarthy provides the score
(By Steve Morse, Globe Staff)

The game is getting close, and DJ Dan is in a mild panic. ''This is when it gets hairy. It's tough to know what to play,'' he says from high above courtside at the FleetCenter, where the Celtics have just blown a 14-point lead and the crowd is sitting back, deflated. DJ Dan has been rocking them with Billy Idol's ''Dancing With Myself'' and the Red Hot Chili Peppers' ''Love Rollercoaster,'' but those are now inappropriate.

No one is in the mood for dancing and waving their arms on the Jumbotron screen. So he opts for ''something neutral'' in the comparatively laid-back instrumental ''Tequila,'' which he turns to low volume.

The mood is somber in the ninth-floor control room, where DJ Dan, also known as Dan McCarthy, is part of a 16-member team of sound and video techies who provide the entertainment during Celtics and Bruins games. McCarthy works alongside organist Ron Horry, who intersperses familiar arena cheering melodies such as ''Here We Go'' and ''Boom Boom.'' But McCarthy takes care of most of the music, pulling from 10,000 recorded tracks that he has cued up on a computerized 16-channel, studio-quality console. Good fortune awaits, and within minutes the Celtics are back on top and McCarthy is having a ball. He punches up the Bee Gees' ''You Should Be Dancing,'' the Romantics' ''What I Like About You,'' and the Village People's ageless disco hit ''Y.M.C.A.'' All help to fire up the rejuvenated crowd.

''It's so much fun when the team wins,'' says Horry. The Celtics go on to defeat the Indiana Pacers, 98-93. The animated McCarthy brings the night to a climax with Led Zeppelin's ''Rock and Roll'' and the Yakoo Boyz's ''Pipe Dreamz.'' It's suddenly a pleasure to be at the FleetCenter. There are high-fives all around. It's the end of a busy shift for McCarthy, a Watertown native who has also spun in local clubs for the last 20 years, from the Palace in Saugus to Vincent's in Randolph to Hurricane O'Reilly's around the corner from the FleetCenter. ''I thought that playing to 1,400 people at Vincent's was big, but this is the biggest,'' says McCarthy, as he looks out over a FleetCenter throng of 18,000-plus people.

''I always thought I was born to do this job,'' he adds. ''When the FleetCenter opened, I did some research into how I could get in here. Then I got a call to do a corporate party for the Celtics, and the marketing director at the time said, `Would you like a shot at this?'

' McCarthy got his shot and has been a FleetCenter fixture for the past five years. He DJs all of the home games for the Celtics and 75 percent of the games for the Bruins (the rest are DJed by Pat Downie, brother of Gord Downie of the Canadian rock band the Tragically Hip, a favorite of Bruins star Joe Thornton).

There's quite a difference between the two assignments. For basketball games, McCarthy accents pop, Top 40, and classic rock. For hockey, it's more of a slam-bang hard rock/heavy metal diet, with Boston bad boys Aerosmith getting several of their songs aired each night, along with tracks by Foghat and Metallica. For the recent Pacers game, McCarthy arrives during the afternoon, in time to play hip-hop tracks for the Celtics as they warm up. Ice Cube's ''You Can Do It'' and Busta Rhymes's ''Pass the Courvoisier'' are on while Celtic Walter McCarty hoists some warm-up three-point shots. ''We play the clean versions of hip-hop songs,'' says McCarthy, ''because there are often groups of schoolkids who come in to see the warm-ups.'' The hip-hop typically subsides when the games begin, except for an occasional Eminem hit, such as ''Lose Yourself'' or ''Without Me.'' But McCarthy finds that the better audience reaction comes from '70s and '80s songs rather than newer hits. ''You put an Eminem song up against something by a '70s act like KC and the Sunshine Band and it's no contest,'' he says. ''The crowds love '70s music.'' Some basketball purists, of course, still don't like any DJing at the games. They prefer the old organ music that played at Boston Garden -- or nothing at all. ''It's a distraction. It's not about the game anymore, but I understand the guy has a job to do,'' sniffs Sports Illustrated writer Ian Thomsen before the Pacers contest.

However, unlike DJs at many other arenas, McCarthy mostly just plays music during timeouts or at the end of periods, without intruding upon the game action. And his specialty is ''back on'' music, the songs chosen when the team is breaking from its timeout and walking back onto the court. This is when he really starts cranking, booming the likes of the Cherry Poppin' Daddies' ''Jump in the Line'' and Guns N' Roses' ''Welcome to the Jungle.'' The vast majority of songs change from night to night. ''There might be 8,000 to 10,000 season ticket holders, and you don't want to do the same things,'' says McCarthy. But there are a few staples, including the Wallflowers' version of David Bowie's ''Heroes,'' played during the nightly ''A hero among us'' segment in which a local citizen is recognized for a heroic deed.

McCarthy also has created some of his own unique sound effects, such as a loop of hand claps from the song ''Car Wash'' that invariably wakes up the crowd. And he loves surprising audiences with unusual cover songs, as he does on this Pacers night with Boston's Letters to Cleo performing Cheap Trick's ''I Want You to Want Me.'' ''I'm always looking for different music,'' he says. ''The only thing I don't have to worry about is ballads. At the FleetCenter, we don't play ballads.'' McCarthy still DJs in occasional clubs and does 40 to 50 weddings a year. This is his life, on top of being a diehard sports fan who is known to yell out encouragement to the players even though he's nine stories up in the FleetCenter. ''The last couple of years, the Celtics have made my job easier because they've been winning,'' says McCarthy. ''And somehow the beer always tastes better after a game that you win.''

© Copyright Globe Newspaper Company.

^Top

Music to their ears

By Kristi Palma
Staff Writer

It's not hard to find Patriots heroes: Tom Brady. Bill Belichick. Richard Seymour. Gary Gordecki. Yes, Gary Gordecki. You won't see the name on the back of a Patriots jersey, but Patriots fans are familiar with his impact on the game.

For two straight games with weather that should have frozen fans to their seats, the crowd was involved as if it were a balmy summer day. They threw snow to Gary Glitter's "Rock & Roll Part 2" after touchdowns, rocked to AC/DC's "For Those About to Rock" before kick-offs and screamed for Guns N' Roses' "Welcome to the Jungle" after big defensive plays. And when it really got cold, the crowd was hit with Frank Sinatra's "Summer Wind." As the song blared through the stadium, 68,436 people swayed gleefully and sang as temperatures dropped near zero degrees during the coldest game in Patriots history.

"It's what keeps the fans in the ball game," said Gordecki, entertainment director and default DJ for the Patriots at every home game.

What Gordecki and the Patriots have learned is that music can have a huge impact on a game, pumping up home fans and players alike. Sports executives are paying more and more attention to the music that gets crowds going, and the rarely seen sporting event DJs feel the pressure to keep the crowd in the game. They enter each contest with a well-prepared gameplan, but one that is flexible enough to change on the fly. So when a stadium full of Patriots fans started tossing snow up in the air during the "HEY!" in Gary Glitter's famous anthem last month, Gordecki made a split-second decision to forfeit other planned songs for Glitter's to repeatedly trigger the impressive display in the stands.

Sports stars themselves have been known to request favorite songs. For Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, it's The Rolling Stone's "Beast of Burden" that gets him fired up. Gordecki said he plays it for Brady's sake, adding, "It really kind of gets him moving around." Music has to enhance but not detract from the game, Gordecki said. This is why many of the songs he picked out for last weekend hit the cutting room floor: the close game was just too intense for music distractions at many points.

But these disc jockeys know how to turn up the intensity when they need to. "It's just amazing," said Patriots fan Susan Landry of Newburyport, a season ticket holder since 1993. "They get everyone going. You want to call all your friends and hold the phone in the air."

The songs that inspire us

Sports executives have been quick to pick up on the reactions of fans like Landry. The Boston Celtics, known for being more traditional, are revamping their game off the court this year now that more emphasis is being placed on the entertainment part of the game experience, which makes fans happy and in turn helps fills the seats, said Rich Gotham, executive vice president of the Celtics.

Gotham returned Tuesday night from an NBA conference in Boca Raton, Fla., where about 125 executives, including basketball icons Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson, gathered to talk about the industry. Music and the overall entertainment factor in basketball games was a big topic, and Magic Johnson told the group that good music and an engaged crowd really upped his game. "I think there's more of an entertainment orientation to sports than it has been in the past," said Gotham. "We spend a good amount of time thinking about it and talking about it."

Classic rock is a staple in all American sporting events. Queen's "Champions of the World," Guns N' Roses' "Welcome to the Jungle" and AC/DC's "Hell's Bells" and "For Those About to Rock" always work, the experts say. Songs from Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones and The Doors are also staples. "It's the rock anthems that have been in our culture" that persevere year after year in sports arenas, said Steven Strick, music director for WBCN 104.1 FM in Boston. "They haven't just been on the radio or part of our record collection." Popular songs of the day, such as Baja Men's "Who Let the Dogs Out" a few years ago and this year's hit "Hey Yah" by Outkast (heard at Bruins, Celtics and Patriots games this season) are sprinkled in, but don't usually make it to the next season. And compilations of sound effects, anthems, video clips and drum tempos are often part of the mix.

You'll generally hear heavy metal and rock at Bruins games, hip hop and classic rock at Celtics games, classic rock, anthems and regional favorites at football games and a mixed bag at baseball games that range from sing-a-longs to sound effects to Top 40 hits. The song "Black Betty" by Ram Jam has been a Bruins staple for years. When the Bruins make a goal, it's Kernkraft 400's "Zombie Nation," a techno song full of "oooooh oooohs," that makes the crowd go wild, said Dan McCarthy, audio producer at the Fleet Center who is behind the music of the Boston Bruins and Boston Celtics.

Been to a Celtics game lately? Though the team has been up and down, music like "Welcome to the Jungle" by Guns N' Roses; "Roadhouse Blues" by The Doors; Outkast's "Hey Yah" and 50 Cent's "In Da Club" has tried to keep fans rocking steady, while video clips, half time shows and contests and the infamous jumbotron have kept them engaged and laughing. "(Sports game entertainment) has evolved over the past 10 years into something that's really essential for fan interaction," said McCarthy. "If the team isn't doing so well, it becomes even more important to have the whole fan experience happen."

Music matters

Don't doubt there is pressure. Consider McCarthy's nightmare one night a few years ago when he played KC And the Sunshine Band's "That's the Way I Like It." Problem was, the New York Knicks had just pulled ahead of the Celtics by 10 points. The gaffe led that night's TV news casts in Boston. "I said, 'Well, that was a nice career,'" laughs McCarthy today. But he wasn't fired. In fact, he's been the man behind the music at Boston Celtics and Boston Bruins games at the FleetCenter for the past five years. And it's a job that makes him think on his toes, he said. "You could be ready to play a song and then all of a sudden (you think) 'Whoops, better not throw that one on,'" said McCarthy.

McCarthy always has 15 possible song choices in front of him, depending on what's happening in the game. For instance, he has an "Up 10" folder and "Down 10" folder. If the Celtics are ahead by at least 10 points, he'll play a high voltage song such as Gary Glitter's "Rock & Roll Part 2" or Blur's "Song 2." If the Celtics are behind by at least 10 points, he might play The Mamas & the Papas' "Twist and Shout" or Chuck Rio's "Tequila," which he considers "middle of the road" songs that keep the audience engaged but doesn't get them dancing or hooting and hollering. The trick is to find music that appeals to all demographics, he said. Though he's always under pressure by his bosses to be current, he can't be so current that he bypasses the old favorites that have proven effective, said McCarthy. "My motto is, whatever works," said McCarthy.

Whether or not it works for the players varies from player to player. Michael Jordan told executives this week he was so focused on his game that music didn't really affect him. Magic Johnson said it helped. Antoine Walker, who has requested McCarthy turn certain songs up during warmups, has also been quoted as saying he doesn't like the music the FleetCenter plays during his games. "I wasn't personally offended," said McCarthy. "I'm not playing for the players, I'm playing for the fans. My response was, the players don't buy the tickets."

Pumped up for the playoffs

There's little doubt that Gillette Stadium will be rocking today. "You really kind of have to amp it up (for the playoffs)," said Gordecki, who's been behind the music controls for seven years, including the magical Patriots season two years ago. He's received calls from players who tell him his music and videos get them so pumped they feel like running onto the field. After last week's Sinatra song, fans eagerly anticipate his selections for today. "Playoffs bring their own intensity," said McCarthy. "The fans really come alive in the playoffs. It's an amazing difference." But the music never plays while the ball does, said McCarthy. "Some teams overdo it and play music while the ball is in play," said McCarthy. "I always thought that took away from the game."

Gordecki has delighted Patriots fans this year with the holiday classic "Let it Snow" as well as Dean Martin's "Baby It's Cold Outside." Today, fans will be entertained and motivated by carefully chosen film clips from inspirational movies such as "Remember the Titans," "Gladiator" and "Braveheart." Landry said the music at Gillette makes her feel like she's "entering into the realm." Music is vital in sporting events, said Michael Mullaney, music director for WBMX Mix 98.5 FM in Boston, because it fosters a kinship between strangers that releases great strength and energy. "There's a very visceral reaction to sports," he said. "The same thing with music. So when the two marry up, it's really wonderful." What music can fans expect to hear at today's game? You can bet Gordecki has a few tricks up his sleeve. But much like the tight-lipped Patriots coach, he's not giving out any clues. "I don't want to give out any trade secrets at this point," said Gordecki. "It's all situational and what we think will be most effective."

Copyright© Eagle-Tribune Publishing

^Top