Concert Strategy Is Long Past

This reader suggests that I help book some Brooklyn indie bands at Belmont to help bring a new, and decidedly younger, demographic out to the races. And I'd surely do that for free, and DJ too!

But NYRA gave up long ago on booking name bands, even after drawing some large crowds when they last did it in the late 70's and early 80's. I actually have distinct memories of only one of those shows, though I'm sure I must have attended several more; can't seem to slice through the chronic haze. But I do definitely recall the Dave Mason show in 1978, a photo from which is pictured here (if you scroll up ever so slowly) with the caption noting a crowd of 30,000 to 50,000. A little Google research shows that Charlie Daniels and Rick Derringer played there too, and I was probably at those. I even managed to find an MP3 file of the entire concert by the latter on a site which broadly facilitates the illegal downloading of copyrighted music and which shall thus remain name- and link-less even though many of you probably know of it and many other sites like it.

NYRA was once so enamored of the concert strategy that in 1976, it actually moved racing back to Aqueduct in July, built a new spacious backyard for the occasion, and staged concerts in the hope that people would take the A train from the city for a day of sun and fun. That experiment lasted one year (though the backyard came in handy when the track first opened for Saratoga simulcasting, which is where I was the infamous day in 1986 when the stewards disqualified the wrong horse [the aftermath of which was colorfully described and critiqued a week later by Steven Crist in the Times]).

I never got the feeling that the extra bodies translated into new customers. There was no real effort to do so, unlike at Gulfstream, where they would give concertgoers $2 betting vouchers, herd them into a corner and literally attempt to indoctrinate them with videos and lectures. Not sure how that approach fared, and from what I hear, there's no longer a backyard to stage such an event.

The only track I know of with a continuing concert series is Del Mar, whose continuing effort to crack down on pot smoking includes "only" two reggae concerts this year.

If I was booking Brooklyn bands at Belmont, I might start with Beach Fossils, whose excellent self-titled debut is out on Captured Tracks. With its lilting, richly harmonic staccato guitar and bass lines, reverb vocals, and spare but efficient drumbeats - think Joy Division as a beach blanket bingo band - its a perfect summer album.

As long as I'm on the subject, been meaning to mention Phantogram, the Saratoga Springs based duo who I saw at the Final Stretch festival there last year. Happy to report that they recently sold out Bowery Ballroom here in the city, are touring with The xx as we speak, and will be doing a free show on Governor's Island with Caribou, whose album Swim, available on Merge, is one of the best albums of the year.

And finally, and then on to the Belmont, one of the bands on that Del Mar schedule is The Lost Pack, a local San Diego outfit which changed its name from The Muslims, I wonder why. They'll be a cool band to see there I'm sure. This video below was filmed at Del Mar Pizza, which I didn't visit in my two trips there and don't know a thing about because I don't eat pizza. But I guess it's near the track.