The Baseball Project at Fine Line (September 17, 2025)
The Baseball Project was playing a show at Fine Line in Minneapolis mere blocks from the Twins-Yankees game. Old and new fans got a great show from this very talented band.
- 1976
- Past Time
- Erasable Man
- The Yips
- Box Scores
- Grand Salami Time
- Uncle Charlie
- Journeyman
- They Don’t Know Henry
- Monument Park
- Disco Demolition
- New Oh in Town
- From Nails to Thumbtacks
- Long Before My Time
- To the Veterans Committee
- ¡Hola America!
— Encore —
- Ted Fucking Williams
- Harvey Haddix
- The All or Nothings
- Words & Birds
- You Don’t Mean It (The Possibilities cover)
- Death the Bludgeoner
- The Garden of Arden (Live debut)
- Blue Rickenbacker
- I Don’t Want to Hate Anyone
- Falling Like Jets
- Let the Rope Hold, Cassie Lee
- Aw Shit Man
- In The Ground
- Hitchhiker (Neil Young cover)
- 9/10 @ Intuition Ale Works, Jacksonville, FL
- 9/11 @ Saturn, Birmingham, AL
- 9/12 @ 40 Watt Club, Athens, GA
- 9/14 @ Bourbon & Beyond Festival, Louisville, KY
- 9/16 @ Codfish Hollow Barnstormers, Maquoketa, IA
- 9/17 @ Fine Line, Minneapolis, MN
- 9/18 @ Thalia Hall, Chicago, IL
- 9/19 @ Bell’s Eccentric Café, Kalamazoo, MI
- 9/20 @ Mr. Small’s Theatre, Millvale, PA
- 9/21 @ White Eagle Hall, Jersey City, NJ
- 9/23 @ Crystal Ballroom, Somerville, MA
- 9/24 @ MilkBoy, Philadelphia, PA
- 9/25 @ The Hamilton, Washington, DC
- 9/26 @ The Broadberry, Richmond, VA
- 9/27 @ Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro, NC
- 9/28 @ Mountain Stage, WV
- 9/30 @ Terminal West, Atlanta, GA
In a fun twist of fate, the Fine Line was hosting The Baseball Project just a few blocks away from Target Field where the Twins were playing the Yankees in Minneapolis. The supergroup (with members of R.E.M. and The Dream Syndicate) has just started their newest tour and we caught the first show of the tour last week in Jacksonville.
The Minus 5 opened things up, but as mentioned before, it was the headliner slightly reconfigured arrangement. This was five extremely talented musicians with Scott McCaughey on guitars and lead vocals, Steve Wynn on guitar, Peter Buck on bass, Mike Mills on keys, and Linda Pitmon on drums. Opening with a “We’re The Minus Five…for this set”, the band went straight into it, and as Vu noted in their Jax show, the professionalism shone through. You Don’t Mean It had Wynn on back up vocals and getting the first of many guitar solos. Pitmon was outstanding with fierce drumming and good backing vocals on nearly every song. A live debut of Garden of Arden from the new album (they have about 15!), Oar On, Penelope!, was a solid rocker. Blue Rickenbacker let Buck have a great bass riff and really drive the song with Pitmon.
Side note: I’m pretty sure I saw a fair amount of the audience at The Big Star Quintet show at First Ave. in July, with Mike Mills in that project as well. That man is keeping busy.
Falling Like Jets was a faster paced song and had triple harmonies from McCaughey, Pitmon, and Wynn. A “good thing I opened that second Red Bull” from Pitmon got a good round of laughs before she kicked off the next number. Aw S**t Man had the obvious repeated lyric and may have been Mills’ first singing of the evening. Finishing up with Hitchhiker, The Minus 5 closed up strong and said, “we’ll be right back as the next band!”.
The Baseball Project came to stage in a slight change and most of the band having changed outfits, with Buck and Mills switching ends of the stage and instruments (Buck to guitar, Mills to bass). 1976 had Wynn on lead vocals, but he switched back and forth with McCaughey over the remainder of the set. Pitmon, the Minneapolis native, asked for the Twins score and hearing it (Yankees winning 8-5 in the 8th inning) had Mills say “We were going to write a song called F the Yankees, but 12 of those exist already” to great laughs. Erasable Man was quite the rock song, while The Yips had Mills crushing on bass. Going to the band’s early hits (pun intended), with Grand Salami Time got knowing cheers from the crowd. There was a young fan near the front of the stage and Mills’ interactions with him were pretty adorable.
Side note two: I’m not sure I have ever spent a set needing to dodge a musician’s instrument. But Mills kept coming right to the edge of the stage and turning in a way that his bass kept swinging over a small group near the stage. An amusing repeated moment for three or four us at far stage right.
Journeyman was dedicated that evening to LaTroy Hawkins, who spent the longest part of his many team career with the Twins. It also highlighted Mills’ crystal clear vocals and a great reminder of what a singer he is. Disco Demolition had Wynn singing and Pitmon on police whistle and it was an appropriately funky sound, with a cacophonous instrumental. Banter during the show was consistently very funny, and the band was clearly having a great time. From Nails to Thumbtacks had all four singers harmonizing (Buck was the only one without a microphone) and on the wall of ooohs was impressive. Closing the main set on ¡Hola America!, The Baseball Project came back shortly for a three song encore, ending with the excellent number The All of Nothings. Walking away from Fine Line, I had to admit that while the subject matter of the songs was often a little odd, the music and some of the themes were very rock & roll. And these are some of the greats playing at some relatively small venues, so if you get the chance to catch them on this tour, go for it!
