Now that the Carolina Hurricanes have been eliminated from the NHL playoffs, Merge Records impresario Mac McCaughan has moved on from chronicling the ‘Canes’ efforts to talking about the music that arenas employ to get fans in prime freak-out mode. In 2006, he brought some albums put out by his label down to the Hurricane home base, RBC Center, in hopes of breaking through what he called its “particularly stultifying mix of Top 40 / Classic rock / Emo (? i don’t know what to call some of the songs on there) / Sports Disco,” and it worked, at least a bit; “Punch Me Harder” got played during the 2006 NHL Finals, which–coincidence?–the Hurricanes won. Anyway, McCaughan has provided his own suggested playlist for hockey arenas to the local paper, and man, is it so much better than the nu-metal and snipped bits of Eurodance that I’m used to at my sporting events. A few selections: More ยป
