Episode 193: MLB Pitcher John Axford

Vinyl Emergency

While on the Milwaukee Brewers roster in 2011, major league pitcher John Axford created a buzz among indie-rock baseball nerds by forgoing the standard jock jams and using Refused's "New Noise" as his game entrance music. While exposing thousands to the Swedish hardcore band’s chaotic screams and atonal, pummeling instrumentation, the choice also garnered some vocal complaints from opposing coaches and TV announcers. Nonetheless, Axford led the entire National League in saves that season, so who knows if some of the song's lyrics ("Good frames won't save bad paintings") don't indeed secretly speak to pitching. Around this same time, his interest in vinyl records began to blossom, leading him to hunt down Japanese Metallica pressings and connect again with his family’s classic Christmas LP’s. Since then "The Ax Man," as fans have dubbed him, has reached the World Series (with the 2013 St. Louis Cardinals), and done time with the Pirates, Dodgers and Blue Jays, among other organizations. Most recently, Axford represented his home country of Canada in last year’s World Baseball Classic. On this episode, we explore how his dad's vintage Edison phonograph somewhat influenced Axford’s current big budget stereo set-up, his fandom for LP subscription service Vinyl Me, Please and why he won't clean his grandparents' fingerprints off their old records. We also dive into John's recent trip overseas, to a quaint Dutch village where his great uncle's heroism during WWII is cemented and honored forever. Follow @johnaxford on Instagram. PLUS, music this week from Milwaukee band Dramatic Lovers!