Mostly bad things - like the Boston Strangler - and, of course, the Charles River, which at the time was famously polluted. The band started to toss out references to everything they knew about Boston at the time. ‘They weren’t from Boston, so they shouldn’t be so popular.’ It’s just sour grapes, I guess,” Tamblyn said. You know, we get this all the time on the internet. But nobody in the band had ever been to the city. “Dick invented some of the lyrics like, ‘I’m going to tell you a story, it’s all about my town. Red Sox Faithful Say Goodbye To Jerry Remy At Public Viewing In WalthamĪn ode to the real 617: Listen to Boston’s first-ever Youth Poet Laureate reflect on her city But then, Tamblyn said, their drummer Dick Dodd started ad-libbing lyrics.ĭavid Ortiz voted into Baseball Hall of Fame And The Standells were starting to get fairly popular, but not “Beatles popular.” So in 1965, the band decided to team up with a new producer, Ed Cobb, who brought them a new song: “Dirty Water.” Their sound was less crisp, a sound that’s now referred to as garage rock or pre-punk. Tamblyn formed the group right around when the Beatles were British-invading, and he and his bandmates wanted to do something a bit different. It all begins in Los Angeles in the early 1960s with a guy named Larry Tamblyn, the founder and original lead singer of The Standells. In fact, “Dirty Water” got its start thousands of miles away from Boston. The riff that gets the crowd to its feet was not intended to be an anthem or an ode to someone’s hometown. Wally will be greeting fans and, hopefully, that song that rings in every win at Fenway will be blaring: “Dirty Water” by The Standells. Tomorrow is the home opener for the Red Sox, and Lansdowne Street will be filled with the smell of sausages.

Where are you now lyrics faded