Jock Jams, Volume 5: How does the Jock series hold up today?

Three years after it started going national with standalone networks in every major market, Fox Sports all but consummated its rise to challenge ESPN by taking over Jock Jams.

Then-Fox Sports Net anchor Van Earl Wright virtually emceed Jock Jams, Volume 5, the last installment of an eight-album series in the 1990s. Much like household names from SportsCenter on some prior installments, he kicked it off with one of his catchphrases, then returned for a midway interstitial and the closing track.

But after he said “Let’s hit the showers,” no one representing the Jock series would return to don the uniform again. That is unless you count 2001’s All Star Jock Jams, which was tantamount to an alumni scrimmage with its overload of repeat tracks.

Naturally, the Fox Sports brand has sustained stability and respectability in terms of sports coverage. Some of its regional affiliates have kept the FSN acronym, which has also inflated to a national network (FS1) covering Major League Baseball, college football and college basketball.

But in terms of athletic music compilations, the new brand on the block had the dubious honor of taking the table scraps. Together with the ’90s, the act of capitalizing on the canned-music crazed was fizzling.

Sure, the practice was permanent in professional, collegiate and some high-end amateur venues. But it was ceasing to be a commercial boon. Afterward, most songs heard at games could just as easily be found on mainstream CDs.

To that point, several of the selections for Jock Jams, Volume 5 stayed obscure even among sports-music junkies. Six of the 15 musical tracks were energized remixes of Billboard fodder, yet most of them still did not make the collective cut in athletic arenas.

Released three months and a week ahead of Y2K, JJV5 awkwardly ushered out an era, with only a few songs leaping into the new century. And even those have proved polarizing among unintended listeners. Others, including the first on the track listing, simply dropped and disappeared in an unprecedented crowd of rallying beats.

“Reach Up”

Lyrically speaking, there is not much to this song, which makes it a prototypical kind of Jock Jam. Other than the Perfecto All-Stars repeating the title and Wright cutting back in with “Can you feel it?” it cedes everything to a rhythm that flows naturally with a game-starting vibe.

 

Whether the song’s placement on the album clouded the public’s perception of its innate specialty is unclear. But besides introductions or opening plays, this also provided a quick in-game pick-me-up in many venues in the early 2000s.

 

And with the sparing, straightforward vocals, it nearly rivaled the chorus of Jennifer Lopez’s “Let’s Get Loud” during that era. Although the latter would come to overshadow it, as would Danzel’s “Put Your Hands Up in the Air!” mid-decade.

 

“We Like to Party”

“Six Flags! More flags, more fun!”

That mind-searing ad campaign came five years after JJV5. More than a decade later, the Colorado Rockies were keeping “We Like to Party” afloat as their run-scoring song. Meanwhile, the Tri-City American major-junior hockey team has used it as their goal song.

Elsewhere, the full song, complete with Vengaboys vocals, can still be heard after a victory or as a re-energizer prior to the next period, quarter, inning or half. But that practice is relatively sparse across the sports universe.

“Ray of Light”

Within the 18 months between this song’s release on an eponymous Madonna album and its inclusion on Jock Jams, the New Jersey Devils were playing it during stoppages of play. There is proof of that in the first five seconds of this highlight reel from the 1999 playoffs.

But overall, this did not have the same broad outreach or long-term adhesive as its preceding track.

“Miami”

The multi-talented Will Smith came back one volume after “Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It” appeared on ESPN’s last Jock Jams album. But apart from fan-produced YouTube music videos on a given team with the Miami dateline, this is short on a sports-related legacy.

Perhaps that owes to Smith’s association with his hometown Philadelphia 76ers. He may declare the Florida metropolis “my second home” in the song, but no one has given much call for the homage at games.

“Turn It Up/Fire It Up”

The first remix on this compilation has surprisingly failed to gain playlist prominence at any point. One would think the call-and-response chorus would make it coveted crowd-participation fodder.

All it would take is to play Busta Rhymes’ request, “Let me hear you say fire it up!” then let the audience oblige. If necessary, one could flash the three-word phrase on the videoboard. For a half-minute stoppage of play, a subsequent loop of Rhymes commanding, “Say fire it up!” followed by a pause for the crowd would match quantity with quality.

If at least one or two relatively high-profile teams had taken that up, it could have established itself as one of their everlasting in-game customs. It could have been another “Jump Around.” But for whatever reason, it is not.

“I’m Gonna Get You”

Of its 10 selections for the best Jock Jams songs, Complex chose two samples from Volume 5. The publication described the 1992 title track from a Bizarre Inc. album as “a perfect fit for this series.”

The same publication’s assessment, however, concedes that the tune “might be a bit too vocal-drenched for some of you.” It is hard to say whether that kept it from seeing as much sound-system action as the best-played of its peers. The opening portion was at least groovy and instrumental enough to fill short breaks in the action.

“Nice and Slow”

This remix of an Usher song hardly lives up to its title. That is good for sporting-event purposes, but it would not make the rapper a can’t-miss presence on the PA system. For that milestone, he would have to wait another five years, when “Yeah!” was an instant all-round hit.

“Woof Woof”

When breaking down every Jock Jams track, Aaron Gordon of Vice Sports had an interesting take. “This is either a poor man’s ‘Whoomp! There It Is’ or a rich man’s ‘Who Let the Dogs Out?’” he wrote.

As it happened, “Woof Woof” marked a belated return by 69 Boyz, who previously sent “Tootsee Roll” to Volume 1. That came two slots after “Whoomp! There It Is” on the compilation’s track order.

Meanwhile, the comparison to the Baha Men’s breakout tune surely stems from the dog references and sounds. Perhaps the fact that JJV5 came one year before “Who Let the Dogs Out” dooms “Woof Woof”’s hopes of becoming a sound-system staple. It was overshadowed by a polarizing mainstream pop hit that spent much of 2000-01 in prominence before crashing the All Star Jock Jams.

“Nobody’s Supposed to be Here”

Deborah Cox leads off Side 2 of this compilation’s cassette with the revamped mix of her September 1998 single. But beyond that inclusion and her later live performance of “O Canada” at the 2008 NBA All-Star Game, the Toronto native has not been quite synonymous with sports.

 

“Feel It”

In advertising and short-order canned-music play alike, the bell-ringing hook is the crux of this dance jam. As such, it is no surprise that sportsannouncing.com endorses it for general rally or pump-up songs.

In other momentary flares, this Tamperer/Maya tune rang its familiar bell after a few goals at the 2001 NHL All-Star Game. Other than that, it has not been at the forefront of any stadium playlists, but the collaborating artists still felt compelled to reunite and redo it in 2009.

“Too Close”

Even as a remix, this version of “Too Close” was too slow to sound right in a sports setting. Much like with “Set It Off” or “No Diggity” on some of the ESPN Jock Jams albums, coming across this track while playing this album makes an in-game music junkie want to shout “Next!” but not as an enthusiastic acknowledgment of the group behind the tune.

“Suavemente”

At least one college baseball player has used one of the many versions of this song as his walk-up theme. That is especially appropriate considering artist Elvis Crespo once harbored high-end hardball aspirations himself.

Elsewhere, Crespo’s music has made its way into Hispanophone soccer culture. But despite the energetic opening riff to the remix on Jock Jams, “Suavemente” did not catch on among major North American arena DJs.

It could have been a gimme at major- and minor-league ballparks alike, and would have even sounded right during a random stoppage of play at a hockey game. Unfortunately, that potential has not materialized.

“Burnin’ Up”

How do untrained ears listen to this and not immediately think of Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch? Just like “Good Vibration” earlier in the decade, this song samples the “Sweet sensations!” cry by the late Loleatta Holloway.

Somehow or other, “Good Vibration” never made the Jock series, even though it would have been a perfect fit. Nonetheless, much like “Woof Woof” soon had with “Who Let the Dogs Out,” “Burnin’ Up” was implicitly overshadowed by a similar sounding mainstream tune.

As such, it could not catch on at the arena. It did, however, land on the aforementioned Complex’s top 10 in 2013. Although the site supposes the song also suffered one of the same detriments as numerous later Jock Jams contemporaries, reflecting, “it was primed for the pre-millenium house party that was imminent before the Y2K bug destroyed everything.”

“All I Have To Give”

Granted, the last of the Jock Jams remixes did lend a little oomph into this Backstreet Boys song. By all accounts, however, that was not nearly enough.

Through its inclusion, the boy band was the last of the repeat artists in the series. And as is common among that group, their later contributions garnered less traction in the stadium DJs’ cues.

“Got to Be Real”

At 21 years of age when it hit this compilation, this was Volume 5’s only non-’90s song. To this day, it injects Cheryl Lynn’s voice into the occasional sampling track, movie or TV episode.

But the return to token disco-era tunes in the Jock Jams series did not prompt much PA-system play. This author recalls exactly one instance of “Got to Be Real” at a sporting event — between innings at an MLB game late in the 2001 season.