The T-shirt in Denise Mroczek’s closet with the big footprint on it was trod upon July 4, 1999, possibly by Rick Springfield.
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
The posters, which are fraying but were recently framed to ensure their preservation, gazed down at Mroczek the evening of August 1 as she clicked on www.rickspringfield.com. A frequent visitor, Mroczek, 33, likes to keep up with Springfield’s doings on the road, and there have been more since he emerged from the cocoon he went into shortly after the release of Rick Springfield’s Greatest Hits in 1989. “People just weren’t into the 80s bubblegum music anymore,” Mroczek says. “I think it was just bad timing.”
With a new album, Karma, out two years ago, Springfield went back on the road. He was being booked at ribfests and like events with such regularity that Mroczek went seven times. Though not an official fan club member, she’s racked up 13 shows since 1982. “I’ve got the resources now where I can go and see him,” she says.
Mroczek was impressed, noting, “He typed it with one hand.” Still, even after she tacked it on her wall and read it a few times, she needed to talk about it. So she called up Kelly Aleccia.
“It was a real bummer at 17,” says Mroczek. She first saw Springfield when he played Poplar Creek in 1982–her mom took her for her eighth grade graduation present.
