The Return of Lance Shepard, A Soldier in Germany, 1951 Up and Down the Dial, Rehearsing Some Songs and 1981 MOR Radio

HAPPY HALLOWE'EN!

I have a media-heavy posting this time around, with three of the six items containing material that was on the radio airwaves at some point, and nothing remotely connected to ghosts or goblins.  

Deejay demo tapes seem to be pretty popular, so I'll start with one of those. I seem to have picked up multiple tapes from the collection of the well traveled Lance Shepard (AKA Bill Brown), at some point, and have shared one of his reels before. Here is another one, from that bicentennial summer (and at least for some of it, if not all of it, from that bicentennial day) of 1976, from a town that already existed in 1776, Waterbury, Connecticut, "Supermusic C-O", otherwise known as WWCO. Here's about twelve minutes of nearly 40 year old, "scoped" Lance Shepard.

Download: Lance Shepard Demo Reel from 1240 Supeemusic C-O, Waterbury, Connecticut, July, 1976

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For those who like audio letters, here's one that I found particularly interesting. It's from a soldier stationed in Germany (with his family), recorded off and on for three months. At the start, the tape is nicely dated to March of 1970, as the soldier mentions that year's NIT and NCAA basketball finals having occurred that day. Later, his son joins him. By the end of the tape, he has learned that he is being sent to Vietnam, but has a lengthy break in between, during which he will be returning to the states, during which time he will be finding and buying a house for his family, as they will not be going with him. 

Download: Audio Letter from a Soldier in Germany, Recorded from March to June, 1970

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Here's part of the tape box: 

I have at least one other tape of this soldier - let me know if you are interested in hearing that one. 

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I've labeled the next one "Media Hodgepodge, circa October, 1951". It begins with a couple of Country & Western numbers. These are "Rainbow in My Heart", and, after a moment of a commercial (which is then cut), an upbeat, accordion driven version of (of all things) "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". Then we get a bit of an ad for Royal Pudding, before the recording switches to "The Camel Caravan" starring Vaughn Monroe. The songs chosen for this program include a thoroughly awful of "The World is Waiting for the Sunrise". (As an aside, I will never, ever, understand the appeal of Vaughn Monroe's voice.)

At just after the ten minute point, the real hodgepodge begins. We hear the end of a spoken word ad then a sung good morning jingle, then the station is changed repeatedly. We repeatedly hear moments of the masterful - perfect - version of "The World is Waiting for the Sunrise" by Les Paul and Mary Ford, a weather forecast (it's October 17th), what seem to be part of two different newscasts and a community events calendar fading in and out (as well as, briefly, yet another song). A Freddy Martin record is introduced and we momentarily hear two songs at once, before the final section, featuring a man with the moralistic fervor of the typical anti-communists of the day. When he all the terrible things that always occur whenever forms of socialism are in place, I have to wonder if he had any idea about the ways that many of the Native American tribes lived before the Europeans arrived. But maybe that's just me. 

Download: Media Hodgepodge, circa October, 1951

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For those of you who enjoy men rehearsing arias and songs, here is a man rehearsing arias and songs. It's called "A Man Rehearses Arias and Songs". I hope that makes things clear enough. 

Download: A Man Rehearses Arias and Songs

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And now, the good news is I have a nice, long musical aircheck from an American radio station. The bad news is that's from 1981 - not the best year for rock and roll, if you ask me, and what's worse, it's not from a rock and roll station. It's from an Adult Contemporary station. BORING!!! But it's a complete recording of over two hours, with commercials and newscasts and DJ patter intact. The station was in South Bend, Indiana and was called WTHQ (it's now WNSN). The ongoing discussion of whether the space shuttle would launch, as mentioned throughout these two-plus hours, very definitely dates this tape to November 4th of that year, as does the segment about how Guy Fawkes Day is coming up the following day. That's almost exactly 44 years ago! Here's that tape. 

Download: WTHQ, South Bend, IN, 11-4-81

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And as (almost) always, here's a very short reel. This is all that was on this particular 1200 foot reel, one which came housed in a VERY early Scotch design box - the type sold around 1951-52, but the recording cannot be from before 1956 or so, as that's when the latter of the two songs heard premiered.  The songs are sung by a woman, a cappella. That slightly "newer" song is "Around the World" from the film of a similar title, and is heard first, after which are some warblings of "Many a New Day" from "Oklahoma". All in just under four minutes. 

Download: A Couple of A Cappella Show Tunes

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Antony Bilbow Reads His Stories, Mike Starr Reads the News, Great Musicians Vs. Tone Deaf Singing, A Few Soldiers in London, and Not Singing "Let Me Go, Lover"

Howdy, 

I'm back from COVID and ready to share more of my enormous collection! But first, a follow up to my last post. 

For what I'm sure is more than the dozenth time, thanks to Eric Paddon for identifying that the brief clip of Tic Tac Dough that I shared last time comes from February 13th, 1959, and that, while the show had already gone through it's period of being "crooked" by that point, the winner of that show came by his successes honestly. And he won the equivalent of $1.5 million during his run on the show. All of this information is better explained in a couple of comments Eric made on the post linked above. 

Thanks to everyone else who has commented, as well. In answer to a couple of those comments, I will continue to make a priority of listening to and sharing DJ airchecks which are in my collection. 

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To start, something a little different. Many years ago, I bought a batch of tapes which had belongs to a "tape club", a batch of mostly old time radio recordings, which a circle of people who would exchange with each other, each of them labeled - usually with up to six hours of recordings of episodes of one show - Jack Benny, Bob and Ray, Mr. Keen... whatever. I'm sure these tapes became available to me because of the dying out of the reel to reel format and particularly, the growth of the internet - for the most part, nowadays, the contents of most these tapes can be found online, either for free or for sale on multiple websites. I've listened to some of these tapes over the years and some remain unexplored, so far, in my basement. 

But one of these tapes, labeled "Worthington", contains recordings of a BBC program which, as far as I've been able to discover, don't appear to be easily found online - I've found references to them, but nothing else. Technically, the show is not "Worthington", that's just the name of the lead character - a dog - in two out of every five stories. The shows are actually 15 minute stories, read by a man named Antony Bilbow, and written, for the most part, by Mr. Bilbow and his wife. I believe this fellow, 95 years old as I write this, is the same person as you'll hear on this tape. The stories are quite wonderful, in my opinion, and British through and through. They would apparently run in the morning on English radio five days a week, with Monday and Friday's shows featuring stories about Worthington the dog. 

Anyway, the tape is recorded in quarter track mono, six stories to a track, which means I have 24 of them, lasting a total of six hours. Here is the first side, left channel of the tape. If anyone would like to hear more of these, just let me know. 

Download: Antony Bilbow - Stories on English Radio, Volume 1

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Here is the part of the tape box which lists the stories on the first side, left channel, as heard above: 

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Next up, in two segments containing at least three different recordings, we have someone named Mike Starr. He was, if this tape is to be believed, a news man and general voice-over/commercial announcer at a station called WHBM (named after its owner's initials) in Xenia, Ohio. You can read about the station's history and current status here. I say "If this tape is to be believed" because elements of this tape are so amateurish as to make me wonder if this isn't a demo tape submitted to the station. Primarily, I'm referring to the comical level of reverb heard throughout, and the way that reverb gets turned up to a distracting point during the latter parts of this tape. 

Anyway, part one of this offering - by far the longer of the two - features Mike Starr giving a lengthy newscast which, based on a couple of the stories involved, appears to date from January 7, 1967. This is followed, in this same segment by several commercials, the first of which is Christmas related, so cannot be from the same date as the newscast. A couple of the commercials don't even sound like the same announcer to me. And it is during these commercials that the reverb gets cranked up, seemingly at random, a few times. But maybe it's real. What do you think? 

Download: WHBM News and Ads with Mike Starr

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Sorry about the clicking throughout - I digitized this five years ago, and I believe that those noises are on the original tape. If I track down the tape at some point, I will double check and replace these files. 

Anyway, after several unrecorded minutes on that same tape, the following short bit of goofiness featuring a man who I believe is still Mike Starr, interacting with his dog. 

Download: Mike Starr at Home with His Dog

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Looking backwards into the previous decade, and for those of you who enjoy Big Band music, here is half of an hour long program featuring Harry James, fronting his band on something called "Palladium Dance Time" on July 27, 1954 - presumably, these particular performances of these tunes have not been heard since this broadcast. The reel of tape this was recorded on only allowed a little more than 30 minutes to a side, at 7 1/2 IPS, so that's where the recording ends. 

Download: Harry James and His Orchestra - Palladium Dance Time, 7-27-54

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And now for the polar opposite to the above. Instead of a half hour of master musicianship, we have a very different half hour.... Yes, it's another recording of someone who absolutely cannot sing, and who recorded himself singing along with various records by Elvis, and a few others, apparently some time in 1959. If you can stand listening long enough, you will hear the same fellow demonstrating that his talent as a vocalist was roughly equal to his talent as a guitarist. 

I don't know why, but I am absolutely fascinated by these sorts of tapes - I have at least three which I believe feature this same guy, but I have others, as well - and I sit and listen to them with amazement, wondering 1.) why anyone, even an excellent singer, would record him or herself singing along with a series of records, and 2.) if this guy had any insight, at least after listening to these tapes, that he was tone deaf. 

I completely understand if this is not of interest, but as I said, it holds a peculiar hold over me. 

Download: Singing Along Badly (and Playing the Guitar Along Badly) With Elvis and Others, circa 1959

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And now for our "Acetate of the Month". I think this one is fairly self-explanatory: 

A reporter the U.S. Army Radio Service interviewed a few soldiers from Chicago, for playback on a Chicago station (WGES), on June 21st, 1945. Here is that recording: 

Download: US Army Radio Service 12 Inch Acetate - World War II Broadcast - London to Chicago - WGES- 6-21-45

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And finally, yet another "Very Short Reel". In this case, we have a little girl named Debby (or, perhaps, Debbie" who is being encouraged by her parents to sing a song, specifically "Let Me Go, Lover" (which likely dates this tape to very late 1954 or early 1955, when that song was a hit). Debby would rather pound on her toy xylophone. This goes on for precisely 75 seconds, at which point the recording turns into daddy asking mommy to name all the colors found in their couch, a topic which takes up the final 23 seconds. 

Download: Debby Doesn't Want to Sing 'Let Me Go Lover' and How Many Colors

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Blowout Post # 4

Greetings!

Every month, I make a point of trying to put up two posts. This, I think, goes back to my posting schedule back at WFMU, and it's hardwired into me at this point. In fact, I've only missed that target eleven times in the years of posting, and in some of those periods, I made three posts in surrounding months. 

Anyway, February is short. And I want to have a post up within the next four hours. So it's time for another BLOWOUT POST! That's where I just shove a bunch of stuff - much more than usual - that doesn't need much comment, and let you have a ball with it. I know there are at least a few out there that actually prefer this mode. I will have very little to say, except for a rant about one of the segments. By chance, this is a very media-heavy offering. Let's begin, shall we?: 

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First up, and what I suspect will be the most popular share for this post, here are 14 great ads promoting Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer, all on the theme of "Give That Man a Blue Ribbon". There is no date on the box (see the scan and photo, below) - maybe someone out there knows when these are from: 

Download:  McCann-Erickson, Inc - Pabst Blue Ribbon, 14 "Give That Man a Blue Ribbon' Radio Ads

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Next, I was very excited to find the following slip of paper inside a tape box:

... and I looked forward to a tape full of vintage top 40 Television. Sadly, much of the tape has been erased by all manner of oddness, some of which is below, and some of which I'll be sharing at a later date, but a small portion of Clark Race's TV show, clearly from 1960, remained on the tape, and that's what I'll offer up here: 

Download: Clark Race Record Hop on KDKA TV, 1960

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The title of this one should tell you everything you need to know, and the tape itself will say the rest:

Download: A Phone Call - Ken Wants to See You

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Okay, here's my rant. Why, exactly, would one spend the clearly excessive time it would take to learn Bob Newhart's comedy act, word for word, pause for pause and idiosyncrasy for idiosyncrasy. I simply cannot fathom it. The material worked because it was Bob Newhart, and because it sounded like Bob Newhart and because there was an audience!

And yet, here we have a sample - and I'm only providing a sample - of a tape lasting TWENTY FIVE MINUTES, in which some bozo mimics Bob Newhart into the microphone. Without an audience, either. I get garage bands covering Paul Revere and the Raiders in 1966. I do not get "covering" Bob Newhart in 1960 or 1961, alone with a tape recorder. It seems borderline psychotic to me. 

Oh, and this is part of what erased that promising looking Clark Race TV Record Hop, by the way. 

Download; Bob Newhart Impressions (excerpt)

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On a short reel of tape, I found two interesting recordings. The first few seconds of the tape had this rather endearing little moment between (I'm guessing) a father and his two sons: 

Download: A Short Interview with Eric and His Brother

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The rest of that same tape - recorded on both sides - was this interview with a New York Policeman, first about a police-sponsored carnival, and then about what I've called "Youth Today". There is a gap in the conversation where the first side ends and the second side picks up. 

Download: Conversation with New York Policeman - Upcoming Circus and Issues with Youth Today

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And here is an example of a show called "Continental Classroom", which aired on Public Television stations in the years before there was a PBS. If this intrigues anyone, I can offer more - I have several recordings of this show on a collection of tapes I acquired at least 20 years ago. 

Download: Continental Classroom - 1-11-63 - The Legislative Process, with Stephan K Bailey

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And if you want to enjoy some music, here's an episode of "The Bell Telephone Hour" from the late winter of 1961: 

Download: The Bell Telephone Hour, 3-17-61 - Much Ado About Music

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One of my favorite childhood Saturday morning TV shows ever was a short lived program based on the nonsense writings and drawings of Edward Lear. I've mentioned it here before, when another of my tapes captured a short segment of the show. Here is a longer segment of "Tomfoolery", from one of my own tapes, complete with little 10-year-old Bobby Purse providing an introduction (and a big ol' sniff along the way):  

Download: Tomfoolery - Saturday Morning Cartoon Show, January, 1971

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Paper reels, as I've mentioned before, were the earliest format of reel to reel tape, before they found that plastic backing worked much better. Any paper reel will be, by definition, more than 70 years old at this point, as they were phased out in 1951 or so. That doesn't mean the recordings on them are all 70+ years old, but most of such tapes do contain recordings of that vintage.

I don't actually have a date for this short reel of paper-backed reel to reel tape. It contains a Sermon delivered at the Diocese of Buffalo. 

Download: A Paper Reel - Sermon at the Diocese of Buffalo

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And now, for our "Acetate of the Month". Here is a recording made just weeks after V-E Day, near the end of World War II, featuring personnel from an American radio station interviewing American Soldiers in Britain, on June 22, 1945. 

Download: 6-22-45 Interview with American Soldiers in Britain

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And now for our "Very Short Reel". Today, I'm offering up three short promos for Evangelist David Nunn, who can read about in dozens of websites. In the case of these promos, we are being urged to listen to "The Healing Messenger Broadcast", which was heard no doubt around the country on various religious radio stations: 

Download: Evangelist David Nunn - Three Promos for "The Healing Messenger Broadcast"

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More Vintage Baseball, The 1961 Oscars, Marge and Her Songs, More from Japan and the Trip to Vegas

Howdy Doody, everyone,

Last time around, I finally provided the New York Yankees tapes which had been a subject of discussion for a month or more. And that got me to thinking about how I have my own vintage baseball recordings. 

These are not nearly as historical (or complete, for that matter) as the Yankees/Red Sox games shared last time around, but they are a piece of my own history. 

I have no memory of falling in love with baseball, but it must have been a very sudden thing. I turned nine during the much-discussed CUBS season of 1969, and have no memory of it, or the excitement it caused. 1970 must have been my pivotal year. Because by opening day of 1971, I was enough of a fan that I feigned being sick on that opening day, in order to see the entire first game of the season. I'm sure my mom knew I wasn't actually unwell, but she seems to have gone along with it. 

And what's more, I taped parts of the game - essentially, all of the innings when the CUBS were up to bat. During the recording, especially in the early innings, you will hear me chiming in with comments and outbursts, as well as very soft conversations with my mother. 

Interestingly, play-by-play man Jack Brickhouse left the game in the later innings, in order to catch a plane to Los Angeles, in order to call a game for the then-fairly-new Chicago Bulls. I had no idea that they had a very good team in what was then their fifth season, but they were in the latter stages of the playoffs, and indeed, would lose the series with the Lakers, three games to two, that very night. So Brickhouse called two games in two different sports, half a country apart, in one day. 

Here is the tape.  

Download: Chicago Cubs Vs St Louis Cardinals - Opening Day, 1971 - 4-6-71 (Excerpts)

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The next day, I raced back to the TV to capture the end of the second game of the season, which decidedly did not go the way the first game had gone. As you'll hear, Brickhouse was back to Chicago by that following afternoon, to call another Cubs game. 

Download: Chicago Cubs Vs St Louis Cardinals - Second Game, 1971 - 4-7-71 (Final Innings)

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The latest nominations for Academy Awards, for films released on 2022, were just named a few days ago. And so what better time than now to share with you this lengthy recording of what I believe to be the entire 1961 Academy Awards telecast. I can't find that this is generally available anywhere, so this may be a particularly interesting recording for some of you.

Download: The 1961 Oscar Telecast

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Here is a tape which is one of a seemingly endless group of tapes which came from the collection of someone named Marge Magenheimer. Ms. Magenheimer (I'm going to type "Marge" from now on) seems to have written a couple of songs, and the tapes in question contain endless versions of those two songs in various settings and tempos, and with various singers.

This particular tape starts with Marge introducing an exciting moment in her life, when one of these songs, "Take Me In Your Arms" (copyright June, 1954) was to be performed on the radio by a pianist, followed by that radio broadcast. Then Marge sings the song with the piano. The radio performer then plays another of Marge's songs "You're a Lucky So-and-So", and she again sings over the broadcast. I can't tell for sure if she was part of the recorded broadcast, or singing over instrumental renditions of her song. I think it's the latter - that she was singing along with either a radio broadcast or a dub of that broadcast. 

There follows an instrumental version of Marge's third song, which might be called "So Long, Baby". 

The recording than appears to switch to a live recording by Marge, accompanied by perhaps another pianist, this time everyone performing live, in another rendition of "So Long, Baby". Or maybe this is still over a tape recorded backing. Anyway, this performance (really two shots at it, back to back) goes on for approximately three days. Or seems like it. 

Download: Marge Magenheimer and Friends Sing a Set of Songs - Circa January, 1955

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Returning to a project I've been working on for several months now, probably over a year, here is yet another audio letter from our young man in Japan, circa 1967. I'm still unclear as to exactly what he was doing there - certainly a student, not so certainly a soldier, but I'll keep the identification as a "student-soldier" consistent with the previous postings. 

Download: Another Student-Soldier Tape from Japan, 9-16-67

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And now, here's a tape I just listened to this week. The tape actually has about five short conversations on it, but all but one of them are recorded so poorly (low volume) and with enough low hum that no amount of fiddling on my part seemed to be able to make them decipherable. The one section that can be heard features a few folks, one of whom is a woman named Bill (not Billie, "Bill" - that's a new one on me), discussing a trip to Las Vegas, as well as the drive home, at some earlier time in their lives. 

Download: Bill and Friends - The Trip to Vegas, etc

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Our "Acetate of the Month" could not look more bland: 

But contained on that plain black disc with its plain black label, is heard a men's singing group, performing six songs all about the Sigma Chi fraternity. Here's the entire record: 

Download: Men's College Singing Group - 6 Sigma Chi Songs - One Side

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Download: Men's College Singing Group - 6 Sigma Chi Songs - Other Side

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And finally, our "Very Short Reel" for this posting. The tape label promises to only provide us with a 60 second, Post-Christmas-Sale (from 1998) for "Car Stereo One" somewhere in or near Toledo, and that ad is heard, but the tape was previously used for two ads for Fritz Gifts & Collectibles Inc., of  Monroe, MI, just 20 short miles from Toledo. So left on the tape is the clunky introduction to those ads, 47 seconds of the first of the two ads, and two seconds of the second ad, so you'll hear those in sequence after the Car Stereo ad: 

Download: Car Stereo One & Fritz Gifts and Collectibles - December, 1998

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A Radio Station's Birthday, a Right Wing Meeting, More From Our Young Man in Japan, and Some Rye Sounds

I have another cornucopia today, with four disparate tapes, three of considerable length, and, of course, a "very short reel".

First is a tape I made myself, on the day that local (and legendary) Chicago Top 40 powerhouse broadcast an hour-long special in honor of their 25th anniversary, some time in the spring of 1985. The station had switched over to Top 40 on May 2nd, 1960, and was easily the best station of its genre for most of the following two and a half decades. 

It was certainly the station my older brother listened to all the time, in the bedroom we shared, when I was a little kid (six years his junior). It vied for my attention (along with the inferior WCFL) when I was a pre-teen, and it became my station again when I started driving my own car at age 17 in 1977. The 60's were the magic years, though, with deejay feuds, funny commercials, content created just for the station, and wonderful music. 

By 1985, I would hardly have called much of the music wonderful or magical, but a station retrospective was always worth hearing, and I'm sure I taped it with much enthusiasm. What you hear here is the entire contents of the tape - there is a gap at the end of side one where I turned the tape over, and the special ends about three minutes before the tape does, so we get to hear an oldie coming out of the show credits, and then the start of the then-current number one hit in town, before the second side runs out. 

Sadly, the station had barely four years to go as a music station. The switch by most listeners to FM (for music, anyway), meant the station started telling hosts to talk more and spin records less around 1988, and by the fall of 1989, music had been eliminated entirely. There was a mix of opinion among the station's hosts, at first, but before too long, it was all right wing talk, all the time. As a result, I haven't listened to WLS in at least 25 years.  

By the way, the glitch a few seconds in is on my original tape of this show. I probably restarted it after a few seconds or something. 

Download: The WLS 25th Birthday Special -1985

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Speaking of Right-Wing Politics, here's a tape that at least some may find fascinating, especially if you like the sort of "fly-on-the-wall" listening in to things that appeals to me. Not that these folks didn't know they were being recorded, but just that they probably thought the number of people who would hear the recording would likely be in the single digits, or low tens, at most. 

This is a recording of a meeting of "We the People", and primarily, their special guest speaker. I'm dating this to early 1965. The Johnson/Goldwater election of November, 1964, seems to be in the relatively recent rear view mirror, and a few other references seem to confirm the time period, if not the date. 

This is a lengthy recording - just over 105 minutes, but it's worth a listen if you're a student of the period, interested in the way the political parties saw each other in 1965 (or perhaps more accurately, how the Goldwater faction, and those to the right of that group, saw most everyone else). 

Oh, and for those who like to play with sounds and make montages and the like, this is chock full of good source material. I've used parts of it myself. 

Download: A Meeting of "We the People", circa Early 1965

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Last time around, I offered up part of a collection I have found, consisting of audio letters from a young man in Japan, to a family member back home. I remain confused as to whether this person was just a student or also a soldier, and if only the former, why he was in Japan, and why there are so many references to military things. Again, maybe someone out there has a better idea. 

In this one, he mentions that it is "Saturday, the fourth" but doesn't give a month. Given that it's also clear the year is 1967, I don't know what month we're in, as there were three months with a Saturday the Fourth that year. 

I hope these are interesting to folks, as I have well over a half-dozen of them, so let me know whether to continue with them. 

Download: Audio Letter from a Student-Soldier in Japan, Saturday the 4th (Month Unknown), 1967

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Finally, this post's "Very Short Reel". This one is a bit longer than most, running just over six minutes, but it's still a small reel, containing what these short reels often do, a Demo Reel. In this case, a voice actor named Michael Rye offers up "The Rye Sounds". 

Download: Michael Rye - The Rye Sounds

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A 1960's Student/Soldier, A Visceral Radio Play, Two Types of DJing, and More!

Hi, everyone, 

Before I go any further - and because I definitely won't be posting again before next Thursday - I want to wish a Happy Thanksgiving to everyone who will be celebrating it. 

To start today, the first of a whole batch of tapes that I have from the late 1960's, made by a young man living in Japan. They are audio letters to family (or at least to one family member) in the states. At some point in the last year I acquired more than a half-dozen of his tapes, and I'm still digitizing and listening to them. 

And I am more than a bit confused as to his status, and as to why he was in Japan. The content of the first several tapes led me to believe he was a soldier, who was also attending school in Japan, because he both mentions his schooling, at length at times, and also talks about the local army base, where he was living during the times captured on some - but not all - of the tapes. That led to my impression of what he was doing in Japan, when I labeled today's feature as "From and American Student-Soldier". 

More recently, in tapes I will feature going forward, it becomes more clear that he was a high school student during the times reflected in most or all of these recordings. So that made me think maybe he was living with a family member who was in the Army, yet those other tapes mention him having moved off-base. I find that aspect of these tapes very confusing. 

I intend to share one of these in each post until I run out of them, so maybe someone more familiar with the times, and/or who is better at picking out details which will explain things, can help. 

I don't have them in chronological order yet, mostly because some remain undigitized, so I just chose the first one that I listened to, to share with you. 

Download: Audio Letter From an American Student-Soldier in Japan, March, 1967

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Next up, a fascinating reel that I bought at the old ALS Mammoth Music Mart, which I've written about many, many times. This is a remarkable production of a retelling of "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves", produced, no doubt for radio, by a conglomeration that called itself "Earwaves Productions". I cannot find anything about this company online, but then again, this does date to 1976. 

This is a pretty intense rendition of the story, visceral in its descriptions and even sound effects at times, and I find it very entertaining. The producers of the drama, who otherwise portray the lead characters as devout Muslims, made the odd choice of adding a scene of drinking to excess - which is not part of the original story, and which would be very much out of character for such people - and that seems weird to me. But otherwise, I really enjoyed this. It's in two parts, and I'm sure it aired that way.  

By the way, the two parts both start off identically, but then part two picks up where part one ended. 

Download: Earwaves Productions - Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, Part One (1976)

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Download: Earwaves Productions - Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, Part Two (1976)

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For several years, I had the great pleasure of listening to the radio show of Herb Kent, "The Cool Gent", on my way home from church on Sundays. He played great soul and R & B oldies, often with a good degree of comment and insight. It was his last gig in radio, and he worked right up until the Sunday before his death, at age 88, in 2016. 

I knew that Kent had been a DJ in Chicago for a good long time. In fact, he worked in radio for 72 years. 

Quite some time ago, I was lucky enough to find a reel featuring Herb Kent, a year into his 15 year stay at Chicago's WVON, in July of 1964. While this 27 minute recording is not a pristine aircheck at all (there are lots of edits, of the sort usually found on tapes made by people who mostly wanted the songs), it is, I'm guessing, a rare recording regardless, and does capture enough of Kent to make it worth sharing. 

Download: The Herb Kent Show, WVON, Chicago, July, 1964

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From the sublime to the ridiculous. I also recently digitized a tape containing three, back-to-back identical recordings of the same 11 minute aircheck, with the songs scooped out, done by someone named John Nelson at WXIV (The Big 14) in 1973. I believe this station was in Maine, based on some research I just did. 

Not only is this a far, far worse era for hit music than that found in the preceding 1964 recording - I could only stomach a couple of these hits (were they not excised anyway) - Mr. Nelson's hackneyed performance is as unlistenable as the tunes we are thankfully spared. I assume he was going to chop these up into three tapes and mail them off for a hoped for better job somewhere. He might have waited until he had a chance to do a show while he didn't have a cold. 

Download: John Nelson's Demo Reel - 8-27-73

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As promised last time around, today I am returning to the "Acetate of the Month" feature. With Thanksgiving a week away, and certain radio stations having long since turned on the Christmas Music, I thought I'd share this eight inch home recorded acetate, of what sounds like an adolescent boy (named Bill Duke), playing a piano solo of "White Christmas", near the end of 1948. 

Download: Bill Duke - White Christmas (Duodisc 8 Inch Acetate)

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On the flip side, Bill Duke serenades us with "My Happiness"

Download: Bill Duke - My Happiness (Duodisc 8 Inch Acetate)

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And finally, it's time for our "Very Short Reel". This is among the very shortest of those short reels, 34 seconds of John Dancy, in which he introduces what he's going to do, does a four second promo for a news special, in three slightly different styles, and says "okay". 

Download: John Dancy - Foreign Policy Special Teaser

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