Interesting Radio Recordings from Two Paper Reels, Birthday Time, An Odd Promo, Music in a Bar and at Home, A Little German, and the use of Cactus and Wood Needles

Howdy, 

I'm starting off today with something I find absolutely fascinating. I recently was lucky enough to purchase two paper reels - that is, reels without plastic backing, just paper. Both were Soundmirror reels, from the company I believe was first in producing reel tape for home buyers. Since that company was out of the reel tape business by 1952, and paper reels were gone by 1953, it's always possible that there could be recordings as much as 80 years old on such a tape. 

That's not quite the case here - these recordings are more like 73 years old - but they are fascinating nonetheless. The first one I listened to had an episode of a radio program called "Answers for Americans", which was heard on the Mutual radio network. A panel of experts answered political questions from listeners, with prizes to the listeners whose questions were used. 

Multiple online sites indicate this was a right wing show particularly focused on anti-communism, but this particular episode really just sounds like the questioners, and the experts, getting their bearings at a very scary moment - the weeks after Stalin died - when a lot of questions about any resetting of US/Soviet relations were unsettled. While I'm sure a left-wing show would have sounded much different, I doubt that a mainstream right-down-the-middle show would have been much different at that particular moment. 

Again, your mileage may vary, but boy did I enjoy listening to this. 

Download: "Answers For Americans" On Mutual Radio, Spring, 1953

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The show ended before the tape did, and at the end of it, there is this fragment of some sort of variety program. The man speaking and singing throughout mentions having starred in "Million Dollar Legs", meaning he could conceivably be one of three male stars of that movie. I certainly am not an expert in any of them, but I'm guessing it's Donald O'Connor

Download: Fragment of a Variety Show circa 1953

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The other paper reel was interesting for a different reason. The person who recorded "Answers for Americans" seemingly recorded another episode of that show or something similar, for the conversation (actually it's more like a series of short speeches) is about how a "One-World Government" would be possible, but only if it were to be a "FREE One-World Government", and I'm sure we all know whose definition of "Free" they were using. 

I believe our recordist must have left the machine alone to record, because powerhouse clear channel station WCKY, and its Country and Western format, begins showing up, interfering with the speechifying. Each station struggles to be heard over the other for a time, but eventually, the Cincinnati C & W format wins out, and the speeches are not heard at all for the last few minutes. What is heard is some down-home entertainment, also likely from right around 1953, complete with ads for worthless patent medicines, which are claimed to be able to cure oh so many ills. 

It's hard to listen to at times, but man oh man, is it rewarding in the end. And the far better radio format wins in the end, too. Well, that's what I think, anyway. 

Download: Competing Stations - "One Free World Government" Discussion Vs. Country and Western on WCKY, Cincinnati

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There is nothing written on either of these tapes' boxes, by the way. One last comment - our recordist clearly intended to record the speeches. Why on earth, after listening to the tape and determining that they had not been recorded correctly, didn't he or she use the tape again? Did the recordist enjoy this mish-mash of sounds?!?!?

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And now, for all you "Ed and Frank" fans, here is more from Ed and Frank: an hour of their drummer and electric piano noodling, as recorded at some facility where I'm guessing a lot of beer was consumed, almost exactly 69 years ago. 

Download: Ed and Frank, 7-4-57
Play:

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Or perhaps children's birthdays are more to your liking. This tape is from the 1960's, most likely 1968 based on other material on the reel, some of which I will share at a later date. It's short and (mostly) sweet.

In it, Kay's father tries to get her to talk more than she wants to, we hear some other children and then the requisite singing of "MacArthur Park". No, wait, that's wrong. It's "Happy Birthday". 

Download: Kay's Birthday

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Maybe you can make out the words "Kay's Birthday" on the back of the box: 

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A company called "Magna-Tronics", also probably sometime in the 1960's, promoted a Muzak-like product, which, rather than being for stores, was for radio stations (!) which wanted to simply program someone else's pre-recorded series of bland musical performers for AM or FM broadcast. 

I have no idea how successful this was - it seems like a fool's errand to me - but here is the promotional tape used to sell the program managers on this product. I have one other tape from this company, an actual example of the product that they sent to stations, which I will feature later. 

Download: Magna-Tronics Radio Station Easy Listening Promo Tape

Play:

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Quite some time ago - and I can't seem to find the post at the moment - I shared some home recordings of old-timey type music and more recent standards, recorded by some folks who clearly got together frequently and made music... and sometimes recorded it. I have a handful of tapes from these folks, and today I have a second recording by them, about 40 minutes this time, and in this case with all of their names identified on the tape box, and if I can find that box, I will add it to this post. I do have their names in the file name. 

Download: More Music at Home - Bill, Vernene, Dianne, Helen and Flavian, 3/23/62

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Well, this is not the box that goes along with that reel, but it is a box from a tape with some of the same people. They all look more or less like this: 

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And for the last reel today.... I wasn't sure what to do with this but I decided to share it. Maybe someone out there can let all of us know what is being said. As it is titled "A woman speaking "mostly" in German". And that's really and truly all I know about it. 

Download: A Woman Speaking (Mostly) in German

Play:

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And finally, here's an Acetate of the Month. It looks like this: 

As you can see. it features what is mostly a blank label from the Acetate company / recording studio, with what might be a family name written in the corner. Note the encouragement to use a "cactus or wood" needle to play this record. WHAT???? Well, a bit of internet sleuthing shows both of these are for real. That's a new one on me!

One side features a bunch of conversations - which definitely sounds like "around the house" type conversations than those that would have taken place in a studio, then a short rendition of "Let Me Call You Sweetheart". Here 'tis: 

Download: Cathedral Latin Acetate - Family Conversations and Let Me Call You Sweetheart

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The flip side is considerably longer, and I've labeled it "Some Sort of Family Skit". That's the best I can do. Maybe someone with better ears than me can make out all of what goes on here. Despite my cluelessness, I still sort of enjoy it. 

Download: Cathedral Latin Acetate - Some Sort of Family Skit

Play:

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Very Short Reels will return next time!

Post 250: Country Radio in 1965, Some Fun Home Recordings, Pete Returns Yet Again, Right Wing Commentary and The Moritz Family!

Good Day!

This is, to my amazement and pleasure, my 250th post to this site. I had hoped to share something extremely precious to me for this post, but I did not have enough time to do as I wanted, and it will have to wait for another day. Hopefully, another post loaded with a variety of goodies will suffice. 

Before getting to those, I want to thank a few people who stopped by to comment. In particular, thanks to Josh, who has commented on several postings, ever since getting wind of this site a month or more ago. He is particularly interested in religious recordings, primarily sermons I think, and has left several comments about the various Christian-related tapes I've posted recently. There are too many comments to repost here, but if you look in my recent postings, you'll find at least five comments from him. He also provided links to his own site where he shares sermon recordings, and his own podcast, for those who might like to dive deeper into such things, Thanks, Josh! I will continue to keep you in mind with regard to featuring those sorts of tapes when I find them. 

And quickly - quite appropriately for my 250th post, an anonymous poster let me know that, over a year ago, in this post, I shared my 1000th downloadable file for y'all. Cool! And in answer to a question about the touch tone tape, from JimmyLee, I will share that that particular tape was included in two full boxes of tapes I bought many years ago, all of which were for internal use by Bell Telephone, so I assume it was for some sort of training purposes. I have shared many of those tapes here, over the years. 

~~

I'll start today with a favorite sort of tape among readers and listeners, the vintage music radio station recording. In this case, it's 50 minutes or so of radio from Canton, Ohio. Most of this recording is from WHOF, which was a country station at the time. I didn't included it in the name of the file, but this is almost certainly from the fall of 1965, as the then-future # 1 (and resolutely awful) country hit "Giddyup Go" is the pick of the week. 

The station is changed a few times, including at least once, briefly, to a top 40 station, and then there is a twirling of the dial in the last few minutes. And then, at the very, very end, we get a piece of what all this radio station recording was erasing - the last few moment of some sort of band rehearsal. 

Download: WHOF, Canton, OH (Mostly)

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Here's a set of home recordings (with some radio and other music thrown in) that I think is pretty interesting and almost stunningly weird in one aspect. It's also REALLY random and so I've labeled it as a "Hodgepodge". I'm going to describe this one in detail, because I think it's worth it. Leaving out a few very short moments in between the longer segments, here's a rundown of what you'll hear: 

A few microphone tests, then a young girl reading some text about tapes and tape recorders. 

A man reading a very bawdy poem, a slightly off color limerick and a shaggy dog story about the old west.

A different man claiming to be broadcasting on radio station S-H-I-T and who tells a lame joke, and another man, identified as being from Shit University, who tells another lame joke, both of them about men having a lack of sexual prowess. 

After several very short things, a stage band plays three songs.

Some radio recordings, including KQV in Pittsburgh (one of the oldest radio stations in the world), including a pop song I don't recognize, a devilish "drive safely" PSA, some DJ patter and the start of a Brenda Lee record. 

A pianist fumbles her way (she speaks at one point, making clear it's a girl who is playing) through "Exodus", fumbles even more so through a piece I don't recognize, then falls back on a little piano piece that nearly everyone knew how to play in the 1960's, and which was popularized as "Down at Papa Joe's" at one point, before playing part of Moonlight Sonata", then cycles through various other pieces, returning to the "Papa Joe's" music after more struggles.

Then it's the REAL high point of this tape. If it was ever your dream to hear a flute player and a trombone play "Danny Boy" together (and at first, not lining up the tune together), particularly with the trombonist trying, and not always succeeding, to play in the upper register of his instrument, this is your moment. 

Back to the pianist, whose work was partially erased by the flute/trombone duo. She's onto the "Heart and Soul" chords (another piece every kid knew how to play on piano in the 1960's). 

Then, a man tells the story of John F. Kennedy from a clear position of clear distaste for the man and his politics, identifying Kennedy as Italian for some reason (using a national origin slur), and ending with a tasteless joke. 

Finally, a man recites a little piece of nonsense doggerel. We're now at Fink university, but before any further silliness can be captured, the tape ends. 

Quite a little compendium, there. It astonishes me that the people who decided to record some off color material chose to do so on a tape that a teenage girl was also clearly using and probably listening to. 

Download: Early to Mid 1960's Hodgepodge of Home Recordings

Play: 

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Next, remember Pete? I featured two tapes of Pete, featuring his off key warbling, badly tuned guitar and generally odd ways, here... and here.

Well, glory be, I have found another tape of Pete. This one features a different side of the man, and yet the same absurdities - and some other ones - shine through. Just as on the previous shared tapes, in this case, Pete set out to re-record some of his other tapes onto the four separate monaural channels of a five inch reel. 

My big question here is.... WHO was he doing this for? The impression I get is that he was just trying to consolidate some shorter tapes (or perhaps his favorite parts of some other tapes) onto one reel. But then, he more or less ruins the majority of the recordings by plugging in his microphone and erasing part of the song being heard, in order to comment on the song being heard, or to make mention of what song it is. At one point, during a re-recording of a Lawrence Welk segment, he comes back in to comment that the performer being heard later died in a car crash. And every now and then, when some backwards material (from what he is erasing) pops through, he comments on that, too.

Again, these seem to have been for his own purposes/enjoyment. Did he want to hear interrupted songs, with his own comments (which he presumably would also be familiar with at a later hearing. Also, songs start and stop in the middle of the recording a lot of the time. The recording is amazingly choppy, even without taking into account his interruptions. 

This is a long tape, and surely won't be for everyone, but the sheer peculiarity of it caused me to choose to share it. 

Download: Pete Records His Old Tapes and Comments On Them

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Here are portions of the front and back of the tape box, for anyone who would like to play "Peteologist" and try to make more sense of this: 

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I recently found in my possession a tape which contained, back to back, a series of episodes of a short radio show which aired on the Mutual Radio Network for nearly three decades, a program of commentary by Fulton Lewis, Jr. I read up on him, and it sounds like he was somewhat akin to Rush Limbaugh, if Limbaugh had presented his program as news and had limited it to a few short minutes a day. I strongly suspect that Mr. Lewis' show would not be something I would dial into, were he still in business. Be that as it may, it's an interesting tape and worth a listen for its historical value, if nothing else. 

Download: Several Episodes of Fulton Lewis, Jr's Radio Commentary Program

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And now for an "Acetate of the Month". And this is an interesting little relic, which looks like this: 

The label is the same on both sides, and the recording is the same on both sides, too. The presence of a zone, rather than a zip code, means this recording is from no later than 1963. The song being parodied, "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" was written by my musical, social and political hero, Pete Seeger, in 1955, but didn't enter the national consciousness until 1961, which helps date this little record to somewhere within an 18-20 month period. 

The performers are The Moritz Family, or at least two of them, singing to friends (I'm guessing) prior to their departure from the neighborhood to parts not named. There are two references Kenilworth, IL, a tiny burg (never more than 3000 residents, covering just over a half-mile square) which is very near the town I grew up in, and which was, in the 1960's, sometimes ranked as the richest town in America. 

Presumably this recording was given to The Moritz' friends upon their departure. I no doubt found it in a sale in the same North Shore area where it was recorded, many years later. 

Download: Sound Studios, Inc - The Moritzs - Where Have All the Moritzs Gone?

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And finally, this 250th post's "Very Short Reel". This is a bit of a cheat, but in another way, not. I have very little doubt that this tiny piece of tape, which I found on its own on a reel, was chopped off of another, no doubt longer reel. Why that would be, I couldn't tell you, but the resulting sound of the material that I somehow acquired made me laugh. 

What it contains is a couple of people setting up an interview, testing the microphones, messing with volume, etc., and then making sure everyone's on the same page, and beginning an interview. 150 seconds into the tape, the actual interview begins, but after 20 seconds, containing one question and an "uh" (presumably leading to the next question), the tape ends. 

Maybe they started again for some reason and chopped off the unwanted stuff. I don't know. But the contents heard as this length of tape plays did make me laugh, as if, as I titled it, they set everything up, then didn't actually record the interview. Maybe you'll find it funny, too. 

Download: Setting Up an Interview, Then Not Recording It

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Vintage WOR from Fall, 1962: Beautiful Music, Long John, Jean Shephard and News, Plus Bud's Kids and More David Hollister

For the third post in a row, I am largely featuring one very long tape. This one will be quite magical, I think, for a good number of people who come to this site. Because after a short segment of home recorded material (which I quite like), the remainder - over five hours of it - contains vintage recordings of WOR radio in New York, including a bit of Beautiful Music-esque programming, a whole lot of Long John Nebel, and sandwiched between those Long John segments, a vintage newscast and nearly an hour of the much beloved Jean Shepherd. All of this except for the opening segment are from a couple of nights in the fall of 1962. 

Without further ado.....

The tape begins with a short segment, recorded most likely several years after the remainder of the tape. On the box, this is labeled as being "Bud's Kids". It starts with a child singing a few things (including the Nationwide jingle still used today), then segues into another child interviewing people (a younger child and an adult), largely about pollution. This very obviously erased about eleven minutes of what was originally on the tape. 

Download: Bud's Kids - A Bit of Singing, Pollution Talk and More

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As soon as the kids are done, we are transported back to 1962. The talk radio segments make it clear that it was the fall of that year, what with talk of the upcoming mid-term elections and conversations about the 1963 cars, among other things - a few ads for TV presentations which appear to have been from 1961 (including a show starring Leslie Neilson), would have to have simply been reruns. There is no way these conversations are from 1961. 

But before all that, we are treated to a few minutes of Beautiful Music, or something approaching it, at least, on a show called "Music from Studio X". 

Download: WOR, Fall, 1962 - Music From Studio X

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That show goes straight into a long (no pun intended) segment of the Long John show, hosted by Long John Nebel. I have posted Long John material once before, and post, with more text about him, and a link to more information on him, can be found here. In this particular episode, the main guest is a representative of the  B'nai B'rith, as well as several other religious leaders and spokesmen, for a wide ranging discussion centered on religion. 

I enjoyed the fact that no one could call into Long John's show, but instead, had to submit telegrams to him, via a downstairs office, which would then be brought to him. 

But the chintzy commercials here may be my favorite part of this recording, particularly the collection of 50 great melodies from classical music on two LP's - lowbrow music appreciation masquerading as highbrow art. I am reminded of the fantastic parody of this product, which that WFMT, the classical station in Chicago, did in the mid-1960's, called "Great Square Inches in Art", where you got God's finger from the Sistine Chapel and the Mona Lisa's smile. 

Download: Long John on WOR, Fall, 1962 - Religion and Related Subjects

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That recording takes up the remainder of side one, and part of side two. The moment it's over, we are taken to another evening from the same time period, and this time, we hear a newscast and then, the deeply beloved, even revered Jean Shepherd takes over for the rest of the hour. You can read about him here, including how he had few if any advertisers for a time, and almost lost his job. Sure enough, there are no commercials in this more than 45 minutes of radio performance. 

I had never heard Shepherd before this. Honestly, I had avoided him, because I linked him in my mind as the writer of the stories which became "A Christmas Story", a much beloved film which I watched once with my family - all of us found it to be wholly awful. Obviously, your mileage may vary, and taste in movies and and humor is as enormously varied as can be. But despite its reputation for verisimilitude, I didn't find a moment of it believable, endearing or funny. So, as much as I dived into Bob and Ray and other contemporaries of Shepherd, I took a pass. 

That was clearly a mistake. This segment is mesmerizing. He does not seem to know or care exactly where he's going, or how he's going to get there. Stories lead from one into another and the outcome - and when it's going to arrive, is always in doubt. This is pure magic, and just about as entertaining as anything I've ever posted here.  

Download: WOR, Fall, 1962 - Newscast and Jean Shepherd

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The tape ends another 106 minutes of Long John, the episode which immediately followed the above Jean Shepherd segment on some long ago 1962 overnight. In the case, the subject is cars, something I rarely need to hear a group of people talk about (with the exception of Tom and Ray, who worth hearing because they were Tom and Ray, not because they were talking about cars). 

Download: Long John on WOR, Fall, 1962 - Car Talk

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By the way, here's all it says on the box: 

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Okay, so two months ago, I shared the very exciting news that I had been gifted with a box full of tapes that had belonged to a composer named David Hollister. Read all about the gift, the tapes and the composer here. 

Today, I'm offering up the contents of the second tape that I grabbed out of that box. The writing on the back of this box looks like this: 

This tape was pretty much a mess. Recordings start and stop, sometimes in the middle of musical phrases, and the next recording picks up 15 seconds or two minutes later, with backwards material from the other side coming through in the mean time. Segments seem to end haphazardly, there is an introduction of a program of materials written by Mr. Hollister, material which seems to have already been heard on the other side of the tape, none of which follows the introduction! This tape is all over the place. I have edited it down to one continuous segment of what appears on the tape, in the order it appears on both sides, with all of the backwards material edited out. 

There is all sorts of material here. For my money, if you want to hear what's really interesting, jump to the 22:30 point and listen to most of the last ten minutes of this tape, wherein a baritone sings with piano accompaniment. This material starts fairly normal but becomes more and more esoteric, and finally, downright bizarre. By minute 25, the pianist is performing a playful series of rather ugly combinations of keys, and the baritone's singing features fart sounds and nonsense syllables. More odd vocalizing follows, but none of that prepared me (or will prepare you) for the song which ends this segment, and which runs from 30:40 to 32:08. And that is ALL I'll say about it. 

Download: David Hollister and Others - David Hollister Variety Tape # 1

Play:

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And finally, today's "Very Short Reel". If you can figure out why this 139 seconds of tape was recorded, you are more observant and clever than I am. Herein, a man narrates an extremely short slide show presentation, featuring someone named The Right Reverend Richardson Reid. Perhaps I am spelling it or hearing it wrong, but I can find no reference to him. 

Download: Very Short Slide Show Narration - The Right Reverend Richardson Reid

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The Return of KRAP Radio, A Bit of Basketball, Sound on Sound, A Good Friday Sermon, Commercials and PSA's

HAPPY EASTER!

I'm going to start with a sequel to a post I made just over four years ago, in which I shared a tape of some high school students and their fake radio station, KRAP Radio. Well, I recently found another tape of KRAP radio parody material, and thought I'd share it, as well. 

As it happens, in that post, I mention that the students involved in this project seemed to be from High School Radio Station KDBG, and by chance, I posted more material - real radio recordings, not this pretend stuff - from that station in my last post, so clearly, all of these tapes must have come from the same reel purchase, at some point. 

This is far more entertaining than the real broadcasts, I think.

Download: KRAP Radio - The Station That Is Full of It

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And here, for your further enjoyment, is the rest of that same reel - presumably some of the same kids, engaging in some reel to reel weirdness. 

Download: Material After KRAP Radio - Weirdness from Some High School Students

Play:  

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We are in the midst of the annual insanity around College Basketball. I personally find the idea of caring about a college basketball team - and certainly caring about who wins a college basketball game - bizarre in the extreme. I would enjoy watching college basketball about as much as I would watching golf or soccer: 30 seconds would be more than enough, especially when one could be watching baseball, tennis or bowling (Three Cheers for Jason Belmonte!). Or streaming Monty Python episodes for that matter,

But anyway, in honor of this yearly event, and for those who do enjoy amateur basketball, here's a tape containing, within its 33 minutes of radio recordings, some moments from the 1958 Illinois State High School Basketball Final, some postgame coverage, and then a very short part of a newscast, some of which is also about that basketball game. 

Download: Excerpts From the 1958 Illinois State High School Basketball Final, Postgame and Newscast

Play:

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Now here's a tape I really enjoyed, not least because, prior to the late 1990's, every time I recorded one of my songs, I used the tape recording method known as Sound on Sound, where you record one track and then bounce back and forth between the two monaural tracks adding more sounds to your recording. Depending on the machine used, you may end up with a stereo recording in which one track alone has the final additions, or you may end up with one track which contains all but the last thing you added, and the other track which has is delayed a split second and contains your entire production, meaning your performance is in mono. The latter is the case here. 

Whoever recorded these guitar pieces appears to me to have only made a basic track and then overdubbed them once. But they are well done and, to my ears, quite enjoyable. 

Download: Unknown - Guitar Performances Using Sound on Sound, Volume 5

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Here's the list of songs you will hear, from the tape box, although the first song is not "Chattanooga Choo Choo", it's "On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe": 

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With today being Easter, and of course Good Friday having just passed two days ago, here is a brief Good Friday sermon. What makes this recording remarkable is that it comes from a reel of paper-backed tape, the likes of which was phased out as a product around 1951 or so, meaning that this recording likely comes from the dawn of reel to reel recording, and is likely somewhere around 73-75 years ago. It ends sort of suddenly, and far from sure it was over when the tape ran out, yet it also ends with several seconds of silence, so maybe it did end like that. 

Download: Unknown - A Good Friday Sermon (From a Paper Reel)

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Here is a short collection of commercials, all of which are parts of series already heard on this blog. However, none of these specific commercials have been shared - just others from the same collection, a huge collection of ads, mostly from the Pacific Northwest, which I bought a few decades ago. 

Download: A Collection of Commercials

Play:

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Here is a recording of a radio broadcast of a play written by Woody Allen, titled "God". This is a recording from legendary Chicago radio station WFMT. It starts with a very short excerpt from the play, and then the announcement of the sponsorship, a commercial, a bit of introduction, then the play. There is a break about half way through and the second half of the play. There are credits at the end. 

Download: Woody Allen's "God"

Play:

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"Mélange": noun. a mixture; confusion.

I labeled the first half (plus) of this tape "Weird Melange of Sound". See if you agree. A little bit more than halfway through this tape, we hear a moment of an audio letter, and then more randomness, before the audio letter comes back at 7:37 and we hear its contents for nearly six minutes. Most of that duration contains a woman speaking to her mother, talking about her mother-in-law and griping about someone else in her family, before requesting a return tape. 

Download: Unknown: Weird Mélange of Sound, Followed by a Short Audio Letter

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And now, our very short reel. And it is extremely short - 55 seconds - and contains someone offering up a brief tribute to the very clearly remarkable Enrico Toti, a one-legged cyclist and World War I hero who you can read about here. With apologies to Rudyard Kipling and his poem about Gunga Din, our unnamed speaker offers a re-written version of that poem, in praise of his hero, giving it three recitations in less than a minute. 

Download: Unknown: Tribute to Enrico Toti

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VERY SHORT REELS FESTIVAL!!!

 Today I have something a bit different. Every time I go to upload more stuff for this site or my other site, I can quickly get a bead on how interesting the most recent post, and its various parts, turned out to be to readers/listeners. And that's because I can see how many times each sound file has been accessed (whether played or downloaded - it doesn't distinguish). 

So it is that I have, for a long time, known that the most popular - or at least the most visited - part of each of my posts is the Very Short Reels feature. Those segments can get anywhere from two to five times as many listens/downloads as the average file. 

So today, I'm going to offer up nothing but tracks which are under five minutes long, a veritable VERY SHORT REELS FESTIVAL!!! Because this is sort of a massive undertaking (I have to attach each of the files, twice), I'm not going to have much to say about any of them. 

I have so many of these that this would probably be a good idea even if it didn't seem to be my most popular feature. This post features 25 files. I have nearly that many left of this length to share, going forward, and no doubt will be making more in the coming weeks and months. 

And overview: I am not claiming that all of these are from tiny tapes, which is what I usually feature in the segment titled "very short reels". Some of these are the sum and total of what was on a reel. Others constitute something I found interesting on an otherwise uninteresting reel - maybe two minutes from a 90 minute reel, or maybe five minutes from a ten minute reel, or anything in between those two extremes. I'm going to share them pretty much in no particular order. 

And now, let's get started!

1.) Let's kick things off with a recording of a fellow who had a few things to say about Juvenile Delinquency in Indiana: 

Download: Unknown - Speech on Addressing Juvenile Delinquency in Indiana

Play:

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2.) Here are two fellows who are working on an Alvin and the Chipmunks impression, one speed lower than he will play it back: 

Download: Chipmunks Impression

Play:

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3.) And for those of you who don't have the technology to speed that up 100% faster, here's what they sound like, as Alvin and his brother: 

Download: Chipmunks Impression (Sped Up)

Play:

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4.) Here's an ad for a Transmission Shop which no doubt dates from the days not long after Rap Music went mainstream. I find this ridiculous, and ridiculously entertaining. 

Download: Weber Transmission Ad

Play:

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5.) Here's one about about as from the one above as possible: Several takes at doing a promo for a then-upcoming Studs Terkel program. 

Download: Studs Terkel Promos

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6.) I've labeled this one "Brief, Difficult to Understand Phone Conversation", and that about covers it:

Download: Brief, Difficult to Understand Phone Conversation

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7.) This next one is heard, as are all the others, exactly as it spools off the reels. But this one is more than a bit chaotic. It would appear that a radio station had some sort of a treasure hunt going on, and someone, from the station or elsewhere, recorded bits and pieces of the daily "clues", back to back to back, sometimes not catching the entire segment. 

Download: Unknown - Treasure Hunt Clues

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8.) I have several tapes involving someone named Buddy Black, who was a radio personality.... somewhere, at some point. Here is an audio letter, from another Buddy, to Buddy Black, on his 50th birthday, in 1961: 

Download: Audio Letter to Buddy Black on His 50th Birthday

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9.) Here's are two young children, doing a math problem while recording a message to someone, or perhaps pretending they are on a radio station. I'm certain this was once a longer, and probably quite enjoyable segment, but all but the last 43 seconds of this recording were erased by some other material, and this is what was left. 

Download: "Working on All Kinds of Subjects"

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10.) All I'll say about this next one is Get Ready To Feel Hungry - YUM!

Download: Magic Marshmallow Crescent Puffs Recipe Ad

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11.) The title of this one pretty much says it all: "Almost Telling a Story and Singing Along with Sinatra":

Download: Almost Telling a Story and Singing Along with Sinatra

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12.) And say, weren't you just asking what bands were coming to the larger Chicago area for concerts? Do you want to spend our money on Peter, Paul and Mary or Ted Nugent? 

Download: WKQX and WDAI Concert Line

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13.) As I may have mentioned in the past, I was gifted with about a hundred tapes from a fellow in Kingsport, TN, about 20 years ago. Nearly all of these were recordings of local classical concerts, but here's a neat little segment of local radio, including part of a neat Pepsi ad, from one of those tapes. 

Download: Brief Segment of WKPT, Kingsport, TN, Newscast and Pepsi Ad

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14.) Here's something I greatly enjoyed: from an otherwise fairly faceless and dull tape of a live performance recording by a small combo, here's a moment where they start "Bye Bye Blues" with the sax player introducing the tune in a different key than the rest of the band. The goofy part is less than a minute long, but I've left in the entire performance, in order to give a flavor of the rest of the tape. There are also a few spots here where everyone is not quite on the same beat of the measure. Both the wrong key issue and the beat issue are mentioned in the comments at the end.

Download: Unknown Combo - Bye Bye Blues (In Different Keys)

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15.) Well, after that, perhaps you'd like a Rheingold Beer: 

Download: Rheingold Beer Ad

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16.) This one I labeled "Weird Short Tape". The speaker here appears to have been using a tape recorder which ran at a variable speed, based on how much tape was on each side of the three inch reel. I've come across this phenomenon on three inch reels many times. I think it was probably a small dictation style machine that only handled three inch reels. Usually, the voices seem to get closer and closer to what their actual voices sounded like as we get towards the end of the tape: 

Download: Weird Short Tape

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17.) I have previously shared short tapes of Firestone Tire ads. Here is another one, not previously shared, from May of 1969, featuring four ads, as detailed on the box: 

Download: Four Firestone Tire and Rubber Company Ads - To Start 5-5-69

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18.) Someone named Larry Ferrari had a program of organ music, somewhere on some TV station. His show was followed by "You Asked For It". Here is a tape with a short fragment of the end of Larry's show and the beginning of "You Asked For It": 

Download: The Larry Ferrari Show & You Asked For It (Fragment)

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19.) Here's a 1982 Dentyne Ad: 

Download: 1982 Dentyne Commercial

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20.) And a 156 second tape containing some unlabeled production music. This actually seems to be the same track, twice, and the tape box, indicating a length of 65 seconds, probably confirms that:

Download: Unknown Production Music

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21.) Aside from the sped-up Chipmunks recording, this next one is the shortest of the batch, at 22 seconds. Here, someone promos a foreign policy special, to be hosted by someone named Dancy. Or perhaps Dancy is doing the promoting. Maybe the tape box will make it more clear to one of you than it does for me: 

Download: Unknown - Three Takes on a News Headline

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22.) Here's all that's left of an audio letter. What's heard here is the end of the first side (the rest erased by something else), the very start of the second side, then the end of the second side (again, the majority of the second side having been erased. It's a little choppy, but I hope that makes sense. 

Download: Short Fragment of an Audio Letter

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23.) Another segment from those Kingsport, TN tapes. This is a fairly creative and interesting ad for a used car lot. Nothing in the first 40 seconds gives ANY indication as to what this ad is promoting. The tape continues for a moment with part of an ad for a pharmacy. Too bad we didn't get to hear any of that stomping Tex Beneke music. 

Download: Scott Motors Used Car Lot, Kingsport, TN

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24.) I made an exception for the randomness of this presentation, due to the just passed 4th of July Holiday. The last two items have patriotic themes. First is a Public Service Announcement for safe driving in Astoria, Oregon, another one of more than a dozen tapes from a station in that town, which I bought more than a decade ago, and which I have featured here multiple times. 

Download: House of Chan 4th of July Safety PSA, for KAST-AM

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25.) And finally, from the "What the Hell Was That, Man?" file, comes a reel I've named "Weird Stars and Stripes Forever Tape". If you don't listen to any of the other tapes here, I really encourage you to listen to this one. It's pretty out there, as out there as 53 seconds can get, anyway. 

Download: Weird Stars and Stripes Forever Tape

Play: 

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Well, that's my show for today. I hope you found something - and maybe even several somethings - to enjoy! Please let me know if you'd like to see this feature repeated. 

A 1950's Rock Session, TV Variety from 1962, Some Odd Interviews, a Truly Bewildering Acetate, and 1980's Radio Jingles

What a wondrous cornucopia of sounds I have for you, this last night of  January, 2002. Let's get right to it. 

First up, a tape which is probably the most fascinating (to me, at least) that I've shared in some time. The box states that it contains excerpts from "The Brazilian Suite", but rather than that, this seven minutes of tape features a small combo, making an attempt to record a song, sometime very likely in the late 1950's, judging from the style of the song and the design of that Scotch tape box that housed it.

I can find no indication that this is a "known" song, and I've labeled it "Blue Tears". And a lovely little number it is, bathed in echo, with a soft backing of a few instruments and a female trio adding some "oohs" and such, and fronted by a lead singer who sounds frozen in 1957-58 or so. There is one complete take, followed by a few breakdowns, and another take is starting just as the tape runs out. 

What a lovely, mysterious little wonder. 

Unknown - Blue Tears (multiple takes)

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Okay, that's the tape that I was most excited about. Here's one that many other readers may find even more fascinating. It's from a collection of tapes that I bought a few decades ago, and am still going through (!), by someone who recorded television shows and performances which were of interested to him or her fairly incessantly in the 1960's. There is a photo of the inside of the tape box, below, but here is a rundown of what you'll hear, during the nearly 90 minutes contained in this recording: 

1.) Mort Sahl hosting the Tonight Show - the last show of a week of hosting duties, while NBC was waiting for Johnny Carson to be available. The date is June 15, 1962, and lengthy excerpts of the show are heard, including an interview with the secretary for the Gemini astronauts, and conversations with someone who appears to be a professor, about some fairly weighty subjects. The recording of this show takes up more than half of the tape. 

2.) The Dave Brubeck combo performing on The Ed Sullivan Show on June 17, 1962

3.) The next subsequent episode of the Tonight Show - from the following Monday, June 18th (hey, that was my brother's eighth birthday!), featuring Steve Lawrence hosting, Steve Allen and songwriter Billy Rose as guests (Allen sings) and, believe it or not, Mort Sahl returning, as another guest.

4.) Oscar Peterson performing on The Today Show (undated)

5.) And my favorite segment, at the end, the wonderful, incomparable Limeliters, performing a few songs on what appears to also be The Today Show (also undated) 

Download: TV Recordings, 1962 - Mort Sahl, Dave Brubeck, Steve Allen, Oscar Peterson, tThe Limeliters

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And here's the inside of the tape box, with The Limeliters' name spelled incorrectly!: 

 

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Here's a tape which is more than a bit of a mystery to me. It sounds like a series of interviews for various positions, but the variety of positions makes me think that this was something else, perhaps even a rehearsal or practice at either interviewing people or being interviewed. 

There are a few references to the Indianapolis Hilton, so I suspect that's where this was being recorded, and most of the jobs being interviewed for involve hotel work of some sort. But not all of them, and not a single one seems to be for the same specific job as any of the other interviews. So it's sort of strange. Strange enough that I thought I'd share it with you. See what you think!

Download: A Series of Interviews at the Indianapolis Hilton

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And now it's time for our "Acetate of the Month". Now if you thought the purpose of the interview tape was inscrutable, or if you thought the "Blue Tears" tape was mysterious, that all may be true, but neither is as inscrutable or mysterious as today's Acetate. 

Imagine my surprise and bewilderment when I heard the following sounds - clearly and entirely backwards - coming out of an unlabeled acetate. 

Download: Bizarre Backwards Acetate

Play:  

My guess is that this was made for use as some sort of effect on some radio program. 

Now I'm sure a lot of you have the ability to turn this around, using one type of software or another, but I've done it for you, and the results are just as bewildering - here we have an old woman singing a sort of nonsensical folk song - one I am unfamiliar with, in which one of the key words is "pumpernickel" - with her performance chopped up so as to make the rendition all the more incomprehensible. Then, of course, they flipped it backwards for the acetate recording. Wow. 

Download: Bizarre Backwards Acetate (reversed)

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Finally, our very short reel, and a return to normalcy. What we have here is the production of a company called Continental Recordings, with a little more than three minutes of jingles and production music for WGAN, AM 560 in southern Maine

Download: Continental Recordings - WGAN Jingles and Production Music, 1982

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And here's that tape box: 

Comments are welcome and encouraged!

See you next time....

Christmastime Is Here

 Seasoned Gratings!!!!

For this last post of the year, I'm going to focus almost entirely on Christmas and New Years, with only an exception for my weekly "very short reel" - and a bizarre one of those, at that. 

First, as I've done every year on this blog, I have a recording of a family celebrating Christmas at home. In this case, it is among the earliest, if not the earliest, Christmas recording I have featured, as the box makes it clear that we are hearing "Christmas, 1954", at a house on "River Road, Chatham, New Jersey". See?: 

There is some wonderfully charming stuff here, mixed in amidst the general conversations, package opening, and (unfortunately, in this case) moments of poor recording quality. I particularly enjoy the music, although the final segment of singing in marred by someone who decided to add a vocal version of stand-up double bass accompaniment, and did so as loudly as the piano and singer, essentially ruining the entire segment. 

Travel back in time almost exactly 67 years, and enjoy a family Christmas celebration. 

Download: Christmas, 1954, at River Road, Chatham, New Jersey

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In a moment, I will have my usual "Acetate of the Month", but first, I have something of a mix between my usual posts and that feature - here is a reel of tape I found, in which someone made a tape of an acetate that he found.

The man who is speaking (Rex, in St. Louis) was almost certainly part of a "tape exchange" club of some sort, probably the type (which I've learned was quite a thing, in the '70's and '80's), in which members exchanged tapes of old time radio. What the speaker has found, as you'll hear, is an acetate someone made on Christmas of 1953, in the Philadelphia area. The person spun the radio dial and picked up nearly 20 minutes of Christmas programming on that day. An enjoyable little diversion from nearly 68 years ago. 

Download: Scanning the Radio Dial on Christmas, 1953

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And now here's that Acetate of the Month. And in this case, it's a lengthy one, recorded at 33 1/3 RPM on both sides of a ten inch acetate. And this one is from a Christmas party. Specifically, a Christmas party held by the employees of a local post office, in December of 1960: 

Aside from saying that there are moments here which are quite affecting, I believe I will let this recording, which is about 25 minutes long, total, speak for itself: 

Download: Post Office Party, December, 1960, Side One

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Download: Post Office Party, December, 1960, Side Two

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Moving on from Christmas to New Year's Eve, what I have here are a few fragments from a top 40 radio New Year's Eve countdown, as 1964 became 1965. I deeply wish I could share the entire countdown with you, but our intrepid tape operator, whoever he or she was, was one of those people who desperately wanted to avoid getting the DJ's voice, so although the entire top 25 of the year (for this station), the DJ patter (and that of a supremely annoying sidekick named Bruno) is only audible before the # 1 song. The rest of the songs literally cut on after they start, and cut off before they end. 

It's an unusual top 25, too, at least when compared to where some of these songs charted nationally that year. # 25 is a version of "Shenandoah" that, as far as my chart books indicate, never hit the charts nationally at all. Other songs which seem to have been MUCH bigger locally than nationally were. The numbers in parenthesis are the songs' national peak - not year end, but just regular run - on the Billboard Hot 100: 

# 20 - No Particular Place to Go (10)

# 16 - In the Misty Moonlight (19)

# 13 - Haunted House (11)

# 12 - Chug-a-Lug (9)

and

# 3 - Nadine (Is It You?) (23)

Only two of the above made Billboard's Top 100 of the year ("Haunted House" and "Chug-a-Lug", and neither of those made the top 60. 

And I love Chuck Berry, and wish his comeback in 1964 had been big enough that he'd had two of the 20 biggest hits of the year nationally, but that was not close to being the case!

Anyway, the station is KXOK, in St. Louis (which helps explain the Chuck Berry songs placing so high). All I have here is the # 1 song (which should surprise no one), with part of its introduction, then a recap of then-recent presidential election. Then there is some talk about the new year ringing in around the world (and an atomic clock counting the seconds), followed by the final seconds of 1964, counting down to 1965 for St. Louis. This is followed by the first song played in the new year, a bit of DJ patter and the start of the next song - "Shake a Tail Feather" by the Du-Tones - a top 60 hit nationally in 1963, but probably a bigger hit on KXOK, as the group was from.... St. Louis. 

Download: 1964 Becomes 1965 on KXOK, St Louis

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And now it's time for that very bizarre, and "very short" reel. What you're about to hear is contained on perhaps 30 or 40 feet of tape - if that - which I found spliced to the end of a large reel of leader tape. 

The first half of its 82 seconds is mostly some sort of white noise. There is something going on faintly beneath the noise, but not much. But precisely halfway through, there is a great bit of vocal noise,  followed by a young person speaking in a foreign language. I believe it's French, but I don't speak that language, and with the white noise persisting throughout, so I'm not even sure I'm right about the language. Maybe someone out there can assist in identifying what's being said. 

Anyway, this little hunk of tape sure fascinates me. 

Download: A Remarkably Odd Piece of Tape

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And finally, those of you who have been reading my posts for the last few years know that my family uses the Christmas Card tradition to engage in a bit of performance art each year. Previous end-of-the-year posts have other examples, and now, here is the latest in the series: 

From the left, that's me, my wife with the marshmallow in her face, then our two adult kids, and on the right, the fellow who will soon be, variously, husband, son-in-law and brother-in-law to the rest of the individuals in the photo. 

Odd Happenings at The Palmer House, A Visit to the Berlin Wall, Arthur's Presentation and Some Philosophical Talk

Greetings!!!!

I have something truly memorable to kick of this post, a tape I'm labeling (down there in the labels) as "The Inexplicable". 

The tape box gave absolutely no indication of what I was going to hear. In fact, I was pretty sure I was going to hear some vintage commercials, given the 1950's Scotch box, and the writing on the back, as you can see here: 

What is actually on the tape, however, is a different creature entirely, and I can't say I've heard anything quite like it. 

The entire tape - just over 40 minutes, with dozens of "tracks", complete with leader banding between each and every one of them - is some sort of bizarre presentation related to - and presumably made for - the Palmer House, a legendary hotel in Chicago's Loop. 

(A side note here: I have an extremely fond memory link to The Palmer House". In 1977, Chicago's first Beatlefest was held there, and as I had only had my driver's license for about six weeks at that time, going to that Beatlefest was the first time I ever drove into Chicago on my own, and I have wonderful memories of their old and glorious ballrooms. The Palmer House is in poor shape these days, and may not survive the next few years, and that's a shame.)

Anyway, there is very little apparent rhyme or reason to this series of songs and vignettes. There does seem to be some focus in the first third, in which there is a series of calls about how to treat hotel guests and other subjects related to running a hotel. But then, for the last 2/3rds, it's something of a hodgepodge.

First, there are a series of phone calls, presented as being handled by the Palmer House operators, of many, many sorts, interspersed with calls from a Palmer House executive who keeps calling to keep tabs on a meeting he is missing. At one point, a hotel guest asks about the hotel's air conditioning, and then, in between other items, we hear bits and pieces about the details of that air conditioning system, ending after about five segments in a lame joke. Near the end, there is a lengthy bit about a man stuck in an elevator, which is almost unbearably stupid. And interspersed near the end, as well, is a series of laments from a sad operator, who can't stand how bad things have gotten. The tape actually comes to a screeching halt - with no closing bit to match the opening song - with another one of these operator laments. 

Again, presumably, this was done for some sort of presentation about and/or for Palmer House employees, perhaps (maybe even likely) a show that they put on for each other. I doubt it was one of those dreadful (but entertaining) Industrial Musicals, but maybe it was a distant cousin of those. But what a weird, wonderfully weird tape. 

I hope you enjoy it as much as I do: 

Download: A Bizarre Presentation of Sketches About the Palmer House

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Next, here's a very interesting (and fairly lengthy) audio letter. This is one of three audio letters that I have from this same family, and I'll share the other two over the next month. 

The family lived in Germany, where the man of the house was serving in the Army. He appears for a longer period on the other two tapes. Most of this tape is made up by the "visiting" of the woman of the house, then some reporting and other thoughts by the children of the house. 

It's those reports that make this tape fascinating to me - the entire family had visited the Berlin Wall at some recent point. In going there, the children had been given some very specific rules to follow (don't wave at the soldiers), and had learned about some horrific stories about those attempting to escape being shot dead (which they report with virtually no emotion whatsoever). 

A couple more comments and then I'll let you discover the other interesting parts of this tape. First, this was recorded on an ultra-thin three inch reel, and the last few minutes of the first side/first few minutes of the second side are completely unplayable. When you hear the transition about half-way through, there are a few minutes of material missing. 

And finally, am I right that the mom "had to spank" one of her kids, because he was crying? What the hell is that? 

Download: Audio Letter From An Army Family in Gerrmany, Including Visit to the Berlin Wall

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Oh, and also, I'm going to try and make a concerted effort to include images of the tapes, when there is something even remotely interesting about them. I'm also going to go back and upload pictures to previous posts. Here is the mailer from the tape you just listened to: 

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And now for something completely different. I mentioned a few posts ago that I'm going to dive into my long-held tapes for some of my favorite things from the years before I was a blogger. 

This one is actually for my best pal Stu, as the recording - and it's odd appearance on a tape - has always been a favorite of his. 

It's just a moment in time: A man - Arthur - presenting his wife (I assume) - Winifred - with the gift of a tape recorder. 

What always struck us as funny is that this 39 second statement of love and birthday wishes, is labeled on the outside of the tape box, as so: 

And in more detail on a slip of paper inside the box, noting exactly what number on the tape the recorder is at, at the moment of the presentation.

And that's the real odd thing. One would think such a "presentation" would be at the very start of the reel, likely the first thing ever recorded on the tape. BUT IT'S NOT. 

It comes after ten minutes of a young child giving a short violin recital. And then a bunch of blank space. And that's all that's on the tape. So someone used the machine (probably) and the tape (definitely) then Arthur ran the tape halfway through and recorded his best wishes to his beloved. And then they never used that tape again!

Weird. And oddly endearing. 

Download: Arthur's Presentation to Winifred

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Here, in fact, is another tape I grabbed from that large batch of "I listened to these years ago" tapes, on the same shelf, actually, as "Arthur's Presentation". In this case, I had five tapes which were labeled in the same handwriting (nothing interesting, just "# 2, # 3, #4, etc., although not #1). I had no memory of what was on these tapes - I suspect I've had them for over 30 years. 

It turns out that the first one I grabbed (#2), and presumably the others, contain conversations in what appear to be a VERY loose college or university class, somewhere near the North Shore of Chicago (an area where I no doubt bought these tapes) - the conversations occasionally make reference to that area. The tape appears to be from 1970. 

That suggests Northwestern, but I'm not actually even sure this is a class. The man who is clearly a professor or doctor of some sort, at one point, asks if the young people present mind him being there - not something a leader of a class would likely say. 

At one point, one of the youths present even starts noodling around on a guitar. The conversation is quite varied and extremely unfocused at times. It becomes irritable a few times, but mostly seems equally theoretical and argumentative (in a friendly way) than it does in terms of being about these students' real lives and real world experiences. 

And I think that's all I'll say. If anyone has any more thoughts about where this is from or what the purpose of this gathering was, I'm interested in hearing it.  

Download: College Class Philosophical Discussion

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And finally, here's our very short reel, grabbed at random. This time, it's another vocal talent demo reel, in this case, for a woman named Nancy Eger. A quick web search did not turn up anyone who was clearly this Nancy Eger, so perhaps she didn't have a long career in the field. 

Download; Nancy Eger - Voice Talent Demo Reel

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