***A note to air check traders. Please do not record these air checks and try and trade. I have the original tapes many of which I recorded myself and thus the authenticity can not be in doubt and can be easily traced.
Another nice double shot of FM radio from the Boston area from 1971 and 1973.
The first clip features the fantastic free form powerhouse WBCN FM with a set of mostly blues and R&B tinged music. Things get started with a great instrumental by a group called Demon Fuzz. The set ends with the album version of the Beach Boy’s Help Me Rhonda. The clip is from April 1971. All the announcers on the station were music fans with stellar taste and this set is no exception. . Please help me ID the DJ on this and several other clips that I have uploaded.
The second clip is from WVBF FM (Electronic Mama) from the summer of 1973 and features DJ Ron Robin. The station began as WKOX FM and was an early FM Top 40 pioneer in 1969. The outlet was owned by Richard M Fairbanks when the call letters switched to WVBF in 1971. The call letters stood for Welcome Virginia Brown Fairbanks in tribute to the owners wife.
WVBF was a Top 40/AOR hybrid during 1971-73 and reported into Billboard magazine’s album rock airplay list as the Boston representative around 1972 ( see picture below from Billboard Aug 1972). This list consisted of submissions from mostly progressive rock stations around the country which submitted their weekly new additions. This song selection on this particular set is mostly top 40 as that side of the format began to gain ascendancy and eventually the station became full time Top 40.
Here’s another alternate version of Help Me Rhonda with Dennis Wilson on Lead
Loved WVBF during this era. It was progressive and commercial at the same time. Not an easy format to pull off, and their love of music shows through.
What is that song that begins at about the 20 minute mark of the BCN clip? Fantastic!
I think the song is called “Rake and Rambling Boy” by Joan Baez. A traditional folk song.
Rake and Ramblin Boy..
Joan Baez
Not sure but I think the DJ was Mississippi Fats. Charles Laquidara read the copy for the Sebastian’s ad. WBCN read the copy for all their ads up to a certain point and they frequently had fun screwing those ads up! Barry & Elliott did their earliest ads for Jordan’s Furniture live on BCN with Charles and they were a lot of laughs! As for WVBF, there was a long version of their Electronic Mama jingle that was absolutely killer! Super bad ass!!
Well I read that Mississippi Fats actually moved to KPPC FM in Los Angles in 1970 and changed his name to the more west coast friendly Mississippi Brian Wilson. http://mmone.org/joe-rogers/
You may be right though, thanks for the tip, the above linked article may be off in it’s timeline ?
Had the pleasure to work at VBF among some of the greats like Charlie Kendall, Mighty Mike.
His electric circus programs were legendary. We were the alternative to BCN and WAAF
Why hasn’t anyone connected with WVBF posted that stations theme song from the early to mid 1970’s?! It was usually 10 seconds or so long, but occasionally, they’d run the long version which ran about a full minute.
There was a singer and a synthesizer. The singer sounded black. Some of the lyrics were something like: “…WVBF stereo one-o-fiiii-ah-ah-iiive. Rising through the sky. Ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba ba…”
Why-o-why hasn’t anyone thought of posting this? A memory from my teen years I’ve been wanting to hear for years. That theme song was very creative and unique. If anyone who reads this is able to post it – please do!
(WBCN, next station up, WVBF, next station up, WBZ-FM. Great music to have grown-up with.)
Dude. That’s what I was looking for when I when found this site. I think there’s a bit of it on one of the many WVBF sound-checks floating around this site. You might want to search for it.
There were a number of versions of that riff, iirc, rambling and curious.
Many great memories of that tune, and of that station. In fact, I could have written this post.
One of my faves is the radio version of “Free Ride”. Seems like there were always interesting mixes of singles available in Boston that the rest of the world never heard at the time.
Rawck Awn!