The first clip starts with a bit of CFNY and you hear Jim Reid ( or is that Earl Jive ?) for a few seconds at 00:55. The rest of the clip is taken from the old Ryerson College radio station, CKLN which was found at 88.1 on the Toronto radio dial. There’s a unknown announcer heard at 05:13 and then at 09:31 you hear the late Toronto rockabilly and country legend Handsome Ned. He had his own show on the station. There’s also a full news and sports cast and that part of the clip can be dated to Feb. 1985. The newscast featuring Bill Hutchins and Mark Bunting is book-ended by a couple of Gram Parsons tracks played by Ned. The audio quality on the tracks is poor.
The second clip features a DJ on WUWU FM ( James Braun or Jeff Gordon ? ) and he’s in full “modern rock” mode playing Shriekback and Simple Minds and ending the set with the comedy rock of Blotto. The DJ can be heard at 09:48 along with a few ads.
This Webcast is taken mostly from prerecorded reel to reel tapes that I purchased many years back. The quality is not A grade. I was inspired to do this as a result of a discussion about The Wild Honey album by the Beach Boys and the fact that it is advertised on the reel to reel cover as “Full Dimensional Stereo” but is in fact mono to my ears. Have a listen and you decide. Playlist includes selections from Friends and Wild Honey by The Beach Boys, Through The Past Darkly by The Stones and Let It Be by The Beatles all taken from reel to reel tapes plus a flexi-disc of Gypsy Rider by Gene Clark that came with the magazine Bucket Full of Brains back in 1988. You will also hear two Byrds tracks taken from mono vinyl recordings.
The “Stereo” Wild Honey selections start at 38:42.
I dedicate The Beach Boy’s How She Boogalood it from Wild Honey to the memory of Lou Whitney of The Skeletons. Lou passed away recently and his band covered the tune.
***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.
The DJ patter on this clip is regrettably short. You will hear John Donabie at 00:59 for a few seconds plus Roger McCall on WPHD at 19:58 and perhaps John Farrell or Jeff Lubeck on WPHD at 26:32.
The clip consists mostly of music. The John Donabie segment features Van Morrison, Al Kooper, Otis Redding, The Bee Gees ( yes the Bee Gees and have no fear no disco, this is from the time the Bee Gees were actually an FM Act), Carly Simon, Dave Mason and The Chamber Brothers with a cover of The Midnight Hour. I know these selections are all from one continuous air check as there are no pauses or stops on the CHUM FM portion of the tape. The musical selection sounds very much like what Mr. Donabie would have played. An amazing seven tracks on one set with one spoken break near the beginning. Such spoken breaks were a feature of free form radio as the DJ would do more than back announce the tracks. They would often create a narrative or theme or tell a story with non commercial spoken-word breaks mixed with music.
The WPHD segment has the final moments of an hour of the Byrds. Daily features of various musical acts were common on Free Form. I believe the announcer is John Farrell. Before that we hear “”Unkle” Roger McCaul after the Hollies. After this Roger went to WCMF in Rochester and I have a few longer clips of him there on the site.
WPHD and WBUF in Buffalo both featured various artists for an hour each weekday and John Donabie on CHUM FM did the same for half hour sets. Comedy selections were regularly interspersed into the presentation and you will hear a few seconds of the great Firesign Theater.
Chronologically speaking, the latest release date for the musical selections is Anticipation by Carly Simon from November 1971 and so I think this clip is from late 1971 or early 1972 when John Donabie was doing the 10 PM to 2 AM shift.
I wish I had more of the announcers on this but the clips does re-open a window into the world of free form radio from the early 1970’s. I would appreciate any corrections to the dates and announcer names etc. Please send me an email.
The first clip is a rare but short one of Brad McNally on CFNY from the time when they were free enough to play a whole set from the 1960’s.The clip is from the late 70’s or early 80’s
The second set is from the great Gary Storm and his Oil of Dog Program. A wonderfully diverse set of acts including John Renbourn, Steeleye Span, The Strawbs, Gentle Giant, Yes, The Small Faces, Sonny and Cher, XTC and Captain Beyond. Be sure to check out the Oil of Dog Corner for much more Gary Storm.
Unfortunately the announcements for some of the tracks are missing from both clips.
Thanks to John54 from the SH Forum for id’ing the track below which is found at 32:30 on the second clip. Had me stumped.
***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.
This is from one of the older tapes that I recorded. John Donabie during the free form era from 1973. The voice on one of the ADs is Larry Green who was one of the early DJ’s at the station but I’m not sure if he was still on staff at the time of this recording.
The clip ends with a segment from John’s Sock Hop show where he used the Rockin’ Rebels as his weekly outro. The song was first recorded as the theme song for Tom Shannon’s Top 40 show on WKBK. I’m not sure about the date of the Sock Hop clip but I used to record all of the oldies as this was the first time I was introduced to many of them. Unfortunately I recorded the music and the DJ patter is missing except for this one brief segment. Wish I had realized the value of the DJ patter and preserved it.
The partial track that plays just before the Rockin’ Rebels is the rather obscure ” Country Judy-Jane” by David Rae. Thank you to the internet sleuths at the SH forum for helping me ID that track.
***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.
Fantastic clip recorded during WZIR FM’s ( Wizard Radio, Niagara Falls, NY) first Birthday in June 1981. Sadly the free form format at the station barely made it past the first year and was gone just two months after this recording was made.
An exceptional set of music by the likes of the Grateful Dead, Michael Hurley, Brinsley Schwarz, Dave Edmunds, Traffic, The Sex Pistols, Cheap Trick and Quicksilver Messenger Service..
Gonzo radio at it’s best. Note the commercial at 11:48 for “Signals from Space” hosted by Dr Lobotomy or the commercial block beginning at 23:23 – leading into the news. Prompting newsman George Prentice to say “This place has a terminal drug problem, I don’t know how they allow this stuff on the air”.
John Farrell plays the straight man with his unique delivery. Hard to find better examples of commercial free form radio than this.
*second clip is same as first except with some noise reduction
The Byrds – My Way is a first-hand description of the inner workings of the Byrds and Burrito Brothers and other entertainment events: written by James ‘Jimmi’ Seiter (Road Manager, production manager and much more for many bands and live events). It sets the record and previous assumptions straight as to what was really going on, from detailed personal, first-hand experience. He takes you on his journey which began in 1966. Click on the Picture for order info.
The CFNY clip has everything from Pink Floyd to Prince but the dominant strain of music is 80’s style New Wave.
The CHUM FM clips are from the Morning Mystery Oldie contest which was a long standing feature that started in 1986 and later changed it’s name to the Morning Mystery Hit to reflect changing demographics. The feature was put to rest about six or seven years ago. Not free form but fun.
Please also check out the Reiner Schwarz clip recently added to the Radio Corner and Benjy Karch added to the Radio Miscellany section. Other recent additions include The Free Form 45’s and Beach Boys webcasts found below. Next webcast will be a feature on Folk and Country-Rock
LISTEN DIRECTLY AND AD FREE TO THE BEACH BOYS BROADCAST
Next show planned is Free Form 45’s featuring deep cut singles from various artists but I do plan more Beach Boys episodes in the future and here’s a tease below
Playlist includes music by The Beach Boys and related material by Roy Wood, Psychic TV, The Del Vikings , Todd Rundgren and many more !
