70s FM Radio.

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My favorite memories of late 60's/early 70's FM radio are of staying up late and tuning into KSAN at midnight for the Abe "Voco" Kesh show. Man, was that show something! Abe would always open his show with the number, "Lights Out" by Harvey Mandel. That never got old! Kesh played a great mix of blues, rock blues, Stax, early fusion and excellent rock. He was the John Peel of our locale/generation. I'm always a bit uncertain as to why Kesh is not so well known. I guess you had to be there and I'm here to tell you, if you had been, you'd say, "Ohhh yeah!"

Here's a cool little bio of Kesh I found on the internet a few years ago:


http://www.vickibrennerent.com/bluecheer/abekesh.htm


Abe Kesh was armenian and a pioneer disk jockey in San Francisco and way into the Blues. He was responsible for opening the ears of an entire generation to the Blues and other forms of music. Harvey Mandel from San Francisco was one of his finds.
As far as Blue Cheer, he became friends with someone at Mercury Records and was able to get us a contract with Philips, because his radio station played a tape of Blue Cheer (before any record deals) which was paid for by Nancy Winarick, who was Gut's girlfriend. This tape was kick ass and done in late 1967 - Three songs and great - This would be a find if someone could find this tape, because it would represent Blue Cheer's first recording as a trio.
KSAN radio station was the first in the country to play hippy music and we would call about three times a day and request the tape which they played in full and thus generated a huge following prior to any record deal. So it was very easy for Abe Kesh to get us a contract, because of the already existing interest.
As producer he was very laid back and really let us produce the records ourselves except, as i told you, took over a minute out of the original Summertime Blues, so that the radio stations would not think it was too long for their format.
Abe had a stroke which left him unable to care for himself and he was walking the streets and eventually into a home for physically impaired people and died young because of the complications of lifestyle.
He taught me a great deal of the manners of the music business and pointed me to record production and was a generally nice and shy individual but a true pioneer in the music industry in San Francisco.
The tape i mentioned is out there somewhere and i know Bill Graham recorded all of the concerts but as yet has not released any. I am sure some of the promoters around the country have them but i know not where
. . . . Ciro d'Elbaran

 

I see that a link to my site has already been posted and I have 70's air checks from many of the stations mentioned in this thread including WBCN, CHUM FM, KMET. KOME and WMMR.

Someone mentioned the Buffalo NY stations and I have fairly lengthy air checks of WBUF, WZIR and WUWU and even a bit of WPHD.

I have a special section of the site dedicated to a show called the Oil of Dog which ran on WZIR and WUWU. Sound quality wise these are not great but in terms of free form it was amazing that such a program existed on commercial radio in the 1980's.

You have to search the site and find the various stations.

There is another site that has about 29 hours of WMMR which I think is fantastic and I also found this site called Past Daily that has a lot on interesting free form and top 40 content from the Los Angles area. Use the search on the site to find the air checks. That site actually has a lot of content that would be on interest to members of the forum in addition to the air checks.

 

That's very cool -- thanks. I remember KSAN very well. Missed. Makes me wish I could travel back in time and makes me so angry that corporate influence ruined so many good things like FM radio. I mean, FM evolved the way it did precisely because there was a market for it, otherwise all the FM stations would have remained with the classical music format or the Mantovanni/101 Strings/Paul Mauriat et.al. MOR early muzak format.

Someone mentioned earlier about having FM radio on during parties. I remember -- in the first half of the '70s -- that you could turn on one of your favourite FM stations and be entertained for hours until, for whatever reason, you wanted to put on a record. It was often that good.

 

In my teens in the 70's and living in Denver...nothing better then KBCO FM and KFML...diversity..diversity..diversity..plus contests

 

I'm so interested in this, that I'm watching the final moments of KMET on Youtube. So weird.

 

Yes, "The Music".

'Perfect Storm'/'Trifecta' tho of:
1. Music; cool "FM" tunes, w/more meaning than "Pop" songs, & longer.
2. DJ's: cool personalities, w/more meaning than "AM" banter, & information on bands/albums/concerts.
3. FM: cool stations, w/more fidelity, & stereo!!

 

I've plugged them here before, but a terrific online station that offers an updated version of the progressive/underground FM rock format is Radio Free Phoenix. Highly recommended!

Radio Free Phoenix - Free Form Rock Commercial Free

 

KMET was like a friend. It introduced me to so much.

 

Is anyone hip to WBLX? I actually enjoy the radio.

 

Also, one was in less of a hurry to install that under-dash cassette or 8-track player because you had FM radio. I couldn't imagine being without a radio alternative now.

 

All the other Cleveland people posting early WMMS memories in this thread... back when it was the mushrooms first, then the ugly looking versions of the buzzard. That was the coolest station, period. We really had it great for a few years there, and also gave us all the perspective of how awful radio became afterward.

 

Well said, EdogawaRampo. I would take a ride on that trip back in time. Radio was so great and has fallen so far. I think about songs that celebrate radio- Van Morrison, The Ramones, Elvis Costello come to mind immediately- but as far as I know, no one celebrates the sheer joy and pleasure of radio anymore. It's gone, sad but true.

 

KMET was the station I grew up with as a teen in SoCal in the early '70s. Great, varied, with interesting personalities. You might hear the Rolling Stones, followed immediately by John Prine. And of course every Sunday night there was the immortal, irreplaceable Dr. Demento.

 

I was a teen also spending summer's there.I'll always remember the smooth dj and sounds on KBCO.This through my older brothers quad Kenwood.Planted the seed for me.

 

Ah, the radio campfire. Tuning in to FM radio during the early-to-mid 70s probably shaped my musical, cultural, and political outlook as much as any other influence in my life, before and since. It was sort of like taking an after school extension class. Where else were you gonna hear a set by the Quicksilver Messenger Service, Ravi Shankar, Albert King, Mothers of Invention, and then cap off the evening with a recorded lecture by Alan Watts? Did they play crap sometimes? Surely. I remember one time, midway through a new album cut (sorry, I don't recall the artist), the DJ took the needle off the record and announced on air "Oh man, that sucked." I miss those times, and folks like Jim Ladd, Dr. Demento, Steven Clean, B Mitchel Reed, Ace Young....This Grundig console was my "rig" back then, heh-heh.

 

Yes on several Sirius channels, as well as left of the dial stations like KCRW.

Back in New York I listened mostly to WNEW-FM, 102.7. Scott Muni, Jonathan Schwartz, Dave Herman , etc. - I miss them all. Occasionally I switched to WABC-FM, 95.5, including the night Elton John played live (which the became the 11/17/70 album). WABC became WPLJ, presumably after the Frank Zappa song.

 

It looks like a shelf full of CDs behind Jimi..

 

Ah. The only time I have access to Sirius is when I rent a car. Budget is too tight to pay for radio.

 

Yeah, when I moved to San Francisco in 1975, KSAN was the station we set our radio to, and it was just non-stop great music, album sides, and even the commercials were fun.
The DJ's were cool, and frankly they seemed stoned much of the time. They also broadcast live shows. I recorded quite a few, and still have some. Go to Jive95.com and they have
a whole bunch of live shows from the 70's that can be streamed. Plus many archived program specials. Better daze!!

 

Yeah, when I moved to San Francisco in 1975, KSAN was the station we set our radio to, and it was just non-stop great music, album sides, and even the commercials were fun.
The DJ's were cool, and frankly they seemed stoned much of the time. They also broadcast live shows. I recorded quite a few, and still have some. Go to Jive95.com and they have
a whole bunch of live shows from the 70's that can be streamed. Plus many archived program specials. Better daze!!

 

Yeah, when I moved to San Francisco in 1975, KSAN was the station we set our radio to, and it was just non-stop great music, album sides, and even the commercials were fun.
The DJ's were cool, and frankly they seemed stoned much of the time. They also broadcast live shows. I recorded quite a few, and still have some. Go to Jive95.com and they have
a whole bunch of live shows from the 70's that can be streamed. Plus many archived program specials. Better daze!!

 

This copied from an old post of mine:

>>To give an idea of what a shocking experience progressively oriented FM rock radio could be, as late (re. rise/decline) as in the fall of 1977... Imagine yourself pumping gas to pay for college, in the middle of a gloomy and cold Saturday, then hearing over the attendant's little radio set, Frank Zappa dropping by CHOM-FM in Montreal to play one complete side (non-stop) of his own test pressing of "Läther": the heaviest one, featuring "Music For Guitar & Low-Budget Orchestra", "Punky' s Whips", etc... I guess ol' Frank knew things would soon never revert back to days like that...<<

Zappa was doing this as a way of boycotting Warner Brothers' eventual release of this album (very long story), actually asking the fans to tape it off the air. Over on other stations in the USA where he also guested around that time, he went as far as airing the entire 8-side LP set!

 

When I got home from work first thing I did was turn on my Pioneer receiver and had WMMS-FM on all the time when I was at home or in the car.