Check out listener-funded WJMJ on ortv.org.(88.9) They play the artists OP mentioned with live veteran deejays, plus classical in the evenings and a jazz show with the ancient Dick Robinson. It's commercial-free with a sprinkling of enlightenment courtesy of Father John P. Gatzak.(It's a Catholic radio station, but all listeners are welcomed!)
It's funny. The oldies station in NY is 101.1 WCBS-FM. When I was listening to FM radio in the 70s, they played music of the 50s. But I guess the music I was listening to at the time eventually became "oldies," and the music after that, etc. At some point, music is too old for oldies radio. The decades oriented streaming channels make more sense.
Too many of us oldies fans are dying off-a sad reality. It's hard to comprehend what volume of current music will be appreciated as oldies in the future.
Piscopo's show is also on WABC, hear the commercials for them all the time listening to Larry Kudlow Saturday mornings.
I never seem to hear Cat Stevens singing Wild World on the radio. It irks me when they play Jimmy Cliff's cover. It's not bad but it ain't Cat.
Technically, at some point, "oldies" is too young for oldsters. It's all relative, and who said 'Boomers get to decide what "Oldies" is, they're not even the generation who first coined the term. For decades the 'Boomer bulge held the format to just one particular time-span, refusing to allow the playlists to budge outside of this one demographics' comfort zone. I have a friend who is a "Brady Boomer", who was always upset that any of the Oldies stations I worked at, ever played "her" oldies. But eventually, it came to pass. And now look at my g-g-generation howl, because "nobody plays oldies anymore".
Most of them in my area banished the '50s years ago, except for occasionally the Everly Bothers' "All I have to Do Is Dream." Except for Peter, Paul and Mary's "Leaving on a Jet Plane", the late '50s/early '60s folk revival is nowhere on oldies radio. One station even had an announcement: "Where you can hear the best of Motown, the British Invasion, and more without having to suffer through the Kingston Trio. Very snotty. I never hear any hard core bubblegum like the Ohio Express, 1910 Fruitgum Co., etc. Just the Archies' "Sugar Sugar." Many of them won't touch John Denver or the Carpenters. One "oldies" station in my area's format is "The best of the '70s, '80s, and '90s." No '50s OR '60s. I never listen. Another station boasted, "No bubblegum and no weird stuff." They lost me. Thank God for my record collection.
I think Even Stevens is a great album. Up until then, Ray Stevens had been known as strictly a novelty artist ("Ahab the Arab", "Harry the Hairy Ape", etc.). With Even Stevens, he reinvented himself as a socially conscious singer/songwriter (who also wrote his own orchestral arrangements which is no easy task) with a light psych touch. "Mr. Businessman" is a brilliantly written character sketch vignette (the type of song Billy Joel would be writing 5 years later). "Isn't It Lonely Together" is more sexually frank than almost anything else in the mainstream at the time, tackling the taboo subject of unwanted pregnancy. He went on to write more socially conscious songs like "America, Communicate With Me" and "Have a Little Talk With Myself", along with novelties like "Gitarzan" and a few years later, "The Streak", and he came up with a real peace and tolerance anthem with 1970's #1 "Everything Is Beautiful." By the '80s, he decided to stop trying to be serious and just go exclusively novelty/musical comedy. He still pulled off a few clever songs like "The Mississippi Squirrel Revival", but now he's basically just become the mouthpiece of the radical redneck right wing. Give me Even Stevens any day over the crap he's peddling now.
Tupper Saussy was a brilliant composer and orchestral arranger who also wrote and arranged Roy Orbison's daring 7-minute flop single "Southbound Jericho Parkway" and was the composer, arranger, and keyboard player for the Neon Philharmonic. He had a fascinating (though not always pretty) life story including being imprisoned for tax fraud. The singer for the Neon Philharmonic, Don Gant, went on to produce Jimmy Buffett.
Ray was once a force to be reckoned with, doing hilarious novelty records and then writing some really good socially conscious songs as well as writing his own orchestral arrangements. Chet Atkins even said, "If Ray Stevens is not a genius, there's not one in Nashville." In the '80s, he decided to just go strictly novelty, then he sold out to the fanatical fringe of the radical right. Yes, it's hard to believe the writer of "Everything Is Beautiful" became so intolerant.
Most oldies stations seem to think Del Shannon was a one-hit wonder ("Runaway"). He wasn't. Where are "Keep Searchin' ", "Hats Off To Larry", and "Stranger In Town?" Great records!
Actually, it was the baby boomer generation that coined it as proven by those Oldies But Goodies comps that have been around since the 50s-60s and these songs were fairly recent when the series news first introduced.
Do you really think the 1961 song, "These Oldies But Goodies Remind Me Of You", was the first instance of the term in the public awareness? The guy who wrote it, was born in the '40s.
I've been listening to WMEX AM 1510 Boston in my car the past few weeks. They play a lot of oldies from the 50s to the 80s, including songs such as the Byrds' "Eight Miles High", "Heroes & Villains" by the Beach Boys & "Peace Frog" by the Doors
Although Billboard did use the term in this way: The term "oldies" in the early days of the rock era and before referred to the traditional pop music songs of previous decades; a 1953 record review in Billboard describes 1925's "Yes Sir, That's My Baby" as an "oldie." The radio stations that played traditional pop were called "nostalgia" or "adult standards."
On the other hand, in the 70s the radio stations wouldn't play Elton John's 'The Bitch is Back"...but they do now.
Sorry, I didn't mean to imply it wasn't played on the radio anywhere in the world. Regardless, it doesn't impact the point I was making.
Funny, I'm in "radio history" as well. But for me, it starts long before the "Woodstock 'Boomers" thought they'd invented history.
I listen to WMTR-AM. They play all these artists. Classic Oldies 1250 WMTR AM Shameless plug alert. But no I do not work there.