February
2002 (last month's is here...)
Can't
Help Thinking About Missing Bowie Dates
Paul Kinder, who runs
the David Bowie website, was amazed to discover
reference on the Radio London site to David's appearance at the Target Club,
High Wycombe, with David Ballantyne. This appearance
had previously remained undocumented, and had proved a useful find to Paul,
who is trying to fill in details of promotional appearances made by David
in March 1966. If you can fill in the missing venues for any of the dates
listed on Paul's Tour
Date page please get in touch with him via the website. Some of them are
known to have been merely visits to record shops
Previously included in the Fab Forty for May 8th 1966,
the story of the visit to the Target Club by David Ballantyne, David Bowie
and Earl Richmond, has now been given a new
page outside the Fab Forty, and expanded and updated to include comments
by David Ballantyne and Paul Kinder.
Fancy
Digging That Up!
There's nothing like a good ol' death-disc to cheer everyone
up. BBC Radio Two's Sounds of the Sixties on
February 23rd, brought back fond(?) memories of Kenny
Everett's World's
Worst Wireless Show, by disinterring Major Minor's grimmest offering,
'The Deal' by Pat Campbell. The lyrics tell how
Pat makes a deal with God that if the Almighty will save the lives of his
wife and new-born, he wonÕt object to being struck down instead. God is only
too happy to oblige him. Cuddly Ken's listeners gladly voted the death-ditty
into the World's Worst Top Ten.
Graeme
Sounds Great!
On
February 17th, Chris and I spent a pleasant Sunday afternoon enjoying
a fascinating telephone conversation with Graeme
Gill. Sounding in great voice, he told us of his early broadcasting
career in Australia and how he had barely arrived in England when he became
involved in the world of watery wireless. He talked at length about his
stints on various offshore stations and of on-shore meetings with pop
celebrities of the time. Graeme unfortunately did not recall being member
number 236 of the Knees Club.
Graeme explained that he changed the spelling of his first name to 'Graham'
mainly because that was the way most listeners spelt it when they wrote
to him. I shall, therefore, revert to using the original spelling.
We have already
assisted Graeme in getting in touch with his old pals he worked with from
Down Under, Alan
Freeman and Ian
Damon. Interestingly, Graeme had never been aware that Ian had
followed him in becoming a Radio London DJ, joining in June 1967. |
Looking
good too: Graeme (right) with Hans Knot,
who very kindly sent us this picture taken by Martin
Van der Ven at the launch of the Radio Caroline Dutch cable service,
26th January 2002.
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 Manx
Communications Commission Grants Licence for 279kHz Long Wave
News Release:
The Isle of Man Communications Commission (Oaseirys
Chellinsh) has today (13 February 2002) announced
the grant of a substantive licence to Isle of Man International Broadcasting
plc (IMIB).
The licence,
under the Broadcasting Act 1993 (of Tynwald), is to enable IMIB to provide
a long wave radio service broadcasting on 279 kHz, and will be for a
ten-year period. The service, provisionally called MusicMann 279, will
be music-led and will target an audience across Britain and Ireland.
It is expected to launch towards the end of 2003.
IMIB plans to
install the transmission antenna on an offshore platform in Manx waters
some 9 km northeast of Ramsey, Isle of Man, near the spot Radio Caroline
was anchored in the 1960s. Some 50 new jobs, both full and part time,
will be created in the town where the studios will be located. As well
as its Isle of Man broadcasting licence, IMIB will hold a Wireless Telegraphy
licence from the United Kingdom Radiocommunications Agency.
Announcing the
grant of the licence, the Chairman of the Communications Commission,
the Hon Phil Braidwood, MHK, said, "The Isle of Man first sought
a high power broadcasting frequency four decades ago. IMIB now has the
opportunity to demonstrate that the Island is again a vibrant source
entertaining radio for the whole of the British Isles."
The Director
of the Commission, Anthony Hewitt, added, "It is now nearly 3 years
since the selection of IMIB to exploit this opportunity was approved.
With planning issues behind them, the way is now clear for IMIB and
its backers to get the station on air and to realise its full commercial
potential." ENDS
Chris says: At last things can move forward! With a power of 500kW,
the station will reach well into Europe – truly international. Previous
coverage of the story is here. |
Rosko
Socks It To 'Em on the Web! He Says:
Hi Everyone,
As a member of the media and DJ with no small ego I am promoting myself! I
have decided to launch my own radio station and hope you will help me let
the secret out of the bag!! I thought it might be nice if the information
I am about to divulge went directly to you, as I am about to rock! I am offering
the Best of Rosko on the Internet. I will be starting with 5 hours and will
expand it to 50 hours over the coming months. There will more details at the
new web site www.emperorrosko.com.
The site, also in its infancy, will be expanded soon.
I am continually bombarded with requests for shows on tape, station information,
etc, so, I thought in light of my global reach, I will make myself available
on the Internet. You asked for it, you got it! The station can be found at:
www.roskoradio.com.
For the time being the station will be commercial free. I may have to take
ads in the future to ensure that the quality, availability, and continuity
remain first class.
I am featuring music I have played for you over the years at different times
and at different stations, as well as all the little productions and your
favorite jingles. I will be reviewing new product and will devote a selection
of hours to the best of what's cutting edge.
I will also be featuring new writers, composers and artists with finished
material who are looking for deals, publishing, and distribution.
A few of you grew up listening to the Emperor on Radio Caroline (South), Luxembourg,
Europe #1, Radio Monte Carlo, Radio One, Virgin, Merlin, EKR, and many of
the ILR stations. For those of the younger journalistic generation please
allow me to introduce myself... More information is at my web site. www.emperorrosko.com.
As with any start-up operations, I hope we won't drop the ball too much. Your
input once you have had a taste, will always be welcome. Thank you for your
loyalty over the years and now, enjoy!
The UK group I am sure know where to find me - Saturday noon till three on
Classic Gold. The program continues to grow and if you have Sky Digital, we
are on channel 859. Negotiations with many others continue and we look forward
to the next UK tour that could be this summer 2002.
Now, if each one of you turns a friend or two or three, on to the new Station,
www.roskoradio.com
we could start something!!
Regards, Emperor Rosko
The
Sister Salvation Sonowaltz
In January's Happenings, night-owl, Philip
Lowe asked:
Can you tell me the name of the music played at the close
of the day's transmissions of Radio London and who played it? In the same
way that Caroline used to play out with Jimmy McGriff Round
Midnight, so Radio London played out with something similar. The
name Sister's Salvation springs to mind, but
I'm not sure.
Many thanks, Phil Lowe
Alan Field discovered a link to a track called Sister
Salvation. Written and recorded in 1961 by jazz trombonist Slide
Hampton and his Octet, it's available on a recently-released CD. Phil
recalls a piece of music similar to Round Midnight.
There is no similarity whatsoever between Sister Salvation
and Jimmy Mc Griff's famous recording of the Thelonous Monk composition, but
it transpires that Sister Salvation sounds so
similar to the Big Lil Sonowaltz
that the listener could mistake it for two different arrangements of the same
music. The 'Wonderful Big L' Sonovox inserts recorded for Big
Lil, would fit Sister Salvation perfectly.
The PAMS Sonowaltz recording was made around the same time as Slide
Hampton's. It was part of the 'Sonosational'
Series 18, which was written by Euel Box.
There is no apparent connection to Slide Hampton.
Alan has since gone into detective overdrive and has contacted
US jingles expert, Ken R. (www.kenr.com)
Ken comments:
I think it's very likely that Sister
Salvation was the inspiration for the Sonowaltz.
It's not big news that Euel Box, the main writer of Series 18 borrowed styles
that were popular in 1961 when the series was written. One of the cuts is
even named "Prado" after Perez Prado who provided the inspiration for that
cut.
Other cuts in the series were based on Henry Mancini riffs and other well-known
composers of the time. There's a definite "Mr. Lucky" sound to one if you
listen closely.
Most people are not aware of this, but it went on with almost every series.
In the mid 60s the bossa nova cut from Series 29 was a direct rip-off of a
Ray Charles song!
In the late 60s Spanky and Our Gang, Sergio Mendez and others influenced the
writers. In the early 70s it was the Carpenters, Blood Sweat and Tears and
Chicago.
It always surprises people who hear these jingles for the first time, because
they are more familiar with the songs than the jingles. To us jingle collectors,
we are so used to the jingles that we almost forgot that most of them were
"borrowed" from popular artists.
'Radio-Free'
Radio
"His
radio is on, but he has tuned it out. He wishes he had a CD player in his
car..."
In 2000, Roger Day had
his own rant on the subject of the
state of UK radio. Now Howie Castle has kindly sent us a
link to an item bemoaning the current state of US radio, written by John
Schneider, which begins:
John may have been writing about abysmal broadcasting in the USA, but
his comments are equally relevant here. For lovers of real radio, this is
highly-recommended reading. www.radiopoly.com/radio/
We wish John the very best of luck with his Internet radio project.
While we're on the subject, in an email we received from Steve
Atkinson of Wisconsin, who in the Sixties had a listening choice
of two local rock stations, plus two Chicago stations, including
the legendary WLS – lucky devil – says:
I agree with you 100% on the sad state of oldies radio stations. There
was so much good music that came from the 1955-1975 era and so little
gets played. Our stations here rotate the same 300 songs over and over.
I guess they have determined that playing familiar music draws the most
listeners and generates the most revenue. I know the guy who is the morning
DJ here in Milwaukee and he just shakes his head in sadness every time
I complain to him.
When it comes to the dire state of radio, there's a "whole
lotta (sad head-) shakin' goin' on" around the world.
Big
L Newsflash! Grocer Has Stork Delivery, and It's Not Margarine!
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Star of the winter Big L RSL from St Katharine's
Dock, London, Steve 'Grocer Jack' Garlick, has some great news. His
wife Debbie gave birth to a beautiful baby girl in the early hours of
February 6th 2002. The new arrival has been named Emily Alice and Steve,
ever the DJ, quips that he, "can't wait for her to play!"
The Grocer was with us at the Brian Wilson concert with his mobile phone
switched to 'vibrate', in case Debbie should go into labour prematurely.
Relieved that the only 'good vibrations' turned out to be those emanating
from the stage, Steve says
"I enjoyed your review of the Brian Wilson concert - it certainly was
a special night. Thanks should go to Emily for not putting in an early
appearance a week early."
(The reason for all these 'Grocer' references can
be found here...
Steve doesn't mind being reminded of it really!)
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Death
of the DJ Who Gave The Beatles Their Big Break
Liverpool's Cavern Club owes much of its success and popularity
not only to the Beatles, but to the venue's resident DJ and Promoter,
Bob Wooler, who died at the age of 76 on February 8th.
He is credited with launching the career of the Beatles after their
return from Hamburg, by persuading the Cavern's owner, Ray McFall, to
allow them to do a lunchtime session on February 9th 1961.
Bob: "There were five Beatles then. They got paid six pounds. Not each,
but for the whole group. That's a pound a man plus a pound for the driver."
The Beatles played 274 times at the Cavern during the next two and a
half years.
He was present at the Beatles' first meeting with manager Brian Epstein
and was invited to follow them when they moved to London, but chose
to stay in his native Liverpool.
It's easy to forget that other stars of pop performed at the Cavern.
Bob Wooler had become the driving force behind the Beat scene in the
Cavern and by the summer of 1962 had persuaded Ray McFall that the time
was right to start booking big names. The first was Gene Vincent who,
with the Beatles on the same bill, made his debut at the Cavern on 1
July 1962.
More history of the Cavern can be found here.
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'The Big Three At The Cavern' EP is one of the few recordings made
at the venue, and has Bob introducing the band. He also wrote the sleeve
notes, and talks about "the subterranean sweatiness and oven-like temperature
of this famous stomping scene!" Nice...
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