Blast from Your Past: The Swinging Sixties

Showing posts with label The Swinging Sixties. Show all posts

Sunday, September 2, 2018

50 Years Ago September 1968 Funny Girl!

Beatles, Barbra & a Buzzard

For a 39er (39 and Holding several years over), it’s just plain fun writing about Rock and Roll and the pioneering Radio DJs who helped make the hits of yesteryear.

It’s especially meaningful when you’re reliving it as you write, listening to a replay of WOR-FM/New York’s New Year’s Eve 1969 100 Top Hits of the Sixties, like “I Got You, Babe”* (1965; coming in around #88).

Give it a try—how many songs can you sing along to?—well, at least the chorus. This Top 100 list isn’t WOR’s 2018 replay on Rewound Radio—every “Top 100” of any era is subjective to its compiler and sources. Seriously … you can have a list of a thousand top ‘60s hits and it wouldn’t capture all the great songs of that decade. I guarantee you’ll still enjoy it.

So let’s see what fun we can conjure up as we step back to one of the most prolific music months of 1968. While our summer tans began to fade …

September 18: Barbra Streisand took her award-winning Broadway musical, Funny Girl, to the big screen. For me, the enigmatic song, “People,” was the most profound tune of the movie. Streisand made it her first Top 40 hit in 1964 when the stage production debuted, and it regenerated for The Tymes in 1968. Funny Girl’s ad for the Goldman Theatre debut, graced the back cover of WFIL/Philadelphia’s September 30, 1968 Boss 30 chart.
Barbra gave women the courage to love themselves as-is in a decade when we were just beginning to realize our potential. ♪ But first be a person who needs people ♪; and one who can always look in the mirror and say, “Hello, gorgeous!”

September 28: WHK-FM radio made history in Cleveland, as the last FM station in the Metromedia dynasty to succumb to the nationally popular progressive rock and freeform format.

Do you recall when it signed back on the air as WMMS? It was an ego-thing, originally meaning MetroMedia Stereo. Arguably, its best-ever broadcast incarnation, becoming unstoppable by the time “The Buzzard” logo was adopted in 1974.

But, back to the chart toppers 50 Years Ago This Month. They pulled at your heartstrings and pushed you into daydreams and nightmares. Something for everyone!

*Just for fun … let’s peek into our future from 1968, what was the decade’s #1 hit on WOR/New York in December 1969? September 1968’s “Hey Jude,”** by The Beatles. ♪ Don't carry the world upon your shoulders | For well you know that it's a fool who plays it cool …♪ (**This video is hilarious—back when you could get up close & personal with celebrities.)

Featured Radio Survey: WFIL/Philly is our featured radio survey, with not only the Funny Girl ad, but a “Revolution” goin’ on—sorta—as fans pushed The Beatles song up to #1, tied with its flip side, MOST POPULAR of the whole DECADE, “Hey Jude” … 50 Years Ago This Month. Rev up your memories and recall that awesome day when …

Celebrate SEPTEMBER 1968 and … Rock On!

Blast from Your Past Gifts

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LinDee Rochelle is a writer and editor by trade, and an author by way of Rock & Roll. She has published two books (of three) in her Blast from Your Past series, available on Amazon (eBook and print): Book 1 – Rock & Roll Radio DJs: The First Five Years 1954-1959; and Book 2 – Rock & Roll Radio DJs: The Swinging Sixties. Coming soon, … The Psychedelic Seventies!

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Thursday, March 1, 2018

50 Years Ago FM Rebel Rock March 1968

Rebel Rock on Your Radio Dial

This 50 Years Ago this Month post can brag about a DJ featured in the Blast from Your Past series! Those of us who were “there”, know the 1960s is in many ways, an uncanny sister-era to the 2010s. But back “in the day” we had the added attraction of enjoying the birth of FM Radio and Rebel Rock.

The Swinging Sixties felt the change and upheaval in all aspects around the world. Rebel Rock really started to catch fire as FM radio heated up the broadcasting industry. A handful of innovative disk jockeys felt the vibe—especially those who heard the call of underground music, and the psychedelic siren of San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury. Leaning into 50 Years Ago this Month 1968 …

March 11^th: With the progress of Acid Rock and early Progressive Rock on FM radio airwaves, several former Top 40 radio stations gave up the ghost for an all-news format, like KFWB in Los Angeles. It followed in the footsteps of KYW/Philly and WINS/NY. However, a Boston station took a go-with-the-flow attitude …

March 15^th: WBCN/Boston thought no one would notice if they gradually began switching from easy listening to freeform Progressive Rock. Right … just proved a point for a very vocal pioneering DJ …

March 18^th: Always the innovator and instigator, popular San Francisco DJ and program director, “Big Daddy” Tom Donahue (1928-1975), propagated the infant Progressive Rock march into FM stations like legendary KMPX. But he shocked management when he resigned, with attitude. He and wife, Raechel, pushed the envelope, taking much of the staff and DJs with them in a walk-out dubbed by locals as “The Great Hippie Strike.” More than a little partying flanked the picket lines, as the strike waged on for two months, with a lot of head-butting, but no resolution.

The Donahues didn’t let one stubborn station owner get in their way of Rockin’ progress. They morphed former KSFR 94.9 (now KYLD) into iconic KSAN/FM “The Jive 95.” Most of the former KMPX staff moved in with them.

As Raechel used to say, “This is KSAN in San Francisco. Sometimes we do it fast … sometimes we do it slow … but we al-ways do it!”

Tom spoke into the microphone with energetic glee, “You can see, we’re gonna be doin’ a LOT of boogie’n’.”

Featured Radio Survey: Top 40 still ruled many San Francisco stations, though, like popular KFRC. The Beatles’ “Lady Madonna” marched up the chart at #13. A far-out rendering of the Fab Four on the cover, fascinated fans. 50 Years Ago This Month, recall that awesome day when …

Celebrate MARCH 1968: 50 Years Ago and … Rock On!