Blast from Your Past, Book 1 - Excerpt 3: Radio Rocks Jay & the Americans

Sandy Deanne w/Jay & the Americans – Excerpt #3 from Book 1, Blast from Your Past! Rock & Roll Radio DJs: the First Five Years 1954-1959

Your Rockin’ Rochelle at BFYP-FM is stroking the clock for timely tunes. I’m tickin’ down the decade’s end with a tuneful tale from the other side of the microphone. Listen up, m’friends!

Mixing business with pleasure can be nice, but heed my advice, keep your cool, don’t be a fool, “Is That Too Much to Ask?”

Sandy Deanne

of Jay & the Americans

with bandmates Howie Kane and John Reineke (Jay #3)

BFYP trivia alert! Do you know that before Jay & the Americans, original member, Sandy Deanne, first wrote and released songs as founding member with the Harborlites in the late 1950s? And it was a friendly radio disk jockey who helped the teen trio hit the airwaves in New York City.

“Cousin Brucie and I were dating sisters,” said songwriter Sandy, in his palpable New York inflection. “I knew he was a DJ and he knew I had a band.” But until their record “Is That Too Much to Ask” was released in 1959, conversations were a fleeting “hi” in chance meetings at the sisters’ home.

“When the record came out,” Sandy continued, “Cousin Brucie stepped up to the plate. He really liked it, I guess, ‘cause he played it a lot. It was a turntable hit for us and got us started.”

Blast from Your Past – Book 1, Excerpt 2: DJ Dr. Don Rose

Dr. Don Rose – Excerpt #2 from Blast from YourPast! Book 1 - Rock & Roll Radio DJs: the First Five Years 1954-1959 

BFYP-FM is helpin’ you rise ‘n’ shine! We see the big ol’ sun peeking over the hill, playing hide an’ seek with fluffy clouds … it’s so bea-u-ti-ful. But wait, wait … ‘Hey, hey you! Get offa my cloud!’

“This is your old fuddy-duddy buddy, Dr. Don at the yawn of a new day!” (A DDR oft-repeated wake-up greeting.)

Dr. Don Rose (a.k.a. Donald Rosenberg)

Best known at KFRC/San Francisco, California

1934 ~ 2005 (Interview with son, Jay Rosenberg.)

While Jeff Prescott’s dad, Norm [coming up in another excerpt], carved out his platter-spinning niche in Boston, another kid in Philly cocked his head quizzically at his dad’s voice coaxing him awake.

“My earliest memory was of listening to him from a clock radio next to my bed,” said Jay Rosenberg, “and wondering how he got inside the box. My mom kind of explained how it worked. But I don’t think I got it.”

Jay recalls this fond memory of his dad, Donald Rosenberg. Before all was said and done, Donald became endeared to thousands of fans on both sides of the country as “Dr. Don Rose.”

Don Rose’s radio star was already on the rise before Jay, the second youngest of five Rosenberg siblings, marveled at his dad’s voice bouncing out from the radio.

Casey Kasem's "Soul Train" No Quiet Ride

Care to comment? Leave your remarks below - what do you think of Casey's suspended burial?

Young DJ Casey at KEWB
San Francisco 02/24/1962

With a heavy heart, I post an update to Casey Kasem’s rise to Rock& Roll Heaven. His family simply will not allow him to take a peaceful journey on the “Soul Train.”

Recent reports raise the question of the whereabouts of his remains. Seriously?! The "Father" of American Top 40 spirited away on Father's Day (06/15/14). Let the poor man Rest In Peace, for cryin' out loud.

We cannot judge his wife without firsthand knowledge. However, she has apparently defied what his children claim are “his wishes” – and who can argue that none of us would want our bodies to linger in limbo.

While my personal belief is that the soul moves on when our Earthly bodies expire, few of us would deny it is simply unethical not to care for our "released" bodies in a humane way.

We can only hope that this ridiculous travesty will soon be remedied and Mr. Kasem can ultimately, truly, Rest In Peace.

“You don't have to hurry | On a soul train ride | You don't have to worry | Let your troubles slide”

(1968, Classics IV)

Rock On, Casey!

Casey Kasem – Peace, Love, and #1 on our American Top 40

This is not the article I had intended to post next. The Universe, however, has its own plans for us as we learned again recently, when it welcomed another American icon into its Rock & Roll Heaven.

Casey Kasem, 82, the "Father of American Top 40" found his peace last Sunday – Father’s Day, a fitting tribute for his ascent – finally escaping the spectacle of family squabbles that dogged his final year(s) on Earth. 

Casey’s “guy next door” voice served him well from his start in Armed Forces Radio Network in 1950s’ Korea, to finish, as co-creator of the perpetual American Top 40 — which has endured for decades and leaves a fitting legacy for the man behind the microphone.

There was a lot of living in between. Let's celebrate Mr. Kasem's accomplishments, dedication, and contributions to Rock & Roll music!

In the mid-1950s that blasphemous, new-fangled boob-tube was taking the world by storm. Radio simply did not know what to do next.

A vital part of the early Pop and Rock music scene, Casey and other DJs of the era helped shape the genre, as a wave of technology enveloped our world.

Television threatened to drown radio in its salty wake. But Rock & Roll rescued radio …