Wednesday, September 20, 2023

Coffee Break 1977

 


Bruce Phillip Miller has more or your MOR favorites on "Coffee Break"



Joe Allison 1963

 


Joe Allison was a songwriter, performer, record company executive and a DJ.  Joe came along around the time of "Modern Country" and was responsible for modernizing "Hillbilly" radio.  It was great.  I just remastered this, enjoy.



Tuesday, September 19, 2023

Wolfman Jack 1983

  


Wolfman was the only one that we'd get complaints about.  First thing I did at SCN when I could was get his airtime changed from 3am to 8pm.  There was only one Wolfman, I'm proud we had him.


Roger Carroll 1972

 


From 1972 Roger has the latest on your opportunities in the USAF.  It's the the best sounds in town!



Monday, September 18, 2023

Melody Roundup - Roy Acuff




 Melody Roundup was the "country show",  In the 1940s many local stations did live country programs.  Sometimes they'd send copies to AFRS.  The network would edit these to fit in the 15 minute program.

Roy Acuff was country music from WWII until well through the 1980s.  Lets visit Roy in 1945.
 

Mary Turner 1985

  



A lonely GI really wants to hear a female voice, Mary Turner continued in the tradition of GI Jill, Rebel Randall and Chris Noel and spoke to the troops


Andy Mansfield 1963

 


In 1963 the loss of Glenn Miller was still fresh.  Here's part two of Andy Mansfield's tribute.  He did a great job and talked with a lot of the people that knew Glenn.  




Sunday, September 17, 2023

Roland Bynum 1979

 


So when in you're in Los Angeles, or streaming Los Angeles radio our friend Roland Bynum is making it happen weekends on Stevie Wonder's KJLH Saturday mornings from 6-8 (Los Angeles time).  Click here

But in 1979, Roland rocked the world for AFRTS!



BIll Stewart 1969

 

Amazing talent from KMPC




Don Browne has some insights: Not all AFRTS-LA radio show hosts methodically recorded their programs at the beginning of the RU 8-week cycle-to-air. Of course, all AFRTS stations and networks held the RU "on the floor" for an additional 3-weeks as a protection for four-class mail delays enroute. The only exception was AFVN in Saigon, RVN who aired the RU and RP ("Date With Chris") the week that it was received. Saigon had daily flights from Travis AFB, CA and didn't have to worry about delay in four-class mail deliveries.
Bill Stewart, and a few other hosts, recorded and stored their shows at AFRTS-LA for four to six months prior to air. Although the programming was 5-55:00 at the beginning, it was considered "ever green" by the LA producers. Bill Stewart never mentioned "it's the Monday edition" or "it's the Tuesday edition" the way Roger Carroll did for his 5-55:00 series. I believe this was due to the inordinate delay in recording the Bill Stewart Shows. He just didn't know what day the show was to be aired!
When Bill Stewart says "this song is a new release", it really isn't. . .it's four to six months old!
Because of the long "lead-time" in recording the Bill Stewart Shows (at the request of Bill himself), I reviewed and logged a year of the Bill Stewart Show to determine if there was a detrimental effect on the program. This took about two weeks of auditioning the pristine discs in the Library of Congress. I saved the "Bill Stewart logs" when I retired from AFRTS in January 2001.



The core artists most likely to be featured on the 1-110:00 series Bill Stewart Show were: Mel Torme, Buddy Greco, Damita Jo, George Shearing, Andre Previn, Les Brown, Ted Heath, Artie Shaw, Peggy Lee, Anita Kerr Singers, Nelson Riddle, David Rose, and Burt Bacharach. The "Bill Stewart logs" began with #733 RU 41-9 (April 1969) and ended with #790 RU 47-0 (May 1970). In this series, Bill Stewart used Hugo Montenegro's rendition of "Palm Canyon Drive" as a bridge (or bumper) between Part 2 (the "b" side) and Part 3 (the "c" side).
In #734 RU 42-9 (April 1969), Bill Stewart remarks "This is the beginning of the Twenty-fifth Year of AFRS (nee AFRTS). . ." in the beginning of Part 4 (the "d" side).
In #749 RU 5-0 (August 1969), Bill Stewart remarks that Henry Mancini's rendition of "Crocodiles Go Home" from the soundtrack album "Hatari" was his "bridge theme" (between Part 1 and Part 2) when the show was 5-a-week (5-55:00).



Although the AFRTS-LA records are not accurate, due to the numbering scheme, the first Bill Stewart Show was probably #1M in RU 27-6 (January 1966). Around #651 in RU 1-9 (July 1968), Bill Stewart was demoted to 1-110:00. An easy way to rank AFRTS-LA radio show hosts was by the number of disc sides that they recorded. 1-25:00 or 1-30:00 was one side; 1-45:00 or 1-55:00 was two sides; 1-110:00 was four sides; 5-55:00 was ten sides. So moving from 5-55:00 to 1-110:00 was considered a demotion.


Bill Stewart is back for another swinging hour.  It's a little jumpy near the beginning but it fills the Bill..




Friday, September 15, 2023

Jim Pewter 1981

 


Come and get your memories.  Jim's back again with another great half hour.  Starts with the original version of a song made huge by the Beatles. Jim was one of us and it shows up on every show.  They don't make music like this anymore.  No one ever presented it better.

Don Browne has more: All AFRTS radio programming records are spotty, but Jim Pewter is more complicated.

Jim Pewter started his AFRTS-LA career in January 1967, presumably with #1M in flight RU 27-7. His "oldies" specialty show was initially 5-25:00 and lasted about two years. About March 1969, just in time for my arrival at FEN, Tokyo, JP, Jim Pewter was demoted to once a week at 1-55:00. I made a note of it in my FEN log when I reviewed show #366, RU 41-9 in April 1969. The Jim Pewter Show 1-55:00 lasted for about seven years (364 weeks)!

Then at the start of the Bicentennial Year, the Jim Pewter Show was promoted to 5-30:00 with (approximately) #752M in flight RU 1-76 (the first transitional quarter) in January 1976. Because of the long period of one-per-week, the numbering system was in complete disarray. For five-per-week, Mondays, which normally started with xxx1 followed by Mondays as xxx6, instead started with Mondays as xxx2 followed by Mondays as xxx7.

If Jim Pewter continued his 5-30:00 "oldies" show through the transition to Unistar/SMN satellite programming in October 1995, his final cassette-delivered program would have been (about) #5961F in flight RC 52-5, December 1995.