There was a time, long ago for sure, when the live radio DJ was king or queen of the on air shift. These were the days before music directors or format captains programmed the songs that were played on the air. These were the days before that terrible invention called the “clock wheel” directed which song you could play with dots of color stuck to the label of that 45 RPM label stuck in the wire frame record holder sitting next to the audio board.
I can still remember the days when I first started doing radio shows at WUSC-AM when I would come in about 45 minutes early to stand in front of two walls stacked floor to ceiling with cubbyholes and shelves of albums standing on end. Dust motes danced in the shaft of sunlight that bathed the wooden desk of the music librarian where I carefully placed the albums that I chose for today’s show. Basically, I had free reign of selection from the thousands of albums on those shelves. Music being what it was back in those days, I typically needed around 40 songs for a two hour show. The rest of the time was for commercials and the news, weather and sports! On the lower right corner right next to the floor near the door to the production studio was short row of cubbyholes that contained 45 RPM records that would become the mainstay of my radio experience of the 60s. At the time, those big holed 7“ vinyl disks were the only thing that was off limits for our “middle of the road” shows.
“Middle of the Road” or “MOR” is an expression that one doesn’t hear much these days. Probably the easiest way to explain it is to say that MOR was what the Armed Forces Radio Network station was playing before Airman 1st Class Adrian Cronauer shook things up as portrayed by Robin Williams in the movie “Good Morning Vietnam!” Little did I know that I would soon be following Adrian’s footsteps as we introduced rock and roll to WUSC-AM in 1965 with the premiere of the early morning “Dawn Patrol Show.” That’s when it all changed for me; suddenly that small collection was my go to place in the music library.
Although that part of the library was small at first, it soon began to grow as the record company reps found out that we had a rock and roll show on the air. I did not say “Top 40” because the contents were a mixture of the current pop and rock hits, golden oldies and songs that the reps were pushing. Soon we needed more cubbyholes. WUSC-AM was THE primary training ground for entry level DJs for the commercial stations in the city and it was not long before I bid a sad farewell to my first radio gig and began rockin’ the airwaves on WCOS-AM and FM.
WCOS-FM was an automated MOR station at the time but occasionally I would go on the air there “running board” for a football game or doing a classical music show. I was hired initially as a weekend DJ on WCOS-AM. A few months after I started, April Black, the overnight DJ on the “All Night Satellite” show left and I was tapped to go on full time.
WCOS-AM was a “Top 40” station at the time. Our play list consisted of the “Top 60 in Dixie”, the “Up and Comer’s” and “Solid Gold Oldies.” All in all there were less than 100 songs in the control room. The music rules were simple, 1). Play a “kicker”, an up tempo high energy song after the news on the top of the hour and the half hour 2). Play a Solid Gold Oldie after the weather at a quarter past and a quarter till each hour 3). Do not play two instrumentals or two female artists (or groups) back to back. Believe it or not, the third rule was not misogynistic as it sounds but reflected the lack of female or instrumental offerings that were available. After all the first all female rock band to sign with a major record label, Goldie & the Gingerbreads, did so just three years before in 1962.
That was it! Aside from those three rules, each DJ was free to play whatever he or she wanted. That allowed each of us to set a theme for the time of day our shows aired. The all night show was probably the most schizophrenic of all. Signing on at 1 AM with hard driving rock and soul for the folks coming home from their evening jobs and parties and then slowly mellowing out with a mixture of lighter rock and pop by the time everyone was waking up at 6 AM in the morning. That doesn’t mean that I didn’t play “Fire” by “The Crazy World of Arthur Brown” at 6 AM from time to time just for the fun of it. That was about the limit of my “Shock Jock” routine.
There was one thing that mixed up the recipe that I baked on the air; audience requests. Like most old school radio jocks, I love requests. First of all, requests keep me honest and more in line with what my listeners want to hear. Second of all, it is a challenge to mix in requests with the songs that I had placed in the queue without causing “train wrecks;” two songs that sound terrible when they are played next to each other.
During my time as the “Chief Engineer” at WIS-Radio in the late 70s, I’d fill in on the air sometimes as a favor to the program director who had to provide a live body in the air chair any time the station was on the air. I was back to playing albums again but this time they were more light rock and pop instead of MOR. Again, I had almost complete freedom to choose my songs from the record library that was along the walls of the production studio.
It was during the 70s that music directors started restricting what songs could be played at what time. This is when the aforementioned “clock wheel” and colored dots came into play. The hour of the “clock wheel” was divided into colored wedges and during that time you could play only those songs that had the same color dots on them. I never had to suffer that but my friends who did, hated it!
Tomorrow morning, when I sit down in the air chair at WUSC-FM, I’ll have a dozen songs in the queue. These are oldies that haven’t been played on the show before. They will not play together or first, I’ll be adding songs the way I did back in the 60s; tying songs together by sound, musical key, beats per minute or something that connects, the artists, composers or even recording studios used for the recordings. The wild card is still the requests. I love ‘em! Keep them coming! Oh MY!
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