In an age long ago there were no ipods nor cellphones or even home computers. Young boys who sometimes lacked diversions would actually become facinated by the changing medium of radio. It's hard to believe that those once big and bulky things could hold such sway on an emerging generation. Perhaps two coliding caches of history emerged to change my life as well as that of a whole generation. Before Harry met Sally the transistor hooked up with Rock and Roll and changed history forever.
Yes I was one of the multitude of kids who got that transistor radio for my birthday and would sneek it endlessly under my pillow to hear ever changing new sounds. Perhaps this was the real genesis of Under the Covers. Add to this a much older and much bigger brother who controlled the other family radios in the house. His influence turned me into a rather precocious kid. At 5 and 6 years of age I heard the early Rock and Roll of Alan Freed blasted into my psyche and the King of the Moondogers was the one who started it all. Brother Bob had other eclectic radio tastes that fermented the formulative Weasel. I stayed up many sleepless nights enthralled by the bold story telling monologues of Jean Shepperd or the occult oracles of Long John Nebel or even the strange sounds at the far right end of the AM dial where Symphony Sid held forth with his blend of Jazz and Latin Salsa music or even the raging rhythm and Blues of Jocko Henderson and his Rocker Ship. And as if my suburban New York State of mind wasn't enough I had plenty of time to DX the broadcast band hearing all of those distant signals that seemed as if they were eminating outter space or at least Walt Disney's Fantasy Land.
I guess Rock and Roll and I both had our adolescence at the same time. In New York it was the WMCA Good Guys vs the WABC All Americans and o9f course the 5th Beatle Murray the K who would later become my mentor. And on the skip there was Joey Reynolds in Buffalo on WKBW Dick Biondi on WLS Chicago Dick Summer and Arnie Ginsberg in Boston and Terry Knight on CKLW Windsor-Detroit who would later form the band Grand Funk Railroad.
As radio and I both grew up in New York we made the switch to FM where I was reunited with Murray the K as well as Rosko and Scott Muni, Jonathan Schwartz Allison Steele and the free form music of WBAI and WFMU. Everybody it seemed not only wanted to re-invent radio but the rest of our lives as well. There was a sense of community in those days that lit a fire under me and gave me the bug.
It was off to college at American University an aimless student not quite sure what I wanted to do with my life but with an unfullfilled fantasy. Then it happened. A chance meeting with Steve Leeds then the program director of our campus radio station WAMU. I proceeded to rail about how awful the station sounded and then something fortuitous happened. He could have decked me but instead told me that if I thought it was so awful why didn't I just join the staff and make it better. And that was it.
One afternoon my AU budies were listening to Glen Burnie native Frank Zappa's Weasels Ripped My Flesh and noted an uncanny resemblence to Neon Park's album cover and my smiling face. That's where the nickname came from and so far it has lasted a lifetime. I later met Frank and he wholeheartedly approved by doing a steller promotional id for my show.
Sometimes we all get lucky and just happen to be in the right place at the right time. While still working at WAMU many of us got involved with a small FM station located in Bethesda at 102.3 on the dial. It was just one cut above being a family owned station and had meandered since it's founding in 1961 from classical to heavy doses of Montovnani Peggy Lee and Frank Sinatra. On sundays it would broadcast programs in Italian French and Greek. The letters WHFS stood for Washington's High Fidelity Stereo and was in fact the first station in the DC area to broadcast in stereo and later one of the first to broadcast in Quad.
Well once the counter culture got hold of it WHFS was never the same and neither was my life. I spent a total of 33 years there following it on the dial from 102.3 to 99.1 and chased it from Bethesda to Annnapolis to Landover, Lanham and back again. We played everything from Stockhausen to Reggae and I talked to everyone from John Lennon to Muddy Waters to Dave Mathews. Along the way there were journeys into My 3 Songs the Flashback Cafe and Live from the Archives.
The next stop was back to Rockville Pike at WARW better know as Classic Rock 94-7 the Arrow. It was back to playing a lot of the original music that inspired me in the first place. A doccumentary approach on the nightly Box Set gave me a chance to share a lot of the stories behind the music with both old and new generations of listeners.
And now we're back to the WHFS model and inspiration with the new 94-7 the Globe. I love to get you up and on the road every morning with World Class Rock. I hope you join me.
