WIP: DYNAMIC DUO OF THE OZARKS

I realize I frequently make excuses for the lack of posting, but I have been busy with work. Also, there has been some upheaval in my life, but for good reason. My sister and my nephew’s wife are helping me clean up and get rid of my late parents’ stuff. My nephew’s wife has a WordPress blog and she wrote a blog post about it. We are finding some interesting things.

One of the things we found is this cassette tape. It is a mix tape of songs I recorded off the radio. Why am I writing about it here? Two reasons:

1. When I listened to it, I found that most of the songs, on this cassette tape, were recorded off of a syndicated radio show, that I loved as a teenager, Solid Gold Saturday Night, hosted by Dick Bartley. Bartley played oldies (1955-1972) took request on a “national toll free hot line at 1-800-634-5789.” (The phone number is a nod to Wilson Pickett) This show inspired me to get into radio. I wanted to host an oldies show like Dick Bartley. The closest I got to that was producing Remember When and Nostalgia Time with Wayne Glenn. I found I got an aircheck of Dick Bartley.
2. The thing that struck me the most listening to this tape was most of the songs I recorded are songs I mention in The Dynamic Duo of the Ozarks.

There are only three current hits (of the time) on the tape. They are “Owner of a Lonely Heart” by Yes, “That’s All” by Genesis, and “Nothing From Today” by the Vipers. The last one was taped off of K-S-M-U is Springfield, which is the radio station, where I started my radio career. The song sounds like it came from the era (65-67) in which The Dynamic Duo of the Ozarks takes place. It was part of a forgotten trend called retro bands or ‘paisley underground’ bands. It did produce some well-known groups, such as the Smithereens, the Bangles, and REM. Genesis and Yes were probably recorded off K-L-W-T FM 92 in Lebanon. It is long gone.

There were two songs on the tape, which are technically 70’s songs: “Fly Like an Eagle” by Steve Miller Band and “Sweet Jane” by the Velvet Underground. I used the term technically because the version I had recorded, off of another syndicated radio show, that I think was called Guest D-J; that night it was the late Greg Kihn. The version he chose to play was the slow version from the Live: 1969 LP. This is the version that the Cowboy Junkies covered in the late 80s.

As for the oldest song on the tape, it was “Runaway” by Del Shannon, also from Solid Gold Saturday Night. I also remembered, after listening to this tape, that I had taped the LP The Hollies Greatest Hits (the Epic hits) onto this tape to listen to on my Walkman. I needed a tape to record songs from Solid Gold Saturday Night on and I grabbed this in a rush.

I know for a fact that I have mentioned “Jenny Take a Ride,” “King of the Road,” and “Wild Thing” in chapters. I think that “Black Is Black” and “So You Want to Be a Rock and Roll Star’ is mentioned in the chapter I am currently working on.

Why did I write this post about a mix tape I made off of the radio in the 80s? I wanted to show that many of my passions are in this novel. I’ve loved the music of the 60s, especially the British Invasion, since junior high. Before that, I was obsessed with TV shows like Batman and The Man from U-N-C-L-E, as well as other shows from that era (on revisiting these shows, I realize my fascination with the opposite sex may have started with Petticoat Junction), and my love of broadcast history. Throw in my happy remembrances of my college years and my college friends, you have why I am enjoying writing this novel.