{"id":371,"date":"2019-09-17T09:12:15","date_gmt":"2019-09-17T08:12:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/?p=371"},"modified":"2019-09-17T09:12:16","modified_gmt":"2019-09-17T08:12:16","slug":"we-all-love-the-radio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/2019\/09\/17\/we-all-love-the-radio\/","title":{"rendered":"WE ALL LOVE THE RADIO"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

PUSH\nBUTTON HEAVEN by Norman Warwick<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Track\nlisting<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Is\nIt A Monster? by The Automatic<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Listening\nto Leven by Marc Cohn<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\nTurn Me On I\u00b4m A Radio by Joni Mitchel<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Listen\nTo The Radio by Nanci Griffith<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Video\nKilled The Radio Star by The Buggles<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Satelite\nRadio  by Steve Earle<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u00b4s\nWhy God Made The Radio by The Beach Boys<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Silent\nNight \/ Seven O\u00b4Clock News by Simon and Garfunkel<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Border\nRadio by Dave Alvin<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

My love of radio has been a lifelong\naffair and I have performed over the years, as occasional presenter and guest and\navid listener to several national and local BBC stations as well as independent\nand community radio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Radio has been my best friend since\nchildhood, even if, in those days, her name was Wireless. Throughout my teen\nyears she became my (only) illicit bed-fellow, though by then she had changed\nher name to Transistor. I would hide her under my pillow and she would whisper\nsweet nothings all through the night. I could catch her on 208 medium wave and\nshe would talk to me from (Radio) Luxemburg and sing to me about girlfriends\nlike Carol, (oh, Carol!) Jennifer Eccles and Carrie Anne.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strangely, though, I best remember\nsnatches of songs played as programme themes. I can recall \u2018a happy tune I\nloved to croon. They called it Sam\u2019s Song\u2019 that introduced the Sam Costa show. He\nwas a popular singer of the British dance band era and was a voice actor for\nthe family favourite radio comedy show Much Binding In The Marsh. He was also a\ndj for both Radio Luxembourg and the BBC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was all in the days of the Light\nService and the Home Service and long before Walkmans and DAB and Digital and i\npod, and the music would fade in and out indiscriminately and would snap\ncrackle and pop all night long to prepare me for my favourite breakfast cereal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So welcome to a Sidetracks And Detours\nplaylist that might guide you all across the arts on the radio. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have a friend here who writes\ncontemporary fiction with clear eye and ear for detail, and has even written\nfor our all across the arts. services in the UK. Born in Scotland, she often\nvisits family there, but after living for years in South Africa she and her\nhusband and daughter settled here on Lanzarote. Obviously, she has stories to\ntell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aileen Hendry loves talking! Her love of\nconversation sometimes takes her writing in unexpected directions and her\npenchant for a good natter serves her well, too, in her daytime job as AJ The\nDJ.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Monster FM radio is the only Lanzarote\nbased station to be broadcasting English speaking programmes, all over Europe.\nHow, then, can we not place What\u00b4s That Coming Over the Hill, Is it a Monster,\nby The Automatic, into a top ten tracks celebrating radio? Aileen\u00b4s shows can\nbe found on 93.3 fm or by internet on monsterradio.es <\/strong>or via the <\/strong>Tune in app and can be listened to\nretrospectively by mixcloud.com Graham1953<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aileen loves a conspiracy theory and\ncould name the thirty men who shot Kennedy. She worries about vapour trails\nthat cross the skies out here suggesting, she says, that we are being watched or\nworse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, a fine singer herself, she\nrecognises a good tune and, being a poet, can identify a good lyric. And that, all\nover the world and all across the arts, is what radio is all about. Good chat\nand good music do good programmes make.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My book, Name Check, (soon to be made\navailable for purchase in our merchandise store) explored singers paying\ntributes in their lyrics to fellow artists. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Walking In Memphis by Mark Cohn squeezed\nin to the book with its lyrical references to Elvis and W. C Handy, but Cohn\nalso wrote and recorded Listening To Levon, which also fits the criteria of Sidetracks\nAnd Detours virtual playlist celebrating \u00b4radio.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crescent Community Radio, was for many\nyears the the only such broadcaster in my home town of Rochdale, with a remit\nto engage with our Asian communities and deliver appropriate programming to\nencourage social cohesion and improve English speaking. Now Defiant Radio is\ncoming along too, primarily to offer work skills to youngsters who fancy\njoining the industry. Both these stations are local revenue funded arts\norganisations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cohn\u2019s song is considered to be written\nabout Levon Helm, one time member of Bob Dylan\u2019s buddies, The Band. Last year I\nread and reviewed a biography of Helm and an autobiography of his colleague\nRobbie Robertson that told very different stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a fictional element in Cohn\u2019s\nsong that suggests he was \u2018dating\u2019 his girl in the family car, until Levon sang\non the radio. Then, unfortunately for at least one of them, everything stopped\n!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Joni Mitchell
more than a voice on the radio<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Joni Mitchel rarely seemed to court commercial\nsuccess, of course, but it found her anyway. You Turn Me On, I\u2019m A Radio was\none of her few attempts to write a hit. The song charts here, too, with its\nreference to djs and frequencies and signals rendering it perfect for\ncelebrating our relationship with radio. The song even included both a dj\nfriendly intro, and a long \u2018diamond time\u2019 fade that allowed broadcasters to\nremind people of the song\u2019s writer \/ performer, title and availability. The\nsong was the first of Joni\u2019s own recordings to chart in America, though earlier\nJudy Collins, with her version of Joni\u2019s Both Sides Now, and Crosby, Stills And\nNash, with their version of a hippie-pilgrim\u00b4s journey to Woodstock, made the\nUS top ten. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You Turn Me On is narrated from a\nradio\u2019s perspective, explaining the ways it could please its listeners. The\nsignal might not always be clear, (tell me, I live at the foot of Montanna Roja\n!) but it \u2018knows what you want to hear.\u2019 The song is interpreted by some,\nthough, as a metaphor for a person too eager to please.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are lots of reasons why I ticked\nall boxes alongside the name of Nanci Griffith as I listened to the debut\ncollection, on a cassette tape given to me by an American song writer I admired\nand trusted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It recommended from a reliable source so\ntick box one. Several superb self or collaboratively penned compositions earned\na second tick in the box and the third tick was for a \u2018down home girl next\ndoor\u2019 singing voice. I put a fourth tick next to her name when I listened\nbetween the lines to enjoy her sense of humour, and in doing so found a girl\nwith a literary heart. A final tick was earned by the friends who layed with\nher on that album, so in demand on the country music scene as to be a recommendation\nby association. So, a five out of five score just from a degraded, several-times\nrecorded tape.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few months later I saw her UK live\ndebut, down in London, maybe The Palladium, I think. Make that a six out of\nfive then!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I quickly fell in love with virtually\nall her first output of songs, including Once In A Very Blue Moon, The Last Of The\nTrue Believers and a song that paid homage to her country music predecessors,\nEmmylou Harris and Loretta Lyn, as Nanci advised us to Listen To The Radio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Claims made years ago by The Buggles\nthat Video Killed The Radio Star  turned\nout to be not only premature but also, as yet, unfounded. Radio has withstood\nbombardments from Music T V (MTV) and its many gaudy films designed to prop up\nsongs, sudden advents of Smart tvs which can now offer all the music anyone\ncould handle and then there\u2019s Spotify and other similar services available. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Radio, though, still survives. The BBC\nbroadcasts over 90 regional stations all of which I can access over here on\nLanzarote via a Smart telly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anyway, video is not corporeal and if we\nare looking for a real person who might have seriously damaged radio and its\nlistenership, and those who starred on it, then it was a man who once did star\non it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mike Nesmith, who played the bobble hatted\ndumb looking one in The Monkees, virtually invented MTV single handed but even\nthe sudden abundance of music on tv with selectable songs accompanied by\nexpensively made, often zany films, could not topple radio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My Old Friend The Blues, regularly heard\nin the country and folk music clubs of the UK, was not a track typical of\nAmerican singer writer Steve Earle. Rather he is known for raucous,\nguitar-twang songs like Guitar Town and Copperhead Road, and my favourite track\nof Steve\u2019s is Satellite Radio, in a similar vein to the aforementioned couple. In\nfact the song reminds me of Rochdale\u2019s relationship with radio. We seemed, when\nI lived there, to sit geographically on the very peripheries of broadcasting of\nboth BBC Radio Manchester and BBC Radio Lancashire and so in some ways, this\nsong speaks for any geographical area that sits on the vey limits of a\nbroadcasting range.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The song works on several levels.\nImportantly, the lyric seems to be about a man pondering what other life forms\nthere may be out there in the universe, and how he might make contact with\nthem.  At another level this is simply\nthe story of a late night dj in a tiny broadcasting studio wondering if there\nis anybody listening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steve Bewick and I wondered that each\nweek when we presented all across the arts on Crescent Community Radio. Then in\ncame a letter,\u2026 from Toronto, \u2018at the galaxy\u2019s end, where the stars burn\nbright, tuning in and turning on.\u2019 They\u00b4d picked us up on the internet !<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I can pay no higher accolade to radio\nthan that offered by The Beach Boys on their 2012 album. The song That\u2019s Why\nGod Made The Radio was the first Beach Boys song in almost a quarter of a\ncentury to feature Brian Wilson on lead vocals. He it was, too, who came up\nwith the title of the song during a conversation about the good old days of\nlistening to radio. Wilson wrote the song with his three other\nconversationalists; Jim Peterick, Joe Thomas and Larry Millas<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The album of the same name entered the\nUSA Billboard charts at number three, the highest ever entry of a Beach Boys\nalbum, some forty nine years after their debut album. The accompanying video\nfor the single was created by Focus Creeps, who had previously done innovative\nwork for Arctic Monkeys. The film showed \u2018kids from various musical eras all\nattending the same garage party, thus reflecting radio\u2019s elastic reach.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lyrics describe radio as being \u2018the\nsoundtrack of falling in love\u2019 and another inspired line talks of radio as\n\u2018push button heaven.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People all over the world, of all ethnicities,\nwill remember waking up a few years ago to the news of a devastating Tsunami\nover the Christmas period celebrated by the Christian religion. Of course, that\nmeant a horrible collision between the hymns and carols of the period and the\nterrible news being shown on our tv screens or reported on our radios.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just such a juxtaposition had been\npredicted several years earlier by Simon And Garfunkel with a recording, Silent\nNight \/ Seven O\u2019clock News, that combined their (beautiful) singing of Silent Night\nwith a voice-over relating simulated news of disputes and of \u2018man\u2019s inhumanity\nto man.\u2019 The work was startling and terrifyingly effective and when I first\nheard it I found myself questioning, and reaffirming, my beliefs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The song appeared on Parsley Sage\nRosemary And Thyme which was one of the first dozen or so albums I bought. Its\nlyrics mention a controversy over the \u2018open housing\u2019 segment of the Civil\nRights Bill of the period, the death of Lenny Bruce, Martin Luther King\u2019s\nrefusal to cancel a \u2018walk\u2019 and then- President Nixon calling voices against the\nVietnam war being the greatest weapon working against the US.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is a brief lyric that, like all great\nlyrics, tells you a novel in a couple of verses. It tells why radio remains so\nvital, particularly in small communities, estranged from city life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Border Radio by Dave Alvin tells of a\nwoman who is home alone, still missing her man years after he has left her,\nwith the radio as her only company. She listens to the music, believing he\nmight be \u2018out there\u2019 listening too, and she suddenly hits on the idea of\nsending a request to the radio presenter to play a song on his programme, for\nher man.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So far, then, so sweet and sickly but\nthere is to be no happy ending for the radio just keeps on playing, and the\nrequest goes unheard. However, it is to be remembered that the narrator\u2019s voice\nin this song is male. Could it be \u2018her man\u2019 is listening after all?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My first memory of this song was of Gary\nHall, in the first phase of his solo career after disbanding The Stormkeepers,\nplaying it on his Walkman. I was there at his request to introduce him to\nAmericana music and he introduced me to this absolute gem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Radio, of course, is not only a musical\nsoundtrack of our lives, but is also a source of news, of gossip, conversation\nand comedy. Here, living away from my homeland I can now tune in via the\ninternet to BBC local radio stations like BBC Radio Manchester and BBC Radio\nLancashire, listen to my old mate Steve Bewick and his Hot Biscuits jazz\nprogramme on fcumradio. There are hundreds of commercial stations and some\nniche market stations, too. The glorious Classic FM and Monster FM Radio are\nvastly different but suggest somehow that radio is the sound of the world\nturning !<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PUSH BUTTON HEAVEN by Norman Warwick Track listing Is It A Monster? by The Automatic Listening to Leven by Marc Cohn You Turn Me On I\u00b4m A Radio by Joni Mitchel Listen To The Radio by Nanci Griffith Video Killed The Radio Star by The Buggles Satelite Radio  by Steve Earle That\u00b4s Why God Made […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":373,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}