I've been a bit distracted as of late! Much of my time has been spent finding new work to feed the technology geek in me and, of course, make money to pay for all my vices, such as shelter, food and other such minutiae for myself and my family. Yet, I have been finding time for music (you can do that on long flights to the opposite coast); thank goodness for my MP3 player and my Rhapsody subscription. Nevertheless, I have had a number of topics stuck in my head and it's time to flesh them out! Bear with me as I ramble on...
You may ask, "what's with the title, Buff?" (Go ahead. Ask.) I was reliving my days as a youthful deejay at my final real radio job (real, as opposed to subbing at my alma mater's radio station) at a radio station in beautiful uptown, downtown, Johnstown, New York. I was the all-night person (11PM-6AM six days a week) at WIZR-FM (they had an AM also, which simulcast but not when I was on, so our larger audience never got to learn about my musical knowledge), a station that played mostly oldies and current Top 40 music. The job was fun, except for the Program Director, who grew up on country music and didn't know squat about he stuff we played. Whenever we had a '50s weekend, I was called upon to help figure out what to play! And when a deejay left the station, instead of promoting me to that spot, he would hire another deejay for it! Nice way to treat one of your "best" deejays!
Now you may ask, "What has this to do with short songs. Buff?" Well, the end of the previous story is that I walked out before my show one day, after I was denied an opportunity to replace the mid-day deejay. But one of the other straws that broke the Buffalo's back, was the day I was finishing off my shift, while he was preparing to start his, and he noticed I queued up Shirley Ellis' 1965 hit, "The Clapping Song", which clocked at 3:15, and woud have taken me to right into the Station ID and National News feed. He noticed that it was the flip of a two-sided hit (the flip was Shirley's 1964 hit, "The Nitty Gritty" which, like its flip, peaked at #8 on the Billboard charts nationally). He said to me, "you can't play that side. It wasn't a hit!" I countered with my vast knowledge (better than my fist) and the comment, "you're wrong! And I have it timed perfectly!" Regardless, I had no time to search for a new oldie and I played the "hit", which clocked at 2:20, leaving me with 55 seconds of air to fill. I just segued into an instrumental, got up and walked out the door. I did come back to work that night, but left about a week or so later, never to brighten the airwaves again.
Yes, I know! I didn't answer the question. One of the most challenging jobs for a deejay is the timing, making sure we hit the news feeds and not leaving any dead air (except when one of my former cohorts unplugged my mic while my back was turned). This can happen when you put on a short song and haven't found the next one, or you were pulling the news feed off the wire and editing your newscast, etc. Short songs really can be the bane of a deejays existence, especially when they are two minutes or less! Of course, I'm talking about an era when we spun vinyl, and you queued up a song on the turntable by using queue mode (a little speaker that broadcast in the studio from the mixing board) and finding the start of the song, then rotating the turntable about a quarter turn counter-clockwise. This allowed the turntable to get up to speed and the song would start at the appropriate speed (I didn't mentioned that the volume control needed to go up at the same time - these volume control potentiometers were called "pots"), thus preventing the 'wow' of a record startup.
Okay, about those short songs! Too many deejays (and their engineers if they are lucky enough to have one) have been burned by short songs. Here is one that has gotten me!
"Stay", Maurice Williams and the Zodiacs, (#1 for one week, November, 1960) 1:36
Try changing records, cueing up a commercial and so on in that short of a time! Songs less than two minutes long are a killer!
However, the fun would have been to play the following song on the radio via a turntable: Shel Silverstein's "26 Second Song". I have a 45rpm copy, and yes, it lasts for 26 seconds! Give a listen!
As far as I know, Shel's song never charted, and that probably gave most deejays a sigh of relief (since the record was about as long as a sigh!)
Then, there are the long songs. Back then songs lasted between two minutes and three-and-a-half minutes. The longer the song, the more the deejay could get done! As progressive rock moved into the Top 40 arena, we'd get longer songs. For example, the late actor Richard Harris' 1968 version of Jimmy Webb's opus "MacArthur Park", clocked at 7:30. Plenty of time to use the restroom, grab food from the fridge, pull from the AP or UPI wire, cue up the next record, select more from the wall and file the ones already played!
Of course, when you needed a real break, there was always the 1972 release of Chuck Berry's "My Ding-A-Ling", from the 'London Chuck Berry Sessions'. Clocked at 11:33, there was always time to do your business and more!
Chuck Berry - My Ding-A-Ling by Red_Chuck
That was my last radio job. I found a high tech position while listening to one of the public service announcements we played on the air. Applied for it, got it, and the rest, as they say, is history!!!!
By the way, Randy Newman's "Short People" was not a short song at all! It clocked at almost three minutes (2:57). Plenty of time to do things!
========================================================================
Any ideas for the Buffalo? Go ahead, comment! As one of my favorite WMCA, New York, used to say at the close of his radio show, "Thanks a lot for listening! If you were in your car, thanks for the ride!"
BB
