Captain, the warp engine…

Captain, the warp engine… was Originally Posted on December 15, 2006 by lavarock

Sometimes an event or a thought triggers a memory. Funny how that happens.

Every weekday I watch Star Trek episodes and yet they did not trigger the memory. Neither did a flash on TV from the old series the Jefferson’s. Nope, not even from my friends name Grace.

Actually, I can’t quite remember just what triggered the memory again tonight but off I went, searching the Internet for the name of someone I met many years ago, Augie Blume. No the name will not be familiar to you and I’m sue that he passed away many years ago, but I always wanted to read a bit about him.

Many many years ago I rented a trailer from a guy who worked for a local radio station. I had done some radio in high school and was aspiring to be a DJ. Back then, a DJ spins records and does “record intros, weather and news-type announcements” I was actually more of a “air personality” who did voices, told stories… think of it as an audio blog with music.

I often visited the station and soon was doing commercials for them, and when a spot opened up, I was then an employee, working for a radio station in Jenkins Kentucky, then named WREM (now renamed and a religious format). At the time we played a mixture of country, easy and rock. We stayed away from most bluegrass or acid rock, but other music was all mixed together.

Steve, the other DJ and I made a few field trips during our employ; the first was to Nashville where we stayed in the Roger Miller King of the Road Motor Inn. The programming conference featured session on how to program music and make your station profitable and entertaining. I should tell you that Steve was the expert in music, I was just a voice with stories.

We were sitting in the bar at the above hotel and a piano player was playing what seemed to be a few songs over and over. Suddenly Steve turned to me and said “Hey, the guy sitting at that table over there is Kris Kristopherson” to which I said “Kris who?”. At the time Kris had written a number of very popular songs, but had not really performed many of them himself; at least not to where I would have heard of him. The astute reader here will note that Kris was married to Rita Coolidge. He wrote Me and Bobby McGee, Help Me Make It Through The Night and a host of others.

Somehow Steve got me to go meet him and chat for just a second. Kris was a bit scruffy, but then again weren’t we all back then? Steve also got Kris to play a few minutes for the assemblage in the bar.

Later that night I was going up in the elevator and Roger Miller (For The Goodtimes) walked in. We chatted for a few minutes about small town radio stations and playlists.

Then I met Augie. Augie was a record promoter for Grunt records which was a division of RCA. Grunt was the new label for the Jefferson Airplane (also known as the Jefferson Starship and finally the Starship).

Besides being a promoter, Augie was one of the people who helped Steve and I to go back and “crank up the volume”, to make the station more professional and exciting. rather than just tell the time and introduce the records, we began arranging playlists, having contests and yes, even timing the records. We began using the “Drake Format” which had us time intros and outros of songs so that we could start talking as one song ended, keep talking and start the next record and stop talking as the vocals began. We were able to actually play more music that way and of course constantly reminded them of that fact

Once I told a friend of my distant association with the Airplane (so distant that in fact my plane was in another airport…). He didn’t believe me until I pulled out a scrapbook with a copy of the Grunt Newsletter where I had written an article about radio station automation.

Once I was at the radio station and a car drove up with a very tall gentleman who handed me an album. Not being an expert in country music at the time, I didn’t realize that the guy I thought was a record promoter was actually a member on the group on the record, the Statler Brothers.

Another time I had a guy stop by the mountain top trailer where we broadcast. As I remember, he was working for UPS at the time and asked if I ever played music by a group called the Drifters. I said of course and he told me he was one of the members of the group early on. Seems I had met him years ago when they played in Seaside Park New Jersey at the bar owned by a friend’s father. In this case I cut the mike on and did an impromptu interview. I think it made his day and certainly was fun for me.

Not all people promoted by our station were real artists. We got duped by a group called “Dawn” who was NOT the real Tony Orlando and Dawn group. At the time the real group was a studio group and never went on tours. How would we know? Perhaps the fact that the records featured Tony and this group didn’t… hmmm, live and learn.

So you see, just a flash of a thought can conjour up all sorts of memories.

One other member of the old station was Randy, who still visits the old area back there as he had family there. He works in the Daytona area for the Post Office. Another coworker went on to become a coach back there and yet another friend and DJ became a writer.

Amazing that none of us stayed in radio isn’t it? I can tell you why I didn’t. I loved being in the spotlight, but didn’t like feel very at home in front of the mike where people could see me. I preferred to be behind the mike. Once Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band came to town and I wanted to interview him. I was told I could if I did the introduction of the band to the audience. Ouch! I did and got the interview but not before being embarrassed by a young girl in the front of the audience who recognized me and squealed “Hey that’s Mark, I know him!” as I walked onto the stage.

Being on radio or TV is difficult for many people because they have to be “on” and exciting for hours every day. Imagine how it might be difficult to be creative daily. After a while I found that I was starting to repeat stories and just felt that I was getting boring. The two cures are to either move on to another town where you can start the stories over, or to get out of the business. I did both!

So I still tell the stories, just now I hide behind the keyboard instead of the mike.

Speaking of reading stories, know what goes great with reading? A piping hot cup of 100% Kona and I know where you can get some, at http://ItsKona.Com where I just spent a few hours redesigning the website. Your best deal right now is the FREESHIP coupon at checkout time. If you hurry, you might just get some coffee before Christmas, although time is running out.

Speaking or running out, so too must I but I leave you with this thought, I have more stories than you have time to read them!

Aloha for now!