History Lesson Part I: The Spirit of The Radio

Playlist & Footnotes: http://anywhereanywhen.com/2015/06/02/history-lesson-part-i-the-spirit-of-the-radio

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The incredible thing about living in the 21st Century is that we have access to information and media of which our early 20th Century counterparts could never dream.  Not only taking into account monoliths like Apple who entirely changed how everyone consumes information in the modern era, but just the access to factoids that would be difficult to source even 10 years ago.  We now live in the future, as difficult as that may be to fully process.  Case in point: at any given moment I can listen to digital transfers of Edison Wax Cylinders, watch The Avengers on a massive screen, text a friend of mine in Istanbul, and take 1000 pictures of a cat sitting next to me, all through devices that are middle class mundanities in this modern world.  The future, indeed.

As a media junkie, I’m always looking for new things to absorb, and with my mind on the very problem of and created by modernity, I stumbled across a CBC Radio broadcast of a program called “The Wire,” and the seeds of this show were first sewn.  Our relationship with music today is entirely born out of music’s relationship with electricity, something that goes back to the end of the 1800s.  As early pioneers discovered ways to capture music – an experience that, previously, required the listener to be in the same room with the performer – music entered a new kind of simulacrum, where mechanical objects were standing in for the real performance and “playing back” these sounds.  Obviously, Edison is one of the movers and shakers in this revolution, but that is not to say that he was the only person fixing sounds to some object in space.  However, his work set the template for the record industry that was to come, and in that sense, he is very relevant. Electricity is now married to music in a way that seems inseparable to the modern ear, and yet is in no way apparent when you are turning on a streaming service to help pass the time.

The idea for my particular punny spin goes back to 2011, when I first began to flirt with the “History Lesson” concept.  I had done a number of shows where I was getting more and more experimental with the editing thanks to my interest in Negativland and Over The Edge, and in some ways my show from the very beginning was about de-contextualizing recordings against music and other forms of audio, but with a “radio” sensibility to the presentation.  (I was, of course, still on the air.)

In 2011 I expanded the scope of these audio essays to a four-hour, two-part broadcast called “Before ’75,” briefly covering as much material as I could about the earliest days of the pre-punk music scene.  However, I always felt as if that show was not enough.  Four hours covered a ton of music, a number of artists, and included a lot of really good interviews and samples that drove the point home.  But the beginning felt lacking.  I always thought that, if you logically extend the story back further, punk rock only really has context if you tell the story that came before it.  Act I of punk rock is the merger of electricity with music; distorted guitars and DIY cassette releases need the first 70+ years of music history to make their revolution son incredible.  I immediately envisioned a new, bigger and grander idea for “History Lesson.”  Let’s really take the listeners back to the beginning.

As we roll back the tape to the end of the 19th Century, the state of music was merely that of being in the same room as a music source: a performer.  From there, we move forward through acoustic recording techniques with Edison, the major difference microphones had on the sounds you could record, and along the way present music that complements the story while driving the narrative from time to time.  Later, we discuss the impact recorded music had on the film industry, and enter a discussion about how these factors lead to the birth of radio itself, a pastime so near and dear to my heart.

At this stage in the program we switch our audio samples over to another very different documentary, “The Empire of The Air.”  This Ken Burns documentary of PBS covers the story of Radio through three men, interestingly enough glossing over Marconi, and omitting Tesla entirely.  (For shame.)  However, it does a good job of drawing a parallel to Edison and his relationship with recorded music: not only do the pioneers of radio develop amazing technology, they are setting the course for how radio would act in the public for generations to come.

And, along the way, there is music to help tell the story.  And what a story it is.

Now, let me grab your attention for an hour.  Side one is about to start.  Thank your for tuning into:

History Lesson Part I: The Spirit of The Radio

Side 1: Electricity & The Beginning

01.) Electricity * Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band * Safe As Milk

For a story like this, how can you NOT pick Beefheart’s “Electricity” to kick-start this mother, huh?  If the thesis statement runs along the lines of: electricity is to music as punk rock is to pop — then you really have to put your cards on the table up front, dig? And truly, “Electricity” was the lighthouse beacon straight ahead across black seas, a song that laid bare a new path that rock and roll could forge through the saccharine formula that was prevalent across the musical landscape in 1967.

Already in the years between the early and late 1950s the world has seen an incredible revolution in the form of rock ‘n’ roll, and the ’60s see a massive array of miniature musical revolutions to match, each setting the course for a wide number of new interpretations.  For Beefheart, it was the dirtiness of rock ‘n’ roll, it was the strangeness of The Blues (with a capital T & B) all mixed with this country shuffle, that really turned him on.  But Beefheart wanted to distort both the recording of his vocals specifically and the artform as a whole intellectually, to return the music to its raunchy & rebellious origins.  Ambitious?  Absolutely.  No small feat for any band of any era.  Beefheart’s deconstruction of the blues/rock jam is so perverted it just oozes with the grime that is unmistakably punk in spirit and form.  “Oh, they do it that way?  Well, we do it this way.”  There’s a sort of Troggs-y quality to the forward momentum and chord-progressions, true, but even that comparison only highlights the weirdness of the bass-line, a direct ancestor of the first Clash album, or some Ramones tunes.  This, in many ways, is the source of the infection, patient zero, at least of this particular strain.

The myths surrounding this number are, themselves, larger than life, and the most appropriate pieces of foreshadowing if ever there were any.  As it goes, Jerry Moss (the co-owner of Beefheart’s label) claimed the song was “too negative” for him to allow his daughter to hear it, leading to A&M Records dropping Beefheart.  It is also said that in an effort to get the gritty vocals, The Captain shattered a microphone during one take.  But the strangest legend of “Electricity” comes from one account of a legendary performance on 11 June 1967.  The Magic Band was slated to play on Day Two of The Fantasy Fair and Magic Mountain Music Festival, by all accounts the first true rock festival as they exist in the modern form.

By way of an all too appropriate tangent within a tangent within an annotation, it is interesting to note that the promoters (Tom Rounds and the staff at KFRC 610) were inspired by the success of The Renaissance Pleasure Faire of Southern California, who were putting together these multi-stage, two-day events with music and artists and food and drinks, packaged together as a weekend of renaissance style fun.  They wanted to do a rock & roll / freeform radio version of their event, and out of this was born The Fantasy Fair, a less documented affair that happened a full week previous to The Monterey Pop Festival, and really kicked off The Summer of Love.

The Fantasy Fair was, for lack of a glamours way of putting it, trying to capitalize on the rise of Psychedelic Rock.  Sgt. Peppers had just come out, and everybody was talking about the San Francisco scene, which was already a few years old by then, and was was already being considered old news by the hipsters who were moving on to the slightly “harder” stuff that was happening in the underground “garage rock” scene of the late ’60’s.  KFRC figured they could squeeze a few dollars from these hippies and make a mark in a big way for freeform AM radio by covering the event.  Everybody wins.

They were, of course, 100% right.  While there were absolutely financial motivations, KFRC was also looking to reclaim rock and roll from the awful version that America was living with in those days.  The early ’60’s had seen the rise of the disdainfully named “bubble gum” craze, called such not only for the association that the music was for children, but for the added insult that the music was also quickly flavorless, and ultimately disposable.  The Pat Boone-ification of these baby-faced teen idols led to a very bland format, which at the time was parading as “rock and roll.”  A lot of people remembered how exciting it was to hear Little Richard on the radio, and were not getting the same vibe from Paul Anka.  At least with the scene at The Fillmore, it could be said to be about, and for, adults who liked to rock, and who remembered that rock and roll used to be fierce and seedy, and fun.  The Rock Festival, as an artistic statement, was to draw a line in the sand and say, “over here, we try to expand our minds like real adults.”

Were we ever so naive?

The line-up at The Fantasy Fair and Magic Mountain Festival is a veritable who’s who of late ’60’s rock bands: The Doors, Canned Heat, Chocolate Watch Band, Jefferson Airplane, The Byrds, Tim Buckley, The Fifth Dimension.  It is in this insane time and place where Captain Beefheart performed his greatest version of “Electricity.”  Here’s the scoop: The Seeds has just laid waist to the audience, themselves already declaring so-called “psychedelic” rock to be bullshit they produced their own hard-driving sound that was pretty formidable for audiences who were there to see Tim Buckley, or had heard that, “Mr. Tambourine Man” cover and thought it was “pretty.”  The Doors had already begun to walk the darker side of rock music, and there was a small but dedicated group of folks who were exploring things that were new and different.  The Magic Band sets up, trying to find a way to follow the propulsive set The Seeds had just offered.  The crowd is ravenous.  They are ready to rock.  Time freezes.  You can hear the sound of a pin dropping amplified through stage speakers.

The Magic Band winds up, rears back, and lurches forward.  “Electricity” issues forth to a slightly perplexed crowd.  They don’t know what to make of it.  A few are just loaded, so they start to dance.  Others just watch.  Several wander off.  One person is turned away slightly, eating.  But most are trying to get into it, trying to figure it out.  This whole weekend has been about something new, and they are eager.  This song is a little shaky on the landing.  Perhaps not the best song to open with, but Beefheart insisted.  If they could just get to their next tune, “Diddy Wah Diddy,” which has been a bit of a hit when it came out and got a ton of radio play, perhaps they could win–

Beefheart signals, and the band lurches to a halt.  They’re confused.  What happened?  The audience is stunned.  They really don’t know what to make of the situation.  Beefheart silently straightened his tie, and pointed to a girl in the crowd.  Off mic he says, “she has turned into a goldfish.”  Silence, quieter than before.  Beefheart walks toward the girl, right off the front of the stage, pitching up face first in the mud and grass below.  “That’s it!” yells Ry Cooder.  “I have had it with your pretentious unpredictable bullshit, Don!”  Cooder walks off stage, and out of The Magic Band forever.  As Cooder leaves The Captain – still face down – signals again, and the band picks up the song (as best they could, sans one guitar), as if nothing had happened.  As the show went on, you could see Beefheart smiling through the grass stains on his face.

The Seeds claimed it was the best performance they had every seen anywhere, and they should know, as they caught the whole thing from the side as they shared a joint.

Fuck the Summer of Love.  This festival was the beginning of Punk Rock.

02.) Tremens * Sonic Youth * SYR 1

The incidental music for this episode is “Tremens.”  Not only are Sonic Youth the musical heirs to the Captain’s throne of art-rock aspirations, they heartily acknowledge this indebtedness in their own rendition of “Electricity” on a fantastic Beefheart tribute record.  “Tremens” holds quite a bit of significance for me, personally.  I began my stint on radio when the SYR series began, and I listened to them as I was learning the ropes.  This track is featured in an early episode of my program, too.  But the title gets at the thesis statement problem too: in order to get us to a place where we can understand the transformative effects electricity has had on music, we may suffer the the aural DTs as we travel back to the acoustic era of recording.   

03.) Two Golden Microphones * Nurse With Wound * Second Pirate Session

I also use a chunk of “Two Golden Microphones” not only because microphones themselves are such a large part of the narrative, and were the innovation that allowed music to evolve out of the acoustic era of recording, and into the electric era of recordings, but to further acknowledge that Nurse With Wound are the true pioneers of the cut-and-paste music aesthetic.  In fact, between them and Negativland – the DNA of which should be apparently audible in nearly everything I’ve done – I would have no other schtick to stand on.  So for that, thank you.

04.) The Very Thought Of You * Bing Crosby & Georgie Stoll

From here on the musical selections are slightly less symbolic and much more literal, though I do hope that these can work on at least two levels as well.  Bing Crosby was chosen only because he is a perfect example of the kind of artist that could only have a career post-microphone.  His voice is very well suited for an intimate performance, where we is really singing at a quiet and personal way, something that couldn’t be done in the era of acoustic recording.

05.) Menuett G flat major & Valse bleat * Beethoven (Kathllen Parlow – violin; George Falkensten – piano) * Edison Amberol 4M-28026 (1912)

There is something incredibly charming about being able to listen to Beethoven while you wash dishes, but for this I decided that I should find an actual Edison Cylinder recording, because I knew I could actually take the extra step.  As this song is in mono, it adds another level of simplicity to the program.  There are a number of places online that you can find wax cylinders, and I do very much love listening to these .mp3 transfers of a 100+ year old record for the disjoinedness of it.  Therefore, I encourage you to go to The Thomas Edison section of The National Parks website, and download some archived recordings of Edison Cylinders.  It’s a lot of fun, and they are all really weird.

06.) Aria from Massanet’s “Le Cid”: O Souverain, O Juge, O Pere * Enrico Caruso * 1916

Something that is lost on audiences 100 years later is the absolute star power of an artist with a name of which you have never heard.  Enrico Caruso released more records in his lifetime than most tenors could ever imagine being featured on, and was the opera singer of his time.  He packed houses across two continents, and critics have spoken so passionately about the sound of his voice that there are some schools who have annual competitions by students who eager to take a shot at describing Caruso’s vocal performances.  If you don’t go that deep into opera, then there’s no reason you would be able to recognize the caliber of his performances, and since the last time Caruso was popular in the US was 100 years ago (and I’m not kidding, it has been that long, precisely), I’m not surprised you don’t know who he is.  I only came across his music when I started listening to The Ragged Antique Phonograph Music Program, and even then I can only really say I know of him.

Plus, opera ain’t really my bag.  But, as a key player in the early days of recording music, Caruso is a perfect example – unlike Bing – of being able to perform for the acoustic era.  It is said that his voice loved the horn, and he could belt out a tune the way no one else could.  It is no wonder he recorded over 250 times in his career; the dude could sing.

07.) After Dinner Toast at Little Menlo * Arthur Sullivan * ENHS E-2439-7 (5 October 1888)
08.) The Lost Chord * (performers unknown) / composted by Arthur Sulivan * ENHS E-2440-3 (August 1888)

Various corners of the Inter-Web-A-Tron can reveal some incredible things, so here’s something fun I turned up as I was researching this episode: a recording of Arthur Sullivan from 1888 talking about being “thrilled and terrified” by Edison’s invention.  Hopefully you have the kind of ear that can dig through the grooves on this one and really “grok” what he’s saying, but the gist of it is something that I think is at the heart of the central conversation about recorded music: the old generation is excited and annoyed by the next generation all at once.  It was just too perfect, not only as an artifact, but as a way of framing how long this generation to generation conversation has been going since the beginning.  Edison’s later resistance to electric recording technology, then finally giving in and embracing it far too late, is entirely foreshadowed, symbolically.

09.) Alexander’s Ragtime Band * Billy Murray * EDIS 36065 (1911)

Caruso might have been the opera equivalent of a rock star, but Billy Murray has often been referred to as the Elvis of his time, mostly in the sense that Murray was known by everyone.  Unfortunately, he was considered a novelty for most of his career, which spanned almost 45 years across two centuries.  Unquestioningly the biggest household name of the 1900s and 1910s, he sang vaudevillian ballads and novelty songs, and for nearly 20 years made a living touring and singing to people all across the country.  His singing style is considered “conversational,” and people really connected with his everyman style, unconventional compared to other artists working the similar circuit.  While he continued to get work into the early ’40s, as electric recording techniques and jazz began to dominate the record industry, Murray had less and less star power.  In the acoustic era of recording, Billy was the biggest star America had ever known in popular music, and it wasn’t until Louis Armstrong or Frank Sinatra that someone as huge grabbed the American consciousness.  While his name is largely forgotten today, this is a sample of American Popular music at the beginning of the 20th Century.  Hopefully, as we continue with more History Lessons, we can see this style and format evolve.

Side 2: The Microphone & The Radio Tube

10.) Paradise * Bing Crosby
11.) You Outta Be In Pictures * Rudy Vallee (1934)

Two major forces were also at work in this early era of American history.  Film and, later, radio, were on the rise in the US, and as this fledgling music industry worked to develop it’s structure and form, the relationship film and radio had with one another was immediately parasitic.  As sound pictures began to develop, they were immediately married with songs, and radio could not only play records on the air, but promote film stars as well with drama and comedy.  These three media forms grew to become dependent on each other, and while film will undoubtedly get left out of this story (to be saved for some future series), the story of music and art in the 20th Century cannot be told without covering the subject of wireless telegraphy.

12.) When The Radio’s On * Jimmy Vigtone * Teenline Vol. 5

As the program moves into it’s back end, I decided to pull out a handful of songs that were not only about radio, but embrace the real center of this argument: the story of music is also the story of radio.  The Spirit of Radio could, in fact, be music.  There is something spellbinding about good radio, something I’ve been obsessed with for my entire adult life.  As soon as radio was self aware enough to do so, it started playing music for audiences, and I love exploring the subject of radio in a radio format.  It just seems fitting.

I’m not really that familiar with Jimmy Vigtone, and it’s possible that there was only the one 45 ever released.  However, I do know the Hyped To Death Compilations, which are all full of incredible gems of punk, post-punk, power pop, and other oddball records released all over the place.  I went through a phase around 2005 where I became obsessed with these collections, and every now and then I can find a song that is just perfect.  This one in particular gets stuck in my head all the time, and it really feel on the nose to me.

13.) Shikaku Maru Ten (Radio Waves) * CAN * Cannibalism 2

This track also works very well as something that runs behind vocal samples, obviously, but comes from a CD I found in a Goodwill here in Salem, and was singular in the kind of band it was, and for the kind of women that worked in the place.  I was very happy to pick it up for 50 cents, and it has entertained me well ever since.  At times listening to CAN feels like radio waves, rolling in.

14.) Spirit Of The Radio * Rush * Permanent Waves

To be fair, I am not the Rush fan I probably should have been.  I am the right age, and they were absolutely popular (and even played in my home by my parents).  You couldn’t avoid them.  But I never really was interested in them the way I liked Pink Floyd and The Doors.  But in time I would feel the power of what they were getting at, and while I can appreciate certain aspects of them, I’m not bound by any nostalgia or early childhood memory to enjoy them in spite of their other musical crimes.

However, this song (and a handful of others) are just incredible, and The Spirit of The Radio is really where all of this was leading.  Perhaps in an exploration of the form I will find new meaning in it all?  It is possible.  There are plenty of subjects I have not been able to cover in a radio form, and I feel as if Audio Essays are only beginning to be understood as a way of telling a story, but at a slower pace.  Like Rush, maybe I’m entering territory that no one else has.  But to me, making radio like this makes me happier than I ever have been happy before, and as I work on this series, I hope that some of that excitement can rub off on the show, on the listener, and the world around us.

15.) Radio, Radio * Elvis Costello * This Year’s Model

After all, its a Sound Salvation.

Part II will come, in due time, and we’ll continue to unravel the story of Radio.  Until then:

Be Seeing You.