Because they asked me. I have a music library but not all of the 72 thru 76 songs I plan on playing. I have to start digging through albums, CDs, 45s, cassette tapes and more. I have about 4,000 LPs, a few hundred 45s and cassette tapes and about 2,000 CDs. If I could find a record player with 78 RPM, I'd really give them a blast from the past and drag out my 1923 record of "Tea For Two" and tell them that this was probably what their grandparents or great grandparents were listening to back in the day.
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Music library
- Thread starter Yabadabado1
- Start date
Hopefully, they won't be like the kids of today who listen to two lines of a song and than complain because it was "too long." Lately, if I play the national anthem at games, I've gotten "can't you shorten that up?" I'm like "It's one minute and 14 seconds, the shortest I can find. Yeah, I can shorten it up but it's going sound like Alvin & The Chipmunks brass band." Or I can play the version with all four verses that last 10 minutes and have fighter jets screaming overhead along with bald eagles swooping and doing cartwheels and dropping fresh fish stuffed with little American flags into the crowd and show a hologram of Fancis Scott Key writing it in 1814 and singing it in various different styles....like doo-wop, ragtime, country, jazz, reggae, etc.
This shebang isn't going to happen for a number of months so I'm just giving it some thought now before I [and they] decide what to do.
I have a majority of the music, I don't have ALL of it which is why I was asking about a music library. By your logic, the oldies station I was at shouldn't have been on the air because they didn't have all the songs the listeners would call in and request and they weren't requesting some oddball tune, it was something that would have been a major hit when first released and the station SHOULD have had it but didn't. I ended up bringing a lot of my oldies from home to play just because the station had no copies. And the reason I don't have ALL the music I plan to play is because I didn't like some of the songs when they were out, so I didn't bother wasting money on buying them. And in some cases, some of my records were ripped off when I was doing "sock hops" or whatever you want to call them. Found some of them in a used record shop [had my name Magic Markererd on the label] and told the shop owner he was selling stolen goods. He didn't care.
It's a lot easier finding stuff via the internet nowadays but seems like they want an arm and a leg, your first born son and two testicles for what they have for sale.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Forgive me for adding a side track to this, but that description reminded me of how the Mighty Heroes were summoned to action in that short-lived Saturday morning cartoon:
Just listen to what others have said: play the Top 10- 20 hits from 1972-76 and don’t overthink it. Also ask for money to do it if they aren’t going to hire a DJ. Is this gonna be in Cleveland?
Not in Cleveland. Not even Cleveland adjacent. And they [and I] don't want to hear the same old songs that are currently regurgitated on the "oldies" stations nationwide. They want to hear those "Oh, wow!" songs that they possibly haven't heard since those high school days. There are obviously going to be some songs from back then that won't make the cut, like "My Ding-A-Ling" by Chuck Berry even though it was his only #1 song and quite a few others that I may weed out. Those might be held in reserve in case someone does request them. And why hire a DJ when I WAS a DJ? I quit doing the hired DJ gigs over 25+ years ago when it got to be too big a pain in the ass hauling LPs & 45s up and down stairs. Nowadays, easy peasy because everything's on a computer, but I'm just too old now to want to deal with it anymore. I may make this my one last blast. Years ago started converting LPs/CDs/45s/etc. to digital but gave up as I had filled up a 500 gig hard drive and had only put 5% of my music collection on it. This was back when 500 gig was about the best that you could get at the time. I might give it another go since you can get terrabytes worth of hard drives now. I've got DJ software on my computer but just use it to amuse myself and make my own mixes now but will probably use it for the reunion. Depending what they want, I might just make a mix, set it to go automatically and see what happens.
I don't anticipate too many people dancing, not unless I have an ambulance on standby for broken hips, dislocated joints, oxygen supply, chest pains.
Then what is the point?
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Background music, presumably.
This thing is like 8 months away, the point is figuring out what way the committee wants to go whether it be "background music", get up and boogie or whatever. It's taking a while to locate the majority of some of the classmates, some may be in witness protection, others in jail, others not wanting anything to do with the reunion, others not being able to afford to come and participate and others, unfortunately, in the throes of dementia/Alzheimer's.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Oh, I know all about that. I ended up on the five-year reunion committee (and ended up emceeing it, being the class member who had been in radio since our senior year). Ditto the ten-year. 15 and 20, I was not on the committee but attended anyway. At the latter, I was now hearing about some of my classmates' children being in high school (and one had just graduated). I decided I didn't need to be reminded that I was now old enough for the next generation to be coming of age, and haven't been to one since.
I made that known to the primary organizer, who made a half-hearted attempt to lure me to #15, but I politely and firmly told her "absolutely no way". My 25th was two years ago and either they didn't hold one or they didn't bother trying to convince me to attend.
You may end up playing music for so few people the reunion could have been held in the back room of a Denny's.
You can also ask the ones putting it on if there are specific songs they need. I'm not talking about a list of requests, but just a few songs that are important to them. I did a high school reunion once that told me their class song was "Friends" by Elton John. If they hadn't told me I wouldn't have brought it. They loved that I had that song.
I've done reunions that were put on by former cheerleaders who wanted nothing but dance music played loud, and most of the attendees wanted background music played lower. It's impossible to please everyone, so said Ricky Nelson.
If I don't have it, I can get it. Much easier to find with the internet now. There was a song that came out in 1974 that only made it up to #94 on the Hot 100, #10 on the Easy Listening charts [why there is beyond me, in my book I don't think it classified as an Easy Listening song]. Was never able to find a single for it when it was out. In the mid 90s when the Internet was getting into gear I was able to track down several copies of it, one with a beautifully horrible cue burn at the beginning and then the demo record of it. Since then, I don't think there's an obscure record that I've been looking for that I haven't been able to find. And if you've never heard Georgia Porcupine:
I have one more sports announcing job to do for my high school and that'll put a wrap on it for my career. 52 years is long enough. Told people that I didn't want to be announcing when great-grandkids started showing up. Well, it's happened. Great-grandkids are now in elementary/junior high school so I'm done. I was sort of looking forward to this reunion, 50th and all, but the closer it got, I was having second thoughts. I was a move-in kid from the south that talked "funny" and this was a very cliquish town and wasn't included in much of anything. Only had a couple of "friends" in high school and they're dead now. So most of the past reunions were me just standing around. I think the last one I left after being there for only an hour [30th or35th, can't remember] and was thinking "None of them have grown up, they're still acting like the snobbish assholes they were in high school, making fun of people".
So I'll do this DJ job but not expecting everybody to be happy because I'm not exclusively playing screaming, death-metal bands, punk music, country, jazz, Sesame Street music, etc. Personally, I'm playing Top 40 songs because I'm sure most of them will remember them. Up until about 1974-75 must of us were still listening to AM radio.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Instrumentals seemed to make it onto the Easy Listening chart almost automatically back then.
Doing the math...the age of everyone at this 50th HS reunion should be around 67-68, right? That's just a few years into retirement. I think you'll surprised at how many will be in a lot better physical and mental shape than you're imagining. And still like to get down and dance. 😁
I'm in that age bracket. I've got rods and bolts holding my back together. I've got chunks of metal in my neck. My knees are in worse shape than the President's brain. My heart's one good combined sneeze/fart/hiccup/belch at crapping out. I have one internal organ left that hasn't malfunctioned..... and they're keeping an eye on that one. And there are people in my class in WORSE shape than me. I'd like to get up and dance but within 10 minutes I'll be sucking air so hard they'll have to open doors to get some more oxygen in.
That I understand but Georgia Porcupine is almost more boogie-woogie, rockabilly, piano pounding sounding to me and wouldn't expect that to make an easy listening chart. I'd be expecting to hear [back then at least] Ferrante & Teicher, Lawrence Welk-ish type music......maybe more along the lines of what's known as Yacht Rock today but even softer. Ones I do remember hearing on Top 40 and easy listening would be "Crunchy Granola Suite" by Percy Faith [which I like way better than Neil Diamond's version], "Music Box Dancer" by Frank Mills, "Nadia's Theme" [originally titled "Cotten's Dream"] and a few others escaping my mind right now. [And mentioning Ferrante & Teicher just sent me down a rabbit hole of listening to some of their music.]
Agree on Percy Faith's "Crunchy Granola Suite". He rocks out on that one! I bought a copy of the 45 back then, which I still have.
The only song by Ferrante and Teicher that I like is "Midnight Cowboy", and that's mostly due to Vincent Bell's unjustly uncredited "water-drop" guitar sound. And... what about the Rumanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci? Quite an interesting life.
Just a sidebar here and not a criticism: calling later-60's "into retirement" is no longer totally valid. I worked until I was almost 80 and still take side gigs. I have many friends in their 70's who work full-time jobs, and at the entry level I see plenty of McDonald's and Walmarts with a broad assortment of "seniors" at work. In fact, at my local Lowes and Home Depot, the staffers that work the departments that require advice giving and knowledge, nearly everyone is over 60.
I mention this because I think that we may find that marketers respond to this by making 25-64 (at least) as their ad target soon. Heck, those above 65 can collect Social Security while still doing gig work.
Totally agree. Unlike the lettered generations,, they are much more likely to engage in social activities than watching items on Tiktok.
Interestingly, my spell checker her seems to be a senior... it wanted to replace TikTok with "ticktock".