What happens to defunct station archives?

[NHRonin]

I just picked up the Balloon Bootleg CD that came from a WCOZ broadcast in 1980. While the quality is sketchy in some areas, this is an incredible CD and I especially liked that they kept the COZ' intro at the beginning.

I remember COZ' broadcasting all kinds of local bands in the eighties, many taped from the Channel or other local clubs. So what happened to these archives? Did most get tossed into the garbage can when the station changed hands? It would be great to hear more of their "live" local music broadcasts.

 

[Varulven]

As stations change owners and program directors I fear much material - say a lot of the WAAF stuff (Third Rail, Willie Loco etc.), for one example, is gone forever unless the fans taped it. I have tapes of those specific acts. I believe the Atlantics are releasing a live album from the WAAF gig this month.


Carter Alan told me that he logged most of the WBCN tapes recently. They don't have the original T Rex/Marc Bolan tape, but I do. I taped it off the radio. It was bootlegged in Europe when a local singer shipped it overseas, but they used a third generation tape, I have the only surviving original I know of.

Sam Kopper might have sold his tapes to Phoenix Media/Records (not the Boston Phoenix). That company may have also purchased the entire New Rose catalog, the French label I was signed to and did A & R for (Johnny Thunders, Willie Loco, etc.)

Speaking of Charlie Farren -
Balloon, Unnatural Axe and Casey Lindstrom's band performed at THE CLUB in Cambridge on 88.1 WTBS (now WMBR). I've got that on tape.

WERS has a vast library going back decades...but I heard an awful rumor that they dumped their vinyl just as WMFO dumped the thousands of CDs in 2000 (which is one of the key issues when I brought the students up on charges to the University that year). Ya have to diligently watch this stuff as the students come and go and a new regime of jerks can wipe out decades of hard work and archiving.

Morgan Huke probably has the WMFO taped archives, which are extensive and CRYSTAL CLEAR. They had a fantastic producer named Paul in the 90s who did a superb job of taping Charlie Farren, Willie Loco, etc.
Those tapes, to my knowledge, have never seen the light of day.

R.I.P. Dave Koehler. Yesterday while interviewing Willie Loco he told me we lost Dave Kohler on May 19, 2007.
Shades of Mr. Butch and Barb Kitson passing on (Barb was the M.C. for many a WERS live broadcast before singing lead for City Thrills). Kohler taped TONS of local bands, much like Artie Friedman and myself, and he was a fixture at shows on the scene probably right up to the end.

Maybe the http://www.mmone.org archives can absorb the tapes left by these soldiers of the Boston scene.

Here's the obit on the Noise board:
http://www.thenoiseboard.com/index....owtopic=166897&pid=2994965&st=0&#entry2994965

 

[jake1966]

I use to have a bunch of tapes from the WHTT show on channel 7. They use to have a local band video now and then. God I wish I still had them

 

[Neggy]

Hey Joe, my sources tell me Farrenheit rocked at Tequilas in Danvers last night... took the stage late, I suspect because Muzz went over to do a set with Beatlejuice at the Danversport Yacht Club where there was a fundraiser for a Delp scholarship fund. Not confirmed that he did double duty but I think he did.... I'll confirm when I see Muzz tonight @ Johnny D's

 

[Varulven]

It is interesting that Tequila's, which catered to a country crowd, is now leaning towards rock.

It's a nice venue, though the volume everywhere is a bit much for me these days.

The Grass Roots / Oldies 103.3 is my speed tonight...

 

[Neggy]

Say HI to John Cafferty for me. Ahh the days of doing remotes from "Mr. C's Rock Palace" in Lowell... seems as if it was only 30 years ago.......

 

[Neanderpaul]

While in New Orleans, working for former WCOZ PD Ted Edwards, I was instructed to clean out the archives. To make sure we had two copies of every show for the library, and anything left over was mine. I pulled probably 300 radio shows out of that closet. Still have many multiple disc Zeppelin shows, and some old VH and Thin Lizzy stuff. Now I'm tempted to go check out what's here...

I remember WERS used to run live bands during the "Nasty Habits" show that Mike Jones used to host.

I have Bang, Kid Crash, and Extreme sets done during their beg-a-thons in the mid 80s

 

[argytunes]

Gee...I'm glad I held on to my masters from my 1979-1980 stint at WAAF. Maybe some of the spots I voiced, wrote and produced are worth some money? ???

Actually...I'm sure many past and present radio personalities have kept copies of their better stuff ----including airchecks, commercial spots and promos?

I KNOW I HAVE!

argytunes

 

[NHRonin]

Doesn't magnetic tape have a limited shelf life though unless its stored in a climate controlled facility? I know most of my cassette tapes from the eighties had to be tossed....not that I even have a player to listen to them with if I didn't.

I remember taping a lot of shows off COZ', BCN and others in those days. Kids today don't seem to have that experience of discovering great local bands since it seems most commerical radio stations here don't support local music.

 

[Eli Polonsky]

Actually...I'm sure many past and present radio personalities have kept copies of their better stuff ----including airchecks, commercial spots and promos

Yes, I've got crates of 25 years worth of mostly unlabeled cassettes of my radio work. I always just put the cassette in my pocket after the show, and threw them in a crate when I got home. I have no idea precisely what shows, what dates, what features, etc... are on most of them.

WMBR still has a pretty vast tape archive of live band performances and special events going back to the early 60's, including a lot of vintage local music from the 70's/80's Boston area "punk/new wave" heyday. There were always local bands playing live on WTBS/WMBR in those days, and still weekly on their "Pipeline" show and others. Occasionally someone brings up the idea of digitizing their tape library for preservation, but no one on staff ever has the volunteer time available to follow through on such a comprehensive project (at this point, the station no longer even has a properly functioning reel to reel deck to dub them from).

A couple that I dug out for my "Lost & Found" 60's/early 70's music show on WMBR included a free Grateful Dead concert that took place outdoors in front of the M.I.T. Student Center on May 6, 1970. It was the day before they were scheduled to play a paid concert at the M.I.T. gymnasium which they did the next night, but it was also two days after four Vietnam War protesters were shot dead by National Guard troops at Kent State U. in Ohio (inspiring Neil Young to write the CSNY hit named for the state), and there were protest rallys all over major college campuses nationwide, including M.I.T.

The Dead were in the area the day before their scheduled concert, and they just decided on the spot to set up and play for free for the protesters. (This was when they were still playing their paid gigs in nightclubs, theaters and college gyms, before their days of selling out huge arenas years later). WMBR (then WTBS) was set up with a mono hi-fi phone line to record events happening at the Student Center, which ended up being patched into the Dead's soundboard to record the concert on a reel at the station.

It turned out that the Dead themselves never got a copy of it, and it was one of their few missing shows in their organization's vast live concert vaults. In 2000, I lent the original reel to David Gans, the producer/host of the official nationally syndicated Grateful Dead Hour (which is aired here on WUMB Thursday nights at 11). He digitally remastered it, and featured it on the show. I was visiting San Francisco at the time for a longtime friends wedding, and I ended up being invited as a guest onto the nationally syndicated show which originates from KPFA in Berkeley, to discuss the history of this concert and the tape for the feature. It was pretty cool.

Another one that I dug out at WMBR and digitally remastered last year was a 1966 interview with the late folk/protest singer/songwriter Phil Ochs recorded a couple of nights before he played at Symphony Hall in Boston. It was recorded while he was still relatively upbeat and witty, a few years before his decline which led to his eventual suicide in 1976. I did a feature about him on the day that would've been his birthday last fall, and sent a copy of the 1966 interview to his sister, who I interviewed live by phone from New York. She still occasionally hosts musical tribute nights to him in coffeehouses and clubs around the Northeast. I couldn't believe I stumbled onto that interview among all those 40 year old reels, and that when I brought it to a studio with a working reel deck, it still played back sounding as good as new!

 

[Eli Polonsky]

Doesn't magnetic tape have a limited shelf life though unless its stored in a climate controlled facility? I know most of my cassette tapes from the eighties had to be tossed.

My old cassettes from the 80's seem to be doing OK in my apartment. I wouldn't store them in some dank and musty basement, or in direct sunlight or right near a radiator, or anything like that. I think it also depends on the original quality of the tape. I used mostly Maxell's.

I know that the environment at WMBR has been all over the place over the years. A/C wasn't installed in that station until 2003, and the functionality of the system has been variable and iffy since after the first season. That whole basement was often like a 90+ degree dripping sauna bath in the summertimes, and at times in the winter when the heating thermostat has malfunctioned it's been 90+ degrees again, but dry as a desert. Yet, some of their archive reels going back to the 1960's play like new, while others have deteriorated. I think it had to do with the original manufacturing quality of the tape. Scotch seemed to make quality reel tape back then.

 

[Neggy]

When WXKS FM did their anniversary show a few years back they almost had nothing to work with as far as archived material. The R2R tapes had deteriorated to the point that they knew that they were only going to get one shot at running them. I heard they conditioned the tapes by putting them in a beef jerky making machine for a while before they ran them. They got one pass over the heads which was enough to get the material onto a hard drive and then onto a CD.

 

[Varulven]

Kiss 108 couldn't spend the 1,000. or so to get them to a professional mastering engineer, into a convection oven, professional transfer, etc?

It surely isn't about art anymore or providing quality entertainment, it appears to be all about the buck.

 

[Eli Polonsky]

The R2R tapes had deteriorated to the point that they knew that they were only going to get one shot at running them. I heard they conditioned the tapes by putting them in a beef jerky making machine for a while before they ran them. They got one pass over the heads which was enough to get the material onto a hard drive and then onto a CD.

That's a common procedure when remastering old, very worn reels to digital called "bakeing the tape". It's done when the oxide is flaking off of the cellulose tape to make it ahere to play one last time to dub to a digital remaster, but then the tape is fried forever and can't be played again. It should be considered a last resort.

 

[NHRonin]

I think I seem to remember Boston using the deteroriated tape excuse for the long delay of Third Stage.

 

[Varulven]

we do the tape baking thing, Eli, and even though some tapes hold up well through the years the baking allows for at least one, sometimes more, spins of the old reel to digitize where just spinning a tape can lead to the flaking problem with nothing to show for it. I don't think the tape is "fried forever", but could be wrong.
We hold onto ALL our analog tapes even after the transfer.

 

[MassMusicMan]

When WXKS FM did their anniversary show a few years back they almost had nothing to work with as far as archived material.

Interesting thread.

Almost nothing? It's 2007. How long did it take Kiss to go digital?

 

[jimcutler]

OMG, I've been through so many station sale and seen tons of archives get thrown out. If it costs the new owners ten cents to preserve station history it gets thrown out. Someone else here said years of hard work and careful archiving can be thrown out in two seconds by the new guys. Anything that lasts seems to be held by regular people like yourselves who care. On the other hand I just threw out thousands of my old promos from WZOU, WRKO, WHDH, WEEI and places earlier in my career. I thought about transferring them all to files and saving them but when you die someday, your stuff just gets thrown out, right? So I kept a few from each place and tossed the rest. You can only save so much.

Jim Cutler

 

[WLYNWAZNgm]

I still have all of the original, analog half-track reels from my college radio days (late 1970's).
I put them all in plastic bags, sealed closed, inside the boxes. If you put them
away properly, they are less likely to get brittle.

It is a shame that stations do not archive more of their old stuff. If we ever get a proper, local
depository (radio hall of fame, etc.) maybe the call could go out for people to submit whatever they
hanging around. I'll bet there are some gems out there waiting to be rediscovered...

 

[Varulven]

A group of dedicated people have created the Music Museum of New England
http://www.mmone.org

A natural extension of this would be to have a separate non-profit (or one under the MMOne umbrella or affiliated with MMone if all involved are in agreement) to archive air checks, playlists etc. I just found a few WRKO
playlists from the 1970s. There should be enough fans out there to compile a data base and get this stuff transferred. I have the Donna Summer WRKO broadcast from the Music Hall/WANG CENTER on cassette somewhere...these are fun things from days gone by - and, yes, WRKO should have preserved all those special moments. WRKO was instrumental in breaking both The Doobie Brothers "Listen To The Music" and Rick
Derringer's "Rock & Roll Hoochie Koo"

http://ntl.matrix.com.br/pfilho/html/lyrics/r/rock_and_roll_hoochie_koo.txt

http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:hifwxqr5ldae