Posted On: Saturday - October 29th 2022 8:54PM MST
In Topics: Music Humor Media Stupidity
... and occupants of campus radio studios too.
This post comes from my comment under the most recent post with its anecdote of Affirmative Action 45 years back in the radio broadcasting business.
One good feeling about working a volunteer job is that you don't need to worry much about being fired. I won't say who this was either, but this guy I know who worked as a volunteer at the campus radio station was (heck, still is) a big Carpenters fan. I don't know about now, if there even are still campus radio stations, but then they played some very eclectic stuff. This station demanded that the DJ's played nothing that could be construed as "commercial", as the idea was to not compete with any commercial stations.
So, though he was a big fan, this guy was told he couldn't play the Carpenters anymore. The very next day, though, you might have heard stuff like "... lookin' down on creation, it's the only explanation I can find." and "Surely time will lose these bitter memories, and I'll find that there is someone to believe in and to live for ... someone else to..." over the airwaves. "Hello? All-hit radio-o-o-o! You are the 4th caller... today. Hey, babe, what would you like to hear?." "-----" "Excuse me, I'm sorry, but you've got to talk a little closer to the phone." "We've been observing your earth..." "You've been observing our earth?" "No, we've been observing your SHOW, and you're fired!"
OK, it may not have been exactly like that on the phone. He WAS fired, though. So what? As I recall, that was not long at all before Karen Carpenter tragically died from her Anorexia. Anyway, The Carpenters take priority over campus radio station management. The paragraph above comes in a little bit garbled from the strange introduction to the very unique Carpenter's song Calling Occupants... of Interplanetary Craft, written a few years before the incident of this post, but after most of their classic music.
It was ... when was it ... nineteen seventy-seven, seventy-eight... it was a different time, you understand...* see, in nineteen seventy-seven, America was in the ending phase of a big fad involving space and extraterrestrial beings. It was really most of the decade, partly a carry-over from the late 1960s, during which there were books about flying saucers, extraterrestrials who'd come to the world in ancient times, ancient people rafting across the oceans, all kinds of weird shit. As for space travel and extraterrestrials, this stuff was in the movies - Star Wars, ET (that cute Extra Terrestrial), Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind. That latter movie came out just after The Carpenters released this song.
There's a nice write up about this brother and sister duo Richard and Karen and this song on a blog by "Musical Aficionado" here.
During those Jimmy Carter "malaise" years, Americans were in dire need of help from someone somewhere... likely nobody in this world was gonna help, so, making a contact of the "3rd kind" with ETs** was the best plan they had. We need those ETs now more than ever.
In your mind you have capacities you know
to telepath messages through the vast unknown.
Please close your eyes and concentrate
with every thought you think
upon the recitation we’re about to sing.
I was going to write that last post on Affirmative Action, what, if anything, we can do about it on the job, in our lives, and in our society in general, today. Instead that one will have to be next week, coming with some Kung Flu stupidity and more current events. Thank you all for reading, writing, and listening!
* This silly Ken Burns-interview-style talk is from the most hilarious video you may ever see - The United Negro Space Program featured by Peak Stupidity in a more serious post of almost 5 years back, Apollo 12 Lunar landing footage from > 48 years back. I don't know why it cracks me up so much. Someone on an iSteve thread referred to this humor just a couple of days back too.
** No, not EFTs - Extra Terrestrials. You're thinking Exchange Traded Funds. They're not gonna help you.
Comments:
Moderator
Sunday - October 30th 2022 8:32PM MST
PS: I got really busy today, so sorry for the late reply, Alarmist. To me the 00's aren't "older" music, and I don't think I'd be able to "name that tune" for most of them.
Thanks for the video - it was a little strange really, and perhaps not as funny as the old SNL from the 1980s.
Ron DeSantis and his crew have got some guts, I tell you, to put that out in the open. I remember those Black Panther "poll watchers" who intimidated voters in '08 or '12 or some time, in Philadelphia. Nobody did a thing about it.
Thanks for the comment.
Thanks for the video - it was a little strange really, and perhaps not as funny as the old SNL from the 1980s.
Ron DeSantis and his crew have got some guts, I tell you, to put that out in the open. I remember those Black Panther "poll watchers" who intimidated voters in '08 or '12 or some time, in Philadelphia. Nobody did a thing about it.
Thanks for the comment.
The Alarmist
Sunday - October 30th 2022 11:57AM MST
PS
My wife and I were driving (a giant circle) literally around Orlando yesterday, and I had found a radio station playing older music of the ‘70s through the ‘00s, and I managed to name those tunes and artists in less than ten notes in every case, and even within one one on two of them. Hazards of the “hobby”, I guess.
“The UNCF ... because the mind is a terrible thing.”
BTW, the Dems might actually be in trouble when SNL does this to them ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46WZfo1yFkI
Then again, they’re the ones collecting and counting votes in too many places...
“FFlorida Gov. Ron DeSantis' new election crimes unit has recommended state police open a full criminal investigation into a Democrat whistleblower's detailed complaint of a long-running, widespread ballot harvesting operation in the African-American communities in politically important central Florida.”
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/florida-opens-criminal-probe-democrat-whistleblowers-evidence-ballot
My wife and I were driving (a giant circle) literally around Orlando yesterday, and I had found a radio station playing older music of the ‘70s through the ‘00s, and I managed to name those tunes and artists in less than ten notes in every case, and even within one one on two of them. Hazards of the “hobby”, I guess.
“The UNCF ... because the mind is a terrible thing.”
BTW, the Dems might actually be in trouble when SNL does this to them ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46WZfo1yFkI
Then again, they’re the ones collecting and counting votes in too many places...
“FFlorida Gov. Ron DeSantis' new election crimes unit has recommended state police open a full criminal investigation into a Democrat whistleblower's detailed complaint of a long-running, widespread ballot harvesting operation in the African-American communities in politically important central Florida.”
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/florida-opens-criminal-probe-democrat-whistleblowers-evidence-ballot
Luv it that she used a calculator to add 79 & 2. Thanks!
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