Zero to 180 – Three Minute Magic
Love To Know serves up this small plate of trivia about the first women to wear pants: Charline Arthur Cash Box ad Sep. 17, 1955 “Discovered” in the early 1950s by Elvis Presley’s future manager, Col. Tom Parker, Arthur (like Elvis) was photographed almost exclusively above the waist in newspaper
This piece chronicles ten years in the life of a young public radio station beginning in 1970, the year my mother was hired as a member of its professional staff. University of Cincinnati’s WGUC-FM – a charter member of National Public Radio – underwent remarkable growth and technological advancement during
Judy Lynn – “America’s Western Sweetheart” – would get her one and only 45 picture sleeve, tragically enough, for this cheerful-sounding honky tonk tale in which the singer informs us she has only seconds to live before the “kindly” stranger who offered a ride at the train station prepares to
As George Lipsitz points out in the introduction to Johnny Otis‘s memoir Upside Your Head! Rhythm and Blues on Central Avenue, Otis was a central organizing figure in the Los Angeles rhythm & blues scene of the late 1940s and early 1950s — thus, a shrewd move on Syd Nathan’s
The full-page ad placed in Billboard‘s August 17, 1968 issue promised controversy: Bill Gavin, publisher of the influential Gavin Report is on record as saying “Mom (Can I Talk To You?)” by Jan Rhodes should be given airplay. If Gavin were still with us, I would very much like to
Is it really true, as Country Music Archive asserts, that Ann Jones And Her Western Sweethearts “was probably the first all-girl band in C & W music”? Bill Sachs, in his “Folk Talent and Tunes” column for Billboard, reported in the November 13, 1960 edition — Ann Jones, King recording
Thanks to William Vernola for recommending the 1991 PBS documentary “mini” series, Making Sense of the Sixties. At one point in the accompanying soundtrack — during the examination of women’s rights, undoubtedly — I was hooked by the catchy chorus to a song called “Drop the Mop“: [Pssst: Click the
When you think of truck-driving country classics, the names of four artists should come readily to mind: Dave Dudley, Red Sovine, Red Simpson … and The Willis Brothers! Brotherly harmonies + offbeat humor + trucker tales = a winning sound and track record. “Give Me Forty Acres (To Turn This
Trailblazing, by definition, can be a lonely enterprise — but someone has to move civilization forward. Therefore, hats off to Jamaica’s first woman music producer, Sonia Pottinger, who managed to navigate a path through a field that is still overwhelmingly dominated by men and left future generations a legacy of
Recognition due to Lester Bangs for pointing me to one of the more unusual storylines in pop music – B.J. Thomas‘ 1966 single, “Plain Jane“: A dramatic narrative about a serious issue, “Plain Jane” might strike today’s ears as being a bit hokey or kitschy, even though this sort of
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