Thanks & Another Air Check Gem

If it is easier to email me than to post a comment please do so at ajlinds@yahoo.com. I received the following email comment:
For the record, I am 41, and first discovered KAAY as a seven-year old in 1972.

KAAY was a great, great radio station. It didn't have a strict "Top-40" sound, the way stations like WLS, CKLW, WCFL, or XEROK had. The station played the hits, and played mid-chart hits that other stations (at least any other 50 kW blowtorches) didn't touch. The jingles, the personalities, and songs all combined to create something that was truly magical.

Listening to airchecks of the station is like having a ice-cold 41 degree Coke on a summer afternoon (and I really enjoyed the Walt Sadler aircheck offered here). KAAY offered Southern hospitality in radio form.

When KAAY would reach into St. Louis through skywave, I usually heard religious programming (typically Garner Ted Armstrong), which I didn't care for, but now understand kept the bills paid. Then at 8 PM, heard "Greetings QSL'ers, this is KAAY Little Rock" kicking off the hour with music.

I also remember "Beakerstreet" which came on at 11 PM. By the time I started listening to the station, Clyde Clifford was gone, but the show remained on the air until 1977. It was not a show I listened to as a kid, but through airchecks and Clyde's current show, grew to really enjoy. Programs like "Beakerstreet" added a certain mystique to the station, and gave KAAY a certain degree of credibility to my friends who didn't care for Top-40 music, and were listening to Album-Rock radio instead.

Even later on, shows like "Blues Alley" had KAAY stand apart from other stations on the dial.

If Doc Brown's modified DeLorean really existed, I'd set the dials at some point in the early 1970's, drive 88 M.P.H. and put 1090 kHz on the presets and hang out there for a while. And I'd bring a tape recorder/hard drive and bring it back!

Best Wishes/73

Paul

Thanks Paul, and here is an air check of the second Buddy Karr, Bob Mullins. I also show up this aircheck reading the "Bannerline news" as Doc Holiday. News was not my favorite, but working the 6-midnight shift you did what was necessary. Notice in the background after the record as Buddy starts to talk, a KAAY jingle is playing softly behind him. This was a requirement of the program director Mike McCormick. The jingle was on a cart machine in a rack out of the way and no one was to touch it. A remote button, under the console was pushed as the jock started to talk. I saved nothing air check wise during the two different times I worked at KAAY.I am always happy to find anything from this era. The air check was made in October of 1963. Bob Mullins also worked for the Big Kay twice and did George J. Jennings.
Enjoy the air check by clicking on this link:
http://www.members.cox.net/lindse/Karr.mp3