i grew up in desolation, well sort of, radio desolation. out in the middle of South Dakota. the only radio i remember was uncle bud's "ham radio shack" off the dinning room of the house we shared. most saturday nights were spent in the dinning room listening to something he "pulled from outer space." when he could "get" the grand ole opry he would put a large speaker in the room for us to listen too.
after we left the farm my mom and i lived upstairs from my other grandma. mom had to work so i spent a lot of time listening to the 78 records or searching the radio while mom was at work. she must have loved music because i often found new records in the rack when there wasn't much money for anything else new.
when i was 15 i got my first paying job and i started buying my "own music." music i "found" on the radio. then i met this crazy guy, a drummer, named ricky johnson. we were both "weird" and seemed destined to be friends. one day ricky invited me over to his house to listen to this new record he gotten. he said he heard it on the wolfman's show on wxrb, said to be broadcast out of mexico.
after school we went over there, ricky's room was out in the single car garage attached to his parents house. he had his drums and a funky "stereo" actually an old pilot tube amp with 2 speakers attached. the record he wanted me to hear was a 12" vinyl album, otis redding's "pain in my heart" it was so cool, soulful, hurting. i think it changed my life. well the music and the pot ricky and i used to smoke.
it's been a while since i've smoked pot but i'm still searching the radio for music, i've found the opry on the net and satellite radio, i feel reconnected to that initial desolation of my youth.
a few people have shared something they love with me and i have shared it with as many people as i could since i've found this love in my life. i have a few thousand favorite songs running through my brain most of the time. here's one i'd like to share with all of you it has little to do with any of this. enjoy 
when you love someone
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| a long time ago in a land far away...... |
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madamegeek
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Nov 1 @ 11:08AM
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Growing up in Newfoundland - mid-winter, on the mountainous West coast - ought to add a new dimension to the definition of "desolate".
Like you, before we got television around 1961 or so, the outside world seeped into our wind-whipped circle through the radio.
I vividly recall my Dad and my brothers and a neighbour or two sitting in our kitchen, draining mugs of tea ( or stronger) as they listened to "Hockey Night in Canada". I was absorbed watching their faces, eyes darting back and forth as they "watched" Boom-Boom Geoffrion race down the ice toward the goal. We were "there" - in that zone where reality and imagination are separated by the thinnest of veils.
I also remember a few years later after the Beatles zoomed into my life, doing homework fiddling anxiously with the radio to receive faraway stations in the exotic-sounding New York. I made a vow then that I don't think I have broken to this day: never change the station when a Beatle song is playing.
Thanks for the serving of nostalgia that's as smooth as my Saturday morning coffee.
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butterfly943
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Nov 1 @ 12:05PM
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My Dad was a Ham operator...my Mom was telling me that they had something called a look see..where everyone met up and was held in different states..people from all over the world came and got to meet the people they had been talking with...  very nice reflective blog 
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Tunes4u
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Nov 1 @ 12:32PM
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I am still out here on the High Lonesome Plains of Wyoming not far from where you write about........and yes...it is still rather desolate....although maybe not quite what with all the satellites and stuff.
It's a good place. Far far away......but a good place.
Good post!
~*~
Tunes
Oh yes....by the way.....I met a crazy drummer when I was young who was instrumental in changing my life....his name was Bobby Johnson........we showed me pot.....and Vanilla Fudge....and we were in a band together in Washington DC....it was a soul band....The Cavaliers. I played trumpet in the horn section.
I later switched to drums and played on the road for many years.
All thanks to Bobby Johnson. 
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poeticcougar
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Nov 1 @ 12:55PM
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I'm a little "too young" for this nostalgia BUT your blog was written so nicely that I wished I could have joined you at Ricky's.
And I agree with Madame, NEVER change radio stations when the Beatles are on..........or Elvis.........or the Dave Clark Five 
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missliss78
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Nov 1 @ 7:23PM
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 Wonderful, feel good blog, keeno!
Thanks for sharing your story & for bringing about a very pleasant departure from the more popular topics today.
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CrackerJackPat
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Nov 8 @ 12:20PM
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This made me think of my youth and music as well. We weren't quite "out in the boonines" although my cousins from Chicago thought so. AND.... we never did get the "top tunes" as quickly as they did, so they would educate me when they visited about the rest of the world.
We had an old box radio in the kitchen and listened to "The little red farm" every morning. I remember asking my mother if we couldn't get a new radio. Guess I was a "hick" I thought a new radio would play new songs.
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