Customer Reviews

Cruisin 1970

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The original vinyl LP versions of Cruisin' 1955 through Cruisin' 1967 were pretty good re-creations of Top 40 radio in a number of cities. They give you the flavor of what great radio stations sounded like in those years. Unfortunately, Chicago was not included in that series: no WLS, no WCFL, no WJJD, not even WYNR! The closest they came was Dick Biondi in Buffalo in 1960, just before he moved to WLS.

The Cruisin' 1968-69-70 volumes, produced by different people, are of a much poorer quality, and the CD reissues of ALL the earlier volumes have been butchered.

The last volume of the year-by-year series finally landed in Chicago, but I kinda wish it had veered off to Rockford or Peoria or someplace else, because it's just plain BAD. It appears to have been spliced together by a first-time tape editor, because it's very sloppy and makes no sense. There are several wildly different weather forecasts within the program. There's an ad for a Sears record sale that promotes LPs not yet released in 1970. There's a pre-election political ad and a Thanksgiving sale ad; the election would have been over three weeks before Thanksgiving. So what? So WLS was a very high quality professionally-run 50,000-watt clear-channel radio station, not some 250-watt daytimer in Podunk. It had the best and smoothest over-the-air sound of any Top 40 station anywhere. This disc is NOTHING like the real WLS of the '60s and '70s.

Skip this piece of crap and search out a real WLS or WCFL aircheck (off-the-air recording) if you want to re-live Chicago Top 40 Radio at its best. There are many from which to choose. For example, besides getting a Larry Lujack aircheck, you can also get Art Roberts, Clark Weber, Barney Pip, or Jim Runyon's classic mid-'60s morning drive time show on WCFL, where Chickenman was born.

If you want to enjoy the Cruisin' Series, seek out the original GRT / Increase Records vinyl LPs, even if you have to get someone to copy them onto CD-Rs for you. Forget the CDs, especially this one.

It's true that most of the songs are lesser known. But in my opinion this adds to the charm of this series. The 1970 issue is a special one in many ways: First, it is basically not 1970 but more 1970 up to 1973. But this is no disadvantage. Second, it is the last one of the Cruisin' series and it's hard to find. Get it if you can and seek out the others of the Cruisin' series as well. Listening to it in one go sitting in your 69 Mustang Mach 1 (if you got one that is), you will be transformed back to the early 70s like in a true time machine. It's like listening to the real AM Radio at the time. The songs are great, too. Give it a try. Trust me, it is pure listening pleasure while driving. I was living in Florida in the 70s and am now back in Switzerland. This CD reminds me of the time more than anything else.

I own three other Cruisin' titles, and this seems different from the older ones primarily in the source used for this. Whereas the older Cruisin' albums were likely not from a single hour of radio programming, they seemed to be taken from the same general time. This one does cover more than 1970, but the transitions from track to track are less smooth than I would like. The jingles in some places cut off abruptly, probably to avoid running into the next song; WLS programming at this time had tight transitions from song to commercial to jingle to next song, etc. It would have been nice if the transitions had been a quick cross fade, rather than the cut that was used. At least the two weather reports that were included were from the same season.

Despite these flaws, the disc is still worth purchasing if you like the Cruisin' series, and particularly if you listened to WLS in the early 1970's. If you want more of WLS and less of the music, [...].

There are at least two major deficiencies with this disc. First, the disc jockey selection: Kris Eric Stevens? I listened to WLS in 1970 and don't even remember him. To be really authentic, Larry Lujack should have been the DJ. He'd be in the same class as the famous DJs on earlier years of this series. Second, the song selection. I realize due to royalty restrictions, many of the big groups couldn't appear here. However, I can't even remember some of these songs and too many others came out prior to 1970. These caveats aside, I'm still giving the disc four stars because it captures the ambience of the WLS of that era so well: the ads, promos, jingles-Jeff Hendricks even breaks in with a news flash. If you grew up listening to WLS, try to track down this disc. Listening to it will be like going through a time warp.

I grew up in the Great Lakes Area and do remember Kris Eric Stevens on 89 WLS at night. Used to fall asleep listening...
school next morning don't you know. All of the titles in the Crusin' series are apt to put you in that time and place especially if Dad let you use the car. If Dad let you use the car or you had your own...the radio was on. Excellent ride.