Customer Reviews

Golden Age of Underground Radio 1

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What can I say? This is one of the best CDs I have ever bought!

Here in England we never experienced the San Francisco underground radio movement, but this CD brings it all to us!

Hosted by Tom Donahue, the cd starts with Tom's succinct, slick, but oh-so-cool intro "Hi I'm Tom Donahue and I'm here to play phonograph records" straight into Spirit's Fresh Garbage and we're off.

There are the spaced-out but trippy ads for Leopolds Records and for the Berkley Free Clinic. There are links between the tracks, news of live gigs (Commander Cody anyone?), and yet, amazingly, each record is here in its entirety, complete, unadulturated, dripping with the late 60s vibe, with no chat over the intro or outro! Nonetheless it all flows as smoothly as a toke on acapolco gold.

And as for the sound quality... just listen to and gasp at Time Has Come Today by the Chambers Brothers. Sit back and marvel - how come DCC can master tracks better than Columbia which owns them?

I love it and it is rarely out of my car CD Player. A bit of a hippy I might be, but this is one great slice of history!

Finally volume 2 is coming... stay tuned...

Anyone who was around in the late 60s cannot help but feel the loss of the vibrant underground music scene. The realities of the present corporate dominated mass media preclude the possibility of there ever being another vibrant musical scene. However, this recording has an amazing ability to capture the the flavour of this bygone day. I strongly recommend this CD for anyone who enjoyed underground radio on the late 60s.

More than a nostalgia trip: more like opening an old suitcase and finding bars of gold. A real treasure if you remember San Francisco during the Summer of Love, the proverbial "good ol' days," or just want to recapture the vibes. Disc jockey Tom Donahue from the first FM radio station in the USA is a nice addition to the tracks. Tom does on air promos for 1960s concerts at the Family Dog in San Francisco, the then new Youngbloods album, and a benefit for the Free Clinic in Haight Asbury.

I cannot stop playing this CD. I had forgotten the great songs by the Youngbloods, Byrds, and Donovan. Moreover, besides those gems you get the 11-minute version of Time by the Chambers Brothers. Wow. The Brothers are psychedelisized. This CD is worth the price just for that track, but that doesn't mean the other tracks are substandard or not worth playing.

Tune in, turn on, drop out. Buy this CD. I guarantee you will be groovin' down Haight Street or in your mind. Peace and love.

P.S. There is a second volume with famous disc jockey B. Mitchell Reed.

I never got to hear Tom Donahue, since I was only a baby at the time, and was on the opposite side of the country anyway. Based on the aural evidence presented on this CD, he seems to have been a pretty cool guy. This is not one of his actual shows, but rather "airchecks" from some of his broadcasts, with songs he might have played inserted. Some of the songs are actually introduced by name, but obviously they were limted as to what songs they were able to license. The CD opens with Tom mentioning that one of the songs he had just played was "Come Together" by the Beatles, but of course they weren't able to license that song. One of my favorite parts is when Tom says "Here's the Youngbloods 'Darkness, Darkness', and I'm looking forward to the day I can hear this in stereo, cause it must be unreal." Then the song procedes to play, and it actually is in stereo. This CD is a fascinating time capsule, and if you are a fan of underground radio from the late '60s - early '70s, or just curious to find out about it, you should find this CD.

GOOd tunes. The full length of TIME HAS COME, full length of all. It's Fat.

This CD was released years ago now, but it captures a little of the 60s underground FM radio era and remains a valuable and historic footnote to it. I never got a chance to hear Tom Donahue, since I grew up in Los Angeles and only very briefly heard KSAN in its heyday. It's a real pleasure to hear his resonant voice on this CD! And to hear him "rap" about the Youngbloods, or an up and coming artist, or talk about how beautiful the Pacific Ocean looked that day.

And of course the music: Spirit's Fresh Garbage, The Chambers Bros' Time Has Come Today (which sounds especially 'psychedelic' here), The Youngbloods' Get Together (to which Tom says "I can't wait to hear this in stereo. It must be unreal!"), Quicksilver's What About Me, Donvan's Hurdy Gurdy Man, among others.

They say if you can remember the 60s, you weren't really there. Well whether you were or weren't, this CD captures the feel of 60s underground radio. It makes me wish even more I'd been able to hear much more of "KSAN, San Francisco/Oakland" in its "golden era" than I actually did. Highly recommended to any radio fan who wants to hear what the "San Francisco FM underground radio sound" was really like. I'm planning on getting "Volume 2" with B Mitchel Reed and look forward to hearing that one.

This cd is way too cool. Excellent choice of music and the remastering is very well done. This cd would be a huge hit for anyone wanting to relive the time and tunes, to the curious, and to those that love classic and psychedilic rock. A must have.