Old Radio

[RPM 26419]

I commute an hour a day. I listen to Bob & Dan on the way in,  going home I've been listening to old radio programs on a phone app instead of Scott Ferrall or the same old classic rock I've heard 1000 times before. You'd be surprised how fast an hour can go by listening to Gunsmoke, Have Gun Will Travel, Johnny Dollar, X Minus One or Box 13.

Interesting listening to the original radio version compared to the TV show and the changes they made. William Conrad was a much colder and meaner Matt Dillon than the homogenized version James Arness played on TV. I'm not sure a short, fat Matt would have played well on camera, but you did not want to fuck with radio Matt. Howard McNear (Mayberry's Floyd The Barber) is a much funnier Doc than the TV version, too.

Kinda like listening to books on tape but they wrap up in 30 minutes. Really makes a commute fly by. I've been using the Old Time Radio app off the Google Play store.

Edited August 7, 2018 by RPM

[notre dame joe 197]

I heard an old Dragnet during my first road trip to Atlantic City.  Jack Webb was so technical, it was almost like a lecture on police work.  Not that it was out of character for him.

[RPM 26419]

Webb was all about the procedural. It was the reality show of it's day. 

[RPM 26419]

Looks like nobody gaf about these old shows, but I'm telling there's gold buried out there. I stumbled across an old NBC radio show Tales of the Texas Rangers starring Joel McCrea, the cowboy's cowboy. It's sort of a Dragnet style procedural set in Texas during the 30's-50's where they somehow wind up having to ride horses every case to solve the crime because Texas Rangers and WW2 era Texas was muy remote. Otherwise it's pretty solid scripts with excellent work by McCrea who is a cowboy legend and many familiar supporting character actors like Parley Baer who went on to become Chester on Gunsmoke.

The series moved to TV for 3 horrible seasons with a new twisted plot where they appeared as Texas Rangers but in a different scenario each program. One week, they might be Rangers in the 1840s and the next week they would be current day Rangers.

McCrea had nothing to do with it.

As bad as the TV show was, the radio program is solid entertainment.

Take a break from your podcasts and check out this bit of forgotten history. There's 30 years of radio to explore before TV came along and there's gold in them there tapes.

Edited May 11, 2020 by RPM

[Dewey 3299]

I watch a lot of classic tv shows, in doing so I learned that Perry Mason was a radio show before tv, might check that out. 

[RPM 26419]

You might be disappointed with that one. It was a 15 minute daytime show and they strung out stories forever. But you might like Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar. He's a freelance insurance investigator with a creative expense account. Ran from 1949 - 1962.

[thrillhammer 684]

So let me see if i got this straight, you're listening to tv on the radio?

 

[notre dame joe 197]

On 5/12/2020 at 11:19 AM, thrillhammer said:

So let me see if i got this straight, you're listening to tv on the radio?

 

There is also a Playboy radio station for those who read it for the articles.

[RPM 26419]

On 5/12/2020 at 1:19 PM, thrillhammer said:

So let me see if i got this straight, you're listening to tv on the radio?

 

It's not TV, it's radio plays. Before TV, this was all they had. Some of it was very good. Think of listening to books on tape with very high production values. The sci-fi series were particularly good since they were all made pre spaceflight and anything was possible. X-Minus One is a fine example.

 

[Underdog 28855]

Folks loved to drive straight through on most trips and remember listening to EG Marshall and the Mystery Theater on the radio, loved that theme...

Would also pick up some talk radio host out of Miami on some nights, wonder whatever became of him? 

[UTCzech III 2907]

KMIL up in Cameron used to run "Lum & Abner" every day about 12:45, I'd go out at lunch and sit in my car and listen to it, waiting for the daily polka show. 

 

And the old Hudson & Harrigan on KILT-AM out of Houston, when it was still a Top 40 station, had a feature called "The Lone Ranger" where it was basically a set-up to play comedy bits, that's where I first heard the Bickersons:

 

[RamjetFDO 10583]

On 6/3/2020 at 10:51 PM, RPM said:

X-Minus One is a fine example.

On Sirius-XM, the "Radio Classics" channel will play episodes from time to time ... but, if you want some "on demand" old-school sci-fi radio: Archive.org

[SimonBolivar 10961]

4 minutes ago, RamjetFDO said:

On Sirius-XM, the "Radio Classics" channel will play episodes from time to time ... but, if you want some "on demand" old-school sci-fi radio: Archive.org

I can't think of many things better in life than listening to that station at 9PM on US-87 somewhere between Dalhart and Texline on a trip to hike Colorado.

[RPM 26419]

2 hours ago, RamjetFDO said:

On Sirius-XM, the "Radio Classics" channel will play episodes from time to time

That's exactly how I got hooked on them. Like Simon said, (there's a joke there somewhere) you can cover some miles listening to that on a road trip. I dropped XM and just listen on the app now.