Where did the Summer go? You have a few hunches.
It’s August 24, 1974 – You’re A Teenager – You Live In L.A. – Summer Is Almost Over – You Didn’t Know It Started
August 24, 1974 – KHJ-AM – Machine Gun Kelly – Gordon Skene Sound Collection –
Where did Summer go? It’s like that every year. June happens – finals, grades, clean out the locker. Head to the beach – road trips, blank spots – Friday turns into Monday and then Friday again. You make good on your pledge of falling in love at least once a day – it’s the Summer and clothing is mostly optional – and the girls you knew at 14 look a whole lot different at 17. They know and you know and you know they know. They say and they do things and you are fascinated.
It’s all going by fast – and even you’ve started to notice.
But the new semester is only two weeks away – there’s still time – still time to party – still time for a road trip somewhere.
Of course, aside from the Summer going by really fast, it’s been a strange one. 1974 has been epic in a lot of ways – even you got interested in politics when Nixon was resigning. Watergate was something else and you started watching Walter Cronkite a lot. You missed Vietnam and all the protests – you heard about them, but you didn’t really know what they actually were.
Maybe that’s what getting older is about – you pay attention to things you didn’t just a few years earlier. All of a sudden you notice what you didn’t notice before. Just like you notice time is going by fast – and you’re one year older and it will be the Fall soon – and how did that happen?
At least there’s music and you have your radio – and you don’t think about it all that much. As long as there are tunes, life is good – and you can’t ask for more than that. Even if the future is a little hazy from time to time.
To get an idea what August was all about in 1974 (aside from Nixon and Watergate) here’s a little under 90 minutes worth of Machine Gun Kelly as he was holding court on KHJ on August 24, 1974. Just so’s ya know.
Tape is running to fast, pitch for MGK and the music is way too high. Can you slow it down to a more normal pitch?
I took it down 4% – it’s not consistent though – it speeds up and and down all through the tape. It was way too fast when I first played it.