KRLA – Bob Eubanks/Dick Moreland – April 18, 1964 – Rob Frankel Collection –
It was inevitable – your dad was a Kingston Trio fan – your mom loved Mantovani. When you arrived home one Saturday, carrying your latest prized possession; a copy of She Loves You by The Beatles, war broke out.
Ground Zero was the family hi-fi – the 8 foot mahogany Magnavox Stereo Credenza Console with AM-FM Stereo radio and speakers you could get lost in was site of the initial skirmish.
You took great pains to make sure your first of what would be an almost endless series of Fab-Four purchases would get a place of honor in the record collection – it was the family room after all.
Somewhere after Ringo’s intro the screaming started. No, it wasn’t your friends wails of ecstasy, it was your mom, bellowing somewhere from the back porch to “TURN THAT CRAP OFF!”
At first you’re offended, more shocked than anything else. How could you not like The Beatles, or The Kinks, or Them or Billy J. Kramer & The Dakotas or The Dave Clark Five (you drew the line at the DC5 just on principle)?
Easy – your mom points out, in no uncertain terms, that what you are listening to is NOT music – it has notes – it has singing – but it isn’t music, and it’s not going to be living on the family stereo.
And at that moment, World War Three breaks out. And it would last until you got your own stereo and the comparative safety of your sanctum sanctorum; your bedroom – the room that would soon turn into a shrine to John, Paul, George and Ringo and just about everyone else with a British accent and electric guitar who were taking up every spare second on your radio.
And all of a sudden you became the object of your parents conversations that started with “where did we go wrong?”
Welcome to your world.
As a reminder, a little under an hour’s worth of KRLA (the “Official Beatles Station”) from April 18, 1964 with Bob Eubanks and Dick Moreland – all by way of Rob Frankel’s collection. A pivotal year for Radio and Rock and also a reminder that the story never changes, even if the music does.
