Recording Date: 1972 (Exact Date Unknown)
Station: 890 WLS Chicago
Format: Top 40
Branding: “The Big 89“, “The Rock of Chicago”
Ownership: The American Broadcasting Company; (Today) Cumulus
Featured Air Personality: Bill Bailey (WWDJ/WLHT/WDRQ/WLS/others)
Contributor: Sandy Bailey
Associated Air Talent: Larry Lujack, Joel Sebastian, Ron Riley, John Records Landecker, Jeff Davis, Fred Winston, others
Total Time: 4:06 (Telescoped)
You’re so vain, you went and named an album after yourself..
Curator’s Notes:
What can a mere disc jockey such as myself write about perhaps the most awesome, legendary Top 40 radio station in all of the storied history of AM radio, and not be redundant? Probably nothing, which is why this will be short.
Donated to this website by Sandy Bailey, husband Bill Bailey had been holding on to this – dubbed from the studio skimmer reel at WLS itself. Despite the reel to reel playback device we have at Airchexx, the quality is outstanding. The master was recorded at 15ips, this dub at 7 1/2 ips, and still, it mastered clean and only required one round of noise reduction to eliminate electrical 60 Hz line hum which is present on the “extension speaker” output jack. This has never (apparently) been shared before and we’re quite honored to have the museum space to present it for the first time.
If this aircheck is from 1972 it had to be December. One of the songs–Marvin Gaye’s “Trouble Man” was released Dec. 8, ’72.
Bill Bailey!! Absoultely, Positively one of the very best ever!!!
Why couldn’t I have golden pipes like his?
I listened to Bill on WLS while I was living in St. Louis. Yeah faded in and out but at night Landecker came booming in! Good times listening to a great radio station!