The second of two perfect-quality, right off the air monitor airchecks of Chip Binder on WGAR courtesy of Joy Binder! This time from 1980, listen as Musicradio 1220 sounds essentially as it did in ’79, complete with reverb and all!
Be amazed realizing that Chip was an overnight guy… who today with that talent and voice would probably be holding down a top 10 morning drive gig with a partner. Why? Well, the obvious. Overnights almost everywhere today are either voicetracked, a satellite feed or jockless. And if there’s actually a live jock on the air, they usually sound horrible (apologies to all the overnight jocks out there, but hey, everybody starts somewhere, right?). But certainly almost nowhere does one hear an overnight jock with the professionalism heard on this 6 minute recording.
This is a good history lesson. You MUST listen, to hear what AM radio was just before it all came to an end. Great radio, from the Great Lakes region where there was so much of it before AM died.
The date for this aircheck is April 22nd, 1980.
As mentioned elsewhere, I’m looking to buy or trade for any old wgar airchecks, or any old cleveland memorabilia. If you have any, please email me at:
danoshannon@gmail.com
thanks,
dan
Excellent description of the great days of radio. I remember listening to Bob James on ‘GAR’ too!
Chip Binder is a very nice man in addition to being a very talented air personality. While a teenager, I called him fairly regularly on the listener line when he was working middays at WHK-AM 1420 and he always very pleasant and patient with me. I think he started as a weekend air person and weekday fill-in during 1982 and hosted the 10am-3pm segment following Gary Dee and preceding Joe Finan starting in early 1983. One of his big segments was called Behind Closed Doors. Shortly after the station switched to 14K solid gold rock & roll, Chip became the morning host and his newsman was the great Jim Hale.
I’m almost positive that was Ed Richards doing the news at the end of this clip.
Thank you for the nice words, Dave. You are correct on both newsmen. That was indeed the great Ed Richards. Last I heard he was with Medical Mutual in Cleveland.
Regards,
Chip
chipbinder@yahoo.com
I met Chip in July of ’83 at Geauga Lake, an amusement park near Cleveland. He was with WHK then. I got an autographed photo of him as well as several other WHK jocks.