Station: 930 KHJ (KRTH/KKHJ) Los Angeles, California, USA
Format: Top 40
Featured Air Personality: John Lennon (The Beatles)
Contributor: Daniel Coulombe
Airchexx Entry: 1,494
Comments:
Given the intense popularity of John Lennon, both as a major recording artist and his status as an outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War, this appearance on the might 93 KHJ should be well documented. At the time, this was included in on-air promos of what was known as “Superstar” week at KHJ. And yes, obviously, recordings were made of the event. Yet, all these decades later, there’s not much historical information written online about this one time appearance in Los Angeles. There are a few references on Wikipedia (Curator’s note: Not everything printed there is 100% reliable, so beware.) including one sentence under the topic “LennoNYC” which makes mention of ‘the week Lennon went to Los Angeles during his Lost Weekend period’.
The date of September 24, 1974 is not arbitrary. It is hinted at in the PBS Documentary “Lennon NYC” . There is also an (unauthorized) YouTube video of Lennon’s appearance which includes some of the audio in this aircheck. That video bears this date as well.
As for the actual audio… This is loosely telescoped, with full songs edited but the commercial breaks and ‘jock chatter’ from Lennon are all included, including telephone calls from adoring fans. Lennon also plays his latest album on the air, allegedly just one hour before it goes on sale at a local Los Angeles record store! And yes, where there are segues (very few here), you do get to hear KHJ jingles and formatics.
Some of you in our audience were there, or were at RKO general – or just listening at the time. Your comments and corrections to this are most welcome.
That commercial with Jerry Reed around 39:00 is awesome…
Great station KHJ,also great to have John Lennon on as a guest DJ.Sounds like John picked all of the music.Think John could`ve had second career as a comedian.
Was this done live? Lots of production elements to juggle….. Or was it recorded and pieced together?
That I can’t say. I believe this was live, but there’s no way to tell unless the jock is still around and lets us know. 🙂
Given that the jock was John Lennon…no, he’s not around.
The jock who he’s filling in for, Charlie Van Dyke, is, though. So’s the jock who led into him (heard on more complete recordings of this morning), Johnny Williams. And so’s the PD, Gerry Petersen (Cagle).
But you don’t even need them. This was KHJ in 1974. A “lot of production elements” was standard operating procedure. They still had engineers. They didn’t go combo until ’77.
As for “Superstar Week”, it’s all out there. You just have to not call it good after 90 seconds on Google. It was Van Dyke’s vacation. With former KHJ morning stars Robert W. Morgan at KIQQ and Charlie Tuna at KKDJ, KHJ didn’t want to just stick Bill Wade in the slot for a week, so Paul Drew and Harvey Mednick came up with Superstar Week.
Cheech and Chong Monday, Alice Cooper Tuesday, Cher Wendesday, Elton John Thursday and John Lennon Friday. All in the KHJ jock booth and all live.
I drove up to KHJ and stood outside the gate along with about 15 other fans. I took 8mm movies of Lennon coming ut and waving at us. I then ran to my parked car and followed Lennon’s limo all the time filming it. In hindsight, after knowing what happened to John by a crazed fan, my actions probably sound creepy today. I cannot confirm what day this was. I think Elton John had been the DJ the previous day. I think JL was in NYC on Sept 28 so he must have left L.A. shortly after his DJ stint at KHJ.