Does this sound interesting? There’s music, poetry and storytelling – all live, and all produced in association with the Long Beach Soul Collective and the city’s own low-power community FM station KLBP (99.1 FM; online outside of Long Beach at klbp.org).
It’s called “Live at Secret Island,” and is held every other Wednesday night at 6:30 at the underground Secret Island Tiki Bar in downtown Long Beach, 209 Pine Ave. Admission is free, though the station encourages donations for the performers.
The shows are two hours long plus breaks.
“They start at 6:30,” said station spokesman Michael Stark, “with the live show airing on KLBP from 7 to 8, followed by a short break, and then they tape the second hour for airing the following week.”
The idea is to highlight local talent and give an opportunity for residents to join together for an evening of entertainment and fun. Promoters encourage you to “stop by for the soul music; stay for the tiki cocktails.”
Stark tells me that the shows only recently started, and as the summer winds down, they have gotten quite popular. Sound good? There is an Instagram page at instagram.com/secretislandtiki.
Questions and Suggestions
I received quite a few emails in response to some of the recent columns. The first comes from Doug Ford of San Dimas, who wanted to know a little more about the old mellow rock KNX-FM.
“Recently, I looked up KNX FM (now KCBS-FM, 93.1), specifically what they played in the late ’70s. I remember it as more of a deep track station with album sides played on Sunday nights. What information I could find described it more as a yacht rock station. Do you have any recollection of KNX in the ’70s and what they were playing?”
I do. You are right; it had a very deep playlist, much more toward album cuts than hits. Some would argue that they were deeper than even KMET (now KTWV, 94.7 FM), though the focus was more on singer-songwriters and the obvious mellow side of things. Yacht rock? No, not really. KNX-FM was more picky and formatted with album tracks carefully selected to keep the mellow mood … yes, it — along with so many other stations of the era — was the place where what is now called “yacht rock” got a lot of exposure … but no station, and certainly not KNX-FM, was that narrow.
There was also an intelligence to KNX-FM that came through not only the music, but also the features, the most remembered perhaps being “The Odyssey File” that highlighted unusual news stories and other interesting topics. The playlist could run from Billy Joel and America to The Ozark Mountain Daredevils and Kiki Dee. And very few of them were “hits” in the traditional sense. Many times, KNX-FM did indeed help launch careers or expose new artists and sounds.
Want to hear a recording of that very era for yourself? Check out this sample from Retro Radio Joe at youtube.com/watch?v=e9hfIKWe8BA, which is a portion of the Steve Marshall Show from late 1977. Or go to TheMellowSound.net and hear a superb re-creation.
Oh, and those album sides? I don’t believe those were on KNX-FM. That sounds much more like KMET or K-West (now Power 106).
Reader Joe Huisenga of Moorpark can’t help anyone in metro Los Angeles or Orange County, but he does have a suggestion on where to find oldies just a bit north.
“I have some good news if any readers live in or pass through Ventura County, he wrote. “There’s a new oldies station playing ’60s and ’70s music, called FM 106.3. It comes in loud and clear in Moorpark; worth giving it a try if you are traveling on the 101 freeway in Ventura County.
That must be KVYB, also known as “Groovy 106.3,” which plays the syndicated Scott Shannon “True Oldies” format. They also serve as the local Dodgers affiliate. The station played top-40 until last April. Hear it at groovy1063.com.
“Also, KTYD (K-Tide) 99.9 FM in Santa Barbara has been around for 50 years,” he continued. “They play rock music from the ’60s to the ’90s. An excellent station.” That would be “quality rock,” at KTYD.com.
Chime Hart has another oldies suggestion … again not helpful for over the air, but a good find on the net. “Check out WLNG in Sag Harbor, New York,” he writes. “It tries to pretend it’s in the ’50s, with lots of PAMS jingles … but it has a full-service small-town feel”
Wow … you’re not kidding. It even has the East Coast reverb! The station is owned by a company called Bark Out Loud Dogs Media, and serves the Hamptons, Eastern Long Island, the towns of Brookhaven, and the coastlines of Connecticut and Rhode Island … and, of course, everywhere you can connect a computer, smart speaker or app. Find it at WLNG.com.
But it’s not always the ‘50s … as I tuned in just now, they were playing Tom Petty.
Richard Wagoner is a San Pedro freelance columnist covering radio in Southern California. Email rwagoner@socalradiowaves.com