Voices Of The Past...
Our time on the Earth is fleeting. It seems to stretch out in front of us and we feel as though we've always been here and always will. Well, that's how it feels for me.
Though when I had that health scare some ten years ago, I realised how finite life is. It hangs by a thread. And though thankfully I am able to put such thoughts out of sight, out of mind most of the time I guess having an illness and also getting older you realise how much time has passed by and there is no way even if fit there will be as much time in the future as I have lived through.
I know everyone is as important as each other and there is terrible suffering and grief being felt by someone who has lost someone close to them and I can and do get moved by a lot of what I see and hear.
You cannot help what moves you.
I was listening online to a segment of a radio show called Pirate Radio Skues. For anyone outside of the UK Keith Skues used to be a dj on the Pirate Radio ships in the 1960's when the UK had no commercial radio(unless you count the shows being beamed in by the English service of Radio Luxembourg)all radio came from state radio the BBC(Public broadcasting)
I don't remember all the stations, the dj's(I was too young at the time)and many stations were not giving a signal that I could pick up(the main stations were aiming their output at the south coast)
In 1967 for a variety of reasons stations were closed down. A law was passed by the British Government. All kind of reasons were given(and many have been refuted and proven groundless since)
Well, Keith was playing the final hour of Radio City which was on a fort in the sea and all the dj's were saying their goodbyes and hopes for radio in the future in the UK and towards the end, they started saying what they hoped they would be doing in the future seeing as when the midnight hour approached, they were all out of work.
At least three of them managed to remain in the radio business(two or three returned to Australia)Tom Edwards like so many managed to have a long and distinguished career in broadcasting doing quite a lot of work for the BBC(TV and Radio)and commercial tv fronting news programmes and doing continuity presentation.
But at the end of this old recording as Keith read out what they were doing between then and now(41 years)the information supplied to Keith from Tom he mentioned Paul Kramer, he'd be around 20 years of age(I guess)he moved onto Radio Caroline for a short time and then Radio 270 based off the coast of Yorkshire and the resort of Scarborough. But he went back into the movie business and I suppose life looked promising.
And then Keith mentioned that Tom had said...
Paul was killed in a car accident on Putney Bridge in London on 5th December 1968 and that he had read some words at the service and it's never really been explained what the cause was and there is still mystery surrounding the incident. And I don't know something just hit me. How all the plans he probably had and what he might've done and came to nothing. Approx a year after leaving Radio City and talking about his future. How fortunate we don't know what's around the corner. And its a bit earie hearing these voices through the ether after all this time and to hear him talking of his hopes.
RIP Paul...
Though when I had that health scare some ten years ago, I realised how finite life is. It hangs by a thread. And though thankfully I am able to put such thoughts out of sight, out of mind most of the time I guess having an illness and also getting older you realise how much time has passed by and there is no way even if fit there will be as much time in the future as I have lived through.
I know everyone is as important as each other and there is terrible suffering and grief being felt by someone who has lost someone close to them and I can and do get moved by a lot of what I see and hear.
You cannot help what moves you.
I was listening online to a segment of a radio show called Pirate Radio Skues. For anyone outside of the UK Keith Skues used to be a dj on the Pirate Radio ships in the 1960's when the UK had no commercial radio(unless you count the shows being beamed in by the English service of Radio Luxembourg)all radio came from state radio the BBC(Public broadcasting)
I don't remember all the stations, the dj's(I was too young at the time)and many stations were not giving a signal that I could pick up(the main stations were aiming their output at the south coast)
In 1967 for a variety of reasons stations were closed down. A law was passed by the British Government. All kind of reasons were given(and many have been refuted and proven groundless since)
Well, Keith was playing the final hour of Radio City which was on a fort in the sea and all the dj's were saying their goodbyes and hopes for radio in the future in the UK and towards the end, they started saying what they hoped they would be doing in the future seeing as when the midnight hour approached, they were all out of work.
At least three of them managed to remain in the radio business(two or three returned to Australia)Tom Edwards like so many managed to have a long and distinguished career in broadcasting doing quite a lot of work for the BBC(TV and Radio)and commercial tv fronting news programmes and doing continuity presentation.
But at the end of this old recording as Keith read out what they were doing between then and now(41 years)the information supplied to Keith from Tom he mentioned Paul Kramer, he'd be around 20 years of age(I guess)he moved onto Radio Caroline for a short time and then Radio 270 based off the coast of Yorkshire and the resort of Scarborough. But he went back into the movie business and I suppose life looked promising.
And then Keith mentioned that Tom had said...
Paul was killed in a car accident on Putney Bridge in London on 5th December 1968 and that he had read some words at the service and it's never really been explained what the cause was and there is still mystery surrounding the incident. And I don't know something just hit me. How all the plans he probably had and what he might've done and came to nothing. Approx a year after leaving Radio City and talking about his future. How fortunate we don't know what's around the corner. And its a bit earie hearing these voices through the ether after all this time and to hear him talking of his hopes.
RIP Paul...
posted by The Great Gildersleeve | 12:55 am
5 Comments:
That's very sad Gildy, but try not to get too depressed, you'll be around for at least another 35 years (Hugs)
That's my sensitive side coming out :-)
I just thought how sad to hear him talking of his plans and then within a year aged 21, it all came to an end.
I do wonder what the mystery was. I cannot find anything online. The only photo I have seen of him, he looks like the typical 60's young adult.
As for their opinion as to how radio was going, 41 years on...they were pretty close with their predictions.
It's amazing how many Australians came over to try their hand at radio in the UK at the time considering that commercial radio was established in Australia and had been for years.
Not that he was Australian.
Hmmm, my best friend when I was at school had a relative visiting from India...she had a book that mapped out all of her main life events written by some mystic person and she said(probably jokingly)that she knew some of the secrets of telling the future and she said I'd live to a very old age, so we'll see ;-)
I don't know if you ever pop over to the Radio 2 boards Gildy but recently one of the discussions was about Alexis Korner - there was a three part series about him on Radio 2 presented by Chris Jagger. Well anyway I worked for ALexis Korner for three years and the sad thing about when he died was that he had just made two programmes out of a proposed 26 for the new Channel 4. I was fortunate enough to see those two shows, which have never been broadcast, and they were brilliant. Alexis knew everybody in music from Ray Charles to Mick Jagger, Jimmy Page to Dusty Spingfield. He didn't need to call in any favours, everybody agreed to be interviewed about the history of popular music. It was very sad when he died and as I said on the MB I still treasure the Christmas cards he sent me, one of them after I'd stopped working for him.
I agree it is sad when you know of somebody's plans and then they are gone. As Mags once told me, you must grab life while it's there.
Paul,
Funny you should mention Alexis Korner...I made a point of listening to that series and seem to remember listening to some of his radio shows but being as young as I was at the time probably paid less attention than I should've and...I now appreciate his importance to music.
He passed away approx 1 month before my Father(which I had not realised)
I loved his style of presentation and there was something about that voice...
Somebody reckoned that Alexis voice got deeper from all the smokey jazz and blues clubs. He put all his money back into music, didn't even own a car for years, his influence on British music is up there with anyone you can think of.
Post a Comment
<< Home