You Say it's Your Birthday! Ringo Starr celebrates his 70th birthday today July 7th 2010!

It was 25 years ago this month, when Robert Plant was in Dallas rehearsing for his “Shaken ‘n’ Stirred” Tour, that kicked off later in the month in Vancouver. The ZOO had the "Plant Patrol" out to see if anybody could spot Robert around town. Contest winners got to come to the Las Calinas ZOO studios to see Robert do a live broadcast of "Rockline".

KZEW-Robert Plant 06-03-85 RockIine clip

After the Rockline show, members of the ZOO crew including Rob Barnett, Charley Jones, Tempie Lindsey and Chris Taylor got to sit down and talk to Robert. Before the interview Robert mentions that one of the ZOO DJs had been calling him "Bob" all week on the radio and that he hates being called Bob. It turns out that it was Chris Taylor, who was out of ear shot of Robert's comment. Later in the interview Chris calls him Bob and Robert calls him on it. The interview was presented to ZOO listeners later in the month by Tempie Lindsey during the afternoon drive the day Robert returned to Dallas for his Reunion Arena show. Of the many hours of ZOO tapes, this is one of those gems. I'm proud to bring you what has lovingly become known as the Robert Plant "don't call me Bob" interview.

KZEW-Robert Plant 06-03 Interview - aired 06-24-85

Later that evening, Tempie covers the concert from the ZOO booth high atop Reunion Arena with help from Doc Morgan back at the ZOO studio.

KZEW-Robert Plant 06-24-85 Concert Coverage

Three weeks later, the world got to see the long awaited Led Zeppelin reunion at Live Aid - July 13, 1985.

Rock In Peace...

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Ronnie James Dio performed at the 1986 Texxas Jam, along with Van Halen, Loverboy, Krokus, Keel and Bachmann Turner Overdrive. Pulled from the KZEW archives and the upcoming Texxas Jam pages, here's some rare Ronnie James Dio which aired on the ZOO July 19, 1986. This audio also features George Gimarc working a rare Saturday midday timeslot.

KZEW-Texxas Jam '86 concert coverage 07-19-86

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Be sure to check out the new book by ex-ZOO Disc Jockey Bob Shannon,"Turn It Up! American Radio Tales 1946-1996". It tells the story of 58 of the top radio legends in the business for the fifty year period post World War II.

Bob Shannon was only with the ZOO a short time in 1977, but has remained close friends with ex-boss Ira Lipson to this day. In this audio excerpt from the book, with introduction by Ira himself, Bob tells the story about the day at the ZOO when the news came in that Elvis had died.

Elvis, Sam and Dewey

Don't forget to check out www.americanradiotales.com for more podcasts from the book, including a couple, voiced by ex-ZOO Ira Lipson and Charlie Kendall.

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Jody Seay, the former ZOO Continuity Director, and later the Promotion Coordinator 1974-1979, now hosts "Back Page", a television show about Oregon writers. She invites Bob Shannon to come on her show to talk about his book. They also talk about their days at the ZOO.

We are celebrating the 36th anniversary of the ZOO this coming Friday with the debut of Chapter 5 - ZOO Year 1974. Our apologies for the long delay of this chapter, but it's been a busy year. We hope to get content posted in a more timely manner in the future. Stay tuned, we have a ton of ZOO Propaganda coming.
Zookeeper

Joe Perry of Aerosmith is recovering at home after a recent emergency knee surgery to correct unforeseen complications that resulted from a previous surgery on the same knee last year. Perry had a complete knee replacement done in March of 2008. The new knee was needed after a degenerative condition developed starting with a stage-fall during a concert in Dallas 23 years ago this week. KZEW's Jon Dillon even mentioned Perry's fall on the air that night, but said Joe had only sprained his ankle, according to the KZEW archives.

I dug up this audio after reading the Dallas mention on the official Aerosmith site and various news sites.

02-20-86-KZEW-Aerosmith Concert Promo

02-20-86-KZEW-Tom Hamilton Station Liner

02-20-86-KZEW-Jon Dillon-Aerosmith Concert Replay

Next, the AEROSMITH guitarist will soon head into the studio with his band-mates to record a much-anticipated new album, for which there are already a “few cool new bits and pieces” in the works, says JOE. And getting back on the road—in late spring/early summer--is very much on his mind: “The last two tours I was in an extreme amount of pain, and it took everything I had to give you the show I know you deserved,” says JOE, who adds: “I am looking forward to playing shows without any pain in my knee for the first time in three years.” For JOE, the train keeps a rollin’ indeed.

It was Groundhog Day 1984 at about 6:30am when I dragged myself out of bed. Back in those days, I wasn't much of a early bird, but it was my birthday and I didn't want to miss a minute of it. After all it was a milestone, my twenty-fifth. I gazed over at the glowing blue dial of my Marantz and could hear the faint KZEW elephant trumpet at low volume. I reached over to turn it up, I realized that LaBella and Rody was on. Being an night-owl, it was a rare occasion to catch the ZOO's morning team. I quickly popped in a cassette and hit record. I soon hear John LaBella and Mike Rhyner, but no John Rody. Rody was famous for being late. I continue to record, not knowing this very recording would go out over the DFW airwaves once again nearly 25 years later.

I came to this realization last month when I happened across a post on the TheUnTicket.com, a fan site for The Ticket Sportsradio 1310am/104.1fm Dallas-Ft.Worth. It seems that this recording had found it way to The Ticket and Mike Rhyner's co-workers put it on the air to rag on Mike about his FM radio style back in his ZOO days.

Not really ZOO related, but besides looking for an excuse to test the audio player, I thought this was an interesting story. Last week, DJ Gregg Stepp of Jacksonville Florida's Rock 105-FM, after learning he is about to be fired, tells off management and walks off while on the air.