*Sterling Blythe was a gunslinger in western movies.
Lou Robbins — Admin/Editor | Airchecks
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Jason: I was so hoping I could find that Sterling Blythe record “Man From Seattle” (#45 on this KAYO Survey) somewhere on the internet. All I could find was photos of the 45, but no actual audio. I had never heard, or heard of, that recording. I did find a recording, “You Pick Up A Stranger”, by Sterling.
There are lots of memories on this June 1969 KAYO Survey … among them being my KMPS deejay friend Gary Vance, the epitome of a “Country deejay”!
Looking over those Country tunes from the Spring of ’69, I zeroed in on a Tom T. Hall song, sung by Bobby Bare … #25 “(Margie’s At The) Lincoln Park Inn”, which became a Top 5 Country Hit that year. Tom T. (still better known, at the time, as a songwriter than a recording artist – although he did have a hit with “Ballad Of Forty Dollars” in ’68) continues to ride the success of his 1968 Jeannie C. Riley crossover smash hit “Harper Valley PTA”. In “Lincoln Park Inn” the protagonist tells of regretting his cheatin’ with a woman named Margie, but for some reason he still has her phone number. Near the end of the song you’re left to wonder if he’s going out for cigarettes or….?
Here’s an interesting “live” version of Bobby doing that song. It’s not quite a match of his record, but it’s fun to see the “young” Bobby perform:
https://youtu.be/dSJtaG3idPM
Then here’s a version by the songwriter Tom T. Hall:
https://youtu.be/YuqtfuX9_P0
…and this abridged version by The Statler Brothers, on the Nashville Network, as part of a tribute to songwriter Hall:
https://youtu.be/4JELIQw5C3k
I was so thrilled when I turned on my radio one morning in 1963 and discovered that Seattle had a 24 hour country station! As a young child I had been a fan on KVI of Buck Richey and his Chuck Wagon Jamboree. Suddenly, I could listen to Western music whenever I had the desire!
It was a wonderful time in the era of radio!
Even KTVW 13 got into the Country swing of things. KTVW had the live performances of Chubby Howard and Grover Jackson as regulars. Much earlier, KTNT 11 was the home of the Buck Owens show, when Buck lived in the Tacoma area.