"Invisible Record Archive" says:

I'm a sucker for old radio broadcasts - the ads, the news, the cheesy hyperbolic DJ's. We lost a lot when we lost AM radio.

It shouldn't be much of a surprise why it's gone pretty well completely to talk format: poor fidelity, increasing % of time devoted to ads, increasing movement of music tastes into niches, increasing reliance on visual image to sell the top 40, etc. But even into the mid-70's in most of America, AM was king.

In Philly, that meant Sonny Hopson, at least if you liked soul music. This summer of '69 show hits a lot of the best soul of the day. In fact, it's kind of surprising how much of this is pretty local or obscure. Sonny had his own way with the dials, fading songs half way out, singing along - but's that's some of the charm.

This broadcast is also from a moment where you can sort of feel the black power and anti-war movements creeping toward the mainstream. A few of the songs go in that direction.

So let's travel back to the summer of '69. Man is going to walk on the moon, Grant Jackson is pitching for the Phils, there's a sale on suits, it's got to be a soul party.

Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.