Favoriting Mid-Valley Mutations with Austin Rich: Playlist from May 5, 2025 Favoriting

austinrich's avatar View austinrich's profile Favoriting

A combination of collage, new experimental records and other bits and bobs, Mid-Valley Mutations is a tour through the mind of Austin Rich, who has been broadcasting in some form since 1998. Heavily influenced by Dr Demento, Don Joyce and old fashioned College Radio, Austin creates Audio Essays on a variety of subjects, and even just plays records, from time to time. Sometimes Live music and Interviews will grace the program, helping create a situation where you don't really know what you're going to hear, when you tune in. What you need to know is when you enter the Mid-Valley region, be prepared for the Musical Mutations... in whatever form they take.

Tuesday 9pm - Midnight (EDT) | On WFMU's Sheena's Jungle Room
Sheena's Jungle Room LIVE Audio Streams (Get help):   Pop-up  |  128k MP3

<-- Previous playlist | Back to Mid-Valley Mutations with Austin Rich playlists | Next playlist -->


Favoriting May 5, 2025: Word Jazz w/ Ken Nordine (A "Cheek-In-Tongues," "Fill-In-Shows," Installment)

Listen to this show: MP3 - 128K | Pop-up listen Pop-up player!

Playlist image Favoriting

Artist Track Album Images Approx. start time
Ken Nordine  Episode 1   Favoriting Word Jazz 
Favoriting
0:00:00 (MP3 | Pop-up)
Ken Nordine  Episode 2   Favoriting Word Jazz 
Favoriting
0:34:14 (MP3 | Pop-up)


<-- Previous playlist | Back to Mid-Valley Mutations with Austin Rich playlists | Next playlist -->

RSS feeds for Mid-Valley Mutations with Austin Rich: RSSPlaylists feed | RSSMP3 archives feed

| E-mail Austin Rich | Other WFMU Playlists | All artists played by Mid-Valley Mutations with Austin Rich |

Listen on the Internet | Contact Us | Music & Programs | WFMU Home Page | Support Us | FAQ

Live Audio Streams for Sheena's Jungle Room: Pop-up | 128k MP3    (More streams: [+])


Listener comments!

Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 7:06pm
Austin Rich:

Good Hello.
Avatar 7:58pm
Imaginos:

Ahoy!
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 7:59pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Imaginos @7:58
Lovely to see you tonight. I'm starting a tad early tonight...
Avatar 7:59pm
Imaginos:

↳ Austin Rich @7:59
So it would seem. Looking forward to a cool Austinthon tonight
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:04pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Imaginos @7:59
Heck yeah! Never hurts to have a fan or two...
Avatar 8:04pm
Imaginos:

Tonight's treat is a bowl of cool whip with malt ovaltine sprinkled on it
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:05pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Imaginos @8:04
Hmmmm. I've never had that. I bet that's pretty good...
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:05pm
Aitch:

Austin Tongues?
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:06pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Aitch @8:05
Fill In Tongues...
  8:06pm
red_door_what_for in ypsilanti:

hiya gang!! ken nordine!!
Avatar 8:07pm
laurapanic:

excellente
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:07pm
Austin Rich:

↳ red_door_what_for in ypsilanti @8:06
red_door! Lovely to see you.

And: who doesn't love a Nudge of Nordine...
Avatar 8:08pm
Imaginos:

↳ Austin Rich @8:07
He seems cool to me
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:08pm
Austin Rich:

↳ laurapanic @8:07
laurapanic! Everyone: straighten up! Knock off all that horseplay.
Avatar 8:09pm
laurapanic:

↳ Austin Rich @8:08
Yes, for I am stern.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:09pm
GorillaFella:

Wow double AR tonight what a treat! Hope Barno is doing well!
Avatar 8:09pm
laurapanic:

OK I've not come across word jazz before but it all is making perfect senses
Avatar 8:09pm
Imaginos:

↳ Austin Rich @8:08
horse play? From a bungo pony? Naaah
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:10pm
Austin Rich:

I recall hearing these on NPR periodically, when I was younger, but that was in the 80's / 90's. and I remember it being hard to find consistently at a specific time. (At least in The Mid-Valley, but maybe it was different in bigger cities?) He was mostly known to me as a voice on TV / Radio commercials, but at some point in the late 90's I heard a bit more, late night on the college station. It probably wasn't until the mid-2000's that I found CDs of his work, and could actually sort of analyze it...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:10pm
Austin Rich:

↳ GorillaFella @8:09
I think he's fine, but I got a message that he would be in-transit, and couldn't do a show. So I decided to step up.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:11pm
Austin Rich:

↳ laurapanic @8:09
Ken Nordine started doing "Beat" poetry over jazz music in the early 50's, and was a radio voice actor starting in the late 40's. But he constantly changed his style to evolve with the times. I love his style.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:12pm
Austin Rich:

↳ laurapanic @8:09
(I have to admit: I'm probably the source of most of the horseplay. I like to get up to a "good time" now and then, which always seems to lead to trouble...)
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:12pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Imaginos @8:09
It always pops up in the place you least expect it.
Avatar 8:13pm
laurapanic:

bump. grind.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:13pm
WR:

Late again and didn't even know what I am late for. Have not seen that photo of Ken Nordine before. Hello Austin and folks.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:14pm
GorillaFella:

↳ Austin Rich @8:10
Awesome, well thanks for stepping up! Always love it here in the Midvalley :)
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:14pm
Austin Rich:

↳ WR @8:13
WR! The party just gets better and better...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:15pm
Austin Rich:

↳ laurapanic @8:13
Yeah, I was wondering about that, if that's his typically odd wordplay, or if we could "date" this show from that phrase. I was trying to find a date on when this show first aired, but the Googles, They Do Nothing...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:17pm
Austin Rich:

Ken collaborated often, was not afraid to work with artists young and old, and really tried to find new ways to paint images with words, the more abstract the better. There's an album where he banters back and forth with Tom Waits, and another where he reads Edgar Allen Poe.

Ken was a great personality, and was wonderfully odd.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:19pm
Austin Rich:

↳ GorillaFella @8:14
I never mind filling in when I can. There's no end to things I'd love to listen to with ya'll...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:22pm
Austin Rich:

Unlike a lot of people his age, Ken was early to adopt computer technology, not just in recording, but in building websites / selling his work to fans through the web.

He only passed in 2019, at age 98. He seemed sharp, even into old age.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:28pm
Austin Rich:

"On Cable Television." I think Cable TV was available in the 70's, so these radio show were probably recorded after that, at least...
  8:29pm
wenzo:

Howdee AR
  8:34pm
wenzo:

I feel that!
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:34pm
Austin Rich:

"Stare with you EARS."

I want that on a T-Shirt...
Avatar 8:35pm
Imaginos:

↳ Austin Rich @8:34
It would be a cool shirt
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:37pm
Austin Rich:

This tape-recorder bit feels like it is inspired by the famous William S. Burroughs bit, about how to make collages. It's like Ken needed to address the nature of these recordings being on manipulatable tape, the way Burroughs wanted to address the way the printed word was manipulatable...
Avatar 8:38pm
Bri The Beatnik:

Reminds me of Max Headroom and that Loveage album
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:38pm
Austin Rich:

I'm sure there's a good college dissertation one could write, about the way that Ken talks to himself in these recordings.
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:39pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Song: "Episode 2" by "Ken Nordine"
Ken Nordine is always welcome.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:39pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:38
Oh, damn! I haven't thought about that Lovage album in a while I used to listen to that all the time back in the day...
Avatar 8:39pm
Imaginos:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:38
Dream thieves?
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:40pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:39
Always. I just found the "Son of Word Jazz" LP on vinyl the other day, a nice addition to the archives...
Avatar 8:41pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Imaginos @8:39
I was thinking the album Music to make love to your old lady by
Avatar 8:42pm
Imaginos:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:41
I forgot about that one.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:42pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:39
Maybe you know the answer: I was trying to find more info on when these were originally broadcast. Do you have any memories...?
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:43pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:41
You actually stumbled onto two members of the Max Headroom fanclub: Imaginos and myself. I even host on podcast on the subject...
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:43pm
Webhamster Henry:

I remember hearing them on WNYC, it was a regular show.
Avatar 8:43pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Austin Rich @8:43
Super cool!
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:43pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:43
Yeah. I would catch it on NPR. Maybe the late 80's / early 90's?
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:44pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Austin Rich @8:43
Wiki sez: Nordine hosted the weekly Word Jazz program on WBEZ, also carried on other stations, from the 1970s for over forty years.[10]
Avatar 8:45pm
Imaginos:

The fly guy reminds me of The Willies
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:46pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:44
Hmmmmmmm. Interesting... these might be a little older than I originally thought.
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:46pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:44
I knew I met him one, probably related to the release of "Transparent Mask" on Asphodel records, I was/am friends with that label.
Avatar 8:46pm
Bri The Beatnik:

I have that same issue about this show I used go listen to on the radio as a kid, some people say it was on until the 90s but I remeber it way into the 2000s, I have no idea when it ended, but I know it was a couple years before the Dj died, but I can find no information of when it ended.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:47pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:46
That's the first album I bought, where I got to know his work. I remember thinking it was both stranger and more accessible than I realized.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:48pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:46
it's funny how little information is available about shows and DJs on the radio. It's not like TV shows, which seem to have been EXHAUSTIVELY researched.
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:48pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Austin Rich @8:47
Did you ever see the Nordine voiced rotoscoped psychedelic Levi's ads or are you too young?
Avatar 8:48pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Austin Rich @8:48
This is so true!
  8:49pm
Uncle Monk:

Toward the bottom this blog post says the NPR series began in the 80s and was 65 commissioned episodes. Also has a screenshot of the Levis ad. patrickmurfin.blogspot.com...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:49pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:48
I didn't see it first time it was on, but I saw it on PBS, when I caught some Nordine retrospetive on night. I wish there had been more TV like that when I was growing up...
Avatar 8:50pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Austin Rich @8:48
I think this might be due to radio being mostly a live event, I mean, thank FMU for archives, but most stations are lucky if they can find airchecks or tapes that people make available
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:50pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Uncle Monk @8:49
I thought I had read that somewhere. Maybe it was on this blog!

Thanks for listening!
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:51pm
Austin Rich:

Whoops... looks like the stream reset for a second. Sorry about that!
  8:51pm
Uncle Monk:

A kind soul has uploaded 89 episodes of Word Jazz to the Internet Archive archive.org...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:51pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Uncle Monk @8:51
Yeah, that's where I got mine. archive.org is the best!
Avatar 8:52pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Austin Rich @8:51
Love Archive.org!
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:52pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:50
Radio - well we listeners to Dimestore Radio have a bit of an idea what live-on-the-air was like. Listening to ads from the 70s and early 80s shows a very different media ecosystem.
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:52pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:52
I actually send them money!
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:52pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:50
Absolutely. It's usually up to fans, when it comes to radio archiving and indexing. The stations just don't know how to keep up!
  8:52pm
Uncle Monk:

↳ Austin Rich @8:50
Thanks for playing this! I've never heard of Ken Nordine before and I'm loving it. Reminds me of having insomnia in high school and discovering Joe Frank way past midnight on WVKR.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:52pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:52
It's the source of so much of my daily listening.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:53pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:52
I should start doing that. It's a REALLY good cause.
Avatar 8:53pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:52
That’s great! One of thee best resources, I adore their open library too!
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:53pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Uncle Monk @8:52
I need to play Joe Frank some night. I've only head a little, but it is typically wonderful and strange.
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:54pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Austin Rich @8:53
I actualy put Joe Frank on the World Wide Web, right here on this website:wfmu.org...
Avatar 8:55pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:52
Super cool, I study a lot of radio, so I listen once in a while to airchecks, commercials were a lot more interesting before it was all “sports-betting0 and big corporations, I mostly listen to non-commercial radio these days
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:55pm
Austin Rich:

While this is fairly dense, in terms of voices and wordplay, his albums can be a little more stripped down, where he tells one story, or one "poem," or whatever. His albums are pretty great, too. I recommend!
  8:56pm
Uncle Monk:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:54
Whoa.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:56pm
Austin Rich:

I'm gonna let this finish. I hope the Dimestore Radio Theater host doesn't get mad at me...
Avatar 8:56pm
laurapanic:

been away for a sec, but I'd marry the Internet Archive if you let me.
Avatar 8:57pm
laurapanic:

↳ Austin Rich @8:56
its OK I'm in with them, I'll sort it out for you
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:57pm
Austin Rich:

Some part of me wonders if this was therapy for Ken? This sounds so relieving to me...
Avatar Swag For Life Member 8:57pm
Webhamster Henry:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:55
I listen to a heckuvalaotta CBS Radio Mystery Theatre - which often has ads and news and weather in it from the 70s and 80s! As well as lots of E.G. Marshall, Fred Gwynne, Norman Rose, and other great voices: cbsrmt.com
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:57pm
Austin Rich:

↳ laurapanic @8:57
THANKS!
Avatar 8:57pm
Imaginos:

↳ Austin Rich @8:56
Oh dear me
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:58pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:57
YES! I do love that show.
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:58pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:57
Norman Rose! "The Voice of God!"
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:58pm
WR:

↳ Uncle Monk @8:51
I first heard Nordine on the radio in 1970 on KSAN in the San Francisco bay area. Around the same time Blue Thumb records released a comp drawn from his late 50s early sixties Word Jazz records. After that I kept an eye out for anything by him.

These segments made for NPR in the 80s are great. I found them on archive dot org a couple years ago but haven't put in the time to listen. Hearing these definitely nudges me to continue listening to the series.
Avatar 8:58pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Webhamster Henry @8:57
Super cool! I always thought it was fun to catch “golden age of radio” on shortwave when I was a kid, I miss my shortwave!
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:58pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Imaginos @8:57
"I gots a million of them..."
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 8:59pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:58
"Every kid needs a Shortwave!"

Let's get that on a t-shirt!
Avatar 8:59pm
Bri The Beatnik:

↳ Austin Rich @8:59
Yes please!
  9:00pm
Uncle Monk:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:55
You might know about this but the Death Is Not The End label in addition to music puts out comps of pirate radio recordings deathisnot.bandcamp.com...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 9:00pm
Austin Rich:

↳ WR @8:58
I love hearing stories like this. I should make a radio show of people remembering how they encountered radio...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 9:00pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Uncle Monk @9:00
OH! Bookmarking for later...
Avatar 🎸 Swag For Life Member 9:01pm
Austin Rich:

↳ Bri The Beatnik @8:59
I had shortwave as a kid. Damn it was cool...
Bottom
Comment!
Name
Email
(C) 2025 WFMU. Generated by KenzoDB, written 2000-2025 by Ken Garson