Bob Fass: From Midnight To Exhaustion

One night in early 1966, I fell asleep as usual with my radio on...

Bob Fass was a true radio genius.  He was on WBAI in NYC, a listener sponsored network.  His show ran from midnight to exhaustion which meant whenever he felt like signing off he did.  He would never announce a song, but somehow you knew what he played.  It was true late night radio and he would do these incredible sound collages.  I listened to him from sometime in 1965 until I moved back to Philly religiously.  He would for instance during the height of Vietnam play a Johnson speech and during it you'd hear bombs dropping, storm troopers marching and so on.  Virtually every musician around at the time with the exception of the Stones and the Beatles and the Kinks appeared on his show.  You never knew what was going to happen until you tuned in. 

One night in early 1966, I fell asleep as usual with my radio on.  It was during mi…