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Bruce Bradley RIP

I had always assumed he was back in St.Louis. Just thinking about Bruce recently. Did a very good midday for ' BZ.
Bruce apparently went from spinning "Olivia Newton Face," Pablo Cruz, Ambrosia to doing Conservative Talk in SL?
 
He did straight ahead talk on KMOX until he was let go in 1992; then he sort of seemed to get a bit out there, and had a show on the St Louis PBS TV station where he basically wigged out on the air, and nobody seemed to know his wherabouts after that until he passed within the last few days.

Blackroc said:
I had always assumed he was back in St.Louis. Just thinking about Bruce recently. Did a very good midday for ' BZ.
Bruce apparently went from spinning "Olivia Newton Face," Pablo Cruz, Ambrosia to doing Conservative Talk in SL?
Click to expand...
 
Blackroc said:
I had always assumed he was back in St.Louis. Just thinking about Bruce recently. Did a very good midday for ' BZ.
Bruce apparently went from spinning "Olivia Newton Face," Pablo Cruz, Ambrosia to doing Conservative Talk in SL?
Click to expand...

I remember him as the evening jock at 'BZ in the mid-'60s, doing the countdown show every week. DeSuze, Maynard, Dunn, Landry, Bradley, Summer -- that was the WBZ lineup of my childhood. Of course, like most others my age, I abandoned WBZ when WRKO, and later WBCN, started playing my kind of music. When did he switch to middays?
 
CTListener asked: said:
When did (Bruce Bradley) switch to middays?
Click to expand...

He didn't do mid-days at WBZ-1030 until he returned for a few years in the late 1970's/early 1980's. By then, WBZ was adult contemporary by day and talk by night.

When Jay Dunn left 'BZ in late 1967, Bradley was "promoted" from evenings to afternoon drive (Dick Summer at the same time was "promoted" from overnights to evenings), and stayed in that slot until he left 'BZ (and Boston) about a year later.

I believe this makes Summer, news anchor Gary LaPierre (who arrived in 1964), and sports anchor Gil Santos (who came aboard around 1966, IIRC) as the only members of the WBZ on-air team from the station's Top-40 heyday still around.

At this writing (2:45 P.M. EDT June 25th), I have yet to find anything about Bradley's death on the WBZ website, which is kind of odd, considering that he was one of the big "names" in 'BZ's history. If a Bostonian were to be asked "Name A WBZ Radio Announcer" during the 1960's, inevitably, they'd come up with three names: Carl DeSuze, Dave Maynard, and Bradley.

---------------------------------

One personal memory: In the late Fall of 1964, my parents bought me my first bicycle as an early Christmas present (so I can use it before the snow flew). A friend of my Dad drove my Dad, my kid brother, and I from Norwood to the old Child World in Dedham to buy the bike, since the friend had a convertible (the top was down although it was a cool, bordering on cold, evening). On the way back, it was just past 8 P.M., the convertible's radio was tuned into 'BZ, and I recall Bruce Bradley's show starting and his playing Marianne Faithful's "As Tears Go By" (which just came out; it would become a big hit a couple of months later). Despite it's sad lyrics, I've always loved that version of the song.

Back then, many adults who hated Top-40 rock 'n roll still listened to WBZ because of their top-notch and comprehensive news coverage.
 
Somewhere in the deepest recesses of my radio, I can hear the "Nutley Nutritional Alma Mater and Marching Song" playing softly.
Radio was good back then thanks to those like "Juicy Brucie Bradley the Beach Boy".

RIP Mr. Bradley
 
Fenway1912

Interesting side note. WBZ article in the Crimson written by Linda Greenhouse who retired in the last couple of years from a long stint as the New York Times Supreme Court reporter.
 
Joseph_Gallant said:
CTListener asked: said:
When did (Bruce Bradley) switch to middays?
Click to expand...

He didn't do mid-days at WBZ-1030 until he returned for a few years in the late 1970's/early 1980's. By then, WBZ was adult contemporary by day and talk by night.

When Jay Dunn left 'BZ in late 1967, Bradley was "promoted" from evenings to afternoon drive (Dick Summer at the same time was "promoted" from overnights to evenings), and stayed in that slot until he left 'BZ (and Boston) about a year later.

Back then, many adults who hated Top-40 rock 'n roll still listened to WBZ because of their top-notch and comprehensive news coverage.
Click to expand...

WBZ had an incredible ability to play plenty of good rock and roll and yet balance everything using personalities that were highly intelligent adults; with the rare ability to appeal to all demographics without alienating anyone!

WBZ sounds (personality-wise) exactly like it did 1n 1963. If somebody were to flash ahead in time from the early 60's and heard WBZ today, they wouldn't even be able to tell the difference until they realized the music was missing.

Bruce is one of the best!

-
 
Linda Greenhouse also had some connection to David Brudnoy, maybe a grad student at some point?

That was an interesting piece because I hadn't listened to BZ at that point. And a 11:30 -6 shift for Dick Summer must have been a killer.

When I first heard Bruce I think it was just prior to the start of the disco era. If I'm not mistaken he had replaced Larry Justice or maybe did the shift just before him.
 
iyiyi, I think you've offered a significant post. What you've said is something I've never really thought about --- I've always thought of WBZ during the '60s and early '70s as a Top 40 station, but its format was really "outside the box." WABC was somewhat similar in that its morning host for many years was Herb Oscar Anderson who, like Carl deSuze, was about as unlikely a rock 'n' roll DJ as one could imagine, yet (also like deSuze) was enormously popular. WABC, however, was otherwise decidedly in the Top 40 mold. 'BZ never really was. As you said, it appealed to kids and to adults, actually played quite a variety of music, and of course had Bob Kennedy's "Contact" in the evening and then the totally unique Dick Summer overnight show. All of this was combined with a news operation that rivaled --- if not exceeded --- those of the network O&Os in New York. (I'd love to know how many the 'BZ news department actually employed back then.)

And I agree --- despite the format change, despite the Westinghouse-to-CBS transition, in many respects the station still has much the same sound that it had 40-50 years ago --- and that ain't bad. It's as much a bona fide New England institution as clam chowder. CBS has been very smart to leave it pretty much alone and not make it a clone of anything else.
 
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