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24 chapter The Payola Scandal and Changing Times Cast of Characters Henry Stone, Tone Distributors and TK Records Ahmet Ertegun, Atlantic Records Harold B. Lipsius, Jamie-Guyden Records Alan Bubis, Tennessee-Republic and Hit Records Stan Lewis, Stan’s Record Shop Fred Foster, Monument Records Irv Lichtman, Cash Box and Billboard Donn Fileti, Relic Records Shelby Singleton, Mercury and SSS International– Sun Records Jerry Wexler, Atlantic Records also featuring Alan Freed, disc jockey All hell broke loose at that never-to-be-forgotten 1959 Miami disc jockey convention, held May 28–31 and sponsored by chain broadcaster Storz Radio headed by Todd Storz. Laboring under the name of the Second Annual International Radio Programming Seminar and Pop Music Disk Jockey Convention, everybody seemed to be there. It was as if the indie record men and women were having a last hurrah with their radio brethren. The new order, which had only just been constituted, was about to be overturned irrevocably. Stop the presses! With a dateline of May 31, the Miami News carried a front-page story with the now-classic headline “For Deejays: Babes, Bribes and Booze,” accompanied by the subhead “Diskers Act Like Tin Gods.” The sensational news feature by Haines Colbert read like an end-of-term report for the independent record industry, inter alia: The disc jockeys, here from cities throughout the United States and Canada, were given the greatest buttering-up since Nero was i-xvi_1-592_Brov.indd 454 11/19/09 10:45:14 AM the payola scandal and changing times 455 persuaded he was a fiddle virtuoso. There were expensive prizes, free liquor around the clock in at least 20 suites and girls, imported and domestic. And there was constant praise for the apparently unbelievable talent required to put a record on a turntable, play it and sell it to all those wonderful people out there in radioland. Promotion men and disc jockeys agreed that the strange industry in which they are chained together is plagued by too many companies and too many records—most of the records being hard on the ears. “There are about 2,000 record companies,” explained a spokesman for one of the major companies, “and all of them send all their releases to every disc jockey. The only possible way to get them on the air is by giving the jockey personal attention. And that means giving him whatever he wants.” The Miami News piece, also notable for the anonymity of the interviewees, confirmed the accumulative, overarching reach of the disc jockey in a music business suffering from excess product, excess competition, excess everything. Here was a terrible public relations disaster for an industry that needed to project a wholesome image, particularly among the teenagers and parents. Something had to be done about the “lousy situation,” as described in the Miami story, and Congress duly obliged after looking for answers to the $64,000 question in the TV quiz–rigging scandal. And so began the “payola” hearings, chaired by Representative Oren Harris of the Special Subcommittee on Legislative Oversight, which targeted the independents’ cartel—and in a way, the music that was being championed. With Alan Freed seen as the prime suspect, the “inventor” of rock ’n’ roll was axed summarily from his jobs at Radio WABC and at WNEW-TV. On November 25, 1959, a big, bold New York Post headline that would have done justice to a declaration of war blazoned: “Alan Freed Telling All About Payola House Problems: Drops TV Shows.” The covering front page story, by Earl Wilson, emphasized just how widespread Freed’s business web had become: The Harris subcommittee investigators started questioning him very soon after he was fired and they also interrogated Johnny Brantley, talent coordinator of Freed’s show, and Jack Hook[e], a former associate and onetime booking agent for his dance shows. . . . They inquired about Freed’s knowledge of disc jockey involvements in other enterprises, such as record companies, record-pressing companies, record distributorships , talent agencies, “ownership” of singers, record shops and all the varied phases of payola which are now being revealed to the public. . . . He was also interrogated about his rival network star Dick Clark but “I merely answered some of their questions about him.” Perhaps out of self-preservation, Alan Freed was careful not to implicate others in his tight New York network. In a farewell speech on the WNEW-TV Big Beat dance show on Friday, November 27, Freed—wearing that trademark plaid jacket...

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