Here are a couple of original tunes from 1979 when Gary Storm invited Parousia to play live on the air for the “Oil Of Dog” late night radio show, WBFO the University of Buffalo (U.B.) radio station.
WBFO played mostly jazz during the day, as far as I recall, but late at night they let Gary play all kinds of weird, often obscure, great music that you would be hard pressed to discover otherwise. Long live progressive rock.
In that spirit, he decided to let a bunch of ambitious unknown Buffalo kids invade his studio late one Friday night in the summer of 1979, and the tunes you can hear above are an example of what that led to. I remember it was quite cramped in that radio studio for a seven piece band to set up and play in, back in the days before digital sound when you had to actually bring every instrument you needed to get the sounds you wanted. We were so smooshed together you can hear our vocal microphones feeding back into one another, especially during the song, ‘Cotton Holiday’.
Gary moved on to a few other Buffalo stations in his career, but his ‘Oil of Dog’ stint at WBFO made him legendary in my opinion, he expanded many a mind with music alone (you had to provide your own drugs)! Thanks for the opportunity, Gary Storm!
Check out Gary’s dissertation (you’re still a little out there, Gary) at http://www.OilOfDog.com – – it’s pretty cool if you are a music geek like me.
Gary Storm with AC/DC Angus Young & Bon Scott
Gary Storm Hanging With The Ramones
Debbie Katz, Gary Storm, Debbie Harry, and Christ Stein of Blondie
Eric Bloom of Blue Oyster Cult with Gary Storm & Scott Field
Parousia 1979 with close personal friend Gary Storm host of the ‘Oil of Dog’ radio show
Gary Storm with the Romantics
Nick Lowe and Gary Storm
Gary Storm and Dave Edmunds
Gary Storm and Keith Emerson of E.L.P. (Emerson, Lake and.Palmer)
Buffalo’s Own Spyro Gyra with Radio Icon Gary Storm
Gary Storm with jazz/hard rock/progressive/psychedelic band ‘Spirit’
Wizard Radio T-shirt Logo
Gary Storm – A True Patriot!
ANGEL LYRICS (an exercise in cliches):
The first day I saw you
We seemed so far apart
From that first day I knew that
I’d love you from the start
I met you on that boardwalk
With your friends and you and I
From that first day I prayed we’d talk
Or else I think I’d die
(chorus)
Angel
You’re my only love
My strength, and my desire
I think of you
As all above
You are my burning fire
We saw each other every day
And everything was fine
The only thing that I could say
Was Angel you are mine
But then it happened on that rainy day
We seemed to drift apart
The only thing that I could say
Was Angel you’re breaking my heart
(chorus)
Angel
You’re my only love
My strength, and my desire
I think of you
As all above
You are my burning fire
(bridge)
I wrote this song
With all my heart
I wanted you to know
I never want to be apart
Angel I love you so…
(instrumental break)
We didn’t speak for half a year
And I didn’t know what to do
I just want everybody to hear
That I was thinking about you
Now we’re back together
Said my baby’s come back to me
Now she’s back for an encore
And everybody’s gonna see
(chorus)
Angel
You’re my only love
My strength, and my desire
I think of you
As all above
You are my burning fire
COTTON HOLIDAY LYRICS:
Venting love above the stormy skies
Crystal mirrors of your lovely eyes
Flying high on top of dark blue clouds
The winds carry us two far from the crowds
We are on a Cotton Holiday
Nothing in the world is in our way
Music softly fills the cool night air
Bright light shining off your golden hair
Time has ended on our pearly flight
Gliding through the stars far out of sight
Neon hits the sparks ignite
All on our Holiday
Silver ships push on with might
Sailing along the way
We’re flying to a crusading fight
All on our Holiday
It’s a quest above the morning light
Sailing along the way
Venting love above the stormy skies
Crystal mirrors of your lovely eyes
Time has ended on our pearly flight
Gliding through the stars far out of sight
It was quite an honor and a lot of fun to play in the studio on WBFO and Gary Storm’s Live Radio Show. I remember that we brought a small entourage with us including our lighting technician Lenny Krucenski and a few friends. Our sound engineer Gregg Filippone elected to stay home and record the show for us on reel to reel tape.
This was going to be the beginning of a long day for Parousia… The WBFO Oil of Dog radio show didn’t start until 3 am and at 10 pm that same night we had another gig at a local Irish pub called “Tell it to McGinty’s” on Seneca Street near Fillmore.
The live radio broadcast went very well considering the WBFO sound engineer was not familiar with our more complex material. Our band had four vocalists, a full drum kit, a bassist, two guitarists, multiple keyboards, a flute, xylephone and harmonica… that presented a unique challenge to mix all those instruments together the right way especially when hearing our songs for the first time. So, we had a few feedback problems throughout the night but all in all, it was one of our top-ten Parousia moments.
This live broadcast gave our band a terrific boost in our overall ‘street cred’ among our audience and piers. It was Parousia’s golden opportunity to broadcast our original songs over the airwaves directly into the ears of a massive college listening audience… on one of the hippest radio shows in town no less!
We posted two original Parousia songs from this live event, “Cotton Holiday” written by Pat Connolly and “Angel” written by Garth Huels. Enjoy!
FYI: In addition to DJ, Gary Storm was a musician and had his own band called, ‘Extra Cheese’.
See an official promo picture of ‘Extra Cheese’ here: https://parousiabuff.com/shows/parousia-live-at-mcvans-1980
Playing/recording on Gary Storm’s “Oil of Dog Show” live on WBFO at UB is probably one of the most fondest experiences I’ll never forget. Our former lead guitarist (Garth) was correct in stating that it was quite a challenge fitting our 7 piece band in his smaller but well equipped studio. It was a little cramped; but fun as all “get go.” I really felt that at that specific point; our band reached a crossroads in our career paths and Gary’s show helped to propel us to the next level of our musical evolution. Gary was such a very patient, supportive, easy going guy when it came to setting our band up to be recorded. It was a real pleasure to know and work with him. God speed to you Gary; wherever you are today; whether your still with us or not. Take care all you rock and roll pilgrims in rock pilgrim land!
Barry from Parousia!
Check out the picture of Gary Storm with Spyro Gyra. I remember listening to Spyro Gyra while standing outside the Odyssey club in Riverside, (I was too young to get in) and hearing these guys jam. I knew the drummer Ted Reinhardt (formerly from the progressive rock group “Rodan” that featured a rock violinist). Ted was and is one hell of a drummer.
Spyro Gyra Facts:
Spyro Gyra American jazz fusion band that was originally formed in the mid-1970s in Buffalo, New York. Popular singles include “Shaker Song” and “Morning Dance” (1979). Spyro Gyra’s early musical influence was an experimental jazz group called ‘Weather Report’. Their first album is aptly named ‘Spyro Gyra’, and was self-released in late 1977. The band’s local rep was strong enough to elicit local airplay, in Buffalo, Cleveland and Rochester. That’s when the band self-financed a pressing of 500 albums and started selling them out of the trunk of their car. Then the band put together a commercial for a local TV station and started selling more and more. Not long after that, their album attracted the attention of locally-based Amherst Records, who re-released the first album with new artwork. The Spyro Gyra debut album was one of Billboard’s Top 40 Jazz Albums of 1978.
Lesser known fact: The band’s name is a misspelling of Spirogyra, a genus of green algae… weird!
I’m sure I’ve heard this music, but what caught my attention was the “Oil of Dog” reference / Gary Storm … I’ve always had this feeling that I went to church school on Sundays with him … Early grade school years …
Great songs but also great vocals
“Cotton Holiday” represents the band’s first original song to be heard on the airwaves, immortalized on July 6, 1979 from Gary Storm’s “Oil OF Dog” radio-show, based out of the University of Buffalo, WBFO.
Music and lyrics by Patt Connolly (lead vocalist/flutist) and like all Parousia songs, “Cotton Holiday” took on a life of its own once each member of the band assumed control of their individual part to develop new variations. It was a bold move to attempt “Cotton Holiday” live on the air, a complex progressive-rock epic that utilized every instrument the band owned at the time, plus intricate harmony vocals.
The song is nine-minutes and fifteen seconds in length and has five distinct parts, each with its own unique tempo and time-signature. The WBFO house sound-engineer was pushed to his limit trying to get a good mix (with no feed-back) from a seven-piece rock band crammed into a room the size of a closet with over a dozen live microphones.
It was an honor to perform on Gary Storm’s “Oil OF Dog” radio show and to appear alongside great talent like Nick Lowe, Dave Edmunds, Spyro Gyra, Blondie, The Romantics, Blue Oyster Cult & Angus Yong and Bon Scott from AC/DC.
“Angel” the second song from the late-night ‘Oil of Dog’ Radio is show, written by Garth Huels when he was just a teenager. When Garth presented “Angel” to the band in 1979, the song had a spot for each musician to play their piece and it developed nicely into an AOR pop song.
Much like Patt’s “Cotton Holiday”, Garth’s “Angel” is one of the first ‘band songs” where all seven of us had the opportunity to contribute to what was already written, sometimes finding a new direction and then the song took on a life of its own, aside from what the writer originally envisioned.
“Angel” is the second Parousia song broadcast over the airwaves, all thanks to Gary Storm the host of the WBFO studio at the University Of Buffalo.
Not long after the show, someone from U.B. heard our music and invited the band to perform live on stage at the Katharine Cornell Theater, an intimate 388 seat venue with excellent lighting and sound.
Hey, Parousia. Thank you for posting this ancient broadcast. I love being photoshopped into the same room with all of you. Hilarious! Oil of Dog is still on the air. I am on public radio KSFR and on streaming Canadian radio LKCB. Thanks for your great music!
I just stumbled across this. I used to listen to the Oil of Dog show on WUWU back in the ’70s. I loved it. Very different times. This brings back a lot of memories. I have a reel to reel recording of Frank Zappa’s interview. I haven’t listened to it since then. Someday I’ll have to get another reel to reel and listen to it