Your PopCulteer is neck-deep in paying work at the moment, so we’re presenting a special episode of RFC this week that isn’t too labor-intensive. You can listen to The AIR at the website, or on the embedded radio player at the top of the right-hand column of this blog.

This week I have repackaged three of the latter-day, one-hour episodes of Radio Free Charleston Volume Four into one three-hour powerhouse episode of RFC V5. These shows, which aired in August and October, 2019, all feature live recordings of bands that were made for the RFC video show between 2009 and 2012. They’ve been off the servers for well over a year, but if you want to be picky about it, there are video versions of these shows floating around YouTube, thanks to a brief experiment with posting the radio programs there.

With all of our other music specialty shows in reruns today, I wanted to give you something new-ish. Tune in at 10 AM and 10 PM for this collection of live, local music.

Hour one brings you audio taken from raw video of two bands, Ovada and Mother Nang. recorded live at The Empty Glass in Charleston, WV.

Ovada was recorded in May, 2009, while Mother Nang was recorded one year later, in May, 2010. This is raw audio taken from one camera angle that we shot for the RFC video show. These files were thought lost in a hard drive crash years ago, but we recentl;y discovered a treasure trove of them tucked away on a backup disc. Much of this music has not been heard since it was recorded.

The audio quality is a little rough, and I left in the between-song banter, to give you an idea of what it was like to actually be there.

Mother Nang, of course, is Spencer Elliott, Brian Young, Jay Lukens and Deron Sodaro, and while they don’t perform together regularly these days, they remain friends and a reunion is always possible.  Ovada, on the other hand was led by the late Joseph Hale. When we recorded them, Joseph as billing himself as “Joseph Hellmouth,” and he was backed up by our old friend John Radcliff, plus Joe Rita and Cliff Boyd. It’s cool to help keep Joseph’s music alive.

Hour two is the first half of a pair of episodes devoted to a 2012 concert, put on by Wood Boys Music. This hour goes back into our video vaults for the first of two hours that bring you highlights of the Tribute To The Troops II show, held at Saint Albans City Park back in the summer of 2012. Some of these songs were heard on a three-part series on the RFC video show, while others are being heard here for the first time. This week we bring you performances by HARRAH, Deck of Fools, The Under Social, Remains Unnamed, Candace Weaver, Breedlove,
Point of Jerus and Johnny Compton.

Hour three dives back into our video vaults for the second of two hours that bring you highlights of the Tribute To The Troops II benefit show.  Some of these songs were also heard on a three-part series on the RFC video show, while others are being heard here for the first time. This hour we bring you performances by Everpulse and Point of Jerus. For some reason we had audio recordings of two entire sets by these bands, so we gave them the last hour of our live music retrospective.

I did not take the time to go back and re-edit the announcing for the original shows, so there may be topical on nonsensible references. Just ignore most of what I say and enjoy the music…which, to be fair, is probably good advice for every episode of Radio Free Charleston.

You can hear this episode of Radio Free Charleston Tuesday at 10 AM and 10 PM on The AIR, with replays Thursday at 3 PM, Friday at 9 AM and 7 PM, Saturday at Noon and Midnight, and the next Monday at 11 AM, exclusively on The AIR.

I’m also going to  embed a low-fi, mono version of this show right in this post, right here so you can listen on demand.