We pay tribute to Kai Haynes this week on The AIR  as we premiere an all-new episode of Radio Free Charleston. It’s a bittersweet, and a little downbeat episode, but his music was so filled with life that you can’t stay sad when you hear it.  To tune in you simply have to point your cursor over and tune in at the website, or you could just stay here and  listen to the cool embedded player elsewhere on this page, or scroll down for the embedded lo-fi version.

This three-hour show brings you two hours of our usual mix of local, independent and downright nifty music, plus a special third hour that is mostly the music Kai made.  You can hear it at 10 AM and 10 PM Tuesday.

You can hear Radio Free Charleston  every Tuesday at 10 AM and 10 PM, with tons of replays throughout the week.

Repeating what I wrote last Friday, Kai Haynes, a titan among Charleston musicians, died after suffering a brain-bleed shortly before Christmas.

Kai’s musical accomplishments, from being a key part of the early Mountain Stage band to performing with too many local musical acts to list here, as well as his expertise in audiophile sound systems and his partnership in LiveMix Studio are only part of a life well-lived.

Kai was a great friend, a devoted father, a man who was extraordinarily kind and generous with his knowledge and just an overall quality human being. Kai was one of the three partners in LiveMix Studio, without whom the 2006 revival of Radio Free Charleston never would have happened. Kai appeared on several episodes, and ran camera on several early episodes of the video show.

We open every hour of the show this week with a track from the 1978 album, “First Impressions” by the band, JOI, which included Kai, along with Bob Thompson, Louise Pearson, Jim Pearson and Gordon Cupit.  This rare album is blissful progressive and soulful jazz fusion, and the first song you hear this week features Kai singing lead on “WV Blues.”

Our third hour also opens with a track from JOI, but also includes the full performance by Elektro Biscuit at LiveMix Studio in 2009. Elektro Biscuit was Kai’s band with Greg Wegmann and Brian Young.  Recently, with the addition of vocalist, Nicole AC, they’ve been performing as The New Old Souls Band. We brought you one song from this EB set on the latest RFC video show.  We wrap up the hour with a track by The Bob Thompson Trio, which included Kai on bass, and a tune by Hot Chocolate that Kai and I had talked about years ago at LiveMix.

A musical memorial to Kai is planned for March, and PopCult will have full details as soon as they become available.

In addition to Kai’s music, we also have our usual eclectic mix of songs, but you may notice that my voice is fairly well shot this week. I’ve picked up a nasty bug, and it’s lowered my range about three octaves. Making matters worse is the fact that, due to a looming magazine deadline, I had to record next week’s show right after this one, so Mr. Froggy voice will be around for another week.

Despite my voice and the sadness of losing Kai, I think this show is a pretty solid example of the kind of high-quality music we bring you on a regular basis. We have a tune from a brand-new Chicago-based Zydeco band, Le Travaillant, plus newly-released music from The Settlement, Skafish, Wall of Voodoo, Todd Burge, Novelty Island and more.

Check out the playlist below to see all the goodies we have in store (live links will take you to the artist’s pages where possible)…

RFC V5 158

hour one
Joi “West Virginia Blues”
Le Travaillant “Au Derrière Du Bayou”
Stark Raven “Bowl Ethereal”
Chuck Biel “The Other Side”
The Settlement “Rainbow”
Skafish “In Another Time, In Another Place”
Ryan Hardiman & Moonage Daydream  “Ashes To Ashes”
Wall of Voodoo “Blackboard Sky”
Astrodot “There Spoke The Monk”

hour two
Joi “Blue Ten”
Strawfyssh “Stir Fry 02”
Hello June “Napkin”
Todd Burge “The Growing Season”
Novelty Island “In My Tree”
Lovely Litle Girls “Emphatic Service”
Ann Magnuson “Waterbeds of Hollywood”
GG Allin“1980s Rock n Roll”
Payback’s a Bitch  “Movin’ Up To Chelsea”
Rockwell’s Ghost “Something Old, Something Borrowed”
Sheldon Vance “Keep On Talking”
The Dollyrots “Hey Girl”
Jerks “Riptide”
Jim Lange “Shiva’s Dance”

hour three
Joi “Seven In, Seven Out”
Elektro Biscuit live at LiveMix 2009
“Crawfish Boogie”
“A Latin Thing”
“Wasp In The Room”
“The Elephant and the Butterfly”
“The Original”
“Rio”
“Dysfunctional”
Bob Thompson Trio “Forbidden Fruit”
Hot Chocolate “Heaven Is In The Backseat of My Cadillac”

You can hear this episode of Radio Free Charleston Tuesday at 10 AM and 10 PM on The AIR, with replays Wednesday at 9 AM, Thursday at 2 PM, Friday at 9 AM, Saturday at Noon and Midnight,  and  Monday at 11 AM, exclusively on The AIR. Now you can also hear a different episode of RFC every weekday at 5 PM, and we bring you a marathon all night long Saturday night/Sunday morning.

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.

 

Then at 1 PM we have MIRRORBALL, followed at 2 PM by Curtain Call. At 3 PM  we bring you two classic episodes of The Swing Shift.

You can hear The Swing Shift Tuesday at 3 PM, with replays Wednesday at 8 AM, Thursday at 9 AM, Friday at 8 PM and Saturday afternoon, only on The AIR . You can also hear all-night marathons, seven hours each, starting at Midnight Thursday and Sunday evenings.