Month: July 2014

EDWIN STARR 1966 SALUTE TO A DETROIT RADIO BROADCAST LEGEND

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BY SUMMER’S END 1966, “SCOTT’S ON SWINGERS” became reality. It became a recorded single ’45 promo having been written by Charles Edwin Hatcher, who expressed into lyrics a song dedicated especially to WKNR radio deejay Scott Regen in Detroit.

Released on Ed Wingate’s Ric-Tic label (Detroit) and numbered RT-109 X, it has been estimated by several Wingate associates since that only 20 to 50 of these recordings were pressed as singles at the time. And were all issued by the label as a single-sided record 45 disk with a blank flip-side.

When this recording was made in 1966, and just six months after his arrival at WKNR in Detroit from WHB Kansas City, Scott Regen was by then a dominant influential source promoting the ’60s music scene — having connected well with the ‘Detroit sound’ with his Detroit radio audience during his nightly shows on Keener 13. Whether it be Barry Gordy’s Motown, Ed Wingate’s Golden World Records, national or otherwise, Scott Regen immersed himself into the music he played on the radio when he was on. 

As it was, it was of no consequence within a short span of several months after his arrival here in June, 1965, Scott Regen was established in 1966 as the No. 1 night-time radio deejay overall here in the Motor City.  And to those of us who still remember, 1966 was also the year WKNR’s Scottie Regen would be permanently immortalized in words and in song. “Dedicated To Scott Regen,” it was written, produced and was recorded by a young, aspiring 23-year old R&B recording artist, then, who went by the name of Edwin Starr in Detroit.

Charles Edwin Hatcher (Edwin Starr) passed away in 2003. But he left a most significant lasting tribute to a legendary WKNR radio talent remembered in Detroit — still today — nearly five decades after this recording was made. Thank you again, Scottie Regen, for those special Keener moments you shared with all of us on the radio here in Detroit —

“… Yeah, listen to his show every night, ’cause the records he plays they are outta sight. So if you see Scott Regen, if anybody see Scott Regen, stop him ON SIGHT.”

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“SCOTT’S ON SWINGERS (S.O.S.)” * Edwin Starr * RIC-TIC Records (Detroit; 1966)