BreakfastWithTheBeatles

Okay, so it wasn’t a concert… but our visit to KLOS was just as exciting. We were there to meet Chris Carter – radio host and ultimate Beatles aficionado.

It was really the right time for this topic since this issue hits your hands in August, the month that brings a milestone for me which I share with over 4 million other Americans (the last products of the post-WWII breeding frenzy known as Baby Boomers)...I turn 45. What’s that got to do with The Beatles? Well, the notable year of my birth 45 years ago was 1964… the same year The Beatles landed on U.S. soil for the first time.

With two older brothers, I was literally raised on the music of the “Fab Four”. And because my father, a musician himself, uncharacteristically agreed that this rock-and-roll band had immense song-writing talent, even my parents became Beatles fans…so I had no choice but to be the same. Lucky me!

Flash forward to my 1987 move to California, when I was introduced to a new ritual - tuning in every Sunday morning to a radio show called Breakfast With The Beatles. Only Beatles music on a radio show? It was most divine!

The untimely death of host Deirdre O'Donoghue in 2001 meant the show could have ended, but help came quickly when Chris Carter, sometimes radio DJ and former bassist for the 80’s band Dramarama (whose hit "Anything, Anything" was a Walkman staple) took over the show.

Amazingly, Carter introduced a whole new format. In addition to the usual playlist of solely standard U.S. releases, Carter, with his extreme background in everything Beatles, began to walk the listeners through a long and winding road of Beatles music that included alternative takes, original mono releases, solo projects, and unreleased songs that many of us had never heard before. It was as if The Beatles were releasing new music when Carter took over the show.

TourBusLive.com is a website created by Jill and Gary, Southern California residents who take advantage of the unbeatable local concert calendar! With more than 60 shows a year, they surely know the ins and outs of getting what they want out of a show – music, memorabilia, and just plain old fun. The website was created originally to share their incredible photos with other fans of live music, but then took on a life of its own! Check out their latest adventures on their website, add to their fan forum, or simply peer into the lives of these avid concert junkies…

And it worked…everyone is listening… even the show’s own guests, including Sir Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Sir George Martin, Pete Best, Beatles wives, Beatles kids, Beatles lovers (notably, a weekly news segment with John Lennon’s ‘lost-weekend’ companion May Pang), and Beatles friends (one of them being the Beatles-inspired/inspiring Brian Wilson).

Since 2006, the show has aired Sunday mornings on 95.5 KLOS, so that’s where we caught up with Chris Carter, who turns 50 in September. Carter is a delightfully friendly person and truly a natural on air. We could tell by the flurry of printed pages covered in hand-scribbled notations that his show takes quite a bit of preparation (he mostly maps out what he plans to play or say ahead of time, following a different theme each week), yet he was also very spontaneous...making last-minute changes to the playlist as new ideas popped into his head for the show that day. He also takes calls from listeners (whom Carter gives honorary titles, such as Beatle Michelle or Beatle Mark), answering their questions or playing their requests. With a little help from his friends Dennis Garling and engineer Mark Felsot, the show is always fresh and always seamless.

To close his show on the day we visited, Carter played "In My Life" (thanks for taking my suggestion, Chris) to honor the unusual cluster of celebrity passings that week (Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, and Ed McMahon), and then ended with a special mix of George Harrison's "Isn't It a Pity" (off of the aptly-named album All Things Must Pass) and an a cappella version of MJ doing Jackson Five hit "I Want You Back". It was so intense that I was surprised by my own tears as we packed up to leave the studio.

At the close of our interview, when I asked Chris to tell me how long he plans to be on air, he simply said, "I hope to be doing Breakfast With The Beatles up until my last breath, which is a date unknown to me...but, as long as I'm still breathing and thinking clearly…well, let's just say breathing (he chuckles)…I hope to be your host of Breakfast With The Beatles."

All together now, raise your juice glass and toast to Chris Carter continuing to set a place for us at his incredible table...it’s getting better all the time.