music friday: wolfman jack

Wolfman Jack died on this date in 1995 at the age of 57.

One thing American Graffiti got right was the presence of the Wolfman in the lives of the teenagers of the day. We would cruise up and down the streets of the town, and everyone was listening to the same thing (no personal tapes or CDs or satellite programs then): the Wolfman, broadcasting from what were called "border blaster" stations with transmitters located just across the border in Mexico, where they operated with enormous watts that covered much of the United States. If you were a teen in the U.S. in the mid/late-60s, you could do an imitation of the Wolfman.

Here is an aircheck from 1967:

Here is a scene of him being immortalized in American Graffiti (I think this was filmed at KRE in Berkeley):

And here, the Wolfman signs off: