Mother's Day at Little Steven's Underground Garage

[JohnnyRingo]

2. I like that channel in the afternoon for Kid Leo.

It's off topic, but I remember the first time I tuned in one afternoon, and the DJ's voice was as familiar as that of a best friend from high school. It was Kid Leo.

I grew up near Cleveland, and in the late '60s through the early '70s The Kid was the iconic velvet smooth voice of underground FM rock on WMMS. He and Billy Bass were the go-to guys for everything from Moby Grape and Hendrix to The Dead and Country Joe & The Fish. If a song was a popular hit, then it was already an oldie on his show. He played the album cuts no one else dared or even knew of. Even then he always ended the shift with his trademark "it's time to wash up, punch out, and head home".

Cleveland's own Michael Stanley relates the time he went to the studio for a live event and first met the man behind that deep booming voice. He said he discovered a deceptively diminutive Italian fellow who leaned in close and spoke so softly into the microphone, he could barely hear him while he stood right next to him.

Little Steven's Underground Garage is a virtual time machine for me, and The Kid still plays whatever he likes whether anyone's ever heard of it or not. Even today, he's that guy who's way more cool than the other Kids. For a long time, he did his Sirius show live from The R&R Hall of Fame.