California Jam 1974: Callers Who Were There

Hour 1 (8.20) Callers who were at Ontario Motor Speedway on April 6, 1974 tell it themselves — the bands, the heat, and the ones who admit they were way too young to be there.The whole hour belongs to California Jam. Callers walk us through what it was actually like to be on that speedway floor: one day, eight acts, a site about 35 miles east of Los Angeles, and a crowd that set the record for the highest paid attendance of any rock concert to that point. Then the lineup, act by act — Deep Purple and Emerson, Lake & Palmer co-headlined, with Black Sabbath, the Eagles, Earth, Wind & Fire, Seals & Crofts, Black Oak Arkansas and Rare Earth — plus the parts people forget, like the fact that ABC put it on television in prime time while KLOS ran the FM simulcast. The confessions come next: listeners who owned up to going knowing full well they were too young to be there, and how they pulled it off. The hour closes with the crew off the Cal Jam topic entirely, going around the room on who they'd interview if they could pick anyone, living or deadSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.