September 2, 2007

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Across the Dial

So, I’ve never heard anything quite like this: a recording of New York radio the night John Lennon was shot — not just one station but a whole swath of them, complete with bursts of static in between, courtesy of some invisible listener ambling down the dial.

It’s pretty amazing. I wish there were more readily-available recordings of TV and radio coverage still mired in the moment. And then on top of that, it’s fascinating when you go beyond a single example into a sort of longitudinal survey.

Bill Moyers’ show on the media in the lead-up to the Iraq war is actually a great example — even just a few years out it’s already revelatory and horrifying, and I’m sure it will only get better (worse) as the years go by.