I was, unquestionably, a weird kid. One of my earliest memories is laying in my back yard in Wildwood, Illinois as a preschooler, listening to a transistor radio by myself on a sunny day, and grooving to the tunes. Music was my drug. When some of my classmates started experimenting with street dope in grade school (rest in peace Kevin and Dennis!), I had no interest. I was mainlining the American Top 40 every week. I didn’t need weed or pills. I had Parliament, ABBA, Bad Company, the Electric Light Orchestra, and the Ohio Players. Although too much exposure to Debby Boone or Loggins and Messina could have turned me into a glue sniffer.
In my tweenage years, my obsession with both pop music and general trivia made me a religious listener to the weekly Top 40 program. How obsessed was I? I would track the charts every week – writing down in notebooks where each song was slotted, whether it was going up or down the charts, pondering what would be the ensuing #1 song. My life was not encumbered by amorous attention from young girls.
During the late ‘70s, Top 40 was clearly the primary music format in the United States and Casey Kasem’s American Top 40 program was broadcast on pop stations throughout the country. As I learned later, Casey was manipulating the audience like a masterful orchestra conductor. The textbook elements of persuasion are logos (the message), ethos (the messenger), and pathos (engaging the audience). Kasem had all three, in spades. The logos/message was contained in the statistics – you knew who was an “important” artist because sales and airplay translated to credibility. The ethos was in Kasem’s credibility – he didn’t scream or hype the music; he had no rooting interest in the results. He was a total pro in his delivery – whether it was a sappy long distance dedication or telling you how many consecutive years that Elton John had a top 40 hit.
However, his genius was in his pathos. Deft politicians and preachers know the true key in selling public policy positions or gathering converts. Their ability to develop or maintain a connection with their audience is directly related to their ability to tell stories that have an emotional impact. If Kasem had been simply spinning platters and telling chart positions, he would have been imminently replaceable. The bits of trivia, the stories about the artists and the songs, the dramatic build to the #1 hit of the week was all part of an ongoing narrative – part mystery, part discovery, always leading to the next week’s chapter in the ongoing saga of pop music history.
As Top 40 became less relevant, so did Kasem’s place in the always evolving world of the entertainment industry. He never translated his Top 40 fame into significant film or television success and as radio transitioned to shock jocks and narrower music formats, the weekly Top 40 program seemed anachronistic. Casey became more of an old friend than an industry leader. However sad the last years of his life were, he carved out an unforgettable niche for pop music fans of my generation. In the afterlife, he might even make up with Snuggles.
