{"id":9496,"date":"2016-10-27T10:21:00","date_gmt":"2016-10-26T23:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/2016\/10\/27\/i-g-y-the-nightfly-donald-fagen-jean-shepherd-and-soldersmoke\/"},"modified":"2025-07-22T02:38:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T16:38:10","slug":"i-g-y-the-nightfly-donald-fagen-jean-shepherd-and-soldersmoke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/2016\/10\/27\/i-g-y-the-nightfly-donald-fagen-jean-shepherd-and-soldersmoke\/","title":{"rendered":"I.G.Y., The Nightfly, Donald Fagen, Jean Shepherd and SolderSmoke"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a><\/div>\n

OK, so from time-to-time we talk about IGY, the International Geophysical Year. I was born during that scientifically momentous period. A lot of cool stuff happened. Amazing propagation conditions too. So for a while (around SolderSmoke 149) I was using the opening bars of Donald Fagen’s song I.G.Y. as the intro for the podcast. That song comes from Fagen’s album Nightfly. The album cover appears above. <\/b>
<\/b>
This morning I got two e-mails from Steve N8NM about another connection between SolderSmoke and IGY. At first I thought he was pulling my leg. But before I show you the e-mails, let me show you another picture:<\/b><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
That’s Jean Shepherd. Can you dig it? <\/b><\/div>\n


<\/b> Steve writes: <\/b>

<\/b> Hey Bill! <\/b>

<\/b> I’m Listening to #149, where you introduced Donald Fagen’s “I.G.Y” as the new theme song. Have you heard that the protagonist on that album is based on none-other than Shep, K2ORS. Don’t know if that’s necessarily true, but the album title (The Nightfly), Fagen being from NY, and the era depicted certainly make that plausible…<\/b>

<\/b> I guess it’s factual – This is from an interview Fagen did with New York Magazine:<\/b> <\/p>\n

Your first solo album, The Nightfly, was inspired by fifties jazz disc jockeys. Which ones were your favorites?<\/span><\/i><\/b>
Symphony Sid was very popular. Mort Fega was probably the best all-around jazz D.J. Ed Beach on WRVR would do this very scholarly afternoon show, and I\u2019d listen to that when I came home from school. <\/span><\/i><\/b>But the figure of the Nightfly was based more on a guy who didn\u2019t play jazz records, Jean Shepherd.<\/i><\/b><\/span> He was a monologist who used to just talk and tell stories a<\/span>nd say funny things. He was a social satirist.<\/span><\/i><\/b><\/u><\/sub><\/sup><\/strike><\/div>\n
Speaking of Shep: You’ve done him proud, not only in your HB radio efforts, but in proving yourself to be a very capable monologist for the several years between Mike’s passing and Pete’s arrival. Three Cheers for Bill! Give that man a brass figlagee with gold leaf palm!<\/span><\/b><\/div>\n
73! Steve N8NM<\/b><\/div>\n
By the authority vested in me by having once spoken to Jean Shepherd, I award Steve Murphy N8NM, the coveted Brass Figlagee with Gold Leaf Palm. <\/b><\/div>\n

<\/b><\/div>\n
EXCELSIOR! <\/b><\/div>\n

<\/b><\/div>\n
TRGHS<\/b> <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OK, so from time-to-time we talk about IGY, the International Geophysical Year. I was born during that scientifically momentous period. A lot of cool stuff happened. Amazing propagation conditions too. So for a while (around SolderSmoke 149) I was using the opening bars of Donald Fagen’s song I.G.Y. as the intro for the podcast. That … Continue reading “I.G.Y., The Nightfly, Donald Fagen, Jean Shepherd and SolderSmoke”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9497,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[462,183,214,251],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-igy","category-jean-shepherd","category-music","category-new-york-city"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9496"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9496\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9499,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9496\/revisions\/9499"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}