WFMU’s Beware of the Blog: Love Workshop: Put On a Happy Face

Shooting out of Phoenix in 1976, The Love Workshop was a 15 minute radio comedy show on rock station KDKB. In it’s heyday, the station was a daring album-rock station that acquired a rabid fan base. Two station employees, Russ Shaw and Tod Carroll, created alter egos Vern and Craig, and then happily pushed the boundaries of good taste in the name of fun.

Derrick Bostrom’s Bostworld blog recently uncovered this lost radio gem, and he describes it thusly:

n one segment, they microwave then eat a small boy surrounded by an accompaniment of jawbreakers and new potatoes. In another, they seduce the recently widowed wife of a Vietnam vet with bourbon and Quaalude. In another, they punch out the subject of a public television “empowerment” program after calling her a stupid lesbian. In still another, they force a guest to try out an I.U.D made of pop tops and bottle caps attached to a dead scorpion.

The writing on the show was brilliant. Their sense of comic timing and attention to detail was impeccable. And in the climate of the mid-seventies, the scorched-earth nature of material didn’t raise as many eyebrows as it would now. But not everyone admired it, apparently. Just as the show was poised to expand into other markets, it was suddenly cancelled as part of a controversial housecleaning of KDKB management.

Russ, the voice talent, went on to real estate (and occasional voice over work, like the classic Discount Tire Company ad), while Vern, who produced and wrote the show, went on to National Lampoon and later wrote screenplays. Check out all the details at Bostworld’s intense Love Workshop page, including this interview with 1/2 of the Love Workship, Russ Shaw.

And thanks to Derrick also for allowing us to repost many of the Love Workshop shows. Unfortunately, there are no airdates available, so these aren’t in any real order. But still, here is a chance for you to check out their show for yourself:

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