CHANNELING PERCY SLEDGE

Adapted from a post published April 15, 2015

I cried a little when I read that the great Percy Sledge had passed away.  He was 73 and died peacefully at his home in East Baton Rogue Parish, Louisiana.

I felt a certain kinship with Percy Sledge and his unmistakable hit song When a Man Loves a Woman. Let me set the scene for you:

Listeners don’t often realize that on-air work can be a lonely time. For instance, at 3:00am a DJ can feel like he/she is the only person alive on the planet. It is just me, the songs and the dark hallways of the station. That was me when I was at Top 40 KISD-AM in the summer of 1968.

Me on the air at KISD's Window on Main Street

I had just started my first radio job as a KISD Good Guy in Sioux Falls.  KISD’s air studio was in a large glass display window on a busy street. We called it The Window on Main Street.

People would walk and drive by the showcase window all day and night. Folks liked to see the DJ live on the air.  I felt sort of like a monkey in a zoo.

The Window on Main Street was located in a seedy neighborhood close to several notorious strip clubs. 

I worked the graveyard shift, so sometimes the people watching got interesting after the bars closed at 2:00am. Sometimes drunk bar patrons would pee on the window.

That night I decided to play When A Man Loves A Woman. As usual, I walked the ramp, a DJ term for introducing a song by talking over the instrumental intro. Then I got up for the air chair and walked by The Window on Main Street.

Unexpectedly a beautiful young Native American woman appeared on the other side of the glass, just inches from me. Maybe she was a dancer at one of the bars.

There was a speaker playing KISD’s audio outside the window. She was singing along with Percy while looking right at me. She was lonely and I was lonely and our vibes clicked.

I looked at her and started sing Percy’s song right along with her. She and I were singing Percy’s song together.  Both of us were swaying to the music while watching each other’s lips and hips.

We both sang passionately. We both craved every word that Percy sang. We lived the song together. For a brief moment both of us weren’t so alone. We had a connection.

When I Man Loves a Woman began to fade. I leaped back behind the control board and played a station jingle. Then I started the next record Pushin’ To Hard by The Seeds.

When I looked up, she was gone. But still think of her whenever I hear When A Man Loves A Woman. Thank you, Percy.