Scott Tady: Let's discuss who should open new Beaver stage; Kurt Angle film recommended

Construction has begun on the new Beaver community center.

If you stand on the lawn between Beaver High School and the former borough pool, you can see the foundation for a new outdoor stage with a capacity for 3,000 spectators.

With a 2024 opening targeted, I say we start brainstorming now who the center's opening night outdoor concert should be.

I've proposed two acts: Charles Wesley Godwin or Darryl & Don Gatlin.

Godwin and his backing band The Allegheny High, featuring five Beaver County-bred musicians, have played top concert venues, like the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville and Red Rocks Amphitheater in Colorado. They're supporting Luke Combs in a dozen stadium shows from April through August. They deserve a big hometown show.

Blackhawk grads Darryl & Don Gatlin, the once nationally signed and charting country duo, are looking to play their first show together since 1997. Don later fronted country-rock band Savannah Jack, which toured the world with Kenny Rogers, whom Don also wrote songs for, as well as for Blake Shelton and Lee Greenwood.

Send me your concert suggestions, and I'll pass them along to the right folks.

Angle film is first-rate

You might feel more empathy for Kurt Angle – I do – after watching the new Peacock documentary on the Mount Lebanon native who became an Olympic gold medalist and pro wrestling star whose substance abuse put him in peril until he got sober.

Filmed in Pittsburgh, "Angle" includes frank and compelling commentary from Angle, his wife, siblings and wrestling peers, including superstars The Rock and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, who both colorfully relay their admiration for Angle's grit, strength, showmanship and wrestling skills.

Director Alex Perry dug deeply for archive footage, including highlights from an epic Mount Lebanon High football performance by Angle just hours after his father was pronounced dead from a construction accident.

Preparing for the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Angle trained at the Foxcatcher wrestling school, the subject of a 2014, made-in-Sewickley film starring Steve Carrell and Channing Tatum. Angle had a close working relationship with Foxcatcher's slain David Schultz, a beloved trainer played in the film by Mark Ruffalo.

In his quest to qualify for the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Angle suffered his first of many serious neck injuries. Novocain shots numbed the pain enough for him to square off against Olympic challengers who targeted his neck, including the more sizable Iranian wrestler he beat to win the gold.

Reluctant initially to go pro, Angle transitioned smoothly into World Wrestling Entertainment, becoming loved and loathed for his naive but arrogant, milk-guzzling character who gave humorous televised interviews, and successfully battled many of the top pro wrestlers of the late 1990s and early 2000s.

The injuries kept mounting, including three separate neck breaks within a year, which Angle matter-of-factly recounts in "Angle." His reliance on painkillers accelerated, with one of the documentary's most poignant moments coming when Angle displays a desk blotter calendar page that listed his every-other-day schedule to acquire painkillers from multiple sources. He was arrested multiple times on DUI charges, as his life spiraled out of control.

He credits the love and an ultimatum from his wife, Pittsburgh actress Giovanna Yannotti, for convincing him to become sober. It was the toughest challenge he ever faced, says Angle, who is seven years sober.

Near the end of the film, Angle acknowledges he made mistakes, but the World Wrestling Entertainment Hall of Famer wants to be remembered more "as a fighter who never gave up."

I wish "Angle" would have touched briefly on his stint as the Pittsburgh Fox 53 sports anchor, but overall, I'd highly recommend watching.

Fondly remembering 13Q

"I'm listening to the new sounds of 13Q!" was the way western Pennsylvanians answered their telephones in 1973-74, hoping to score cash prizes of $13,000 or more through a brilliant publicity campaign that introduced the region to a new Top-40 station, WKTQ-AM (1320).

A trendsetter and attention-grabber until 1980, when it succumbed to a corporate radio buyout and waning public interest in AM radio, 13Q's glory years are richly recounted in a new podcast where host Tim O'Brien elicits amusing stories from former WKTQ personalities Buzz Brindle, Batt Johnson, Dennis Waters and Ray Zoller.

They discuss how a visit from "Welcome Back Kotter"-era John Travolta nearly caused a Monroeville Mall riot, or how not-yet-famous Aerosmith arrived by helicopter to an outdoor concert in McKeesport, as the band members tossed roses to the crowd gathered below.

O'Brien selects appropriate music, like Paper Lace novelty hit "The Night Chicago Died" and Jim Stafford's "Spiders and Snakes" to illustrate the eclectic mix of 13Q. The interviewed DJs claim their early spins made hits out of Frank Zappa's "Yellow Snow" and Cheech & Chong's "Sister Mary Elephant."

The station made guerilla marketing fun – remember those lime green or garish orange Top-40 lists with a 13Q disc jockey profile available weekly at National Record Marts? Those motor-mouthed, off-the-cuff disc jockeys crafted a radio style much edgier and "local" than what's heard on Top-40 radio today.

If you're from that era, I recommend the "13Q: A Top-40" episode on O'Brien's Shaping Opinion podcast, streamed on Spotify, Apple and shapingopinion.com.

Pittsburgh harmonica master celebrated

Harmonica ace Marc Reisman celebrates “The First 50 Years” in an Oct. 26 showcase at Thunderbird Music Hall in Pittsburgh.

Reisman will perform alongside a Who's Who of Pittsburgh musical talent including former bandmates Joe Grushecky & the Houserockers, as well as Billy Price, Bill Toms, Ernie Hawkins, Melinda Colaizzi and the Night Sky, Jon Bindley, Peter King, Rick Witkowski and others.

I asked King, a singer-songwriter and former music journalist at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, what makes Reisman special.

"Marc brings both technique and a lot of soul to his playing, but that’s not all," King said. "He’s one of the best in-the-moment musicians I’ve ever come across. He is alert to any shift in volume or mood or groove that a bandmate makes, and he manages to roll right along with it. One more thing: Even though it sounds like he’s blowing with wild abandon, he’s actually choosing his licks with care. He wouldn’t toss off showy, meaningless lines that don’t contribute to the music.”

A longtime member of Grushecky's Houserockers, Reisman also records as a solo artist and with Spanish rock band Los Madison.

Tickets for the 8 p.m. show cost $25 at thunderbirdmusichall.com

This show culminates a 50-year journey for Reisman that began his senior year at Pitt when two kids approached him on an Oakland street and said, “Mister, do you want to buy a harmonica?"

Scott Tady, Times' entertainment editor, is reachable at stady@timesonline.com.

This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Tady: Let's discuss who should open new Beaver stage; Angle film is worthy