Back in the 1970s, John Timpane and Don Rooney hosted a radio show on student-run KUCI-FM in Irvine, California. On one show, either John or Don — no one remembers exactly which one (although it was probably Don) — turned on the microphone to introduce “a soothing musical interlude.” In his excitement, either John or Don (again, probably Don) instead announced “a soothing musical innertube,” and the name stuck.
The Musical Innertube radio show was music interrupted by comedy bits — or, more accurately, comedy bits interrupted by music. When John and Don re-united for a podcast in the early 2000s, they picked up where they left off, with one important change: the comedy bits were uninterrupted by music.
In the years between the 1970s and the early 2000s, John and Don made careers out of radio, television and newspaper reporting. So eventually, the Musical Innertube podcast was re-fashioned to feature conversations with interesting people about their interesting lives; you can hear them over at www.musicalinnertube.com. But here you’ll find the comedy bits John and Don created for the first incarnation of the podcast —
The Musical Innertube, Volume 1.