WORCESTER—As a radio personality and parody song writer, Bob Rivers entertained people throughout the nation, but he got his start in Worcester and he worked on his final project nearby in Princeton.
Rivers died at age 68 on March 11 after battling esophageal cancer for three years.
Rivers wrote many parody songs, but his most well known is probably “The Twelve Pains of Christmas,” part of his 1988 Twisted Christmas album. The song is a parody of “The Twelve Days of Christmas” and plays on the radio every Christmas season.
“I would easily put him up against ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic,” said Peter “Zip” Zipfel, “as far as depth and breadth of material and overall just the amazing number of tunes that he did.”
Zipfel, 71, has a gold record on his wall at home in Shrewsbury from Twisted Christmas.
Rivers and Zipfel co-hosted the morning drive “Bob and Zip Morning Show” on WAAF in Worcester for seven years in the 1980s.
“We started out pretty sophomoric as far as the content,” Zipfel recalled, “but in later years any conversation was not out of reach or off limits to him and he still managed to do it with a great deal of humility. The chemistry between us was like two guys talking.”
A decade ago, they reunited on 100.1 FM The Pike from noon to 4 p.m. on Saturdays by hosting a show they called “The Morning Show That Started at Noon.” They hosted the show from The Pike studio in Worcester at first, but later Rivers did the show remotely from his home in Henderson, Nevada, and Zipfel did it from his basement in Shrewsbury.
“He was the bus driver on the program as far as being fearless,” Zipfel said.
In between, Rivers worked in radio in Baltimore and Seattle and Zipfel worked in Phoenix and Detroit.
With his condition worsening, Rivers appeared on the show for the last time in January. Zipfel plans to continue to host the show without him, no matter how difficult that may be.
“It’s a tough pair of shoes to fill,” he said. “We really did have a unique kind of chemistry. We had similar upbringings. We’re both from Connecticut. We both love music. We had overbearing fathers that told us to get real jobs.
“We really were like siblings, honestly. Consequently, when he did pass, it was more painful than I ever imagined it would be. It’s hard for me to explain that, but it really was. It hurt when he left us.”
Bob Goodell, market manager at WXLO, The Pike and Nash Icon 98.9, said Rivers and Zipfel held nothing back from their listeners.
“They both had very public struggles with alcohol addiction and other substances,” Goodell said, “and both got through the other side of it. So they talked about it on the air right up until the end – about medications they were on and therapies they had gone through, the feelings they had. It strained their friendship at one point, but I think in the end, because they had succeeded in getting rid of their addictions, they were closer because of it.”
Rivers recorded his final parody song the last weekend of February and the first weekend of March at Wachusett Recording in Princeton. The facility’s co-owner, Roger Lavallee, 53, of Worcester served as the recording engineer.
“I think he felt like he was on borrowed time and he just wanted to keep doing things that made him happy,” Lavallee said.
Rivers’ brother died of esophageal cancer a few years before he did.
Many people who Rivers hadn’t seen in years stopped by to see him at Wachusett Recording.
The song they recorded was a parody of the Three Dog Night song, “Eli’s Coming.” It was called, “Elon’s Coming,” after Elon Musk and is finished except for the sound mixing. Lavallee expects the audio recording to be available on YouTube soon.
“I spent two days with the guy,” Lavallee said, “and immediately he became one of my favorite people I’ve ever met. He and I clicked so hard. He was just a good soul, kind and funny and loved music.”
Recording his last parody in Princeton brought Rivers back close to his radio roots.
“In Worcester and at ’AAF was where it all began,” Zipfel said. “So it was really like a full cycle of life. It was really amazing.”
Guitarist Cliff Goodwin, 71, of Worcester worked with Rivers on many of his song parodies, including his last one. Most were recorded at Long View Farm Studios in North Brookfield.
“It was a gas,” Goodwin said, “because the song parodies were funny. You were just laughing all the time.”
Goodwin, however, wanted no part of stating what he thought Rivers’ legacy was.
“That would suggest that he wasn’t here anymore,” Goodwin said. “Guys like that kind of live on forever. Maybe not in a physical way, but certainly in a spiritual way.”
Goodwin said Rivers’ motto was “Ready, fire, aim.”
Rivers didn’t aim before he fired.
“When we went into things with Bob,” Goodwin said, “you knew we were going to go for it.”
Rivers left Worcester to work in radio in Baltimore for a couple of years and in Seattle for 25. In Seattle, Rivers was one of the highest paid radio personalities in the country and his show was often ranked No. 1 in the market.
Then he retired and moved with his wife Lisa to a farm in Vermont. After he was diagnosed with esophageal cancer three years ago, they moved to Henderson, Nevada, to be closer to sons Keith, a filmmaker in California, and Andrew, a standup comedian.
The funeral service was last Friday in Claremont, N.H., where he was buried.
“His passing is incredibly sad,” Zipfel said, “but the service was especially beautiful because there was a mixture of laughing and crying.”
In 1988, Rivers remained on the air in Baltimore for 258-1/2 hours, taking only short naps, until the Orioles finally snapped their American League-record losing streak at 21 games to open the season. When the Orioles returned home after a 1-23 start, 50,000 people attended as Rivers threw out the ceremonial first pitch. WooSox president Charles Steinberg was Orioles public relations director at the time.
Recently, on Hank Stolz’s radio show, Steinberg said the attention that Rivers brought to the team helped convince Orioles owner Edward Bennett Williams, a noted Holy Cross graduate, to go ahead with construction of Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Larry Lucchino was president of the Orioles at the time and oversaw construction. He later bought the Pawtucket Red Sox and moved them to Worcester. Steinberg said if there wasn’t a Camden Yards, there might not be a Polar Park.
Zipfel and Goodell were on hand when Rivers was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in New York City in 2023. Rivers asked to be inducted as the “Bob Rivers Show” to also honor the people he worked with in Seattle. He paid for the flights, hotels and admission to the ceremony for about a dozen of his former co-workers, including Zipfel.
At Rivers’ funeral, Goodell called Rivers one of the most knowledgeable people he had ever met. He’ll miss learning things from him.
Goodell pointed out that a fellow patient in Rivers’ esophageal cancer group spoke at his funeral and told everyone that Rivers had taught him how to communicate with people and how to be empathetic.
Rivers did a lot of charity work. He was also a pilot, a beekeeper and a hiker. After he was diagnosed with cancer, he started making his own maple syrup.
But radio was his first love.
“I swear to God,” Zipfel said, “he must have been born with a pair of headphones on because he was a radio guy from age 5. He just got fixated on it and turned it into a career. Broadcasting was in his DNA.”
Bill Doyle has been a professional journalist for 47 years, most of them as a sports writer for the Telegram & Gazette. He covered the Boston Celtics for 25 years and has written extensively about golf, boxing and local high school and college sports. He also worked for the campus newspaper when he attended UMass-Amherst. He can be reached at billdoyle1515@gmail.com
