By: BRIAN McTAVISH Arts & Entertainment Writer
Date: 05/5/05

What may well be the world's most authentic-sounding Top 40 oldies radio station isn't a station at all, but a site on the World Wide Web. 

Dallas-based DJ Richard Kaufman, is stuck in the 1960s and loving every memory of it as host of ``Ricky the K's Solid Gold Time Machine'' at www.60sradio.com. 

Any paying customer with Internet access and a RealAudio player (go to www.real.com for a free download) can get Kaufman's three-hour show Monday through Friday at their convenience. Kaufman makes each show available on the Web after recording it between midnight and 4 a.m. 

``The Solid Gold Time Machine,'' which had its debut January 1, plays more and different oldies than most oldies stations are willing to deliver. Listeners can hear 3,000 songs from 1955 to '71, with no song repeated for twelve weeks. The realities of radio today - even oldies radio - dictate far fewer songs played in a much higher rotation for folks typically in cars with limited listening time. 

``Oldies stations today are programmed so that people can get their 15-minute quick fix,'' Kaufman said. ``My show is for somebody who really loves '60s radio and misses it, who loves personality and misses it, who loves the other 2,200 songs that are not getting played on most oldies stations. '' 

Kaufman's meticulous re-creation of vintage Top 40 radio - the kind that used to be heard on WHB-AM in Kansas City - includes hundreds of reruns of '60s commercials. And, like a wacky DJ from yesteryear, Kaufman bandies back and forth with more than 100 lines spoken by actor Jay Silverheels as Tonto in ``The Lone Ranger'' TV series. 

``I play George Burns to Tonto's Gracie Allen,'' Kaufman said. ``He's not a live person. He works cheap. '' 

``When I got into radio, this kind of radio was just beginning to die,'' he said. ``I didn't think it was going to come down to me to do it again, but somebody had to do something. ''