Daily News from New York, New York • 141

0: Crty ttBhts- ill: llll I 15 iw a Mail know," Josephson replied.) Josephson continues to use the William Tell Overture as his theme music. And he still offers up his confessional first-person radio monologues. "What I'm trying to do is open my raincoat a little bit and expose myself," says Jo- sephson, who turned 50 on Friday. Other than National Public Radio's daily news programs, "Modern Times" is the only 4 1 -i I wl V-. est TV host Larry Josephson ED MOUNARI DAILY NEWS mm is back in N.Y.

with stern words I was really depressed. I was a man without a station. Larry Josephson nonmusical program WNYC-FM runs. Distributed by NPR's rival, American Public Radio (APR), it ironically makes its way into the station's Saturday night lineup because WNYC decided to drop "Good Evening," APR's replacement for "A Prairie Home Companion." And who was set to be Jo-sephson's guest last night for the New York debut of "Modern Times" but Garrison Keillor. Before the show, Josephson promised that the shy guy would read an essay about love and sex.

"He has a reputation as a tough interview," Josephson said of Keillor before the program. "But I think I can warm him up or turn him on or just give him the program and leave the room." (Jon Kalish is a Brooklyn-based freelance writer.) cannot be No. 1. WBCN in Boston, 98 Rock Honolulu, KSHE 95 St. Louis, WCKG Chicago (before after the classic rock format), 1-95 Connecticut all blow New York away And as usual, Dr.

Rob's got much more MOVIE SOUNDTRACK TIME: The use of music in the first two segments of "New York Stories" is superb. In his, director Martin Scorsese actually makes "A Whiter Shade of Pale" meaningful, and Francis Ford Coppola throws you a curve with original music from YES! Kid Creole the Coconuts! Almost as neat is Woody Allen's choice of "SING SING SING" to highlight his mother and aunt's striding forbiddingly down the hall of his character's law offices Available on ElektraMusician Also, in the new "Field of Dreams" check for the use of the All-mans' "Jessica" but listen real close and see if you can catch a snatch of the Lovin' Spoonful's "Daydream." BACK AT THE CONTROLS: rin Lill Larry Josephson By JON KALISH oward Stern stole my act," complains Larry I Josephson, the origi nal bad boy of morning radio. "Stern is an imitation enfant terrible, lie's not very funny. I resent him," Josephson says, the bitterness apparent in his voice. It's a voice and honesty familiar to a generation that came of age in the 1960s in the metropolitan area.

As host of "In the Beginning," the morning show on WBAI-FM, the grumpy punster became a local institution by cursing the very idea of morning, eating bagels noisily on the air and ruminating about his own misfortunes. Along with Bob Fass and Steve Post, Josephson made something known as "free-form, live radio" into an art, spontaneously mixing recorded music, in-studio guests, telephone calls and just about anything else that could be patched into the mixing console. After a five-year absence from New York's airwaves, Josephson has returned on Saturdays at 9 p.m. with "Modern Times," a live, two-hour talk show originating from WNYC-FM that airs in California and Iowa as well. ft Check It Out TAKE IT FOR GRANTED Is there a budding "Bob Grant" lurking out there on the airwaves? Cindy Grant, 22, daughter of the outrageous WABC talk show host, has joined talk-music station WBRW (1170 AM) street reporter.

Fresh out of St. Petersburg Junior Col- i for Howard programs that have aired on KCRW are a lengthy interview with McGeorge Bundy 'on the history of atomic bomb, an April Fool's Day conversation with Marshal Efron pretending to be Donald Trump and Firesign Theatre member Phil Proctor impersonating Boris Yeltsin, and a call-in show with listeners singing songs about fax machines. (After one caller sang a lit- "tle ditty in an Elvis Presley voice, he said: "By the way, Larry. I'm still alive." "Yes, I pecially now. Been listening to 'BLS I turn to CD 101.9 and even they could be playing the instrumental version." 'CBS-FM wants you to know: Today is Bobby Darin's birthday and also this month Pete Townshend turns 44 Friday is 48 the 24th; Gladys Knight hits 45 the Regular correspondent "Dr." Rob Imhoff of Beth-page, L.I., checks in: "I don't see what's unique about Susan Lee Taylor's 'all request electric it's the same old rota- GUZMAN tion the Zoo is much funnier now without (Scott) Shannon At Hot 97, Fast Freddie Colon's Hot Lunch Classics at noon are good This is New York City.

The tion KCRW-FM in Santa Monica. "He gets on the air and is himself. He's opinionated. He's feisty. He's funny and extremely intelligent.

It's an art to be able to do that on the air." In November, Josephson returned to the Big Apple and after a two-week layoff, continued producing the show for KCRW from a WNYC studio. But he wasn't on the air in New York, only inL.A Among the more memorable of the 37 "Modern Times" OFF-OFF RADIO: Belated Congrats to Don Imus on his induction into the Emerson Radio Hall of Fame (and loved one of his sidekickcol leagues' comebacks, "Just what the heck IS the Emerson Radio Hall of also kudos to Larry King WCBS-AM's Rich Lamb did a superb job of on-the-spot reporting last Sunday afternoon fol- -lowing the third suspect's surrender (from Abyssinian Baptist Church in Har--lem)inthe shooting of undercover Officer Richard Bert Fordham U's sta By PABLO tion, WFUV (90.7) features big-band sounds from Rich Vonaty Sundays 9-11 p.m Cornnis Crawford of Brooklyn writes: "Why aren't 'BLS, KTSS rtn nlnuincr'Qolf no. "structibn" (by thepp he The last time "Larry the as his radio brethren fondly refer to him, was heard in these parts was in 1984 when he gave up his Sunday morning slot on 'BAI, "Bourgeois Liberation." Although Josephson kept busy producing half-hour Bob and Ray programs for syndication and cassette distribution after that, he sorely missed the electricity of live radio. "I was really depressed," he recalled in an interview at his upper West Side apartment and production studio. "I'd have ideas and no place to vent I tried to get back on 'BAI, but they felt I was too old, too white and too liberal.

I was a man without a station for years until Ruth Hirschman brought me back from the radio dead." Hirschman, a Bronx native and veteran of Pacifica Radio (the listener-sponsored group that includes WBAI and four other FM outlets), brought Josephson out to Southern California last summer and for four months the portly broadcaster delighted (and infuriated) his West Coast audience. "What Larry does is very hard to do," says Hirschman, manager of public radio sta lege, this is her first full-time job. "She's the apple of my eye," said Bob Grant, whose son, Jeff, used to be a reporter for "I'm very proud of her." Cindy joins WBRW personalities Charlie Bengle, Patri- it cia Dell-Bene and Larry Mattei. George Makslan Violence Movement)) es? no reasoa why arock station in.