Milwaukee legend Bob Reitman is best known for his long career as a DJ on several radio stations, but before he became an on-air personality he was writing poetry. Reitman’s first spoken word album The Eleventh House came out in the 70s. Produced with his friend John Sahli, it combined his spoken word poetry with music provided by more than a dozen Milwaukee musicians. 54 years later, Reitman is revisiting his love of music and poetry with a follow-up album called 12th House. The album features 16 poems spanning several decades of his life since he started writing poetry as a teenager.
So why did Reitman want to create another spoken word album in his 80s? Because of his 12th House producer and engineer, Gary Tanin, who had a nearly unrelenting insistence for years that Reitman produce another album. "That attitude just inspired me," says Reitman. "God, this guy likes this? OK, maybe it’s OK. It was just personal letters to myself, that’s what poetry was."
Tanin jokes that he and Reitman had a rivalry that Reitman didn't know about since the 70s. "In 1971, I had an album that I was recording at the very same studio that Bob [Reitman] recorded his first album. When I went to place copies of the record [at] Dirty Jack's Record Rack... and said, 'Would you mind putting these on consignment? And [they said], 'Yeah, that's funny that you should walk in here with an album right now, because Bob Reitman just brought the Eleventh House,'" he recalls.
"I thought right away, well, it's a waste of time because here you've got a radio personality! ... But since that point, I've always hoped that there would be a follow-up with Bob."
Reitman and Tanin connected over a decade ago and would get together for coffee regularly, and Tanin would periodically bring up revisiting a new poetry album. "I was very patient. Ultimately, the last few years, I made a point of saying, 'Can I ever look at your poetry?'" adds Tanin. "I found the stuff that resonated with me and Bob let me [produce it]. So we actually recorded probably twice as much as actually ended up on the album, I looked through hundreds of poems. So it's not a question of wealth of material."
From Reitman's first poem composed in grade school, to the Vietnam War era, reflections on music, Milwaukee counterculture scene, politics and more — the poems of 12th House strike a chord and remain relevant even in today's world. Three of the poems are also revisited from the debut album, Eleventh House, including the first piece Reitman ever wrote, the 1958 rhyme “The First One.”
"What I realized when I started looking at Bob's poetry is the massive appreciation that Bob had for cultural and social issues," notes Tanin. "What it showed me as an amateur historian looking at his poetry was that we don't change as much as we think we do as human beings."
"I'm surprised that Gary [Tanin] felt so strongly about it... I mean, the stuff was sitting in boxes and [I] had no plans for it. And so it kind of brought it back to life," adds Reitman. "Some of the poems he picked out I'd forgotten about and I haven't gone back and read them and I go, wow, that's interesting. It was like my past talking to my present. I was really separated from that and could listen to it as a listener."
In today's digital age, why does capturing the poetry and releasing it exclusively on vinyl matter? For Tanin, it's about creating connections — inviting listeners to imagine Reitman in front of a mic in a communal third space, sharing his musings.
"It's a call back to the days of analog when Bob would show up at a coffee house and a guy would sit down and play, inspired by the words that somebody would say," says Tanin. "I think that interactive thing between artist and the consumer is what's really left to be human about what poetry and music is all about."
12th House will be released on Oct. 12 in conjunction with 12th House in Twilight, a special launch celebration at the Pabst Theater bringing together local performers and artists to honor Reitman’s lasting impact on Milwaukee’s music and radio community. You can find more information about the show and get your tickets here.
