Radio Free Suckitude
If I could change only one thing about Atlanta, it wouldn't be the humidity, it wouldn't be the horrible traffic - no, it would be bringing a couple of decent radio stations to this market. I have no words to describe how awful radio (at least, rock radio) is in Atlanta, so I must turn to the keen wit of that admirable wordsmith, Bart Simpson: "I didn't think it was physically possible, but this both sucks and blows!"
I'll give you an example. Today on my drive home, my choices were: McDonald's commercial (featuring weird white-boy almost-rap), "Sweet Home Alabama" by Lynyrd Skynyrd, "(I Wear My) Sunglasses At Night" by Corey Hart (I kid you not) and "Paralyzer" by Finger Eleven.
Don't get me wrong, I actually liked "Paralyzer" and even bought it off iTunes. In retrospect, however, I should have saved my dollar because between the 2.5 rock stations in this city, they play it between 40 - 50 times a day, whenever they aren't playing "Rise Today" by Alter Bridge and "Life is Beautiful" by Sixx AM. Although to be fair, one station occasionally throws "Animals" by Nickelback into the mix and the other lately has been playing Puddle of Mudd's "Psycho" almost as much as they play "Rise Today". Seriously, if I could forbid those 2 stations the same 5 songs, they'd go bankrupt because of all the new CDs they'd have to buy to fill the day.
I wrote "2.5 rock stations" up there because, although there are actually four nominally rock stations in Atlanta, I don't judge one of them as harshly because they are self-described as classic rock - they play a lot of Steve Miller and Styx, but it's worth checking while flipping around because you can occasionally get lucky with a Fleetwood Mac or Led Zeppelin or Cream, or someone you'd almost forgotten about like Gerry Rafferty. (And no, it was not this station that was playing "Sunglasses at Night", so no one is off the hook on THAT score. Not that I'd call 'Sunglasses' a classic, but in case you thought I should give them the benefit of the doubt in case someone mistakenly thought classic = old - no. Not even that halfway excuse.) Then I only counted one as half a rock station because they evidently can't decide whether they are or not. They play decent tunage from time to time - in fact, they're about the only ones who give decent airplay to the Foo Fighters's "Long Road to Ruin"; the other 2 stations seem to think "The Pretender" is the only song on that album - which I like "The Pretender", I like it a lot, but I think "Long Road to Ruin" is a far superior, absofrickinlutely GREAT song. But alas, that particular radio station is like the little girl in the nursery rhyme, the little girl who had a little curl. When it is good, it is very, very good but when it is bad, it is horrid. Intermingled in there among the Foo Fighters and Red Hot Chili Peppers and Black Crowes, they play horrors by John Mayer and Jack Johnson and Sheryl Crow. UGH. And if they sometimes play Death Cab for Cutie, well, they also sometimes play Linkin Park. The composition of the playlist is very odd to me because it seems like anyone who liked the former wouldn't like the latter, and vice versa.
I would just give up on the radio and listen to my CDs, but when we were prepping the house for sale, the realtor wanted us to de-clutter (apparently a realty euphemism for 'fix it so that it looks like no one has ever lived here, not even for 10 minutes, thus sullying the sanctity of this wonderful property') so 98% of my CDs are in a box in our storage facility and, no matter how much I like them, I get tired of the same 10 discs. For a few years in college and immediately after, I had a pirate radio station - WRED, and my slogan was, "Where we don't play stuff that sucks". I might play rock or blues or country, it might be 30 years old or released last week, it might even be me and my friends goofing around on a cover tune, but I never, EVER played stuff that sucked. It might be time to revive WRED...although I might have to move into this century and podcast it, because I think the fantabulous crystal-tuned transceiver my dad made me (Oh yeah! You bet my dad aided & abetted my forays into crime!) is boxed up in the storage place too.
If I could change only one thing about Atlanta, it wouldn't be the humidity, it wouldn't be the horrible traffic - no, it would be bringing a couple of decent radio stations to this market. I have no words to describe how awful radio (at least, rock radio) is in Atlanta, so I must turn to the keen wit of that admirable wordsmith, Bart Simpson: "I didn't think it was physically possible, but this both sucks and blows!"
I'll give you an example. Today on my drive home, my choices were: McDonald's commercial (featuring weird white-boy almost-rap), "Sweet Home Alabama" by Lynyrd Skynyrd, "(I Wear My) Sunglasses At Night" by Corey Hart (I kid you not) and "Paralyzer" by Finger Eleven.
Don't get me wrong, I actually liked "Paralyzer" and even bought it off iTunes. In retrospect, however, I should have saved my dollar because between the 2.5 rock stations in this city, they play it between 40 - 50 times a day, whenever they aren't playing "Rise Today" by Alter Bridge and "Life is Beautiful" by Sixx AM. Although to be fair, one station occasionally throws "Animals" by Nickelback into the mix and the other lately has been playing Puddle of Mudd's "Psycho" almost as much as they play "Rise Today". Seriously, if I could forbid those 2 stations the same 5 songs, they'd go bankrupt because of all the new CDs they'd have to buy to fill the day.
I wrote "2.5 rock stations" up there because, although there are actually four nominally rock stations in Atlanta, I don't judge one of them as harshly because they are self-described as classic rock - they play a lot of Steve Miller and Styx, but it's worth checking while flipping around because you can occasionally get lucky with a Fleetwood Mac or Led Zeppelin or Cream, or someone you'd almost forgotten about like Gerry Rafferty. (And no, it was not this station that was playing "Sunglasses at Night", so no one is off the hook on THAT score. Not that I'd call 'Sunglasses' a classic, but in case you thought I should give them the benefit of the doubt in case someone mistakenly thought classic = old - no. Not even that halfway excuse.) Then I only counted one as half a rock station because they evidently can't decide whether they are or not. They play decent tunage from time to time - in fact, they're about the only ones who give decent airplay to the Foo Fighters's "Long Road to Ruin"; the other 2 stations seem to think "The Pretender" is the only song on that album - which I like "The Pretender", I like it a lot, but I think "Long Road to Ruin" is a far superior, absofrickinlutely GREAT song. But alas, that particular radio station is like the little girl in the nursery rhyme, the little girl who had a little curl. When it is good, it is very, very good but when it is bad, it is horrid. Intermingled in there among the Foo Fighters and Red Hot Chili Peppers and Black Crowes, they play horrors by John Mayer and Jack Johnson and Sheryl Crow. UGH. And if they sometimes play Death Cab for Cutie, well, they also sometimes play Linkin Park. The composition of the playlist is very odd to me because it seems like anyone who liked the former wouldn't like the latter, and vice versa.
I would just give up on the radio and listen to my CDs, but when we were prepping the house for sale, the realtor wanted us to de-clutter (apparently a realty euphemism for 'fix it so that it looks like no one has ever lived here, not even for 10 minutes, thus sullying the sanctity of this wonderful property') so 98% of my CDs are in a box in our storage facility and, no matter how much I like them, I get tired of the same 10 discs. For a few years in college and immediately after, I had a pirate radio station - WRED, and my slogan was, "Where we don't play stuff that sucks". I might play rock or blues or country, it might be 30 years old or released last week, it might even be me and my friends goofing around on a cover tune, but I never, EVER played stuff that sucked. It might be time to revive WRED...although I might have to move into this century and podcast it, because I think the fantabulous crystal-tuned transceiver my dad made me (Oh yeah! You bet my dad aided & abetted my forays into crime!) is boxed up in the storage place too.
11 Comments:
Listen to my show this week if you can.
By
Anonymous, at 10:50 PM
Why not get an iTrip or similar for your iPod and broadcast your own fm rock station?
By
thermalsatsuma, at 12:59 AM
Atlanta never changes! You should live in the vast wasteland that is Alabama. We get stations from Huntsville and Birmingham and they all suck. How do we survive? Two letters: X and M.
By
Topcat, at 7:53 AM
A pirate radio station? How cool! (Did you say "Arrr" a lot on the air?) I almost never listen to the radio, just podcasts on my iPod or CDs. Or the hip-hop station out of S.Carolina that Anthony likes. It's kind of weird that all the djs sound very white, but the music, not so much. And they have (or had - I haven't tuned in lately) this great commercial for some local club. "Remember, it's 18 to party and 21 to GET YOUR FREAK ON."
I don't think our taste in music overlaps 100%, but you introduced me to two of my favorite songs ever, "Brand New Key," and "Hallelujah."
By
Anonymous Me, at 8:12 AM
As Jack Johnson's future wife, I disagree on your opinion of him. . . respectfully :)
By
A Margarita, at 9:16 AM
I have to tell you, I love both Death Cab For Cutie and Linkin Park. And Jack Johnson, and Foo Fighters. And the Red Hot Chili Peppers might have a song I like somewhere but I'd never buy them. And Fleetwood Mac is so my mother that I just cannot bear it, whereas Sheryl Crow is quite cool, IMHO.
I'll grin and bear "Classic" Rock, but I do think it's just another word for old. So the fact that I might like some of it does not mean we should set up a radio station that does nothing but that.
And "Sweet Home Alabama" is a guilty pleasure.
But the radio stations here are pretty eclectic, in a whole "it's good music" type way, and if they could do away with the reggae, I'd be so much happier.
By
Anonymous, at 10:31 AM
Heather, I will certainly try!
Neil, that's a great suggestion and I will look into that.
Sandy, I have issues with XM as well (we have it as part of Direct TV, not in our cars). I'll be happily enjoying a station - I'm fond of Squizz, as I think Jon is as well - but no matter what station, it'll be great for a while, then they play something so abominable I want to boil my ears in bleach.
Nancy, I'm so glad you love those songs!
Margarita, sorry for insulting your future husband. :-)
Maria, I don't think we should road trip together. We are musically incompatible. But I still love you!
By
Helly, at 3:15 PM
I can go you one better. I listen to AM 750 on the way home from work to get traffic updates and am thereby forced to listen to (choke) Sean Hannity until Captain Herb comes on with the traffic report.
cheers,
Phil
By
Anonymous, at 8:32 PM
Phil - you're a great American!!!
By
Helly, at 9:06 PM
From the time I arrived in this country in 1980 I've lived in Cleveland, Washington D.C., Los Angeles, South Florida, and North Carolina (triangle region) and always, ALWAYS all radio stations sucked bollix. I never bought into the satellite radio fiasco (ClearChannel will own everything, as all good-n-evil corporations do), so for decades I've had to do w/compilation tapes, CDs, now mp3s and mp4s. I thank god for the iPod
By
Anonymous, at 1:07 PM
When my brother lived in Cincinnasty, they had a great rock station. You could hear Rob Zombie, Foo Fighters and Zeppelin in the same set. Unfortunately, that and Skyline chili were about the only things Cincinnasty had going for it...
By
Helly, at 1:06 PM
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