So this week I had to watch a CBC Documentary for class called, The End. It discussed The End of media formats that we have come to love... one specific idea was the shift away from radio to digital and satellite sources. It got me thinking that yeah, I used to LOVE the radio. I used to have it playing in the background while I did just about everything. It was fun because you never really knew what you'd hear next... kind of like finding a mixtape on the street and popping it in as soon as you got home. But lately, my love for the radio has died out. I find that I will discover a song I love and within a month it will be played every 15mins by the radio stations to the point where I cant even stand that song anymore. Its awful!
Cobra Starship is a great example of this. I heard Good Girls Go Bad and thought, man they are gonna hit it big with this! Sure enough a few weeks later it was slowly being introduced to top40 radio. I was stoked for them, thats awesome that they finally found an audience but... if I listened to the radio for lets say, an hour, I probably heard the song two or three times! Are there not other songs to fill the time slots? There are soooo many songs out there!
The same thing happened when Green Day's American Idiot album. I used to love it but after a couple months of constant radio play, I had to put the CD on the back of my shelves. It was only recently that I was able to bring it back from seclusion.
Heres the deal, traditional radio only plays a handful of songs. No matter how many awesome songs are out there, they only use a VERY small percentage of that to create their radio play lists. Also, things like MAPL and CanCon ensure that in Canada, at least 30% of content aired is Canadian. In order to adhere to these regulations, stations often choose some of the top charted Canadian artists and play those tracks constantly so they can say the requirements were met. College stations are some of the only indie friendly airwaves out there who look for newer songs.
I love radio but lately I've had enough of the traditional style. Digital radio, podcasts, online stations, concerts... these are all great ways to discover new sounds. From there, I load them up on my ipod and hit the shuffle button. Not quite the community feel of radio, but it sure beats listening to the same stuff over and over again until my favorite songs make my ears bleed.
What do you think? Are you a radio fan or have you had enough? What will you miss about radio, if anything?
Let me know what you think... did Radio kill the Music star?
Rock On,
- Girl At The Rock Show
Song of the Day: Spirit Of The Radio by Rush
hey jess.. i liked this blog.. you have a good point.. flipping on the radio nowadays its constantly the same beats over and over to the point where your favourite song can give you a headache after a week or two.. even here in europe alot of the french stations play pitbull and the black eyed peas literally over and over.. theres no variety.. but the radio is one of the best ways to hear new music when they do finally decide to try news things, so.. i guess im not entirely sure how i feel about the radio, but i like your points :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. I just find that radio is somewhat delayed lately in airing new music. And then when they do, they loop it on overkill you know?
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