Bad Music on the Radio

I live in a one-radio-station-town (a university owned NPR/FM station). Of course there are other stations on the air available, but they are made up of Top 10 crap and several getting-saved-by-Jesus stations. So my options are obviously limited.

Now on the bright side, the NPR station here in Athens plays really good music. It’s not classical music, but I can’t have everything. This I can get on the web and through my stereo via high speed cable. WOUB plays eclectic hip stuff.

BUT—there are times when even the best of the best revert to the cliché. This usually happens during a holiday. I think you know what I’m talking about. You know—when you have to put up with all of those incredibly lame rock and roll Christmas songs like; Thank God It's Christmas – Queen; Rock and Roll Christmas - George Thorogood & the Destroyers; and that classic All I Want for Christmas Is You – Foghat.

I need to clarify something here first. It takes me forever to fall asleep at night, so my only solace during this frustrating period (sometimes two to three hours) is to listen to music while my wife enjoys her slumber, next to me. Which begs the question: What happens when they play the cliché music? Well, I just have to lie there and take it (remember it’s a one-station-town).

Last night was one of those times. It was a St. Patrick’s Day weekend and the DJ of one of the “good” shows decided to play Irish music for the whole show. It was some of the most irritating music ever played in all of Christendom. Diddle dee dee, diddle dee dee, diddle dee dee, didle dee dee, for three F-ing hours. And then it ended with a fiddle being sawed in half by only two notes for over fifteen minutes, I thought that the record must have developed a skip and the DJ was off in the bathroom taking care of a problem caused by too much corned beef. It even woke my wife up. I was ready to pull my hair out.

So Mister Grumpy—why the sad tale?

I just don’t understand why we are goaded into these clichés. Why do we have to play Irish music on St. Patrick’s Day? This—everybody is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day--is as old and tired as TV antennas. Please, join the millennium, folks.

Hopefully by Christmas, I’ll have a CD player on my nightstand. This blog is written by a poor poet, so buying something that extravagant is not as easy as some of you might think.

What we put up with for our art!