Friday, November 16, 2007
HELP! I’m Trapped In This Car And Dying Of Boredom!
I never understood the horrors of commuter traffic until we moved to Nashville. Now, I not only understand, I endure its hellish unpredictability every working day. My only companion, not by choice but necessity, is the radio. For anywhere from two to three hours a day, I have nothing but the radio to keep me company as I suffer the stupidity of the vast number of individuals the state somehow deemed worthy to hold licenses, along with the illegals who are driving on luck and my prayers they don’t hit me.
What's more, I am one of those who consumes radio on a regular basis. Trapped in a ten-by-ten office with nothing but a window into a hallway, my rare guests come only to give me more work and hardly ever just to socialize. It is a dull and tedious existence preceded and followed by the afore mentioned commute. In all, I estimate that I listen to 13 to 15 hours of radio in my four-day work week. Therefore, I can consider myself an expert on what is out there. And the verdict, it’s terrible, bad, stale, tedious, mind numbing and terrible. However, it is consistent. That is to say, boring. Regardless of the genre of music or talk radio format, the results are the same, large doses of the same, it’s practically the same stuff 24/7, same is the name of the game, more of the same each and every day, it’s the same sameness every single hour of every single day. You think that was a lot of redundancy? That’s radio in our modern age. Choiceless.
Let’s take my favorite medium, talk radio. The Democrats and RINOs want to crush talk radio. Why? Because it is dominated by conservative hosts who blather on about their pet issues and drag the rest of us along. That is not to say that they don’t include liberals. Any regular listener to talk radio knows these hosts love to get as many liberal callers as they can. In fact, the medium is bias. If you are a left-leaning liberal, the farther left the better, you have an excellent chance of getting on a show, more so than a conservative. The reason is simple, liberalism sounds as dumb as the old Abbot and Costello skit on baseball. The liberal caller usually makes the conservative host seem the most intelligent person in the history of mankind and riles the average conservative listener. In other words, it sells. That is why liberal radio fails every time it has been tried. Liberalism cannot stand the test of open discussion. It sounds stupid and unworkable when challenged. Ask the hosts of the Air America programs and the other assorted liberals such as Allen Colmes who have tried and failed. But my point is that the medium is predictable, boring. Even for a conservative rightwing religious nut like myself (just trying to give the liberal reader a point of identification). But the point is that talk radio is the same regardless of who hosts it or from what region it originates. Boring, the same.
Talk radio, Country music radio, easy listening, crap music (not a misspelling), even Christian music stations, all offer the same sameness in their particular specialty. Radio is to entertainment what fast food is to the diet, bad for you no matter where you eat and yet, it is quick and convenient.
I long for something new, something different, a choice. It is no surprise that IPods are so popular. The consumer can have his own choices of blandness instead of the station programmer’s choices (I said it before and I’ll say it again, the easiest job in the country is program director).
We live in a country where those who develop NEW are rewarded with riches and wealth and power. Yet, we are consistently treated to THE SAME. I know, it is easier to produce the same for whatever than it is to develop a new product but, PLEASE, where are those willing to try!? As an aspiring writer and producer, I am trying to force my way into the entertainment business. But it is hard because, sameness sells. The powers who control entertainment would rather pay someone who, once-upon-a-time, managed to create a product than a newcomer. For them, it is a safe investment. Yeah, right. Name the bombs recently set off by those who had one successful venture. They are legion.
If, in the not too distant future, you read a story about a Nashville commuter who suddenly and inexplicably went crazy and rammed his car into his fellow commuters while screaming in emotional pain, you might know the identity of said person and the motivation.
What's more, I am one of those who consumes radio on a regular basis. Trapped in a ten-by-ten office with nothing but a window into a hallway, my rare guests come only to give me more work and hardly ever just to socialize. It is a dull and tedious existence preceded and followed by the afore mentioned commute. In all, I estimate that I listen to 13 to 15 hours of radio in my four-day work week. Therefore, I can consider myself an expert on what is out there. And the verdict, it’s terrible, bad, stale, tedious, mind numbing and terrible. However, it is consistent. That is to say, boring. Regardless of the genre of music or talk radio format, the results are the same, large doses of the same, it’s practically the same stuff 24/7, same is the name of the game, more of the same each and every day, it’s the same sameness every single hour of every single day. You think that was a lot of redundancy? That’s radio in our modern age. Choiceless.
Let’s take my favorite medium, talk radio. The Democrats and RINOs want to crush talk radio. Why? Because it is dominated by conservative hosts who blather on about their pet issues and drag the rest of us along. That is not to say that they don’t include liberals. Any regular listener to talk radio knows these hosts love to get as many liberal callers as they can. In fact, the medium is bias. If you are a left-leaning liberal, the farther left the better, you have an excellent chance of getting on a show, more so than a conservative. The reason is simple, liberalism sounds as dumb as the old Abbot and Costello skit on baseball. The liberal caller usually makes the conservative host seem the most intelligent person in the history of mankind and riles the average conservative listener. In other words, it sells. That is why liberal radio fails every time it has been tried. Liberalism cannot stand the test of open discussion. It sounds stupid and unworkable when challenged. Ask the hosts of the Air America programs and the other assorted liberals such as Allen Colmes who have tried and failed. But my point is that the medium is predictable, boring. Even for a conservative rightwing religious nut like myself (just trying to give the liberal reader a point of identification). But the point is that talk radio is the same regardless of who hosts it or from what region it originates. Boring, the same.
Talk radio, Country music radio, easy listening, crap music (not a misspelling), even Christian music stations, all offer the same sameness in their particular specialty. Radio is to entertainment what fast food is to the diet, bad for you no matter where you eat and yet, it is quick and convenient.
I long for something new, something different, a choice. It is no surprise that IPods are so popular. The consumer can have his own choices of blandness instead of the station programmer’s choices (I said it before and I’ll say it again, the easiest job in the country is program director).
We live in a country where those who develop NEW are rewarded with riches and wealth and power. Yet, we are consistently treated to THE SAME. I know, it is easier to produce the same for whatever than it is to develop a new product but, PLEASE, where are those willing to try!? As an aspiring writer and producer, I am trying to force my way into the entertainment business. But it is hard because, sameness sells. The powers who control entertainment would rather pay someone who, once-upon-a-time, managed to create a product than a newcomer. For them, it is a safe investment. Yeah, right. Name the bombs recently set off by those who had one successful venture. They are legion.
If, in the not too distant future, you read a story about a Nashville commuter who suddenly and inexplicably went crazy and rammed his car into his fellow commuters while screaming in emotional pain, you might know the identity of said person and the motivation.
# posted by Richard W Black : 6:29 AM
