Could Video kill the Radio Star if the Radio Star was Already Dead?

Needless to say, I am a music nerd-slash-snob. Music and all that it implies is truly the only thing that I can argue beyond a shadow of a doubt, that and how the Fair Tax plan will save our dying economic security. As a kid, like most every other kid, my first encounter with music in a consumable form was my dad's enormous collection, MTV, and the radio. My father's taste in music was so unique and expansive that it was a stand-alone monster of an influence. You couldn't here Graham Parker, Jason and the Scorchers, R.E.M., Mojo Nixon*, King Crimson or Frank Zappa** on the radio or MTV in those days. In 1983-86, the radio was reserved for the Go-Go's, post-'The River' Springsteen***, Journey, Pat Benetar, WHAM!, Duran Duran, Madonna, and the long running list of classic 80's tracks now available on the Time-Life 'Totally 80's' collection.

That being said, let me dive into this a bit deeper.

In 1977, the fledgling Saturday Night Live invited Elvis Costello and his newly formed band the Attractions to play two tunes off of his debut album, 'My Aim is True'. This being network television, the story goes that NBC basically allowed Costello to play the single and one album track of the producers choice, The producers chose the less-than-enthusiastic "Less Than Zero". Coming back live the night of the show, the announcer says, "Once again, here's Elvis Costello."The band launches into an adrenalized working of "Less Than Zero" and all seems well. Halfway through the second line of the first verse, Elvis shouts out "Stop, stop," and the band abruptly ends the song unfinished. Apologizing to the crowd for the sudden halt in the program, Costello turns to the band and they crank out the now classic performance of "Radio, Radio", a non-album single that openly bashed the radio format with lyrics such as:

You either shut up or get cut out

They don't wanna hear about it

It's only inches on the reel to reel

The radio is in the hands of such a bunch of fools

Tryin to anesthetize the way that you feel.

In 1981, with a rocket launch and a flag set firmly into place infront of a lunar backdrop, the curly-haired everyman Mark Goodman welcomed the world to the new format known as MTV, all music, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. After some brief introductions to the other newly-dubbed "VJ's", they launched right into the first video, The Buggles' one and only hit, "Video Killed the Radio Star".

They took the credit for your second symphony.

Rewritten by machine and new technology,

and now I understand the problems you can see.

Certainly a fitting way to start up a station which was simultaneously lauded and criticized for it's use of image and buzz words to decide the fate of popular music. Needless to say in order to keep up with MTV's stamina, the radio began to cave to the likings of the post-punk MTV generation as they hailed in the synthesized New Wave music from across the pond. I for one like to forget that it was their fault that we, as a nation, had to fight off A Flock of Seagulls, but when you put that against their more recent crimes against humanity, TRL, Room Raiders, My Super Sweet 16, etc. it was a small price to pay. Besides, we got Martha Quinn out of the deal.

Let's jump forward in time to 2004-2005. There was a time when the radio in atlanta was a simple collection of easily digestable formats:

92.9 FM - Classic Rock
94.1 FM- Top Forty
94.9 FM - Light, Easy Listening
96.1 FM - Rock
97.1 FM - Oldies
97.5 FM - Hip Hop...etc. etc.

What followed in the 2004-2005 period was a massive reformating to compete for listeners, which did nothing but split the Atlanta audience every which way.

- We lost an oldies station
- We have two new rock stations...both with comparable playlists
- We have two top 40 stations...both with nearly duplicate playlists
- We have two major country stations...both with comparable playlists
- We have a sub-par classic rock station...with a playlist of what appears to be 20 songs
- We have two Contemporary Christian stations
- All of them spend more time on average with commercials than they do programming

The fact as it appears to me is what was evident before MTV came around. Radio makes money and they drag us along with whatever songs they think we would like. There is no real new voice anymore. Oldies are played for nostalgia, and new rock is played for sales. And the big bad Clear Channel wonders why folks are flocking to Satellite radio, and the record companies wonder why sales are down. Check out the radio in ATL and it is clear as day.
Folks should listen to what they like, but I've talked music with enough folks in my time to know that all too often, myself included, we rely on the radio to play it for us. Somewhere we have to decide as listeners, and at the end of the day consumers, that we are going to support the artists we enjoy. As long as there are folks who listen in everytime 96 Rock plays Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Sweet Home Alabama" although just about everybody has that tune somewhere in their collection, 96 Rock will neglect other artists from that time period, such as Little Feat, Johnny Winter, and Neil Young. DaveFM on 92.9 has it down to an art, play what we like and what the people seem to dig. They actually listen to their listeners. It takes a lone misfit to stop the music suddenly, and abruptly change direction. Hopefully, other folks will follow along as they did years ago, and the voice on the end of the reciever will be ours once again.

*Mojo Nixon ended up doing MTV promo spots later in the 1980's as well as becoming a radio drive time DJ, now hosting a station on the Sirius Satellite Network
**Frank Zappa did a concert performance for MTV's 1st annual Halloween bash, however his only real brush with radio success came in the form of "Valley Girl", sung by his daughter Moon Unit
***Bruce Springsteen's first top 40 radio hit was "Hungry Heart" off of 1980's 'The River', but his first mega-hit was "Dancing in the Dark" nearly four years later.