Every morning before school I crank on my car and turn up the radio dial to help me wake up. I rely on music to help my brain turn on while I’m driving. CD’s are outdated, and fiddling with a smartphone trying to pick a song while driving isn’t too safe, so I’ve been listening to the radio a lot lately.  The past few mornings I’ve caught my index finger hissing at me every time I reach to hit the Tune button.  It’s only trying to help me, as I know I’ll only be torturing myself as soon as I hit it.  Well, I hit it anyways.  For about the 5th time this week (and it’s only Monday), I get to hear all about how Meghan Trainor is “all about that bass”.  While that’s only on one station, it’s the same sort of deal with all the others.  I can turn it to the Country Music station and hear Florida Georgia Line bragging about the same truck they were yesterday, or I can turn it to the Rock station, and 30 years later, Ozzy is still riding that stupid “Crazy Train” at least twice a day.

I’m not typing this out to criticize the music, the artists, or the genres, but instead to question the commercial radio stations and mainstream music industry.  Even though it’s challenged by portable music players, Pandora, and Youtube, radio is still plays a huge part in the music industry.  I guess I have a bit of nostalgia towards it, and that’s why I’m even concerned.  When I was younger, iPods still weren’t “around” and CD’s were a pain, so all I had was the radio.  Maybe that’s why I hate to see it fall.  Why is it predicted that FM radio stations will be obsolete in 6 years?  Why do we hear the same songs over and over, and why does the catalog of songs for each station update and change so slowly? I think I figured it out (without even using Google), and it’s all driven by money.  Well, of course it is, this is America.

I’ll use the new Krispy Kreme they’ve just opened here in Roanoke as an example.  Krispy Kreme has had the same logo, and has been glazing their doughnuts over in sugary, greasy goodness in the same exact same fashion since the 1930’s. Why haven’t they changed anything since? It’s because they’ve always sold extremely well.  If a company has a product that people will buy over and over again, why change it?  The same goes for the radio stations.  If the station builds a playlist with songs on it that people like (at first), why change it? 

Another reason these song libraries are so shallow has to do with the record labels.  Record labels don’t want to hire a lot of artists because it costs them a lot of money.  A label must pay out a lot of money to get one of their artists’ songs on the radio.  This is why record labels will only hire artists they believe will crank out hit after hit.  It causes the artists are already big to get bigger, and the “rising” artists all get lost in the crowd.

It’s predicted that the age of FM radio stations could be over within the next decade.  Most people probably wouldn’t care, and now, I don’t blame them.  I might even be the only one complaining about it.  It’s not like there’s any money coming out of my pocket to listen to it, but getting this sore throat from cringing each time I hear a song from earlier in the day is a charge high enough to make me shut it off and sit in silence.  I probably won’t miss it when it’s gone for good.

*wipes dust off of iPod classic from 2006*