Radio Music | Teen Ink

Radio Music

January 17, 2013
By jlamkin BRONZE, Cambridge, Massachusetts
jlamkin BRONZE, Cambridge, Massachusetts
1 article 0 photos 0 comments

Favorite Quote:
"when i get off this bus, im going to run into the woods and never come back. And when I DO come back, i will be the knife master"


Let me begin by defining music. Music, organized sound, can be anything, whether its a guitar, banjo, or even banging two rocks together. Now we all know that music, although usually extremely annoying, is constantly being played on radio stations around the world. And as much as I’d like to say that basically 99% of it isn’t music, I’d just be contradicting myself. But what i can say is that the modern radio music SUCKS!

The music that used to always be played was good ol’ Rock N’ Roll. The thing about rock is that its a broad concept. Rock can be anything, from the classics all the way to the verge of becoming hard hitting metal. With such a large variety of rock, you would think that there would be more rock fans. So why do radio stations seem to play nothing but that pitchy, annoying, unintelligent “party music” that all you need to make it is a computer and a 4th grade education....

The thing about rock is that its real instruments. Real guitar, real banjo, real rocks and real vocals. Yes, i said that. Real vocals. Don’t let any of those udderly horrible “musicians” tell you they can actually sing. Its called auto-tune. It costs $399.99 and when you really listen to it, it sounds more robotic than human. It just shows you how badly that the person using it is singing. And for those who are bad enough to need it, they shouldn’t be singing at all. So basically none of those pop singers should be singing.

Think about it this way. 60% of Americans like classic rock music, and only about 1/16 of the music stations actually play rock. I guess the radio stations must feel like they should be supporting new artists, but the music that is being created is basically the same 3 chords as another song. For these artists, all it takes is a 4th grade education and garageband. Seriously, any song you listen to on the radio these days are probably written by a 14 year old girl with too much free time and money. So next time you hear a new “talented” artist on the radio, think to yourself about how simple and how little skill it took to create the song.

Another thing to consider is how many legit bands are struggling to even get a radio station to listen to a demo, let alone play it. And these are the people who actually invested time to learn an instrument and exercise their vocal abilities. These are people who write unique new songs that aren’t copied off the summer hit from the year before.

Here’s a challenge. Go to the billboard 200 after a rock band releases an album (make sure the bands well known) and write down the top three songs. Then, if the rock bands album wasn’t one of the top 3, which it probably wasn’t, find where it is on the charts. In a few weeks check the site again and see what the top 3 are. Chances are that they haven’t changed. Then look for the rock bands album, i give you a 95% guarantee that the album has already been replaced. For example, when Green Day's album “Uno” came out, it reached #2 on the billboard 200, and by the end of the month it had already dropped below #10 while the leading album was still #1. Now even for a band as big as Green Day, making the top 10 is near impossible.

On August 21, 2010, the album “Nightmare” by Avenged Sevenfold (A7X) reached #1 on the billboard 200. The thing that makes this even more astounding is that A7X is a heavy metal band. Guess how long this lasted though.... less than a week. From the 21st to the 27th of August, it was #1. By the midpoint of September it was already below 30. Now I know you’re thinking “well, they reached #1, so who cares?”, but the thing is, albums by any techno artist manage to stay in the top 10 for almost a month. And this is all because radio stations just straight out wont play any music by rock and metal bands.

So what do you want to listen to? Some kid who managed to figure out how to make a song that sounds exactly like 30 other songs, or do you want to listen to unique, new music that it actually takes skill to write? Take a second and think about your answer. With so many rock bands and metal bands trying to make a living off music, it takes years for them to get noticed, while it only takes a matter of weeks for music generated by a computer, “created” by some 14 year old. Its just not right.



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