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My top ten songs about radio
Radio is dead. Maybe not completely, but it’s hooked up to a respirator and just waiting for someone to pull the plug. Yes, there is satellite radio if you want to add another monthly bill to your budget, or internet radio if you don’t mind listening to music at 56 kbps. But the glory days of FM radio are far behind us. Disc jockeys have gone from cultural heavyweights and arbiters of taste to just a few flickering flames of freedom on college radio. Most of them are now just corporate slaves like the rest of us. Many mainstream DJs don’t even broadcast live anymore- they tape their spiel ahead of time and punch it into a computer database, and they haven’t spun actual records or selected their own playlists in years. Stations are bought and sold, formats are changed, and the diversity of music available on the airwaves is shrinking every day. With that in mind, and in the same manner that media outlets prepare obituaries for public figures before they actually die, this is my eulogy for terrestrial radio before it’s gone.
The Ramones – “Do You Remember Rock N’ Roll Radio?”
Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers – “The Last DJ”
Elvis Costello and The Attractions – “Radio Radio”
The Kinks – “Around the Dial”
David Bowie – “DJ”
The Ramones – “We Want the Airwaves”
Steely Dan – “FM”
Jet – “Roll Over DJ”
The Replacements – “Left of the Dial”
WKRP In Cincinnati – “WKRP Theme Song”
