It's 2009 and I'm Still Bitching About Clear Channel Conclussion

Continued from yesterday.....

Back in Grand Rapids there are some signs of hope. A few years ago some students got together in a store front and start hosting shows. They dubbed themselves the DAAC; the Division Ave. Arts Cooperative. They inhabited a store front in a part of Grand Rapids that was undergoing an “urban renewal” i.e. clearing out the crack houses and the gang activity. Down the street was Skelatones; a coffee house hosting local shows. Slowly things were coming back to life.

One of the aspects of our current predicament is that it forces a community to go back to the long held ideal of DIY. When all the outlets are in the control of one hand, musicians and fans are forced to seek out some way to get there music out. Embracing the basements and coffee houses, college radio stations and the internet as a means to get music out there and bring people together creates a more immediate and personal experience. When I think back to the best I’ve been to or have played it’s inevitably some cramped, sweaty space with scores of kids brought together for a single purpose. By creating our own alternative media outlets we have the ability to control the content, we don’t need to force-fed what some marketing people think is the next big thing. How much longer does broadcast radio have anyway? We live in an ever changing world; with new technologies being developed every single day, radio is a dinosaur at this point, doomed for extinction. Maybe we should just let the vulture pick at the rotting corpse.

But the reality is that for the time being the majority of people are still going to listening to broadcast radio. That means that most people are going to be exposed to a limited range of artists, a limited range of sounds. As far as I’m concerned what Clear Channel is doing is basically tantamount to brainwashing. Maybe their entire goal is to get people to stop listening to music.

I want our airwaves back; plain and simple. There used to be enough room for everyone to have their little piece of the pie, there’s plenty of frequencies on that dial. But now that pie is getting smaller and smaller. If we let this continue one day there won’t be any left at all.

For the first time in my life I wish I could turn on a smooth jazz station in Chicago.