THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 21, 1995 TAG: 9505180159
SECTION: REAL LIFE PAGE: K3 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: REAL MOMENTS
SOURCE: BY KEITH MONROE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
THE DAY the music died was just like any other day. There I was, commuting to work on 44 and punching radio buttons to hop from one golden oldie station to the next. But all of a sudden I realized I wasn't just dodging commercials, I was dodging the oldies too.
``All the leaves are brown. . . '' Punch. ``Can't buy me love. . . '' Punch. ``Stop, in the name of love. . . '' Punch.
This was the music I grew up with. I knew these tunes ineradicably. They run through my head unbidden, uninvited. But after 30 years, enough was enough. I no longer wanted to get the old records off the shelf. I didn't care who put the ram in the ramalamadingdong. I didn't want them to give me any more of that rock 'n' roll music. It had a backbeat, but I was prepared to lose it.
The question was what to put in its place. I had no interest in simply listening to the hiss of my fellow commuters' tires on hot pavement. At first, I thought I'd get up to date and listen to some cool '90s tunes. So I consulted the neighborhood teen to get the word on who's really in. They had names like Nirvana and Pearl Drops (which I thought was a dentifrice), Toads in a Sprocket and Pigs in a Blanket, Simply Red and Green Day. But most sounded more like they were Terminally Blue.
I must be too far over the hill to get with the program. This Generation X music explained why Prozac is so popular. It's not that it's loud or outrageous or played by kids dressed weird and tattooed or punctured in odd places.
My parents complained about most of that in the '60s and the answer is still the same. Rock 'n' roll is supposed to be loud and anarchic. But it's also supposed to be joyous and manic and make you feel happy like an oldtime movie. Three tunes of this stuff and you were ready for the suicide hotline.
Maybe there are upbeat acts, but I kept running into despair and alienation, losing your religion while avoiding a melody. None of this music had much of a beat and you couldn't dance to it. You could enter a coma or bang your head to it, but that's about all. Some of these acts are described as alternative music. An alternative to music is more like it. For a tune they substitute a drone, and here's a sample lyric:
``It's all hopeless. Kurt is dead.
Lassie was a dog and Rosebud was a sled.
I applied for a job in a monotone
But I didn't get it so leave me alone.
I'm hangin' at the mall
With worms in my head.''
More power to kids who adore this stuff, but I decided it must be an acquired taste - like strychnine. It's hard to imagine someone looking back with nostalgia on this stuff a couple of decades from now.
``Oh, listen, dear, they're playing our song.''
``You're right, it's `Turn On the Gas and Stuff Rags Under the Door' by the supergroup Head in the Oven. Whatever happened to them?''
``Don't ask.''
Since the golden oldies have worn out their welcome and the latest rage gives me clinical depression, I decided to go back further in time and further afield geographically. So I've dropped about a zillion dollars on tapes and now inch down the highway at rush hour to happy sounds.
There's Fats Waller playing ``After You've Gone'' and Glenn Gould playing Bach, Peggy Lee and Benny Goodman doing ``Why Don't You Do Right'' and Brenda Lee imploring ``Break It to Me Gently.'' I've got Ella singing Arlen and Bob Marley singing himself, Beausoleil for a sprinkling of cajun magic and Basie feeling ``Blue and Sentimental.''
This is obviously the first time in history when such a range of music has been produced on the planet, let alone available to anyone with 10 bucks and a machine to play it on. Almost a hundred years of songs still linger on, magically. Yet many of us content ourselves with the same old Top 40 tedium. It's a big mistake. As Frank croons ``Come Fly with Me,'' I vow never to set the radio on oldies autopilot again. MEMO: Send your real moments to Fred Kirsch, Real Moments, The
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