"@#$% you!"
-anonymous caller to KQUE radio
One would not expect a Benny Goodman lover to speak so crassly.
A Beatles lover, perhaps; a Metallica lover, definitely. But not someone who listens to the likes of Glenn Miller. Right?
Guess again. KQUE-FM 103 unexpectedly switched formats on March 20 and Houston radio will never be the same again. Gone are the likes of Duke Ellington. In are the likes of Sting. The diehard listeners aren't too happy about it, and they're making their feelings known.
Paul Berlin, veteran (he's been there 47 years - can Stevens & Pruett say that?) disc jockey at KQUE, said the response to the sudden change has been "unbelievable." Leave it to old farts to whine and moan when something happens they don't like. Except for once, I agree with them.
I first developed an appreciation for big band music in my high school jazz band. I played bass. There are two types of bass players - good ones and me. while the rest of my ensemble was improvising solos, I was trying to figure out what key we were in. (Is four flats the key of C? G?) Luckily for me, bass isn't an instrument that stands out, so whenever I'd get lost (which was most of the time), I'd turn my volume all the way down, nod my head to the rhythm and pretend like I knew what I was doing. My instructor was never the wiser.
But, I did become much better. I learned a lot more about playing bass from Count Basie than I ever did from Alice in Chains. I also learned to appreciate big band music. I still think that "Sing, Sing, Sing" is one of the coolest songs ever written. It's also one of the funnest songs I've ever played.
So what's KQUE going to play now that they've been bought out by SFX Broadcasting Inc., a Yankee-owned radio conglomerate? Crap. I mean pop. Pop/rock music. "Modern" pop/rock music.
And that's the problem. Modern pop/rock music, well, it lacks a certain je ne sais quoi, it uhm ... well, it's really loud, and, uh ... it has a beat, and ... it's depressing ... really loud ... and ... uh ... well, it just plain stinks. Rock music nowadays is awful. Atrocious. Horrendous. Ghastly. There's no variety anymore. Everyone sounds the same.
Really, given a choice, would anybody honestly pick Oasis over the Beatles? Pearl Jam over Led Zeppelin? Alanis over Janis? The new Metallica over the old Metallica?
I guess I'd just like to think that in Houston there's room enough for all types of music on the radio. But apparently not.
Maybe I'm just getting old. The symptoms are all there. I play racquetball, sport of the middle aged, instead of lacrosse, the sport I played lo those many moons ago when I was in high school. I actually study now in the hopes of learning something rather than sleeping and cutting up in class. I even recorded Frank Sinatra over Ozzy Osbourne, a mortal sin for anyone who wishes to be "hip" and "with it." Come to think of it, most of the music I listen to is older than I am. Or about the same age.
My co-worker, Ed, has a motto about aging. "You're as young as you feel," says Ed, "so keep feeling something young." Ed uses it to justify his sexual dalliances with 12 year-olds (or, more truthfully, his fantasies of dalliances with 12 year-olds). But we just let him be, because Ed's just another dirty old man whose time on this earth is limited and who has to pull his foot out of the grave anytime he wants to walk anywhere.
He's 38.
Pennell is a junior English major who wishes to exclude Rush (the band, not the man) from his disparaging comments about modern music.