Saturday, April 7, 2012

What Happened to the Good Stuff?


While we're on the subject of good reading, what about some good listening?  Now, my radio dial is set to country.  I don't have an HD radio so it's local stations.  I guess I'm getting old (52), I just don't like the new music.  Where's the melody?  The clever lyrics?  Can you sing to it?  I love my Ultra Lounge CD collection.  Things I remember from childhood (Yes, along with Sing Along with Mitch!).  

Don't get me wrong, my heart is tuned to the blues, good St Louis blues, Memphis blues, deep down south  blues, but not as everyday listening.  As a teen I listened to Top 40, my husband tuned into KSHE95- real rock radio- the more hard core rock in the 70s.  I did enjoy Led Zeppelin, Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd,  Rush, etc. but really, I liked the lighter versions to sing along with.  

Today I just see strangeness.  Skulls, horns, strange dancing that looks like it ought to be in a carnival side show, little if any clothing, overtly sexual.  Fixated on evil.  Not appropriate for family television viewing, especially during a major sports event.  


What happened to nice?  You didn't have to be angelic, not apple pie perfect.  What happened to good entertainment?  Family musicals, nice television entertainment.  

I like a good scary movie too, but make it worth watching. The House on Haunted Hill with Vincent Price,  The Haunting from 1963, The Wax Museum with Vincent Price, the old Lon Chaney movies.   My favorites have to be the funny ones though- Abbot and Costello:   Hold that Ghost, or when they meet Frankenstein or the Mummy.  Clever, creative or funny, not just a bunch of zombies doing the same thing all zombies do in every zombie movie.


If I eliminated every slasher movie from the local video store, I'd be down to almost no choices.  Why?

My granddaughter tricked me into letting her watch an RL Stein movie.  I've seen some of the shorts, campfire type stories where kids get themselves in a scary mess but nothing too tragic or disturbing.  This one was, it wasn't on the kid channel.  It revolved around a camp ground where a demon came into their dreams at night.  It was scary and I turned it off.  For the next three hours I made her watch "Too Cute" on the animal channel to drive the "bad" out of her.  Three hours of watching all kittens all the time.

Again, I'm really not terribly prudish.  I love movies about space, movies where things blow up.   Think Die Hard or Schwarzenegger movies.  Love them!  Total Recall is one of my favorite movies.  


How about these good old radio shows?  The audio quality needs to be be better, my hearing isn't nearly what it should be; however, again clever stories designed to spark your imagination. 


And the nice books, not cotton candy nice, but something I could leave out on the coffee table and not be embarrassed if the preacher would stop by.



8 comments:

Michelle said...

I agree with you. Even the cartoons are bad today. A couple of years ago they made a big deal over Tom and Jerry being to violent. Have these same people bothered to watch what on TV today. I love the old movies. William Powell is one of my favorite movie stars. I love his Thin Man collection. Most of my movies are old ones. Love them. We have X M radio so we get all the old radios shows. Bob hope, Burns and Allen, the Shadow........

Beth said...

Ugh. I agree with you! I'm in my mid 30's and can't take the movies, books, music of today. I love country music, but get tired of hearing the same new songs over and over again...I think I"m an oddity at my age, but I LOVE listening to Vern Gosdin, Tammy Wynette, Alabama, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, etc. I wish there were more ways to find (free) radio stations that play more of the older stuff. 80's and back as far as country goes, and I LOVE it. I haven't seen a movie I love in YEARS. Things move too fast now. Oh well...I guess it's better to entertain myself rather than wait around for music, movies or books to do it. Thank goodness for old paperbacks at yardsales! lol

LindaG said...

You and I and my hubby are all in agreement on these things, though there are shows that we do like.
Vincent Price, Boris Karloff and Lon Chaney. Now that is some good 'horror'.

Yup. Agree with you on it all.

Happy Easter!

Pat said...

Great post! You have brought up some really good points about the current "music" and "movies" - and I use that term loosely. I get really perturbed when I hear what pop rock stars are scheduled to be at the Super Bowl each year. Definitely not for prime time watching with the family.

Easter Blessings...

Catawissa Gazetteer said...

Your fogey's showing again.

Candy C. said...

I agree 100%...

Yahoobuckaroo's Blog said...

Just one hint. If you go to the following link, they have every radio show available that the Orson Welles Players ever did for the old Mercury Theater shows. They even did a show taken from GK Chesterton's novel--The Man Who Was Thrusady!, and it's pretty darn good too.

http://www.mercurytheatre.info

And the good music's all acoustic these days I think. You gotta find some internet acoustic radio shows. AOL has a good radio selection, and anyone can use it. Just search for AOL Radio.

Kathy Felsted Usher said...

Thanks!