Tuesday, October 30, 2007

ARTS & CULTURE


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CALMING MUSIC CAUSES SAVAGE BREASTS

NOAH BIERMAN, BOSTON GLOBE - Some T riders complained about maudlin Phil
Collins music and lame trivia. Others balked at hearing commercials in
yet another public space. Then there were commuters who wondered why
young guitarists who play live music on the platform were being drowned
out by the "radio ga ga" of corporate disc jockeys.

But today, these disparate T riders are united in joy and a degree of
quiet. T Radio, the two-week experiment in bringing disc jockeys and
music to MBTA platforms, has been shelved.

"There is a God," exclaimed Tom Augello, 45, a multimedia editor from
Cambridge.

Augello is still irked about a trip to South Station in which he heard
Phil Collins's "In the Air Tonight," one of those songs that gets stuck
in the subconscious and refuses to leave. "Not just Phil Collins, but
somebody really inanely explaining the back story for that song," he
added acidly in a phone interview.

Joe Pesaturo, spokesman for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation
Authority, said the agency may bring back the private radio venture,
after a period of study and possibly in a new format.

Pesaturo acknowledged that the T received an overwhelming number of
e-mails, 1,800, and that most were complaints about the radio station
broadcast at South Station, North Station, and Logan International
Airport platforms. . .

"The end of Torture Radio!" Roslyn Klein said when she heard the news. .
. It was insult to the intelligence of commuters, she said, when a disc
jockey asked a multiple-choice trivia question about when Bill Clinton
was first elected president and gave 1991, 1992 and 1993 as options.. .
.

The strongest reaction came from street musicians who have long battled
the T for the right to play live music on the platforms. The buskers,
who count such luminaries as folk musician Tracy Chapman among their
alumni, gathered 1,200 signatures in an online petition.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/10/26/t_radio_hits_wrong_note_with_riders/


ZACH PATTON, GOVERNING - Rockdale, a suburb of Sydney, was having a
problem with loiterers in a local park. So officials decided something
must be done to drive them away. Their solution? Play songs by Barry
Manilow and Doris Day. Loudly. At all hours. Residents near the park
aren't too thrilled with having to listen to songs like "Copacabana,"
"Could It Be Magic?" and "Que Sera Sera" all the time.
The city is turning down the volume a little and reviewing the playlist.

http://governing.typepad.com/13thfloor/2006/07/at_the_copa_cop.html

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