Corniest selection in The Current's list of the top essential songs since 2000

I'm an Annie Hardy/Giant Drag fan but yeah they never got much exposure past outside CA

omit "past"

Corny like a cliche or like some cheap sentiment, I guess I'll pick the Flaming Lips song.

No I don't realize, Wayne. Otherwise I wouldn't be stumbling through life like a malcontent bitch.

'Do You Realise?' is a rip off of this much better song from the South Park Christmas album

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=XUFfeTjuPeg

There’s just something about the list that makes me want to “crack the code”... it’s a weirdly specific-feeling combination of great stuff, obvious/overplayed stuff, and “Adele songs you hear in barre class” — almost like it reflects the iTunes library of an actual couple in their early ‘40s who were “really into music” in the 2000s, and have gradually lost touch, but try to “keep up with it.”

This is the Current demo to the letter.

j. your post is so dead on wrt the current's sociology

Would have been a more interesting poll if you had limited it the 10 or 15 songs that are actually corny, and not sprinkled those in with stone cold classixx.

j. i spot on, except it's early '30s rather than '40s, I think.

no Gangnam Style no credibility

j.'s post is excellent, morrisp's on the same wavelength with

almost like it reflects the iTunes library of an actual couple in their early ‘40s who were “really into music” in the 2000s, and have gradually lost touch, but try to “keep up with it.”

I used to hear The Current very sporadically when driving around the twin cities in the early '00s and it feels like it's more homogenized now? Or, like the notional listener/dj it's a matter of my tastes changing and now I can see the big funnel that is an aging set of interests. Feels like the overall mix used to feel a little more regional.

The last couple times I've been north my reaction has been something between "huh" and "I guess Iowa Public Radio's gotten that much better?"

obviously also a bias toward highly-played mainstream hits that overlap with the station's demographic, avoiding a lot of the truly corny things while being unable to recognize how insanely corny most local bands truly are

I didn't know there was a code to be cracked, myself. For most people music is what Facebook would refer to as a "social affinity". For most people that taste solidifies, ossifies, in one's teens and early 20s. The list makes sense to me because I used to be in that "corny indie fuxx" demo; I just kept occasionally listening to new music after about 2008. Current listeners have heard good things about Kendrick Lamar, but they're pretty sure they don't like hip-hop except for "Stankonia", and anyway they have to take Conor to soccer practice. I don't, honestly, begrudge them that, but I do begrudge the station for making catering to them a business model. I've seen how that sort of thing played out with the Boomers.

I first encountered The Current on a visit back home where all of my friends were 100% over it and I was like "thanks to spending all of my time listening to Boston hip-hop stations, I haven't been inundated with the staples of their playlist so this actually feels refreshing and exciting to me".

Later in that trip, I was jamming out to some random "Shameful Songs I Like" segment and the DJ played Christina Aguilera's "Beautiful" and I was like "oh now I get why this station sucks so much"

lol

yeah, I would also imagine some of the DJs subscribe to some weird ideas about pop music purity that would have kept them from even listing things they think out of their scope (where are the Black Eyed Peas!) while also keeping others off the list because they're "just great pop songs"

I don't, honestly, begrudge them that, but I do begrudge the station for making catering to them a business model. I've seen how that sort of thing played out with the Boomers.

It would honestly be less embarrassing if these people just got into Dire Straits.

I'm not sure I understand what makes this bubble more blameworthy than other bubbles.

the thing i didn't realize before having kids was how much of your music listening time gets eaten up by them. i thought it would be me and my 2 yr old in the car jamming out on link wray and shit but it's basically "we are the people in your neighborhood" on a constant loop. that being said, i'd take any sesame street songs on repeat over the majority of the stuff on this list

a lot of sesame street songs really slap

For the avoidance of doubt, I don’t “begrudge” my hypothetical couple in their 40s (the description applies to myself, more or less!) — I’m just interested in the “blind spots” reflected/promoted by this station’s grand list.

xp My 2-yr-old is really into that “No no no, no no no no” (Elmo/Oscar?) song

my brain's on monday morning mode and I conflated the list being corny with it intentionally being a list of corny songs in prior comment. please disregard

the biggest family-friendly blindspot is having Childish Gambino in there and not a single Kendrick mention

and even then, those are the two most consensus "rap acts public radio listeners should at least have heard" picks out there and they missed one

..incidentally that's why the Childish Gambino pick is corniest as a choice -- you need a post-2010 hip hop pick and that's where you go?

Not to pedantic about this dumb list — but again, there are 8 Kendrick tracks on it (just none in top 50).

workplace seems to have blocked the current's site as streaming media, my bad

Here’s the Google Doc: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aSuC88B5BmPtTTssXUwyWUVDD5WHnFSkprcUV8sE8CM

(you guys did I mention I’ve been retained by “The Current” to promote this list via social/viral channels)

heh.

Anyway, i'm not sure whether The Current deserves all this snarkiness... they are a radio station after all, so they have to cater to some non-trivial listening audience, which ain't gonna happen if they play the ILX Top 77 albums on heavy rotation.
They're doing a lot better job of it than most public radio stations, in my opinion.

(also no one is gonna convince me ever that Skinny Love or New Slang are corny songs, but i'm squarely in their target demographic, if that wasn't already obvious)

My main memory of The Current is from a decade or so ago hearing The Suburbs' "Turn The Radio On" and Atmosphere's "In Her Music Box" several times in 48 hours.

xxxp imo they deserve it because it's a bullshit business model for a public radio station to service the tastes of a market segment that could sustain a proper commercial radio station but likes the prestige of having its music be subsidized against crass market logic. i'd much rather they tried to be a genuinely public-serving station with programming in the various musics that are merely semi-popular given the commercial landscape.

rip rev105 imo

wealthy minneapolis liberals are some of the most detestable people on the planet, or maybe i just think that because i have to deal with them all the time at work. it only makes sense that their favorite radio station is forgettable indie pap

j. so so otm

They're doing a lot better job of it than most public radio stations, in my opinion.

there are at least three public radio stations in mpls that do 10000x better

not to mention the college station

Kicking myself for voting "Such Great Heights" before noticing the obvious winner, the unbearably corny Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeroes "Home", the only song on this list which makes me IRL cringe with embarrassment when I hear it.

To those who doubt me I ask you, which other songs on this list have a spoken word interlude where the singers deploy cartoonishly affected fake southern accents to discuss how in love they are?

not being terribly up on regional American radio I'd never heard of this station before but 6 Music (BBC digital station) cater to much the same audience in the UK afaict

googled to see if they'd done a similar list and this one from 2013 is p lol in its similarity, both in terms of how many actual same picks there are and the fact nearly every post itt could apply to 6 Music with only the names changed

My understanding is that 6music list was voted for by listeners, I think even 6music wouldn't be corny enough to vote Clocks to #1 if it was just staff and DJs.

143 Animal Collective My Girls
142 Spoon Inside Out
141 Florence + The Machine Shake It Out
140 The Darkness I Believe in a Thing Called Love
139 Foster the People Pumped Up Kicks
138 Jet Are You Gonna Be My Girl
137 Alt-J Breezeblocks

This section is hilarious.

xxp 6music is a far better station, whatever you think of it.

yeah that seems a fair assessment looking at the Current schedules and what playlists are available. seems to be very light on specialist programming

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Thank god for Radio K, KMOJ, and KFAI

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

this thread is the corniest and youve been told.

actually i mean it. the corniest thing, it’s here.

KMOJ is a treasure

#4 in these results is entirely new to me. i've never heard of trampled by turtles or wait so long. it is.....not great.

Arcade Fire should win this for Wake Up.

Too late Moka

Kicking myself for not noticing “Home” on the list when I voted. Just goes to show everyone’s voice is important , one vote can change the world.

Trampled By Turtles is an outlier on this list - an acoustic/bluegrass-y jam band that is "big" in its world, but its world is not the same world as the other 49 artists here. (maybe there are a couple other worlds represented, but you know what I mean.)

given that, i would say that Trampled By Turtles' presence on this list is largely driven by the fact that they're from Minnesota ... home of The Current.