We watch the shows - we watch the stars
On videos for hours and hours
We hardly need to use our ears
How music changes through the years

It’s how many decades later, and that QUEEN song still resonates today. It serves as the perfect backdrop for my last column.

For the past few years, I’ve been ranting and raving about what I consider the best and worst music out there. Some of you have really enjoyed it and others have sent hate mail. Recently, I’ve been consumed with numerous new projects and they just take too much of my time to keep up with this column, which is truly a labor of love.

And while I used to genuinely enjoy following all the current trends in music, good and bad, it has just worn me out over the past year. It’s almost a foregone conclusion that when I get a new padded envelope in the mail that the enclosed CD for review will be either utter crap or just mildly crappy. Neither seems to be worth the time. I know it sounds like apathy and laziness, but I have about three other steady writing jobs and that’s not even including my 9-5.

Just sitting around with my friends discussing how bad music is makes me sound like an old man at the ripe number of 29. That’s not right. So why will I pass that annoyance on to hapless readers? I even attempted revamping the column in blog format and that didn’t seem to alleviate any of my pangs of ambivalence. And I do still write about topics passionately, mainly at Autoblog (www.autoblog), it’s just rarely about music.

My few bright spots of 2004 included my “Artist of the Year,” John Frusciante. His slew of releases this year were better than many artists’ entire careers. GREEN DAY is still one of the best rock bands around and their new disc deserves all the credit it gets. HOT WATER MUSIC keeps getting better every time they release an album and I sound like a broken record saying so. PILOT TO GUNNER’s Get Saved was one of the best records this year, and the most listenable.

That’s pretty much the wrap-up of an entire year of music. That is all I took from 2004 and I can’t say I think I’m missing anything. While “Radio Ga Ga” might be about the fight of radio in a video age it still has meaning today. A year or so ago I was railing against modern radio’s embrace of THE STROKES, THE WHITE STRIPES, etc. Today you’d almost beg to have them on the airwaves. People are turning to satellite radio, downloadable music and almost everyone, even the music illiterate, has an iPod or an equivalent MP3 player. Everyone’s plugged in but they’re also choosing custom playlists, lessoning the need for a good record. And it shows. There’s too much information out there, too many bands to keep up with and only a small fraction are worth the time of even reading a review much less listening to an entire record. It’s not a good time to be a fan of music. Unless you enjoy cataloguing your collection onto your computer.

So here it is, the end. I wish everyone well and a terrific 2005. If you want to send me an e-mail, feel free. I appreciate everyone reading for all this time.

Let's hope you never leave old friend
Like all good things on you we depend
So stick around cos we might miss you
When we grow tired of all this visual
You had your time you had the power
You've yet to have your finest hour
Radio

All we hear is
Radio ga ga
Radio goo goo
Radio ga ga
Radio blah blah
Radio what's new?
Someone still loves you

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