I hate to think its true, but it seems like XM Radio has shifted their style again, and I am guessing they probably finally gave into payola schemes (taking money for playing certain songs on the radio).
Whether that’s the case or not, what is definately for certain is that their playlists have changed dramatically. Of the six stations I have pre-programmed on XM1 on my car (I got twelve pre-programmed total for XM alone … I love my stereo), all of which are in the 20s, have started playing the same stupid songs *over and over and over.*
It’s pretty bad. I’d estimate that 50% of the time on one of the channels they are playing something from an extremely short playlist. What happens often enough too is the same song is playing on two stations at the same time. It’s really annoying. I signed up for satellite radio so I wouldn’t have to listen to local stations. Now, pretty much the only difference is not having some commercials of some local bimblot car dealer who thinks its a great idea to take popular songs and rewrite them with crappy lyrics singing about how there’s a great APR deal going on right now.
Just another reason for me to rethink keeping my subscription alive to XM, which is a shame. I really need to buy some CDs of my own and just play those, instead. I know XM Radio has been going through some hard times lately, financially, but please … for the love of whatever, the whole thing that attracted me to getting an account in the first place (and then keeping it) was getting something *different*. I’ve already got plenty of local stations that have never heard of any songs that weren’t in the top twenty between now and 1995, and XM was freaking great when most of the time you’d hear new songs all the time.
What a crock. What’s really sad though, is that even with this, it’s still better than local radio stations, and I’ll probably keep it anyway. Less commercials, no annoying local ads, and especially no brainless morning shows helps out. It’s kind of a shame that they had to settle into the same age old formula of keeping radio dull though on the major channels. I guess someone has to reinvent it, again.